Television sets make great monitors (but not vice versa), I know a thing or two about that, which is why the Samsung QN700B Neo, the cheapest 8K TV right now, is a great choice if you’re looking for the most affordable 8K monitor on the market. This 55-inch QLED TV is on sale at Best Buy for only $1299.99, a saving of $700 off its SRP.
For the money, the specs of the QN700B are spectacular: according to Hamish Hector, the AV expert TechRadar, with Samsung's impressive Neo QLED technology, you can expect bright images with fairly decent contrast in darker scenes. The contrast won't be quite as good as standard OLED TV - or one of Samsung's rumored QD-OLED screens - but there are still plenty of great reasons to opt for the QN700B..
It will not be a match for the best monitor for photo editing or the best monitor for video editing but if you’re looking for a business monitor or something that can display a LOT of information with a good (rather than perfect) image quality, then it should be on top of your list except for a small problem; it may be too big for you to handle.
You see, it is 30.5-inch high with a width of 48.2-inch (and just to confirm, its diagonal is only 54.6-inch rather than 55-inch, a rounding up trick used by many manufacturers). That TV takes a LOT of real estate on a desk so make sure that your desk has enough space and can support its weight (almost 54-pounds). Don’t expect any tilt or rotation options (unless you want to have it wall mounted via its VESA mount).
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8K means that the TV will have a resolution that's four times higher than 4K. Rather than being 3840 x 2160 pixels, it's twice as long horizontally and vertically (7680 x 4320) - resulting in four times as many pixels overall. The benefit of this more dense pixel count is that images will become even more sharp and clear than what we've seen before.
A 55-inch display 8K is the exact equivalent of four 4K 27.5-inch screens or 16 full HD panels with a 14-inch diagonal. This could be a game changer for your productivity (if your eyes can cope with the pixel density) as you’d no longer need to deal with monitor arms, thick bezel or compatibility with multiple monitors. One single pane to rule them all.
You also have four HDMI 2.1 ports, Bluetooth 5.2, a built-in microphone, three USB ports, an Ethernet port, Wi-Fi and an SPDIF connector. Audio is handled by four speakers offering 60W of power in total and Dolby Atmos support.
Samsung offers only one year warranty but we strongly recommend taking an extra protection plan via its Geeksquad plan, especially useful as technicians will come to you for any issues rather than having to bring the TV in store. The 5-year plan costs $299 and is the best value for money.
Remember that while you may not need something to match our best business PC to run 8K resolution if all you care about are productivity tools (think email services or spreadsheets), things will be different for creative services (Photoshop or Premiere Pro) and games.
Solidigm is clearing out old Intel SSD with the 670p selling for $75.99, just a dollar more than its Silicon Power rival. It is much faster (3.5GBps/2.7GBps on read/write); however because it uses QLC, its endurance is lower at just 740TBW, almost 40% less than Silicon Power’s. Just bear in mind though that when it launched in February 2021, just over two years ago, it retailed for a staggering $330.
The 670p is one of the fastest PCIe 3.0 drives around so you have to move to PCIe 4.0 SSDs to get even faster models. The Fanxiang S660, currently available at Amazon for $79.19 with a 10% discount voucher, is the fastest cheap SSD we could find, thanks in part to its SLC cache. It claims to deliver read/write speeds of 4.8GBps/4.2GBps with a 5-year/1400 TBW warranty. We like the act that it comes with a bundled heatsink (great for PS5 SSD upgrades) but others will balk at the lack of reviews and brand pedigree from this Chinese company.
At just under $98 (down from $111.99 after a 10% discount coupon), the S770 (the faster sibling of the aforementioned S660) is the fastest SSD under $100. We haven’t found an independent review of the S770 (or indeed any Fanxiang SSD) but the numbers that this SSD brings to the table are ludicrously good - at least on paper: its 7.3GBps/6.8GBps read/write speeds with 1400 TBW make it almost as good as the Samsung 990 Pro. It comes with 2GB DRAM and uses 128-layer YMTC NAND and like the S660, has a heatsink.
Check out the best prices for the Samsung QN700B (55-inch) that we found in the country where you live.
Microsoft just let us know how it has been making the popular Bing chatbot more helpful in some areas, and most recently there have been improvements to how the AI handles queries about traveling and recipes for cooking.
In a blog post summarizing improvements made over the past week, Microsoft noted that steps have been taken to give its ChatGPT-powered AI better answers on those two topics.
In both cases, the software giant further observes that it has “improved the accuracy of citations” and that with recipes, improved ‘grounding data’ from recipe content providers has been used, with citations directing you to the provider’s site rather than Bing.com (avoiding poaching traffic).
Expect more tweaking in these areas based on user feedback, Microsoft tells us.
Elsewhere, the amount of ‘end-of-conversation triggers’ have been reduced, meaning instances where the Bing AI just clams up and ends a chat session prematurely (telling you something like: “I’m sorry but I prefer not to continue this conversation”).
It’s good to see conversation-ending errors getting reduced, and this is something Microsoft has been regularly engaging in over time, so slowly but surely, the number of times you witness the Bing chatbot falling over and just closing a session should be fewer and fewer.
It’s also interesting to see Microsoft gradually honing the Bing AI in specific categories – recipes and traveling in this case as mentioned, but before now, we’ve seen further work on making the chatbot smarter with queries pertaining to your local area (like ‘where’s the nearest grocery store?’ for example). Not to mention improvements on the maths front, and with queries relating to the current (and breaking) news.
There’s a lot going on to push the Bing AI forward, it seems, and we’re not hearing nearly as much chatter about the progress of Google’s rival AI, Bard. That said, Bard is now starting to get meaningful updates – and full documentation of them – starting with various performance improvements and beefing up the variety of the chatbot’s responses. In short, this is important tinkering albeit at a basic level, and hopefully Google can build on that considerably from here.
There’s certainly no shortage of effort to drive forward with Bard from what we’ve heard via the rumor mill, with Google redeploying staff to focus on the AI (at the expense of Google Assistant, apparently).
Via MS Power User
We're probably only days away from the official unveiling of the Google Pixel 7a, and now unboxing images of the mid-range phone have leaked out online, showing off the design of the handset and two of the colors it's going to be available in.
The snaps have appeared courtesy of seasoned tipster SnoopyTech (via 9to5Google), and they reveal a shape, size and aesthetic that's pretty much as we expected. The familiar Pixel camera bump is visible on the back, for example.
We get a look at the dark gray version of the Pixel 7a, which will apparently be called Cobalt, and the pale blue edition that will be called Arctic Blue. This shade of blue is new for the Pixel series, and has appeared in previously leaked images too.
Pixel 7a pic.twitter.com/FBaw6qTGSqApril 28, 2023
The photos also show us the straightforward packaging that the Google Pixel 7a is going to come in. As with recent models like the Google Pixel 6a, don't expect there to be a power adapter in the box – you'll need to buy one separately.
That images like these are appearing now suggests a launch is close. All the signs are that Google is going to announce the phone at the Google IO 2023 event, which gets underway with a keynote presentation on May 10.
We will of course be covering the event live, and bringing you news of everything that Google announces. There should be lots more information about what's coming with Android 14, as well as quite possibly the Google Pixel Fold.
There's no way you can really judge a phone before it's even come out of course, but everything we've heard so far about the Pixel 7a – from fairly reliable if unofficial sources – suggests that Google has produced another promising phone in the Pixel series.
The Google Pixel 7 and the Google Pixel 7 Pro impressed us with what they had to offer, on the whole, and so a mid-range version of these phones that makes some sensible trade-offs between performance and price should be an appealing proposition.
When it comes to upgrades over the Pixel 6a, the specs under the hood are going to be significantly better, and there's also a rumor that Face Unlock will be coming to the Pixel 7a – that would be a first for this mid-range series of handsets, and most welcome.
Only a few days ago we saw the Pixel 7a leak out in a rather attractive orange color, and we like the look of that as well. As always, the price point is going to be very important, so we hope that the phone goes on sale for a reasonable sum.
While we wait patiently for the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5 to get its grand unveiling, some unofficial renders of the foldable have appeared online. These are third-party renders, based on information from a variety of sources that has leaked out so far.
The images are courtesy of the well-known leak-monger OnLeaks and Smartprix, and they show a phone that's very much like the Galaxy Z Fold 4 that was launched last year. It looks like there won't be any massive design changes this time around.
That's partly to be expected – there aren't that many ways you can design a foldable phone, really. One change is on the rear camera module, where the flash has moved to the side of the camera lenses rather than sitting underneath them.
Good morning #FutureSquad! Here comes your very first look at the #Samsung #GalaxyZFold5 (360° video + stunning 5K renders + dimensions)!On behalf of @Smartprix 👉🏻 https://t.co/CP8EVA9eQB pic.twitter.com/QAnWJtSOoBApril 29, 2023
What will be different, apparently, are the dimensions of the device. The Z Fold 5 apparently measures 154.9 mm x 129.9 mm x 6.3 mm when unfolded, compared with 155.1 mm x 130.1 mm x 6.3 mm for the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4.
When folded up, the new phone is said to be a few millimeters thinner than its predecessor, thanks to the introduction of a waterdrop hinge that means both sides of the screen are going to be able to lie fully flat against each other.
It would seem that the biggest upgrade is going to be on the inside, with the Galaxy Z Fold 5 rumored to be powered by a Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset. As per the most recent report, the Z Fold 5 and the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 could launch before the end of July.
It always adds a little bit of extra interest to a phone launch when there are significant design changes to talk about – but as we mentioned earlier, it's hard to see too many ways to innovate when it comes to two slabs of glass and metal folding against each other.
What's more, design changes cost money. If the Z Fold 5 looks similar to the Z Fold 4, then Samsung may well already be able to use existing components and manufacturing lines to get the handset out to the masses.
When your profits have been declining as fast as Samsung's over recent months, saving money is important. Let's hope that some of the savings are passed on to consumers – the Z Fold 5 is rumored to cost the same as its predecessor (from $1,799 / £1,649 / AU$2,499).
It looks as though we might have to wait for next year for the design of this foldable to be significantly different: the Galaxy Z Fold 6 is reportedly going to come with a "major form factor change", but what exactly that looks like remains to be seen.
All the indications are that the Google Pixel Fold is going to be unveiled next month after years of rumor and speculation – and thanks to some freshly leaked image renders, we've got a very good idea of what it's going to look like too.
These pictures come courtesy of well-known tipster Evan Blass (via 9to5Google) and show off the foldable phone in a dark gray kind of color. Based on the color schemes of previous Pixel phones, this shade might well be called charcoal.
There's some kind of bulge around the rear camera unit, which we're used to from previous handsets like the Google Pixel 7, and it looks as though we have three camera lenses on the back – which matches up with what we've heard previously.
The hinge on this foldable phone looks nice and thin, so we're hoping for a thin and light Pixel Fold. An earlier rumor suggested that the Google foldable would have a more durable hinge than the one fitted to Samsung's equivalent handset.
We also get a look at the familiar Pixel home screen, with its Material Design theme. Based on what we've previously heard from unofficial channels, the outer screen on the device is going to come in at a rather compact 5.8 inches in size.
The Google IO 2023 event gets underway on May 10, and considering how many leaks we're now getting about the Pixel Fold, it would be something of a surprise if the foldable phone wasn't announced – though it may not go on sale until June.
With the Google Pixel 8 due later this year, Google clearly now feels that it has enough experience in hardware to be able to take the next step, which is actually more of a leap: bringing out a foldable phone in the series.
Right now the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4 is leading the pack in terms of foldables, but it's not that big of a pack. Foldable technology remains hard to get right, with issues around hinge and screen durability still on the minds of potential buyers.
The complexity of the technology also has an effect on the price: this phone is rumored to be costing in the region of $1,799 (possibly around £1,649 in the UK). Google is gambling that people are going to be prepared to pay out that much for their next phone.
From what we've heard so far, this is going to be a solid piece of mobile hardware, with a slick folding mechanism and some high-end specs. However, we'll have to wait and see whether Google's leap into foldables is a hit with phone buyers.
We’ve just seen a further leak on the pricing of the Asus ROG Ally, this time for the lesser spec model of the Steam Deck rival – and it seems that lower-tier handheld will be pitched at $599.99 in the US.
As flagged by The Verge (via VideoCardz), that’s the contention of Twitter-based leaker SnoopyTech, who believes that’ll be the MSRP of the ROG Ally with the vanilla AMD Z1 CPU and 256GB of storage (courtesy of an M.2 SSD).
ASUS ROG Ally 7" AMD Z1 (not Extreme) = $599.9916 GB LPDDR5, 256 GB NVMe M.2 SSD https://t.co/X6hAE6ZtLF pic.twitter.com/ueKYpeMzusApril 28, 2023
SnoopyTech was the source of the original price leak, and the claim that the higher-end ROG Ally with Z1 Extreme processor (and 512GB storage) will cost $699.99.
The Verge notes that it has corroborated the latest leak with Roland Quandt, who (again) showed the tech site materials that backed up the assertion of a $599.99 price point. Seemingly, both these leakers are working from the same source.
Despite these leaks supporting each other, we still need to add a good dollop of skepticism here. And even if this is genuinely what Asus is thinking price-wise at the moment, there’s a chance that the planned price could change between now and launch. In theory, the launch date is June 13, by the way.
What’s the difference between these models given the purported $100 price gap? Well, the top-end ROG Ally’s Z1 Extreme processor has 8-cores (16-threads) compared to 6-cores (12-threads) with the standard AMD Z1, and for the integrated RDNA 3 graphics, the Z1 Extreme has 12-cores whereas the Z1 offers 4-cores.
That’s a fairly startling gap on the GPU front, with triple the amount of cores for the Z1 Extreme. And according to AMD’s own marketing bumph for the Z1 chips, the Extreme boasts 8.6 Teraflops of graphics performance – which leaves the Steam Deck in the dust, and indeed the entry-level Z1, the latter of which gives you 2.8 Teraflops (the Steam Deck is 1.6 Teraflops).
Now, raw Teraflops isn’t nearly the full story of course, and AMD also provided some gaming benchmarks which illustrate just that. The long and short of it is that in some games, the Z1 is fairly close to the Z1 Extreme, but in other more demanding titles, a pretty big gulf opens up. (As AMD notes, the GPU isn’t the limiting factor in some cases, rather, it’s the memory bandwidth).
Even so, if this is the correct pricing, it seems to us that buyers would be foolish not to fork out an extra $100 to get this faster CPU – considerably speedier in some cases – with double the storage on-baord to boot.
Having heard the price of the Z1 Extreme-toting ROG Ally is set to be $699.99, we were hoping for more like $499.99 for the Z1 model. The prices being set so close together doesn’t really make sense to us given the relative hardware specs here.
There are some reasons why Asus might be angling pricing like this, though. As The Verge observes, we don’t know if the company might be planning another lower-end handheld – like Valve does with a baseline Steam Deck that cuts corners with a small eMMC drive rather than a proper SSD. If that’s the case, then Asus may need to leave room in the pricing spectrum to drop that model in.
Alternatively, maybe Asus is fully expecting the top-tier model to sell out, and believes it can still shift the base Z1 ROG Ally at $599.99 – which is doubtless true. Because, let’s remember, at $599.99 with that spec, this device still looks great value compared to the Steam Deck.
Valve’s portable gaming machine is $530 for the 256GB model, but with a CPU engine that’s distinctly less peppy, and the disadvantage of incompatibility with some Windows games – ones that don’t play nice with Proton, like games with anti-cheat systems for example. The Ally runs Windows 11, of course, so will have no such compatibility stumbling blocks. (It’s also worth noting that VideoCardz believes that Asus plans to offer the Ally with three months of Microsoft’s Xbox Game Pass Ultimate thrown in for free, too).
A further possibility occurs that the $699.99 price is wrong, and it’ll be higher – as our first thought was that it does seem too good to be true. We were shocked when it was revealed, frankly, so maybe it’ll turn out to be $799.99 in the end. Obviously we hope not, but as we’ve said already, even if the leaks are technically correct right now, Asus could make last-minute pricing adjustments.
Whatever the case, we shall see whether Asus has a Steam Deck killer on its hands soon enough, but aside from exact pricing, we’ll also need to know more about battery life, and how the Z1’s ramped-up performance might affect the longevity of the ROG Ally when out and about gaming.
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse's directors are having a good time reading all of your fan theories about the forthcoming movie. Unfortunately for you, though, most of them are "way off base".
Speaking exclusively to TechRadar during a long lead press day ahead the next Spider-Man film's launch, Kemp Powers and Joaquim Dos Santos confirmed they were yet to see a fan theory that was close to being right.
Given the secrecy surrounding Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse's plot, it's understandable why that would be the case. Even so, some movie and TV show lovers – particularly those who frequent rumor-filled forums like Reddit – have accurately guessed certain plot points about forthcoming films or TV series. A case in point is The Mandalorian season 3, which recently finished airing on Disney Plus – director/executive producer Rick Famuyiwa exclusively telling TechRadar that some Star Wars fans had correctly guessed the direction of this season's narrative.
Powers and Dos Santos, though, say the same cannot be said of Across the Spider-Verse. In fact, of all the fan speculation that the duo has read online, around "90 percent" of it is completely wrong.
"I've not [been] on social media much," Powers said. "But the theories I've seen, I have to say 90 percent of rumors are way off base, to the point where it's almost annoying how wrong they are!" *laughs*
"We live in a time where a bad rumor kind of spreads and people start accepting it as the truth. Or, say Phil [Miller] and Chris [Lord, Across the Spider-Verse's executive producers] might have said something in an interview four or five years ago, fans then go 'They said that might happen! Now we know it's going to happen'. Guys, the movie is almost ready. You will see it. But yeah, the vast majority of rumors are false."
"There have been some doozies, for sure," Dos Santos added. "On the other side of it, though, it's like, we're happy people are talking and pontificating on it, rather than not at all. Believe me, for a million years, I raged about who would win in a fight between Spider-Man and Wolverine or, you know, if we'd ever see a big Marvel and DC crossover. People are going to talk and that's just part of being in the fandom."
Given the lengthy involvement in Across the Spider-Verse's development, Powers and Dos Santos' comments can be taken at face value. They know what the film's story is about, which characters will show up, who'll get the most character development, how it'll end – and lead into its sequel, Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse, which is currently slated to launch in theaters in March 2024.
That said, the pair are sure to have thrown a few misdirects our way over the last 12 months. Even if a solitary Spider-Man fan had correctly guessed the movie's story, including its ending, Powers, Dos Santos, and company aren't going to let us know that someone has got it right. That would only further fuel the fire, and result in fans of the webslinger searching for the correct theory online.
We aren't averse to speculating on what'll go down in Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, either. We've discussed our thoughts on the movie's direction in our hub (linked above), as well as in our Across the Spider-Verse trailer breakdown article. We can't sit here, then, act all high and mighty, and tell fans of the wallcrawler to stop theorizing and simply wait for the film to arrive in theaters.
With certain members of the movie's cast and crew dropping the occasional tease our way, too, we can't help but speculate on what we'll see when one of our most anticipated new movies of 2023 works its way into cinemas, either. Just this week, Powers told CinemaCon attendees (via Total Film) that the film has secret cameos that its main voice cast doesn't even know about – one of which is "gonna blow your eyeballs out the backside of your head". Meanwhile, The Lonely Island's Instagram account has teased Andy Samberg joining fellow comedian/actor Jorma Taccone in voicing a character in the film, even though Sony and Marvel haven't confirmed his involvement.
Across the Spider-Verse's own creative team, then, is helping to drive discussions and fan theories about the flick pre-release. As Dos Santos and Powers say, that's part and parcel of the world we live in today. Even so, in partaking of these online discussions, they're fanning the flames of the very same fan theories they state are "off base", which we're sure is amusing them greatly. Curse you both!
Still, we don't have much longer to wait for Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse to swing into theaters worldwide, so we'll soon know which fan theories were bang on the money. Be sure to check back in with TechRadar next week for a more in-depth, exclusive discussion with Dos Santos and Powers about the movie, too.
In the meantime, find out how to watch the Spider-Man movies in order, or read our Spider-Man movies ranked piece. Alternatively, see how one Across the Spider-Verse poster spoiled some of its biggest cameos and see why the Miles Morales-starring film might be more connected to the Marvel Cinematic Universe than we realize.
Millions of gamers have been tricked into downloading fake Minecraft Android apps that run ads in the background, earning serious profit for the developers.
Cybersecurity researchers from McAfee recently discovered 38 games posing as Minecraft for the Android platform, running adverts in the background without user knowledge, or consent.
Of the 38 games, the most popular ones are Block Box Master Diamond (10 million downloads), Craft Sword Mini Fun (5 million), Block Box Skyland Sword (5 million), and Craft Monster Crazy Sword (5 million).
Block Pro Forrest Diamond, Block Game Skyland Forrest, Block Rainbow Sword Dragon, Craft Rainbow Mini Builder, and Block Forrest Tree Crazy all have one million downloads each. They were all found on the Google Play Store, and not on third-party, or obscure repositories.
Aside from the smartphone heating up, or performing somewhat slower than what one might expect, there is no way for the user to actually know they’re being served ads, the researchers said. Yet, even these two symptoms might be written off as normal behavior when running a mobile game. To make matters even more difficult - the apps all perform as advertised - the users actually get to play the game.
Most victims were located either in the United States, or China, the researchers say. Brazil, Iran, the UK, and Germany, were also bigger victims.
Minecraft is one of the most popular games in the world, today. It’s a sandbox game that allows players to gather resources and create their own environment. There are two modes in the game, a survival mode in which players are required to gather resources, build the world and survive against hostile mobs, and a creative mode in which players get all the resources they need to build whatever they imagine.
Minecraft is currently the best-selling video game of all time, with 238 million copies sold. According to ActivePlayer, it has more than 170 million monthly active players.
Via: BleepingComputer
The rumored Google Pixel 7a has leaked once again, and this time in a striking orange colorway.
This recent leak comes from Evan Blass – popularly known by his handle of EvLeaks – courtesy of his private Twitter account. It's a simple render showing the rear of the rumored Pixel 7a in orange. This color, from what we see in the render, extends to even the metal railings on the side.
The Google Pixel 7a is rumored to be making its debut on May 10 at Google IO 2023, and it's also expected to come in black, white, and blue shades.
Going by leaked specs, the same Tensor G2 chipset as the Google Pixel 7 and Google Pixel 7 Pro backed by 8GB of RAM is said to be making its way here. Improved fast charging, and a 64MP sensor – the first for any Pixel – are also expected to be in the Pixel 7a.
While this is an eye-catching shade, it's also one that you might not be able to get everywhere, and it almost certainly won’t be sold with 256GB of storage. Google has a tendency to limit Pixels with larger storage sizes to more pedestrian colors, based on our experience in the past.
The Pixel 4a’s Barely Blue, and the 4a 5G’s Clearly White stand out as Pixel colorways that were limited in availability. This orange shade would also be the fourth rumored color for the Pixel 7a, and it's rare for Google to offer that many shades on a phone, so at least one of them is likely to be available in limited configurations or regions.
As for the orange color itself, Google has flirted with orange quite a few times. The Pixel 6 was sold in a Kinda Coral shade and the Pixel 4 had an Oh So Orange colorway. There are also rumors of the Pixel Tablet coming in orange, creating some synergy.
Following its announcement earlier in April, Google is now rolling out its new Live tab that will air over 800 live TV channels for free.
So, even if you’ve recently unsubscribed from Netflix because of its upcoming password-sharing rules – or you’ve ditched any of the other best streaming services – you should still be able to find something to watch on your Google TV device.
The Live tab will collate channels from a bunch of free services including Plex, Pluto TV, and Tubi, but it will also give you easy access to the paid live TV you subscribe to through YouTube TV and Sling. Just note that while you’ll be able to watch free content without downloading any other apps you will need the relevant app to watch paid content – i.e. you can watch free Tubi shows without Tubi, but you’ll need Sling to watch your paid Sling content.
If you do need to download an app, the Live tab will still show you the content in its guide – it’ll just prompt you to install the relevant program before it lets you watch the channel.
This update is currently only available to Google TV device users in the US – though it is at least rolling out to not only Chromecasts but TVs from Hisense, TCL, and Sony that use the Google TV OS as well. We’ll have to wait and see if Google introduces something similar in regions outside the US at some point in the future.
800 channels is a lot, but don’t expect everything you find in the Live tab to be on par with the best Disney Plus shows or best Netflix movies. There’s a lot of trash TV out there.
What’s more, Google’s Live tab won’t only air English content, so unless you’re fluent in Spanish, Japanese and a bunch of other languages you might struggle to understand what’s going on on all 800 channels.
That said, there are some potential diamonds in the rough if you’re willing to dig through it all. Fans of reality TV can find channels dedicated to Top Gear, Hell's Kitchen, and MythBusters; entertainment channels like WB TV Watchlist and Stories by AMC will air hit select hit shows such as Westworld and The Walking Dead; and you can tune in to a wide variety of live news channels so you can keep up to date local, national and international news.
If you find a channel you love, the Live tab will let you favorite it too, allowing you to curate your own selection of go-to content when you’re next looking for something to watch.
Following a reduction in headcount of around 15% earlier this year in response to the lasting effects of the pandemic on the economy, cloud storage giatn Dropbox has announced a second round of layoffs impacting even more workers.
The company announced the departure of 500 workers, accounting for around 16% of its already reduced headcount, and it’s blaming AI.
Company CEO Drew Houston first shared the news with employees in a company-wide email, promising individual meetings for affected workers with their team leader and an HR representative to discuss departure.
Contrary to fears that have been growing in recent months, during what Dropbox’s Houston calls “the AI era,” artificial intelligence hasn’t replaced the jobs of tech workers according to the company.
Rather, AI development has meant that the company has needed to acquire new talent whose skill sets more closely match its up and coming products. Houston explained that workers have already shifted to other departments “wherever possible.”
Affected workers’ severance packages will include 16 weeks’ pay plus an additional week for each year worked at the company, up to six months of COBRA healthcare in the US and similar equivalents in other regions, and support for career transitions. Company-provided hardware, like business laptops and business smartphones, will also remain in the hands of departing workers.
Describing the layoffs as “painful,” Houston believes that the changes are necessary for the platform to lead from the front as other companies begin to ramp up their AI operations.
With tech layoffs slowing down recently, it’s unclear whether a new bloom of AI-related layoffs will emerge and how this will affect employment moving forward.
According to our own expert writers, the multi award-winning Bowers & Wilkins Pi7 “blew basically everything else on the market out of the water” when they launched in 2021; the headphones were “a revelation… the depth of bass, the detail in the treble and the clarity of the vocals were on another level.” The Pi7’s even more affordable siblings, the Bowers & Wilkins Pi5, attracted rave reviews too thanks to their superb noise cancelling and gorgeous, immersive sound.
And now Bowers & Wilkins has made them even better.
Bowers & Wilkins is part of music’s DNA. Chances are your favourite records were made using Bowers & Wilkins loudspeakers: they’re found in the world’s leading recording studios, including the legendary Abbey Road Studios and Skywalker Sound. Now, Bowers & Wilkins has brought its many decades of audio experience and expertise to its very latest headphones.
The Pi7 S2 builds on the award-winning acoustic excellence of the Pi7, with its two 9.2mm bespoke drive units, balanced armature tweeters and individual amplifiers delivering an incredibly wide dynamic range and vivid sound stage. Their proprietary DSP takes in-ear audio to a whole new level thanks to its highly accurate reproduction and low distortion, and with aptX Adaptive support built-in you can take full advantage of high resolution streaming at up to 24-bit / 48Khz. There’s adaptive noise cancellation to eliminate unwanted distractions and a 25% improvement in battery life.
Like its predecessors, the Pi7 S2 features the brand’s innovative wireless audio retransmission technology, which you can use to retransmit sound from external audio sources, games consoles and in-flight entertainment systems to your earbuds.
The new Pi5 S2 uses the same proprietary drivers as its siblings, with one 9.2mm driver per earbud delivering superb and accurate sound. There’s aptX for CD-quality audio streaming, superb noise cancellation and once again, even better battery life than before. If you forget to charge your Pi5 S2s, just 15 minutes in the case will deliver a full two hours of listening.
The Pi7 S2 and Pi5 S2 are the first Bowers & Wilkins true wireless headphones to be compatible with the firm’s intuitive Bowers & Wilkins Music App, offering a convenient and seamless set-up, complete control and configuration and direct music streaming from music streaming services including Qobuz, TIDAL, Deezer, NTS Radio, TuneIn and SoundCloud – with more services due to be added this year. It couldn’t be easier to stream the playlists you’ve already created in your existing music apps, while accessing curated playlists from Bowers & Wilkins’ team of music lovers.
The Bowers & Wilkins new True Wireless models feature premium design finishes that look as good as they sound. The popular Midnight Blue finish from Bowers & Wilkins’ Px7 S2 over-ear headphones has been brought across to the Pi7 S2, and there are also three new colours: Satin Black, Canvas White and Midnight Blue.
The Pi5 S2 offer the widest range of colours Bowers & Wilkins has delivered to date, including Storm Grey, Cloud Grey, Spring Lilac and, from this spring, Sage Green.
Whether it’s the flagship Pi7 S2 or its great value for money sibling, Pi5 S2, Bowers & Wilkins’ true wireless headphones get you closer to the True Sound of the artist’s intent.
Click here to discover how the Bowers & Wilkins Pi7 S2 and Pi5 S2 will make you fall in love with your favourite music all over again.
Prime Video is set to become the new streaming home for new animated Batman projects, including the much anticipated Batman: Caped Crusader animated series.
In March, we reported that Batman: Caped Crusader would glide its way onto Amazon's streaming platform following its cancellation on HBO Max. Almost six weeks later, Amazon has finally confirmed that the sequel to the acclaimed Batman: The Animated Series will launch exclusively on Prime Video, with the streamer greenlighting two seasons of the Bruce Timm, JJ Abrams, and Matt Reeves-developed animated TV show.
Caped Crusader isn't the only Batman project in the works for Prime Video, though. In an Amazon Studios press release, the company also confirmed two other animated offerings were being created specifically for one of the world's best streaming services – both of which would star Damian Wayne, Batman's sociopathic son.
The first of these productions is Merry Little Batman, an action-comedy film that'll see a young Damian assume the role of 'Little Batman' as he defends Wayne Manor (and Gotham City) from the Dark Knight's various villains during the holiday season. A spin-off series, titled Bat-Family, will follow, and focus on Bruce Wayne/Batman, Damian, and butler Alfred as they navigate the trials and tribulations of being a rich, superhero-centric family.
As the below images shows, the animation style in these shows represent a marked departure from the visuals we've seen in previous animated Batman projects.
Commenting on the announcement, Amazon and MGM Studios' Head of Television vernon Sanders said: "Batman: The Animated Series helped pioneer in the evolution of superhero storytelling and defined the Dark Knight for a generation. Batman: Caped Crusader will no doubt continue that tradition and, alongside Merry Little Batman and Bat-Family, we're thrilled to collaborate with Warner Bros. Animation to offer a variety of takes on the Batman mythos to our global Prime Video customers."
No release date has been set for this trio of Batman productions. Their additions to Prime Video in the coming years, though, will only strengthen the streamer's back catalog of top-tier animated content, including Invincible, The Legend of Vox Machina, and Undone.
It might seem odd that Prime Video is the new home for all things Batman (from an animation perspective, anyway). The legendary superhero/vigilante is one of DC Comics' most popular characters and, by proxy, the rights to the Dark Knight are owned by Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD).
Considering that WBD has its own streaming platforms – HBO Max, the home of its live-action and animated DC content, and Discovery Plus – it's strange that one of these services, or WBD's forthcoming super-streamer Max, won't be the home to new animated Batman projects.
Well, new animated fare like Batman: Caped Crusader was originally set to air on HBO Max. However, cost-cutting measures at WBD, which began in the wake of Warner Bros' merger with Discovery in March 2022, meant that numerous HBO Max animated projects were cancelled.
Thankfully, Amazon Studios has stepped in to save some of them. And, in my mind, it's a good thing that it did. Not only will we get to see a Bruce Timm-developed sequel to Batman: The Animated Series – one of the best animated shows of all-time, I think you'll agree – but more people will be able to watch it, too. That's due to Prime Video being available globally, whereas HBO Max's availability has been limited to world regions like North and Latin America, and some parts of Europe. As long as Batman: Caped Crusader is half as good as its predecessor, you bet it'll be on our best Prime Video shows in no time.
Batman fans can expect plenty more Dark Knight-centric content over the next few years. First up is the return of Michael Keaton's Bruce Wayne/Batman in The Flash, one of the last DC Extended Universe (DCEU) movies before WBD's main superhero universe is reborn as the DC Cinematic Universe (DCU). Be sure to read our trailer breakdown article on The Flash's latest teaser, too, for all of the coolest Easter eggs it'll contain.
The DCU will also see Damian Wayne make his live-action debut in a new Batman film, titled The Brave and The Bold, sometime in the next few years, too. Be sure to read about why it's one of our most anticipated DCU Chapter One projects while you're here. Lastly, WBD is fleshing out its Elseworlds universe centered on Matt Reeves' The Batman, with The Batman Part II, an HBO Max spin-off starring Colin Farrell's Oswald Cobblepot/Penguin, and a horror-esque Arkham Asylum series in the works.
For more Batman coverage, find out how to watch the Batman movies in order. Alternatively, read our Batman movies ranked piece, or see which Dark Knight films made it into our best superhero movies guide.
Multiple leaks have apparently confirmed the pricing of Asus’s upcoming handheld gaming console, the ROG Ally – or at least, one version of it. And it looks like good news for those of use who've been looking forward to its arrival.
According to a leaked Best Buy store screenshot from @wickedkhumz, a tweet from known hardware leaker @_snoopytech_, and another separate claim made by ‘retail intelligence’ leaker Roland Quandt, the price of the ROG Ally will be $699.99 – and that’s specifically for the high-end model, which packs an AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme processor, 16GB of LPDDR5 RAM, and a 512GB SSD.
While we don’t know what cheaper models of the Ally will look like yet (it’s currently looking like we’ll get at least one other version, presumably with the standard Ryzen Z1 chip and 256GB of storage), this is some seriously competitive pricing.
Best Buy product page leaked the price of the Asus ROG Ally. It will be priced at $699 dollars for the 16GB/512GB variant. pic.twitter.com/CbfERTkGT4April 27, 2023
Looking at the Steam Deck, the Ally’s main competitor in the handheld PC gaming space, the high-end model (with comparable storage but a less powerful AMD processor) costs $649 in the US. That extra fifty dollars nets you a whole lot more gaming performance, if AMD’s pre-launch statistics about the Z1 and Z1 Extreme APUs prove to be accurate.
Naturally, since this is a leak, caution is advised. But with multiple sources corroborating the same price tag, I feel pretty confident that’s the list price we’re going to see when the Ally launches – and the leaked Best Buy screenshot suggests that it could be with us pretty soon, since it lists a release date of June 13.
The cheapest Steam Deck (which only has a measly 64GB of slower eMMC storage) will cost you $349, so it’s fair to say that handheld PC gaming consoles still aren’t exactly accessible. The cheaper handheld console you can buy right now is actually the Nintendo Switch Lite, which costs $199.99 / £199.99 – but that’s a console running six-year-old hardware, and you’re limited to Nintendo’s catalog of games.
If Asus can provide a sub-$500 price for the Z1 model of the ROG Ally, I’ll be intrigued; sure, it’ll still be expensive, but the performance jump from the Steam Deck should be impressive – and that opens up the field for more great handhelds in the near future.
Nintendo, Valve, and smaller companies like AyaNeo will need to step up their game if they want to compete with Asus’s new handheld – which is good news for AMD, since it makes the APUs that power all of these devices.
The Z1 chips could be exactly the kick in the pants the handheld gaming industry needs to get back on its feet: ever since the improvement of phones as viable gaming platforms, the space has become rather desolate. With Asus putting up some seriously good pricing and a high-quality console – judging by our hands-on review – we can probably expect other manufacturers to strike back later this year.
So, Steam Deck 2? Nintendo Switch 2? AyaNeo 3? All quite likely. Hell, perhaps we’ll even see Sony decide to throw its hat back into the ring with a new PlayStation Portable. Please, Sony. I’ll give you my firstborn child for one of those.
AMD has announced a new line of processors built from the ground up to power handheld consoles: the Ryzen Z1 series. Billed as ‘the ultimate high-performance processor for handheld PC gaming consoles’, the Z1 and Z1 Extreme will be system-on-a-chip (SoC) APUs incorporating both AMD’s Zen 4 CPU architecture and RDNA 3 graphics architecture.
Why is this exciting? Well, for starters, these chips will be with us very soon, as AMD is partnering with Asus to deliver the first Z1 handheld: the previously-announced Asus ROG Ally.
It gets better: performance-wise, the Z1 chip inside the ROG Ally should absolutely demolish every other gaming handheld on the market right now, from the Valve Steam Deck to the Nintendo Switch. AMD has also claimed that the Z1 APUs will offer excellent energy efficiency – good news, since the ROG Ally will be running Windows 11, and that’s already made me concerned about its battery life.
The standard Z1 chip will feature a 6-core/12-thread CPU and 4-core iGPU with up to 2.8 teraflops of gaming performance, while the Z1 Extreme uses an 8-core/16-thread CPU and 12-core iGPU for a whopping 8.6 teraflops of potential performance. For reference, the base Nintendo Switch is capable of about 0.4 teraflops; in gaming PC terms, the Z1 Extreme is roughly equal to the RTX 3050.
Now, we didn’t think the 3050 was all that impressive back when we reviewed it, but that was looking at it in a desktop PC gaming context; for a handheld targeting 1080p, the Z1 Extreme could be pretty incredible. With AMD’s Radeon Super Resolution 2 upscaling tech, the Z1 Extreme can reportedly crack 60fps in a tonne of triple-A games at 1080p.
Asus is planning to reveal more details about the ROG Ally – including the launch date and pricing – in a special event on May 11. I wouldn’t rule out a surprise launch on the day, but let’s not get our hopes up too much.
An Asus exec has already said that “the price will be below $1,000”, but it’s not clear whether that means all models will sit below the thousand-dollar mark, or just the base Z1 version – since the ROG Ally will be available with the Extreme chip too. Personally, I suspect we might see a $799 Z1 model and a $999 Z1 Extreme model.
In any case, this is bad news for Valve and Nintendo, currently the biggest names in the handheld gaming space along with the less well-known AyaNeo. It’s extremely good news for AMD, though; the Switch and Steam Deck already both use custom AMD APUs, and the two gaming giants will likely want to upgrade their hardware in the near future, prompting more demand for AMD’s new Z-series chips.
The Switch in particular is in dire need of a successor, with the console now well into its sixth year and starting to show its age. The Nintendo Switch 2 (or whatever ridiculous name Nintendo gives it) will almost certainly be powered by AMD tech, so when the Ally arrives it could give us a delicious taste of that handheld potential.
Me? I’m just hoping Sony is watching. Give me the PSP2, dammit!
Dropbox has announced a handful of new features for its online approval and collaboration tool Replay, which it says is now open to all.
With the full launch of Dropbox Replay, the global cloud storage company hopes to make collaborating on media projects even easier while eliminating the need for additional tools.
Replay takes on the likes of Frame.io by giving content creators the ability to share video, image, and audio with others in order to obtain feedback, making it a powerful tool for long-distance projects that would otherwise require workers to be in the same room.
Much like the beta, which Dropbox reckons helped seven in 10 users to achieve a faster workflow, Replay supports live reviews and can handle comments and time stamps. Some tweaks have since been made specifically to comments to include pinning and filtering, which will be welcome news to larger teams and those working on longer projects.
It also integrates with Adobe Premier Pro, Blackmagix Design DaVinci Resolve, LumaFusion, and WeVideo. Dropbox promises that Apple Final Cut Pro support is also in the works, but it’s best not to bank on that until it is delivered.
While Replay comes as part of all plans - including the free 2GB tier - users will only be able to upload up to four video, image, or audio files for collaboration, up to their account storage limit.
A premium add-on for $12 per month ($10 per month when paid annually) removes the video limit, but retains the account storage limit stipulation, and adds a handful of other features including video transcriptions and captions, the ability to archive finished projects to Dropbox, and support for deadlines.
While there are much more powerful, dedicated tools out there for specialist companies, smaller businesses already subscribing to the Dropbox ecosystem will be able to benefit from the new Replay functions that are set to grow with time.
If you’ve purchased one of AMD’s latest gaming processors, like the mighty Ryzen 9 7950X3D or any of its more affordable brethren, you might want to think twice about overclocking it. Reports of the chips burning out – seemingly at random – have been springing up across the internet.
The affected chips quite literally burn out: overheating and expanding dangerously to the point where they not only break, but have also damaged the motherboards they’re seated in.
According to a quote from Asus given to YouTuber Der8auer, the issue is caused by excessive SoC voltages – so if you’re running the chip at stock settings, you should be fine. But overvolting is common practice when overclocking CPUs, and it seems that high voltages are damaging the chips’ thermal sensors; that means the processor can’t detect dangerously high temperatures and throttle accordingly.
These voltages can obviously be set manually, but plenty of people will overclock their CPUs using pre-programmed EXPO profiles in their motherboard BIOS – and it looks like these could also be a threat to your chip’s safety.
The image above shows one of the damaged chips, from user LT-Cc on Chinese social media site Baidu. As you can see, there's a burnt patch on the motherboard interface, and some additional distortion on the right-hand edge. This sort of 'hot spot' damage typically also damages the motherboard socket.
According to Tom’s Hardware, this issue can affect both 7000X3D and regular Ryzen 7000 CPUs, but it’s far more likely to be an issue with the former. The motherboard model doesn’t seem to be a factor either; reports have indicated that the issue could occur with any brand of mobo.
TH’s sources have indicated that a fix is on the way, but there’s been no official word from AMD so far, so we can’t really ascertain a timeframe. A fix would presumably involve a firmware update that imposes a new voltage cap, since it looks like there are safe overvolts that can be used – 1.35V appears to be ‘safe’, but 1.4V or above creates a risk of overheating.
The downside of this is that imposing such a cap on voltage could inadvertently lower the frequency at which users can achieve a stable memory overclock – not something that’s likely to affect the majority of users, since RAM overclocking is a fiddly and often not worthwhile endeavor, but it’ll probably annoy some serious hardware-heads.
In any case, we’d strongly recommend that you stick to the default settings until AMD announces a proper fix. AMD explicitly does not cover damage caused by overclocking in its processor warranties, so if you burn out your chip, you’re on your own.
While the Ryzen 7000X3D series are some of the best processors around for gaming, this is a setback AMD really didn’t need right now – Team Red is still getting roundly spanked by Intel in the CPU arena, even if it’s pushing some excellent gaming laptops with the ‘AMD Advantage’ initiative. I hope a firmware update arrives speedily to resolve this problem – not least because I’ve got a Ryzen 7000 chip in my own PC, and I won’t be overclocking it until this is fixed.
Businesses are under the impression they’re getting better at detecting, stopping, and mitigating ransomware incidents. However, the number of successful attacks is still high, as is the number of businesses that ended up paying the ransom demand, new research has warned.
The “2023 global ransomware report”, published by Fortinet, which surveyed 569 cybersecurity leaders from the US, UK, France, India, Japan, and other countries, working in manufacturing, technology, transportation, and healthcare, found a vast majority (78%) being “very” or “extremely” prepared to mitigate a ransomware attack.
Many firms (72%) also said they would be capable of detecting an incident within hours - sometimes within minutes.
But the report also says that the global threat of ransomware “remains at peak levels”. Half of the organizations of all sizes, in all regions, and in numerous industries, fell victim last year. In fact, almost half were targeted two or more times. Almost three-quarters made “some form” of ransom payment, it was said.
Firms in the manufacturing sector received higher ransoms and were more likely to pay the fee, the survey found. A quarter of attacks among manufacturing organizations received a ransom of $1M or higher.
For the survey’s respondents, the top challenges to stopping such an attack were related either to people, or processes. Many organizations were said to be lacking clarity on how to secure against such a threat, despite being in the know of a “range of technologies” designed for that purpose. Most firms are prioritizing an integrated approach to security, the report said.
Next year, most firms will increase their security budgets, and will focus on things like Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) technologies. These promise faster detection times, centralized monitoring tools to speed up response times, and better preparation of both people, and processes.
Cyber-insurance also plays a major role, but so far it doesn’t have much to show for itself. While almost all firms (88%) purchased some type of insurance, almost 40% didn’t receive the coverage they expected. In some cases, they weren’t paid out at all - because of an “exception” from the insurer.
We recently reported on rumors that the iPhone 15 Ultra will arriving packing a telephoto camera with a variable zoom lens, and new leaks suggest this won’t be the only impressive camera upgrade heading to Apple’s upcoming flagship.
According to serial Apple tipster Ice Universe, the iPhone 15 Ultra – which, as a reminder, is expected to replace the iPhone 15 Pro Max in 2023 – will use Sony’s new IMX903 48MP sensor. Why is this significant? Well, the IMX903 measures 1/1.14 inches, meaning the iPhone 15 Ultra could be shipping with the biggest camera sensor ever used in an iPhone.
For comparison, the iPhone 14 Pro Max (aka Apple’s best iPhone right now) uses Sony’s already-excellent IMX803 48MP sensor, which measures 1/1.28 inches. The larger sensor size on the iPhone 15 Ultra, then, should allow for more efficient light capture and detail retention.
As Ice Universe notes, 1/1.14-inch sensors aren’t strictly the same as 1-inch sensors – of the sort used on photography-focused phones like the Xiaomi 12S Ultra and Sony Xperia Pro-I – but they suggest that the difference between the two sizes will be negligible on the iPhone 15 Ultra.
“The specifications of IMX903 for [the] iPhone 15 [Ultra] are close to 1 inch, that's for sure,” Ice Universe writes. “I'm looking forward to Apple joining the 1-inch club.”
The specifications of IMX903 for iPhone 15PM are close to 1 "That's for sure.I'm looking forward to Apple joining the 1 "club.April 23, 2023
Suffice to say, the iPhone 15 Ultra looks set to challenge the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra to the title of best camera phone – read our analysis of why the iPhone 15 Ultra will be the wake-up call Samsung needs – but the rumored camera credentials of the former could give traditional photographers a serious headache, too.
Combined with its periscopic zoom lens for real telephoto zoom, the iPhone 15 Ultra’s huge 48MP sensor will make Apple’s next flagship a phenomenally powerful camera in its own right. And, at an expected price of around $1,199 / £1,309 / AU$2,099, the phone should provide a cheaper alternative to many of the best cameras, which typically retail for figures in excess of $2,500 / $2,000 / AU$3,700.
As TechRadar's former Cameras Editor, Mark Wilson, explains: "Mirrorless cameras still have much larger sensors than the iPhone 15 Ultra’s rumored 1/1.14in chip, but Apple’s computational processing will help compensate. The larger the sensor, the more light and information those algorithms will have to work with – and that could be particularly helpful for the Ultra’s periscope zoom lens, as those traditionally have quite dark apertures."
"But these upgrades for the Ultra could give photographers like me a difficult decision. If the rumors are true, the Ultra will be opening up a sizable photographic gap to the rest of the iPhone 15 series – so it could be a decision between splashing out on that flagship, or waiting until next year for an iPhone 16 Pro with a periscope zoom."
In terms of what else we expect to see from the iPhone 15 Ultra, unofficial iPhone 15 Ultra renders have hinted that Apple’s upcoming flagship will be getting a USB-C port, a slightly shallower camera bump and a curvier chassis than the iPhone 14 Pro Max. The phone could be clad in titanium, too (which is typically stronger and lighter than the stainless steel used by current iPhones).
Also on the design front, the iPhone 15 Ultra was widely rumored to get solid-state volume and power buttons. Leaks had suggested that these buttons would use vibrations to simulate the sensation of being touched despite not actually moving (think the iPhone 7’s haptic Home button), but analysts Jeff Pu and Ming-Chi Kuo recently poured water on those claims. Other leakers, however, still believe that the iPhone 15 Ultra will be getting solid-state buttons.
Despite using the same A17 Bionic processor, the iPhone 15 Ultra is rumored to be even more powerful than the iPhone 15 Pro, with one source claiming that the former’s software won't limit the phone as much as it will on the Pro model.
We’re keeping tabs on all the latest iPhone 15 Ultra rumors as and when they appear, so stay tuned to TechRadar as we learn more about what to expect from Apple's next flagship handset.
