Latest News - Page 902

There's been a lot of excitement around the ASUS ROG Ally, and the anticipation around the Windows 11-powered gaming handheld just got cranked up massively thanks to a leak putting the price at $699.99 for the top spec model (with Z1 Extreme CPU).

The possible price - always remembering this is just the rumor mill talking, for now - was flagged up by The Verge, though it comes from two sources to give it a bit more weight: Twitter tipster SnoopyTech (see the above tweet), and Roland Quandt.

Another well-known leaker, Quandt, contacted The Verge directly and showed the tech site material that left "little room for confusion" that said price tag of $699.99 applies to the Z1 Extreme model with 512GB of storage.

Taiwanese hardware manufacturer Sparkle is set to return to the discrete GPU market with new Intel Arc series graphics cards. Sparkle, which used to be an NVIDIA partner back in the day, stopped making GPUs in 2013 after the release of the GeForce GTX 700 series.

There's no word on why Sparkle is returning to the GPU market, but it's always great to see more companies release more models - especially for the relatively new Intel Arc series. Sparkle is releasing three Intel Arc graphics cards, with two Intel Arc A750 models and one Intel Arc A380 model - with Titan, Orc, and Elf naming.

Visually the cards follow the minimal look of the Intel Arc range, though the blue shroud does look really cool. The flagship Intel Arc A750 TITAN OC (it doesn't look like there's an A770 model just yet) features custom cooling and an LED light bar on the card that changes color based on the current temperature.

The confusingly named MSI GeForce RTX 3060 Ti SUPER 3X, a new Ampere-based GPU release from the company featuring a similar design to its SUPRIM cards, is no more. The confusing part comes with using the word 'SUPER,' a branding NVIDIA used during the Turing-based RTX 20 Series generation for more powerful models.

Although the GeForce RTX 30 and RTX 40 Series have stuck with the traditional Ti and non-Ti models for the different SKUs, there's always a chance that NVIDIA could bring back the SUPER branding for upcoming GPU releases.

This is a roundabout way of saying that NVIDIA disapproves of MSI releasing the GeForce RTX 3060 Ti SUPER 3X in select markets, with word from HKEPC stating that NVIDIA has told MSI to recall the GPU and remove it from sale. And with that, the product has been removed from MSI's website.

Rumors from multiple sources point to AMD's next discrete desktop GPU in the RDNA 3 Radeon RX 7000 Series being the mid-range Radeon RX 7600 XT, with the RX 7800 XT and RX 7700 XT put on the back-burner.

According to a new report from the YouTube channel Moore's Law is Dead, citing inside sources, the Radeon RX 7600 XT could arrive as soon as May 25 - with reviews for MSRP models set to appear on May 24. This would be similar to how NVIDIA handled the launch of the GeForce RTX 4070, MSRP model reviews first, and then custom higher-priced variant reviews a day later.

The dates also specify that press and media outlets will receive stock on May 15, giving them around 10 days to test and benchmark the mid-range RDNA 3 GPU.

The Last of Us Part I coming to PC felt like an easy win for Sony and developer Naughty Dog. As one of the most critically acclaimed and celebrated series of the past decade, having the first game - in remastered form - arrive on PC on the heels of the excellent HBO series felt like perfect timing.

And with previous PlayStation exclusives like Horizon Zero Dawn, God of War, and Marvel's Spider-Man all receiving technically impressive ports - the expectation was that Joel and Ellie's adventure would get the same treatment.

Of course, that's not how things panned out, with The Last of Us Part I's PC debut being one of the worst-performing and executed ports in 2023. Not only in terms of frame rate and poor optimization for different PC hardware, but it was also a release plagued with bugs, glitches, and other issues not present in the PlayStation 5 version of the game.

If you're an Astropad Studio users you're probably going to be in for a very good time thanks to a new version 5.3 software update.

Atropad Studio is effectively an app that allows an iPad to be connected to a compatible Mac and then act as a giant graphics tablet of sorts. It's always worked pretty well but this new update makes things even better.

This new update brings with it a couple of new features, the first of which is support for direct peer-to-peer connections between the iPad and Mac, making for a more solid connection between the two. That ensures that there are fewer chances for the Wi-Fi router and network to get in the way by removing them from the equation entirely. That should also ensure for reduced latency which is a big deal when you're drawing.

Activision-Blizzard shares have dived by nearly 12% as the UK moves to block the proposed merger with Microsoft.

Today Activision-Blizzard reported its best-ever Q1 earnings in the past 14 years, but the company's outstanding performance has been overshadowed by some bad news for investors. UK regulators at the Competition and Markets Authority have ruled against the Microsoft-Activision merger and created an uphill battle for the billion-dollar games publisher.

The news has caused Activision's stock to crash from $86.74 down to $76.50 in just a matter of hours. This marks the single largest rapid drop in value throughout the year, and the merger's block has taken the thunder out of what would have otherwise been a significant milestone for the company's overall earnings.

NVIDIA's RTX 4070 is seemingly continuing to be the victim of somewhat lackluster demand, with another European retailer having been spotted cutting the price of one model well below the MSRP.

German tech site Computerbase spotted that a retailer in Germany, Alternate, has cut a Gainward GeForce RTX 4070 Ghost graphics card down to €599.

Given that the official recommended price for the RTX 4070 in Germany is €659, that's an almost 10% reduction from the MSRP. This mirrors what happened in Poland recently, where a Palit RTX 4070 was dropped by a similar amount.

UK regulators have decided to block the Microsoft-Activision merger. Now the companies involved are responding, and Activision in particular has strong words for the UK's Competition and Markets Authority.

Today the CMA has published its final decision to block and prevent the Microsoft-Activision merger, citing anti-competitive concerns in cloud gaming and subscriptions. Microsoft and Activision-Blizzard are predictably unhappy with the outcome and executives have largely kept their composure to deliver measured and even-keeled responses.

Activision, however, has told the BBC that it will rethink its growth plans in the UK market, going so far as to make antagonizing remarks that the UK is "clearly closed for business."

MSI has pushed out a fresh BIOS update for AM5 motherboards (X670 and B650) which introduces a new option that supposedly cuts boot times in half.

That's a pretty spectacular claim, but MSI proved this was the case, at least in one test scenario shared by the company (as highlighted by Tom's Hardware).

In the case of a PC with an AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D processor and MSI MAG X670E Tomahawk WIFI motherboard, by turning on the new feature - 'Memory Context Restore' - the time for a cold boot (from hitting the on switch to reaching the desktop) was reduced from 43 to 22 seconds.

NVIDIA has unveiled a new piece of software, NeMo Guardrails, that will ensure chatbots driven by large language models (LLMs) - such as ChatGPT (the engine of Microsoft's Bing AI) - stay on track in various ways.

The biggest problem the software sets out to resolve is what's known as 'hallucinations,' occasions when the chatbot goes awry and makes an inaccurate or even absurd statement.

These are the kind of incidents that were reported in the early usage of Bing AI and Google's Bard. They're often embarrassing episodes, frankly, which erode trust in the chatbot for obvious reasons.

UK regulators at the Competition and Markets Authority have blocked the Microsoft-Activision merger, and Microsoft plans to appeal the decision in an attempt to get the deal passed.

Today the CMA has announced that it will prevent the $68.7 billion Microsoft-Activision merger from taking place, citing potential anti-competitive harm in key gaming segments like the cloud gaming and multi-game subscription market. The CMA argues that Microsoft would not only have the incentive to raise Xbox Game Pass subscription prices to reflect the significant added value of Activision-Blizzard games, including the Call of Duty franchise, but also that Microsoft's 10-year licensing deals were not sufficient behavioral remedies due to the fact that the games in question would be restricted to defined services that required a purchase of the game from specific storefronts.

Microsoft plans to appeal the decision and fight for the merger. Microsoft President Brad Smith issued the following statement on the matter:

It's official: UK regulators at the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) have chosen to block the Microsoft-Activision merger.

Today the CMA published its final report on the Microsoft-Activision merger with a decision to prevent the merger from taking place. The UK regulators have prevented the deal on the grounds of anticompetitive effects arising in the cloud gaming segment, and argue that Microsoft failed to sufficiently prove that its proposed 10-year deals with competitors like Nintendo and NVIDIA were proper behavioral remedies to address the substantial lessening of competition.

CEO of Meta, Mark Zuckerberg, was at home on parental leave following the birth of his third child when Meta made its latest round of mass layoffs.

Facebook, along with its parent company Meta has been going through multiple rounds of mass layoffs in an effort to reduce running costs amid declining revenue. Meta began handing out pink slips to employees on April 19 that informed them that their position was no longer needed. Individuals familiar with the matter informed The Washington Post that an internal analysis estimated the company could lay off as many as 4,000 workers on April 19.

This figure was confirmed by people that were on a call with Mark Zuckerberg while he was at home on parental leave. Notably, the call with Zuckerberg isn't a free-for-all as the questions Zuckerberg answers are submitted by employees, and then the most popular ones are selected for a response by the CEO. The most recent call with Zuckerberg focused on questions about further layoffs and why senior management and executives were receiving even larger bonuses than last year when the company is going through a massive layoff period.

SpaceX launched its Starship launch vehicle on April 20, and after nearly four minutes of flight, the rocket was intentionally blown up, causing debris to scatter much further than initially anticipated.

SpaceX has been developing Starship for quite some time, and on April 20, the company conducted its very first orbital test flight of the nearly 400-foot-tall rocket. Starship is slated to be the transportation method astronauts will take to the surface of the Red Planet, and its first orbital test flight was a monumental milestone on the long road to achieving that goal. SpaceX's next-generation rocket featured 33 Raptor engines, which generated a whopping 16.5 million pounds of thrust at liftoff.

Prior to the orbital test flight SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said in a Twitter Spaces held on April 16 that there was a real risk of Starship exploding. In fact, Musk said it was more likely that it would explode rather than reach orbit. Musk was right. Just four minutes after achieving flight, SpaceX was forced to initiate its mission termination process, or what officials called a "rapid unscheduled disassembly". The rocket's first stage, or booster called Super Heavy failed to separate from its second stage, Starship, which caused the rocket to tumble and lose altitude.

China successfully landed its Zhurong rover on Mars on May 14, 2021, and after exploring the Martian wastelands for some time, the rover entered into hibernation mode, breaking all radio communication with China National Space Administration (CNSA).

China selected the Mars region Utopia Planitia as the destination for Zhurong, and the primary mission for the rover was to conduct scientific operations on any discovered water ice that's expected to be located under a volcanic rock within the region. Notably, Zhurong uses solar panels as an energy source, and in late May 2022, the CNSA decided to put the rover into hibernation mode ahead of dropping temperatures and sandstorms in the region.

Putting rovers into hibernation mode is a common tactic used by space agencies as it keeps the rover in a safe, energy-conserving position. Typically this tactic is carried out when there isn't enough sunlight available for the rover's solar panels to absorb and convert into usable energy. However, having only solar panels as an energy source comes with some severe downsides. If enough Martian dust builds up on the rover's solar panels, it will prevent any sunlight from being absorbed, effectively killing the rover.

Former PlayStation 5 exclusive Returnal made its PC debut in February this year with an excellent port that featured day-one support for DLSS 2 and real-time ray-tracing. The third-person sci-fi roguelike shooter from Sony and first-party studio Housemarque was a break from the norm regarding AAA cinematic blockbusters from PlayStation Studios, with the game finding both critical and commercial success.

Today comes word that Returnal is adding support for DLSS 3, NVIDIA's new rendering tech exclusive to the GeForce RTX 40 Series of graphics cards that can boost performance via the new AI-based Frame Generation.

In Returnal, NVIDIA notes that with a GeForce RTX 4090, the performance increase compared to native 4K rendering is 2.2X, boosting the overall frame rate to over 180 fps. Even the recently released GeForce RTX 4070 sees a performance boost to under 100 fps in 4K with DLSS 3 enabled, and this is with all visual settings maxed out and ray-tracing enabled.

NASA's Mars helicopter has taken its 51st flight, and throughout, it has snapped an incredible photograph of the Martian landscape, which features Ingenuity's companion Mars rover, Perseverance, and a mysterious shiny object.

The Mars helicopter, which has impressed NASA engineers time and time again, took off from the surface of the Red Planet on April 22 to embark on its 51st flight. From an altitude of 40 feet, Ingenuity snapped the above photo showing the desolate Martian landscape, with a curious and motionless Perseverance located in the top left-hand corner of the frame. Given the distance between Ingenuity and Perseverance, along with the dusty environment, NASA's newest Mars rover blends into the background and could easily be mistaken for a distant Martian rock.

The image was posted to the NASA JPL Twitter account on April 24 and explained that during Ingenuity's 51st flight, the helicopter was airborne for 136.9 seconds, traveled a horizontal distance of 617 feet at 8.9 mph, and reached a maximum altitude of 40 feet. So, what's NASA doing with a helicopter on the surface of Mars? Ingenuity was originally sent to Mars to test if it was possible to design an aircraft capable of flying on another planet. The initial objective was quickly achieved by Ingenuity thanks to its specially designed rotors that rotate 10 times faster than what is required to fly on Earth.

ASUS has announced that it is holding a special ROG Ally launch event on May 11, 2023. It will reveal the full specifications and pricing for its upcoming PC gaming console handheld that is being pitched as an alternative and direct competitor to Valve's Steam Deck.

The launch event is being reported by many as the actual launch date for the ROG Ally, though the press release doesn't specifically state this is the case. The presentation will start at 10.00 a.m. Eastern Time (14.00 GMT). It will feature a panel discussion with Shawn Yen, Product Management Director of the Gaming Business Unit from ASUS, Roanne Sones, CVP, Head of Xbox Hardware, and Frank Azor, Chief Architect of Gaming Solutions and Gaming Marketing from AMD.

Although full specifications aren't available, we know quite a bit about the ROG Ally, specifically that it's powered by the new Ryzen Z1 Extreme processor with RDNA 3 graphics that was formally announced earlier today. The powerful chip can run AAA titles at 1080p with frame rates higher than 60fps. Impressive stuff and something that will pair well with the ROG Ally's bright 120 Hz FHD (1080p) panel with AMD FreeSync Premium support.

Microsoft will reportedly defy the FTC and close its merger with Activision in June, sources have told the New York Post.

The FTC has sued to block the Microsoft-Activision merger. Instead of bringing the merger to federal court, where the general consensus is that the FTC would lose the case, the Commission has brought the antitrust lawsuit to its in-house administrative court in an adjudicative proceeding on the basis on multiple theories of harm. These include potential anti-competitive effects in the High-Performance Console Relevant Market, where Microsoft is said to have the incentive and ability to foreclose competitors to key Activision-Blizzard titles, and in the nascent cloud gaming segment.

Microsoft has been fighting the case at every turn, filing multiple responses to the FTC's claims in an attempt to elaborate on Microsoft's intentions and frame the merger as pro-competitive as it relates to merger law. Now there are new reports that Microsoft and Activision may have the confidence to move to close the deal if the merger is approved by other regulators in foreign jurisdictions like the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) in the United Kingdom, and the European Commission (EC) in the European Union.