Latest News - Page 874

Ahead of the expected reveal of the Galaxy S24 Ultra in the first quarter of 2024, a renowned leaker has showcased the camera specifications.

Samsung rolled out massive changes to its Galaxy S23 Ultra, specifically the primary camera that got massive upgrades such as a 200-megapixel rear camera and a new selfie camera.

According to leaker Ice Universe, the Galaxy S24 Ultra won't experience the same degree of changes, or many changes at all, compared to the Galaxy S23 Ultra, as the S24 is rumored to have the same 200-megapixel Samsung HP2 primary camera sensor, a 12-megapixel Sony IMX564 sensor for its ultra-wide lens and a 12-megapixel Sony IMX754 telephoto camera with 3x optical zoom.

Russian security agencies have been targeted by a mysterious hacker that has used Bitcoin technologies to erase and send funds to Ukraine.

Chainalysis, a blockchain analysis firm that has worked with the US government, has reported that a rogue hacker has targeted cryptocurrency wallets that appear to be owned by Russian security agencies such as the Foreign Military Intelligence Agency (GRU), the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), and the Federal Security Service (FSB). Notably, the hacker even took the time to write in Russian that these identified wallets were involved in hacking activity.

Chainalysis was able to confirm at least three of the alleged Russian wallet addresses are linked to Russia, with two of them being used in the SolarWinds cyberattack in 2020 and one of them being used to pay for servers that were used in Russia's 2016 election disinformation campaign. Furthermore, the hacker appeared to both erase funds and send funds to Ukraine. The hacker destroyed more than $300,000 worth using the OP_RETURN function in the Bitcoin blockchain, which nulifies previous transactions of Bitcoin.

Former intelligence official David Grusch has sounded the alarm on what he describes as secret US military programs that involve officials recovering a crash-landed alien spacecraft that contained non-human intelligent lifeforms.

Grusch has appeared in a few interviews where he outlined his claims to the best of his ability, saying that there are secret government programs being hidden from Congress. Additionally, Grusch claims he has provided proof of these secret government programs that involved US military recovering a non-human spacecraft and encountering non-human intelligence. This proof was sent to both the Inspector General and Congress.

One of the most shocking claims made by Grusch was during a News Nation exclusive interview where he responded to being asked if human beings have been harmed or killed by a non-human intelligence. Grusch says, "While I can't get into the specifics because that would reveal certain US classified operations. I was briefed by a few individuals on the program that there were malevolent events like that."

NASA's Center for Near Earth Objects (CNEOS) has confirmed a space rock that's between 1,214 and 2,727 feet in diameter will approach Earth today.

The asteroid, which was originally identified in 1994 by the Spacewatch group working at Kitt Peak Observatory in Arizona, is now on its way to making its closest approach to Earth, coming within 1.8 million miles of our planet, or approximately eight times the distance between Earth and the moon. According to NASA projections, the asteroid named 1994 XD will be at its closest point to Earth on June 12, 9 pm EDT.

Despite this asteroid's size, the goliath space rock is moving at extreme speeds, with recent measurements indicating a speed of 48,032 mph. Combining the asteroid's speed with an average diameter measurement of 1,500 feet, we can predict how much damage such an object would create if it were to collide with the surface of Earth. Using the Asteroid Launcher simulation website, plugging in the 1,500 diameter, speed of 48,000 mph, an impact angle of 45 degrees, and Central Park, New York, it's estimated that 222,286 people would be vaporized and carve a 1,390 ft deep crater.

Apple finally announced the Vision Pro AR/VR headset during an event at WWDC 2023 last week and while the huge cost has understandably put some off, there's some light at the end of the tunnel.

That's because Bloomberg's Mark Gurman says that Apple is already working on a new, cheaper model for those who won't want to spend quite so much. But that doesn't mean that the high-end model is going away - Gurman believes that Apple plans to offer the headset in both Pro and non-Pro configurations moving forward.

According to Gurman Apple is well aware that the Vision Pro's $3499 asking price is a high one, but it's already keen on finding a way to offer a cheaper one. Gurman suggests that Apple could choose to reduce the display quality to save money, while also making a cheaper, more simple headband setup. However, the hand and eye-tracking capabilities as well as the external EyeSight display are expected to remain.

Researchers are aiming toward generating the world's first brain atlas that will hopefully assist clinicians and scientists in determining why diseases such as Alzheimer's occur.

In a new partnership between the Allen Institute for Brain Science and Amazon Web Services (AWS), using funding from the National Institute of Health, researchers are aiming at creating the first map of the brain using artificial intelligence. According to the press release, using AI-powered tools, the team will create a map that will be based on single-cell genomics technologies that will be able to measure genes within individual brain cells and identify the cognitive functions through these genes.

The press release states that through the analysis of these cells, researchers will be able to create a platform that will integrate information on all mammalian biological systems.The brain has approximately 200 billion cells, and getting an AI to scan each of these cells, organize the data, and store it in a server, is no easy task.

After months of rumors, Apple finally announced the 15-inch MacBook Air a week ago, and that laptop is set to actually go on sale this week. But a new report suggests that Apple is already hard at work on what comes next. And it might be a big upgrade.

The 15-inch MacBook Air, like the smaller 13-inch model that it joins in the lineup, is powered by the M2 variant of Apple's in-house silicon. But there will be a new flavor as soon as 2024, and now Bloomberg's Mark Gurman reports that Apple is already hard at work on an M3 MacBook Air in both 13 and 15-inch configurations.

Gurman was writing in his weekly Power On newsletter when he said that Apple is already developing upgraded M3 versions of the MacBook Air models. with laptops expected to go on sale at some point in 2024.

Video game industry legend Todd Howard has released some saddening news about Bethesda's highly anticipated upcoming release of The Elder Scrolls 6.

The Bethesda game director and executive producer, well-known for titles such as Fallout, The Elder Scrolls, and now Starfield, stated that his time with the company might be slowly drawing to an end. With Bethesda's first intellectual property in over 25 years and first major release in over 8 years, Starfield, being set to release on September 6th, many fans have been left wondering what is next for the video game giant.

While speaking with IGN, Howard explained what is next in line for Bethesda. According to Howard, fans can expect that Elder Scrolls 6 will be their next big title which will be followed by Fallout 5. Following these statements, Howard teased that when Elder Scrolls 6 does finally drop, he might be taking a step back from the company he has been leading for many years.

A brand new Cyberpunk 2077 trailer has been released for its upcoming expansion Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty, with a wide array of details involving the forthcoming DLC.

CD Projekt Red has shared a whole bunch of information regarding Cyberpunk's first DLC, which is to be set in a new district of Night City called Dog Town. Taking place during the main story of the game, players will be able to access it with any of their current saved games.

Many of the game's core systems have had a complete rework following the famously messy and buggy launch of the game in late 2020.

Multiple news outlets have reported on a family that claimed a UFO crash landed in their backyard, and the spacecraft contained non-human subjects that stood as tall as 10 feet.

Authorities responded to a call made by a family on May 1 in Las Vegas that dialed 911 to report a spacecraft crash landing in their backyard. The 911 audio has been released by police, and you can hear the caller recounting the events, starting by saying he was working on his truck in his backyard with his brother and dad when they saw an object fall down out of the sky and land in their big lot. The caller recounts the object having lights, and when it crash landed, they all felt a "big impact".

The caller went on to say they began to hear "a lot of footsteps near us", and then they saw a lifeform inside the spacecraft that had "big eyes" and was "looking right at us". Additionally, the caller said that these creatures were massive, measuring anywhere between eight and ten feet in height. One of them was spotted outside of the "equipment," and the other was spotted inside the craft.

Last week Apple unveiled what could be viewed as the company's most anticipated product in the last ten years, the Vision Pro mixed reality headset.

Apple's Vision Pro augmented and virtual reality headset has certainly made waves across the technology industry, with many tech-focussed YouTubers that were lucky enough to use the product for a limited amount of time taking to their channels to discuss their unique experiences. Marquess Brownlee, MKBHD, reported being very impressed with the eye-tracking, or the user's ability to navigate the user interface powered by Apple's brand new operating system, VisionOS.

If you have managed to catch any news on the Vision Pro, you have probably heard about the headset's exorbitant price tag. Apple will be slapping a $3,499 price tag on its Vision Pro, and according to reports, the company's preliminary sales expectations were at 1 million units. However, that number has reportedly been revised. According to Gizmochina, Apple has revised its initial sales expectations of 1 million to 150,000 units, or a figure that can be described as 'something much more appropriate.'

At Computex 2023, one of the big recurring stories and advances that we witnessed first-hand from all the major players was a shift towards cable management and making fundamental design changes to motherboards, graphics cards, cases, and even fans to minimize the number of cables you see and make the whole building process smoother and more manageable.

At first glance, the new GeForce RTX 4070 AX eSports and GeForce RTX 4060 Ti iChill X2 White from Inno3D look to follow in the footsteps of concept GPUs that pretty much remove the PCIe power connectors.

The clever design touch puts the connector on the back for a hidden approach to make new PC builds cleaner with no noticeable cables plugging into the GPU. Having the power cables routed via the back of the GPU is an excellent idea, and based on the number of companies looking to make significant changes to how cables connect to GPUs, it's the sort of design idea we can see becoming more prevalent as time goes on.

Some more troubling news from the GPU world, with many GIGABYTE GeForce RTX owners - covering the GeForce RTX 30 Series (Ampere) and potentially GeForce RTX 40 Series (Ada Lovelace) too - reporting catastrophic cracking on the PCB.

With the cracking close to the power connectors, the graphics cards are non-functioning and in need of critical repair or replacement. This is troubling because GIGABYTE is an established and trusted brand in the PC gaming space, which has seen its graphics cards, motherboards, and other hardware components receive critical acclaim and commercial success.

In Australia, my homeland, it's one of the go-to brands for GPUs and motherboards for new builds - so a widespread PCB cracking issue is not the sort of news you want to hear about.

Recently we reported on the seemingly dire state of the discrete graphics card market, with a report from Jon Peddie Research stating that total AIB shipments decreased by around 40% in Q1 2023 compared to the same quarter from last year.

Well, NVIDIA's SVP of Gaming, Jeff Fisher, has presented a somewhat different story at the recent Bank of America Global Technology Conference, stating that the Ada Lovelace generation and the new GeForce RTX 40 Series are performing exceptionally well in terms of revenue and sales. With a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 20% for the GeForce segment of NVIDIA's business through FY23, Jeff Fisher specifically highlighted the success of the GeForce RTX 4070 and RTX 4070 Ti models.

Of course, with higher MSRPs compared to their Ampere generation equivalents, the idea of higher revenue and growth beings to make sense, with Jeff Fisher noting that the GeForce RTX 4070 and RTX 4070 Ti have generated revenue 3X faster than the GeForce RTX 3070 and RTX 3070 Ti - or 40% faster.

When NVIDIA lifted the lid on the new GeForce RTX 40 Series of GPUs - and so far, the GeForce RTX 4060 Ti is already available starting from USD 399 - we got word that the baseline mainstream GeForce RTX 4060 was set to launch sometime in July 2023.

NVIDIA is changing its plans, with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 8 GB now set to launch in late June 2023, as per insider leaks. The information comes via MEGAsizeGPU, a well-known and established leaker in the GeForce space, who said to expect the GeForce RTX 4060 in June.

The good news is that the GeForce RTX 4060 is set to launch with a price-point of USD 299, cheaper than the GeForce RTX 3060's launch price of USD 329. As far as performance is concerned, NVIDIA has already provided information noting that it will deliver a raw 20% or so bump over the GeForce RTX 3060 with the added benefit of being considerably more power efficient thanks to the new Ada Lovelace architecture as well as making full use of cutting-edge techs like DLSS 3 and Frame Generation.

When Intel introduced its new line-up of discrete Intel Arc graphics for PC gamers, it also introduced the AI-based Intel Xe Super Sampling, which is similar to NVIDIA's DLSS and AMD's FSR in that it's all about upscaling and boosting performance with minimal impact to visual fidelity.

Today comes word that XeSS (which is also compatible with non-Intel GPUs though tests showcase that it works best when leveraging Intel Arc's dedicated AI hardware) is now available in over 50 games.

The good news is that adoption for XeSS covers many popular PC titles, including the recently released Diablo IV from Blizzard and other high-profile releases like Hogwarts Legacy, Call of Duty Modern Warfare II, Returnal, and others.

Starfield will officially be locked to 30 FPS on consoles, Bethesda Game Studios has confirmed.

In a recent interview with IGN, Bethesda's Todd Howard has once and for all confirmed that Starfield will deliver 30FPS frame rates on Xbox Series X and S consoles. The only difference between the two systems will be fidelity and visuals.

"I think it'll come as no surprise, given our previous games, what we go for...these hyper-detailed huge, open worlds that are fully dynamic where anything can happen. And we do want to do that. It's 4K in the X, it's 1440 on the S. We do lock it at 30, because we want that fidelity, we want all that stuff. We don't want to sacrifice any of it," Howard said.

Final Fantasy XVI's gameplay demo will release tomorrow, June 12 on PlayStation 5.

Square Enix has revealed new details about Final Fantasy 16's anticipated gameplay demo at the game's big pre-release celebration. The demo will drop tomorrow on PS5, and will allow players to try out the prologue sequence of the game with about 2 hours of content. Yoshi-P warns players that this is the very beginning of the game, so it will be pretty cutscene heavy but they'll get a lot of information about the world, events, and overall story of the grand fantasy experience. "You'll get to learn a lot about what drives Clive."

All the progress you make in the demo will carry over to the final game, and once they complete the demo, players will be able to try out a heightened battle sequence. The prologue takes place in the early portions so Clive will be young, and his abilities, combat proficiency, and overall skillset will be very different than his power in the later portions of the game. Completion of the prologue will unlock a special battle demo where players take on the huge boss combat sequences with the new Eikon summons.

Square Enix's new CEO Takashi Kiryu shares a heartfelt memory of his childhood experiences with video games, and gives new confidence in the company's business focus.

Just minutes ago, Square Enix kicked off the Final Fantasy XVI pre-release celebration event. Square Enix's new fresh-faced CEO Takashi Kiryu took the stage to reveal that not only is he a gamer, but he grew up with the Final Fantasy franchise and has a deep appreciation and love for the RPG series.

In this age of billion-dollar live service games and digital-focused releases, the general reception of Kiryu's words has been met with favor. Gamers seem to be warming up to the new Square Enix CEO following his speech, especially after the often strange messaging delivered by the former Square Enix CEO Yosuke Matsuda.

Today's Xbox Games showcase went off with a bang, giving players updates on some massively-anticipated first-party games that have been quietly in the works for years now.

It's been a few years since we last heard about the Fable reboot, but Playground Games came out swinging with a new in-game trailer that perfectly captures the humorous spirit of the franchise. The trailer had a surprise cameo from The IT Crowd's Richard Ayoade, who played Dave, a simple man who finds pleasure in vegetable gardening. Oh, and Dave is actually a giant living in a house in a sky, straight out of a dry British modern-day retelling of Jack and Beanstalk.

The footage shows off the rendering capabilities of Playground's tech as it pertains to human modeling and interior environments, along with the animations from the fighting sequences and general performance capture. Ayoade's mannerisms were captured perfectly alongside his voice and signature facial expressions.