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FTC Chain Lina Khan denies allegations of potential collusion between the FTC and overseas agencies, and directly responds to comments from former SEC chair and NEC director.

The FTC's decision to sue to block the Microsoft-Activision merger has been met with widespread scrutiny. The FTC was the first to take legal action against the merger, and UK regulators at the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) also chose to block the merger in late April. Activision CEO Bobby Kotick, who stands to gain about $185 million in share value if the merger goes through, went so far as to say the CMA has been "used as a tool by the FTC," and that the British agency has been "co-opted by FTC ideology."

Other officials have expressed similar sentiments, with former SEC chair Jay Clayton and NEC director Gary Cohn outlining their thoughts in a New York Times op-ed piece entitled The Microsoft-Activision Mess is a Blow to American Sovereignty. In this op-ed, both Clayton and Cohn say that the FTC seems to be 'outsourcing U.S. regulatory policy to Europe:

Nintendo's handheld-console hybrid just entered its 7th year on the market, but that hasn't stopped the platform from shipping over 125 million units.

The Nintendo Switch is understandably cooling down as it enters Year 7, however total cumulative worldwide shipments have broken 125.62 million as of March 30, 2023. The Switch could very well become Nintendo's best-selling hardware ecosystem of all time and dethrone the DS. How likely is that to happen, though?

Before we celebrate the Switch's milestone, we need to take a closer look at the system's overall shipment trends. FY23 shipments were actually down a considerable 5 million units year-over-year to 17.97 million. Nintendo also missed its shipment target by over 1 million units for the year. Nintendo says Switch production has been affected by the shortage of semiconductors in the first half of FY23.

Windows 11 is going rusty, and we don't mean that someone left the operating system out in the rain for too long - rather that Rust is now part of the OS in a fresh plan being enacted by Microsoft to bolster security levels.

As tweeted by Mark Russinovich, CTO of Microsoft Azure, Windows 11 testers are now using builds of the operating system which have Rust in the Windows kernel (as denoted by the 'rs' in the above screenshot).

What is Rust? It's code that offers a greater level of security than C++, and Microsoft is introducing it to the kernel to beef up memory safety in particular. Tackling that aspect is a big thing, as a good deal of zero-day exploits come about due to bugs in memory handling.

Nintendo will not release new next-gen hardware until April 2024 at the earliest, sources tell Nikkei Asia, however that point was made starkly clear in Nintendo's latest financials.

Nintendo has no plans to launch a new Switch model in 2023 or early 2024. While sources have re-affirmed this point to Japanese publication Nikkei Asia, saying that "a [new] product launch won't happen before next spring at the earliest," only glance at Nintendo's financials tells us everything we need to know.

First let's take a look at Nintendo's forecasts. The company saw a steep $3 billion+ decline in net sales revenue, driven by decreased hardware and software sales. Switch shipments also declined by 5 million units, and while shipments do not equal sell-through, Nintendo has confirmed sell-through also declined, leading to a drop of $1.7 billion hardware earnings.

Rumors around AMD's RX 7600 graphics card are coming in at a fair old pace now, and with the GPU supposedly less than a fortnight away from its launch, some retailer prices have been spotted.

The bad news is that they're slightly higher than anticipated. As VideoCardz reports, Cowcotland - a French tech site - has sources claiming that the RX 7600 cards (custom models) will weigh in at €349 in France.

As VideoCardz works out, there's a 20% sales tax to be taken into account there, which would leave a rough price conversion at $315 - apply salt now - a bit pricier than the latest rumor from the tech site's own sources, which held that the RX 7600 should cost $300 (or maybe even a touch less).

When Google announced the Pixel Fold during the Google I/O event earlier this week there weren't too many surprises. Unfortunately, that also extended to the price of Google's first foldable as well.

Leaks had already suggested that Google would sell the Pixel Fold for around $1799 and sure enough that's exactly what was announced. That isn't all that expensive considering the competition's own prices in this particular market, but it's still a lot of money to ask people to hand over. So Google has come up with a plan.

That plan, it seems, is to try and make it easier for people to buy a new Pixel Fold by giving them insane trade-in prices on their old phone. Specifically, it looks like Google wants people to trade in their old iPhone or Samsung phone with those being the ones that are worth the most according to the company's trade-in prices.

Motorola has always been a company with something of a cult following and it always helped when it was making decent phones. The next foldable flagship from the company is now just around the corner, and it's looking pretty great.

That phone is the Motorola Razr 40 Ultra flip phone and it's expected to be announced relatively soon. But the lack of an official announcement doesn't mean that we don't know much about it and now we've also been treated to a handful of images showing three gorgeous colorways - one o which is absolutely our favorite.

The images were shared by leaker Evan Blass who posted them to this protected Twitter account. We get to see the phone in black and blue, but it's the third color that we're most interested in. It's a kind of magenta or red affair and it's possibly our favorite phone color right now. It might even be nicer than the Pixel 7a's Coral, but it's definitely a close-run thing.

When Google announced the Pixel 7a earlier this week there were a handful of colors to choose from. But anyone who wanted the best one - the gorgeous Coral color - has to buy their new phone directly from the company itself. And that posed one problem.

Those buying a Coral Pixel 7a from Google's UK store quickly spotted that the company was selling that one color for £50 more than the others. Oddly, the price hike was only in place for that one color and also only in that one part of the world. Anyone buying the Coral color anywhere else on the planet paid the same price as they would if they bought a different color altogether.

It wasn't clear exactly why that was the case and, it turns out, it shouldn't have been the case at all. Google says that the £50 markup was a mistake, adding that people will receive refunds as a result. Orders won't be canceled, thankfully. Buyers will just get their £50 back instead.

Google finally got around to announcing the Pixel 7a during its Google I/O event earlier this week and while the Pixel Fold stole the show, the company's budget offering is still a big deal. But there's a problem.

When announcing the Pixel 7a Google confirmed that it would sell for $499, which is $50 more than the previous Pixel 6a. What's more, Google decided to keep the Pixel 6a around which meant that the two were far too close together in the company's lineup, at least in terms of price. Now, that's all changed.

To make it easier to differentiate the two phones, and make the Pixel 6a an even more attractive buy, it's had a big price drop. Now, buying a Pixel 6a will cost just $349 and you might even find it for a bit less if you shop around as well. That's $100 less than it was costing just a few days ago and that makes it quite the bargain.

Massive quantities of GPUs all in a single location, powered up, crunching data, and performing various tasks. We could be talking about a crypto-mining setup or something newer, more high-tech, and bleeding edge, like an AI supercomputer setup in a data center.

When it comes to the former, though, GPU-powered mining operations, the demand and viability of cryptocurrency mining have significantly decreased in the past year or so. And so, with mining operations looking to capitalize on unused processing power (in addition to flooding the second-hand market with used GPUs), they're looking towards AI.

According to a new report at Bloomberg, crypto-mining company Hut 8 Mining has generated USD 16.9 million from AI clients looking for high-performance computing. Then there's Hive BLockChain which bought USD 66 million of graphics cards from NVIDIA for its AI plans.

Calling all Steam Deck and Microsoft Surface owners, Sabrent is offering a sizable $50 off its Rocket 2230 1TB NVMe SSD - currently listed at USD 109.99 on Sabret's official site and storefront.

Thanks to the popularity of portable devices like Vavles Steam Deck, we've noticed more smaller form factor 2230 Gen4 NVMe SSDs appear on the market - but this one from Sabrent stands out among the pack. As per our review of the Sabrent Rocket 2230 1TB NVMe SSD earlier this year, it's safe to say that this is a perfect choice if you're considering upgrading your Steam Deck's internal storage.

"Exceptional gaming performance sets the Rocket 4 2230 apart from the rest of its kind," Jon Coulter wrote, adding that the smaller size makes it an ideal choice for portable systems because performance is on par with many drives three times its size. CrystalDiskMark benchmarks from our review showcased impressive sequential read and write speeds for Sabrent's 2230 SSD of 4813.44 and 4853.33 MB/s, respectively.

With all of the talk lately around the rise of new high-speed PCIe Gen5 SSDs, here's MSI with a friendly reminder that PCIe Gen4 can still deliver the goods. The new flagship PCIe 4.0 SSD from MSI, the SPATIUM M480 PRO series, can provide incredible Gen4 performance of up to 7,400 MB/s sequential read and 7,000 MB/s sequential write.

Available in three storage capacities, 1TB, 2TB, and 4TB, the new SPATIUM M480 PRO series arrives with a stylish bronze-colored aluminum fin-stacked heatsink that MSI notes reduces SSD temperatures by around 20 degrees Celcius under load.

The only thing missing, it seems, is PlayStation 5 compatibility due to the larger heatsink size and shape, though, for that, there's still the impressive SPATIUM M480 PRO PLAY. We reviewed that heatsink-powered model last year, dubbing it "PS5 perfection."

LG's new UltraGear gaming monitor (49GR85DC) is a beast, as it features a curved 49-inch display with a 32:9 aspect ratio and a blisteringly fast 240Hz refresh rate. With a resolution of 5,120 x 1,400 pixels, it's like having two 16:9 displays in one.

Ultrawide gaming monitors represent some of the most popular models out there, especially when it comes to delivering an immersive gaming experience. The wide cinematic view is brilliant for several games and great for expanding desktop real estate when it comes to productivity. On a side note, I've been playing Star Wars Jedi: Survivor on an ultrawide, and outside of that game's performance issues, I wouldn't want to play it any other way.

However, most ultrawide displays come in the 21:9 aspect ratio flavor. The 31:9 aspect ratio of the LG UltraGear's 49-inch display goes one step further - and based on all the pixels, you'll probably need a high-end GPU from NVIDIA or AMD to get the most out of it. Though, it's worth noting that the total pixel count is still less than what you'd find on a 4K monitor.

Before the big April Sale ends, you can still snatch up hot deals on Microsoft software at software activation keys provider Scdkey.com. In other words, it's not too late to nab great prices on Microsoft Windows, Office, and more. Don't miss it.

What could be better than paying less than the full price for Windows 10 and other crucial software from Scdkey? You can click on the links below to secure low prices on loads of Microsoft software. Plus, Windows 10 comes with a free upgrade to Windows 11.

Scdkey's prices are always affordable. But to get the absolute best savings possible, enter promo code CULT at Scdkey.com. That will slash an additional 25% off the site's super-low prices on keys for Windows 10 Pro Global, Microsoft Office 2021 Pro, and more.

UK competition regulators at the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) have been informed about Microsoft's next-generation Xbox hardware, the agency's final report indicates.

The CMA's final decision report on the Microsoft-Activision merger is filled with lots of interesting information. In a section outlining the future of the cloud gaming market, the CMA asserts that it has seen Microsoft's internal discussions about new Xbox console hardware.

According to page 200 of the report, Microsoft had outlined its strategies for next-gen Xbox consoles as early as September 2022, and the CMA was made familiar with these plans.

FTC Chair Lina Khan reiterates the Commission's scrutiny of the $68.7 billion Microsoft-Activision merger.

In a recent interview with CNBC, Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan talks briefly about the agency's decision to sue to block the Microsoft-Activision merger, asserting that U.S. antitrust regulators have a responsibility to prevent big tech firms from stifling competition and innovation.

Electronics-maker Sharp Corp. tells investors that it plans to manufacture LCD screens for "new game consoles," hinting at handheld systems.

Sharp recently posted a new earnings brief that mentions the company is supplying LCD panels for new consoles. Bloomberg's Takashi Mochizuki caught the reference, and Sharp actually removed the comment shortly after the report went live.

Popular consensus is that Sharp's LCD panels will be used in the next-gen Switch that's currently in development at Nintendo. This new model is expected to built on NVIDIA's new Orin 8nm architecture, with significantly higher performance capabilities, including 4K gaming through built-in DLSS support. Nintendo may have chose an LCD panel for the initial wave of next-gen Switch handhelds to keep MSRP as low as possible; Nintendo President Shuntaro Furukawa commented on rising costs of chip fabrication, manufacturing, and component assembly in the company's recent FY23 Q&A report.

When Google finally announced the Pixel 7a during its Google I/O media event yesterday everything was pretty much as the leaks had foretold, including the $499 price. Except, something strange happened.

As expected, Google announced that the Coral color would be exclusive to its own online store, meaning that would be the only way to get the Pixel 7a in its best color. The problem is, if you choose that one color and happen to be in the United Kingdom, you'll pay more than if you chose any of the other ones. And nobody seems to know why.

Checking the UK Google Store shows that the Pixel 7a retails for £449 in the standard Sky, Charcoal, and Chalk colorways - Blue, White, and Black to you and me. But if you choose the Coral that price gets jacked up an extra £50 to $499 for reasons unknown.

Elden Ring is a smash success with 20.5 million lifetime sales as of March 2023.

FromSoftware's Elden Ring was a lightning in a bottle moment that happens once every generation. The game offered an incredibly robust open world filled with mysteries that sent players on a kind of massive interactive scavenger hunt. The collective gaming world came together to share their findings in a fun social experience. Judging by the review scores, this year's equivalent could be Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.

Elden Ring's significant popularity led to incredible sales for Bandai Namco, FromSoftware, and the developer's parent company Kadokawa Group. Charted data shows that Elden Ring managed to sell some 500,000 copies since its one-year anniversary in February 2023.

After months or rumors and leaks, Google has finally announced the Pixel Fold during the Google I/O event yesterday. It also showed off the Pixel 7a for the first time and finally told us all when the Pixel Tablet will go on sale. But the real star of the show was that foldable Pixel. But it has a rather interesting secret.

Well, it isn't a secret now. But it was. That secret is that it can't actually open all the way. That is, it won't lay flat on a table because the hinge doesn't actually go all the way to allow the phone to open through 180 degrees. And it all seems a bit strange.

The news was confirmed by a few people who visited Google to see what the Pixel Fold had to offer before it was announced but Mr Mobile was one who explained it particularly well on Twitter. According to him, the hinge can be forced to get to 180 degrees but ti requires too much effort and, presumably, makes the user feel like something will break. That isn't something you want to happen to your new $1800 foldable.