Category Archives: Technology

Technology

Walmart will have PS5 and Xbox Series X consoles available today

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If you want another shot at trying to buy either an Xbox Series X or a PlayStation 5, you’re in luck. A Walmart spokesperson told The Verge that the retailer will be restocking the consoles online today, March 18th.

Walmart plans to have inventory for the PS5, the PS5 Digital Edition, Xbox Series X, and Xbox Series S gaming consoles, with prices ranging from $300 to $500 depending on the model you purchase. The retailer told me that restocks for Xbox Series X / S will begin at 2:30PM ET, while PS5s will be up for purchase beginning at 3PM ET.

Xbox Series X / S

Prices taken at time of publishing.

The Xbox Series X is Microsoft’s flagship console, serving as its most powerful (and biggest) option that costs $499.99. While the $299.99 Series S is aimed at smooth 1440p performance, the Series X is focused on fast 4K gameplay.

For those looking to buy a next-gen Xbox console, you may want to consider picking up some other accessories to get the most out of your console. An additional controller is likely a good purchase. And unlike the PS5, you can purchase a 1TB SSD expansion to add to the Xbox’s base storage (512GB on the Series S, 1TB on the X), though it is not cheap. If you are having trouble deciding on what games to buy, you can always buy a subscription to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, which gives you access to a slew of digital games and access to Xbox Live Gold.

Sony PlayStation 5

Prices taken at time of publishing.

Sony’s flagship next-gen console, starting at $399.99. The biggest difference between both models is the Digital Edition can only play digital games, while the $500 PS5 includes a disc drive, allowing you to play both digital and physical games.

If you plan to buy a PS5 console, there are a few additional items you should pick up to get the most out of your new console. I recommend picking up a second DualSense controller, which is necessary for any in-person multiplayer action. I suggest that early adopters also subscribe to PlayStation Plus, which gives you a few perks, such as free games every month.

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Technology

Facebook shows off mind-reading technology

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Facebook has unveiled its mind-reading wrist device and an augmented reality keyboard that would allow users to replace the mouse and keyboard in future hardware products.

The company’s Facebook Reality Labs division showed off the prototype technologies on a virtual call with members of the media this week. Executives from the division talked about the technologies while videos of the projects were played for the audience.

The wrist device is capable of reading neurological signals sent from a users’ brain down to their hands. It could theoretically read these signals to get a sense of what a user wants to do and replicate the action in a virtual or augmented reality environment.

“You actually have more of your brain dedicated to controlling your wrist than any other part of your body, probably twice as many neurons controlling your wrist and the movement of your hands than is actually dedicated to your mouth for feeding and for speech,” said TR Reardon, director of research science at Facebook Reality Labs.

The Facebook researchers demonstrated “force” actions where a user could pinch with their fingers in real life to hold and control virtual, far-away objects in augmented reality. The name of the action is a reference to the Star Wars franchise where certain characters can use the Force to control and move people or objects that are far away from them.

Additionally, the company demonstrated electromyography wristbands that users could wear to type on any surface as though they were typing on a physical keyboard. Though there’s no keyboard, the EMG wristbands would register the intentions of a user’s finger strokes and jot down the letters and words.

Facebook’s development of these technologies comes as the company prepares to release its first smart-glasses later this year. That device will be Ray-Ban glasses and will be released in partnership with Luxottica.

Unlike smartphones, which rely on touchscreens, or Oculus virtual reality headsets, which rely on handheld controllers, there’s no current obvious input mechanism for smart glasses. That is why Facebook is working on these projects.

Asked how soon these technologies may make their way to the public, Facebook CTO Mike Schroepfer said they are in the early stages of development.

“It’s hard to predict their timeline,” Schroepfer. “How these things sequence out in the market, when they show up — are things I don’t have crisp answers to. What we’re focused on is hardening these technologies.”

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Technology

NVIDIA Raises GeForce NOW Paid Subscription Plans to $10 Per Month, $100 Per Year

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Just over a year ago, NVIDIA finally brought GeForce NOW, its PC game streaming service, out of beta. The commercial launch of the service saw the introduction of two tiers: a feature and time-limited free tier, and a paid Founders tier that offered a full set of features (including RTX) and priority access. Now as the company is in its second year of operating the commercial service, today NVIDIA is raising the price for GeForce NOW paid subscriptions, essentially doubling them to $10/month (or $100/year) for new members.

Officially, what NVIDIA is doing today with its subscription plans is two-fold. First, the Founders plans, which were advertised as a limited-time offer from the very beginning, are finally being retired and will no longer be offered to new customers. In their place the company is launching a new set of “Priority” memberships, which are otherwise identical to the old Founders plans, offering the same features and priority access.

The only meaningful change, other than the name on the plan, will be the price. Whereas the Founders plans were $5 a month or $25 for a six-month subscription, GeForce NOW Priority subscriptions will be sold on a monthly or yearly basis. Monthly plans are now $10 per month (or more specifically, $9.99), while yearly plans are $100 ($99.99).

With that said, as a thank you to their Founders members – and no doubt mindful of the negative public reaction to price hikes – NVIDIA is also grandfathering in the old Founders rate for existing customers under what they are calling their “Founders for Life” benefit. This means that while new customers will have to pay the new, higher prices, existing customers will have their old prices locked in so long as they remain in what NVIDIA calls “good standing.” Which for all practical purposes works out to a 50% discount on the service for existing members.

Past that, NVIDIA’s blog post announcing the price increase doesn’t go in to any detail on explaining the reason for the increase. But it’s not terribly surprising to see NVIDIA raising prices; even without the explicit limited-time nature of the founders packages, $5/month was probably not covering all of NVIDIA’s costs, especially as evidenced by the price of comparable high-end instances from the major cloud service providers. If nothing else, this is a sign that NVIDIA is finally looking to make a real profit from the service, rather than just trying to cover costs.

Overall, NVIDIA seems rather bullish on the future of their unique cloud gaming service, even with the licensing-related teething issues over the past year and the hit to demand that will no doubt come from a price hike. According to the company they’re continuing to add capacity to the service, including spinning up a data center in Montreal later this year. Similarly, the company is continuing to expand its GeForce NOW Alliance partnerships for other countries, further increasing the number of countries that have local GeForce NOW servers.

Finally, while today’s news is largely focused on the business-side of the service, NVIDIA does mention that an upcoming update to the service is going to address refresh rate synchronization. With the 2.0.28 update, the server-side refresh rate will be set to match the client-side refresh rate in order to account for the existence of both 60Hz displays and 59.94Hz displays. This small variance in refresh rates is not an issue with games locally, but similar to streaming video, it can be a problem with cloud gaming as a mis-match would lead to judder and the occasional dropped frame.

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Technology

Sony announces new PS5 VR controllers with adaptive triggers

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Sony is revealing its new VR controllers for the PS5 today. The orb-shaped controllers look more like typical VR controllers than existing PlayStation Move motion controllers, and they also include the same adaptive trigger technology found on the DualSense PS5 controller. Each controller has tensions in the triggers, and Sony is aiming to use this tech in future VR games.

The controllers also have haptic feedback, and finger touch detection that will let them detect fingers without having to press areas where you rest your thumb, index, or middle fingers. “This enables you to make more natural gestures with your hands during gameplay,” says Hideaki Nishino, head of platform planning and management at PlayStation.

Sony’s new PS5 VR controllers.
Image: Sony

Each controller has haptic feedback and adaptive triggers.
Image: Sony

Naturally, these controllers will also include tracking to Sony’s new VR headset via a ring at the bottom of the controller. These certainly look far improved over what’s currently available on the PS Move controllers, with better ergonomics, too.

“SIE’s Product, Engineering, and Design teams have collaborated to build our new VR controller from the ground up with a goal of making a huge leap from current-gen VR gaming,” says Nishino. “Prototypes of our new VR controller will be in the hands of the development community soon, and we can’t wait to see what ideas they come up with and how the controller helps bring their imagination to life!”

Sony hasn’t shown off the design of its next-gen VR headset for the PS5 just yet, but the company did reveal it has an improved field of view, resolution, and even a single cord to make it easier to use. Sony isn’t planning to launch its VR headset for the PS5 in 2021, but it’s clear the company is getting ready to test it with game developers soon.

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Technology

Xbox Series X’s Brilliant Auto HDR Feature Is Coming to PC

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Xbox Series X’s brilliant Auto HDR feature is coming to PC, and will improve the visual experience of over 1000 games.The news was revealed in a post on Microsoft’s DirectX Developer Blog, which notes that the feature is initially available as part of the Windows Insider Program, which you can join here.

On the Xbox Series X, Auto HDR improves the range of colours and luminance of backwards-compatible games, and it will function similarly on PC. Users with an HDR-compatible display will be able to improve the visual quality of games by toggling the feature in the Windows HD Color Settings, even if those games weren’t designed with an HDR mode.If you’re still confused about the visual benefits of Auto HDR, there’s a handy example in the blog post (below) which uses a luminance heatmap to show how HDR can bring out the detail in a scene from Gears 5.

Essentially, it’s like using an auto-filter on a picture you’ve taken on your phone. Older games will naturally benefit from this technology, and in many ways are being given a new lease on life thanks to it.

Auto HDR heatmap image. (Source: Microsoft)

As Microsoft previews the feature, it is looking for feedback as it enables Auto HDR on more titles and optimizes performance. As for the performance hit of this new feature, Microsoft says that there will be a slight, but not certainly not intensive, effect. “While Auto HDR does take some GPU compute power to implement, we don’t expect it to significantly impact your gaming experience,” the blog post reads.

It’s not the only Series X perk coming to PC – EA Play is becoming a part of Xbox Game Pass for PC as of today. Meanwhile, Series X users will soon be able to suspend games to improve download speeds.

Jordan Oloman is a freelance writer for IGN. Follow him on Twitter.



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Technology

Super Nintendo World opens at Universal Studios Japan

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Osaka, Japan (CNN) — Children and adults alike waited in line for their turn to experience the world’s first Super Nintendo World and its life-sized Mushroom Kingdom, which opened Thursday at Universal Studios Japan in Osaka.

Many wore the iconic red Mario hat, while others were decked head-to-toe in Nintendo memorabilia.

Minutes after the attendees were let in, lines formed to get pictures with Mario, Luigi, Princess Peach and Toad.

Sisters Mika and Yuko Kobayashi — one wearing a Yoshi headband while carrying a Mario doll — said they became emotional when they first walked into the new park. They’ve been playing Nintendo Games since they were kids, they said. One added that “it’s not an exaggeration to say that Mario raised me.”

Sporting a Princess Peach headband, Sakura Konohana said the park “is beyond my expectations. I feel like I’m in the Mario world.”

While attendees are allowed to interact with the characters — who speak in their video game-sounding voices — they can’t touch them due to coronavirus protocols. So, for now, there’s no high-fiving or hugging. In comparison, Disney parks currently are not allowing character photos amid the pandemic.

Covid-19 restrictions at Universal Studios Japan include temperature checks at the entrance, mandatory mask-wearing, hand sanitizer everywhere, social distancing in line, and signs in front of roller coasters asking riders to refrain from screaming.

This last request isn’t limited to Super Nintendo World. A group of Japanese theme parks asked visitors to “scream in their hearts” instead of out loud last summer in a story that went viral.

Capacity is limited to 10,000 people per day, or about half of pre-COVID visitors, according to park officials.

Costumed characters greet guests on the park’s opening day.

Noriko Yoshinaka took the first train from Kyoto Thursday morning in order to be at the park on opening day.

“I’m scared when I take off my mask to eat food,” Yoshinaka said. “But the park seems to take safety protocols, cleaning the rides and wiping surfaces every time people touch them, so I feel safe.”

Many fans said they are most excited about Koopa’s Challenge: a real-life Mario Kart race through Bowser’s Castle. Riders have to wear augmented-reality headsets to see the projections of other characters and the track as well as to collect coins and to throw items.

In addition to conventional rides, the entire Super Nintendo World is an immersive game in which guests can compete against other gamers in the park.

Just in like in the video game, visitors can jump up and punch “question blocks” and collect virtual coins. Guests can also purchase Power-up Bands, a wristband that can be linked to a smartphone app, where they can store these virtual coins and keys.

Super Nintendo World cost about half a billion dollars to construct and more than six years to develop. The gaming industry — and Nintendo especially — got a big boost during the pandemic, as people in lockdown increasing turned to Nintendo games for escapism.

For Nintendo, this is an important step beyond its core business of video games and consoles. The company is cashing in on its trove of intellectual property and iconic characters, with Nintendo items in gift shops across the theme park.

“They are in a decades-long strategy of going from being a video game company to an entertainment company” by expanding into mobile games, movies, theme parks and merchandise, said David Gibson, analyst at Tokyo-based Astris Advisory.

Visitors strap in to enjoy the Koopa’s Challenge ride.

Philip Fong/AFP/Getty Images

This opening comes as the global theme park industry is struggling. Theme parks are re-opening in a patchwork around the world. There are plans to open Super Nintendo Worlds in California, Singapore and Florida. In Orlando, the opening has reportedly been delayed until 2025.

Last year, Comcast executive Stephen Burke said Nintendo “is one of the biggest potential drivers of attendance that you could have of any kind of IP. It’s up there with Harry Potter.”

Super Nintendo World was originally set to open last summer ahead of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic games. Both have been pushed back by about a year and along with the Olympics, Super Nintendo World was expected to attract an influx of tourists and boost economic activity.

Japan’s borders are still closed, so international travelers can’t come to the park yet. Osaka’s state of emergency was only lifted earlier this month, and Tokyo is still under the declaration.

At the opening ceremony, Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto said he hopes the whole world can visit the park when the pandemic is over.

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Technology

Kuo: OLED iPad Air and Mini-LED MacBook Air coming next year

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Rumors have been suggesting that Apple will soon release a new iPad Pro with a Mini-LED display, but the company also plans to bring this technology to other devices in the future. In a research note obtained by 9to5Mac, reliable analyst Ming-Chi Kuo claims that Mini-LED displays will be used in the MacBook Air by 2022, while the 2022 iPad Air will feature an OLED display.

Kuo points out that although Apple will now adopt Mini-LED displays for the new iPad Pro, other iPad models will switch to OLED displays, beginning with iPad Air next year. Mini-LED panels offer the same benefits as OLED, such as deeper blacks — since the backlighting is based on several small LEDs — but they don’t suffer from burn-in.

However, as Mini-LED is a more expensive technology, Apple plans to bring OLED to the cheaper iPads, which includes the iPad Air and the entry-level iPad. Unlike the iPhone, in which Apple had to use a custom OLED panel that is folded at the bottom, the OLED displays that the company will adopt in the iPad are flat. This means that the cost for the new panels will be close to what Apple currently pays for each LCD panel used in the iPad Air.

According to the analyst, Apple has no plans to bring OLED to its productivity devices because of burn-in concerns, which could be more noticeable by users who work with the same software for hours. Kuo says that the MacBook Air will also get a Mini-LED display by 2022, which will also boost the adoption of this technology.

He previously said that Apple is also working on new redesigned MacBook Pros with Mini-LED, which are expected to be introduced sometime later this year. Bloomberg today reported that the next generation iPad Pro will launch in April with Mini-LED, but only the larger 12.9-inch model will get the new panel.

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Morgan Stewart Shares First Photo of Her Baby Girl Row’s Face

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An adorable debut.

Morgan Stewart just shared the first photo of her newborn daughter Row Renggli McGraw‘s face. The Daily Pop and Nightly Pop co-host re-shared husband Jordan McGraw‘s Instagram story on Wednesday, Mar. 17 and treated fans to an adorable up-close look at her baby girl’s sweet face.

“Those baby blues,” Jordan wrote with a snapshot of Row in a pink onesie cuddling up to mama.

Just yesterday, Morgan celebrated one month since she gave birth to her first child. “The happiest month I’ve ever had,” Morgan shared in IG with a pic of her holding up baby Row. The photo shows off Row’s beautiful eyes, gorgeous face and her already full head of hair.

Morgan and Jordan welcomed their first child on Feb. 17. “Row Renggli McGraw just quickly wanted me to update you guys that after 30 hours, 27 apple juices, & 16 pushes later that she decided to join our party!” the E! personality wrote on Instagram in her announcement.

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Technology

Grimes posts heart-melting video of X AE A-XII, 10 months, laughing as he plays on a synthesizer

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Grimes posts heart-melting video of baby X AE A-XII, 10 months, laughing as he plays on a synthesizer

By Sameer Suri For Dailymail.com

Published: | Updated:

Grimes posted a heart-melting Insta Stories video Wednesday of her 10-month-old son X AE A-XII playing on a little baby synthesizer.

The 33-year-old singer shares her child with her beau, 49-year-old tech heartthrob Elon Musk who is CEO of SpaceX and Tesla.

In her charming new video the baby could be seen making techno music come out of the machine and then laughing.

So sweet: Grimes posted a heart-melting Insta Stories video Wednesday of her 10-month-old son X AE A-XII playing on a little baby synthesizer

Grimes, aka Claire Elise Boucher, could be heard giggling off-camera and cooing at her son: ‘You’re so smart!’ as he played with the synthesizer. 

A couple of months ago Elon passed up Jeff Bezos to become the world’s richest man but at the moment Jeff is back at the top spot according to Forbes. 

When Grimes first gave birth to his baby last May it was initially announced that they had named their child X Æ A-12.  

Family matters: The 33-year-old singer shares her child with her beau, 49-year-old tech heartthrob Elon Musk who is CEO of SpaceX and Tesla

Baby mine: In her charming new video the baby could be seen making techno music come out of the machine and then laughing

However they then discovered that the California constitution only allows legal names to contain characters from the English alphabet.

As a result they eventually changed the name to X Æ A-XII, replacing the Hindu-Arabic numerals ’12’ with Roman numerals signifying the same number.

Elon – who shares five sons with his first wife Justine Wilson and was married twice to his second wife Talulah Riley – has explained how to pronounce X Æ A-XII.

Proud mama: Grimes herself could be heard giggling off-camera and cooing at her son: ‘You’re so smart!’ as he played with the synthesizer

Origin story: When Grimes first gave birth to his baby last May it was initially announced that they had named their child X Æ A-12

Details: Shortly after the baby was born he went on The Joe Rogan Experience and shared that his newest son’s name is verbally said: ‘X Ash A Twelve’

Shortly after the baby was born he went on The Joe Rogan Experience and shared that his newest son’s name is verbally said: ‘X Ash A Twelve.’

He dished that Grimes ‘came up with the name’ except for ‘A-12’ which was ‘my contribution’ and was inspired by Lockheed’s aircraft ‘Archangel-12, the precursor to the SR-71, coolest plane ever. It’s true.’ 

Elon confided: ‘It’s actually, I think it’s better being older and having a kid. I appreciate it more. Yeah, ’cause babies are awesome.’

Side by side: Grimes whose real name is Claire Elise Boucher is pictured with her sizzling beau at the Catholic-themed Met Gala in 2018

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Technology

Automata’s New PC Version Is Better Than The Busted Original Release

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Screenshot: Square Enix

A new PC version of Nier: Automata, part of the Become As Gods Edition, has just been released on the Microsoft Store and Game Pass. And early reports are that, unlike the version available on Steam, this one actually works.

The game’s original PC release on Steam back in 2017 was a notoriously poor port, so much so that fans had to step in and work on “mods” that patched up things that should have been working at release, from framerates to resolution issues.

As notorious as the port, though, was publisher Square Enix’s seeming unwillingness to do anything to fix the game, letting it languish on the marketplace for years, warts and all, in spite of Automata’s critical and commercial success.

That’s changed this week with the PC’s Become As Gods Edition—released first on Xbox back in 2018—which early users are reporting is just fine, and so is likely a direct port of that improved Xbox edition, and not…whatever collection of rat hairs and broken glass the original PC version was made of.

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This PC version of Become As Gods is available on Game Pass, but also directly on the Microsoft Store if you’re reading this in the future and it’s been taken off the subscription service.

Note: While this appears to be a superior version to the original, there are still things present (like a fps cap) that the FAR mod is able to fix or improve on, so if you still want to check that out (or see if it works with this version at all, maybe it won’t!), you can find it here.

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