Many people think of their furry, four-legged friends as being part of their family, so it can be hard to leave them for the holidays. But with holiday travel being hectic enough on its own, it’s not always clear whether to add your mutt to the mix.
Source: LifeHacker – How to Decide Whether to Board or Bring Your Pet on a Holiday Road Trip
A processing incident that caused the entire Webb Space Telescope to shake did not cause any perceptible damage to the observatory, a NASA-led investigation has concluded.
Source: Gizmodo – Webb Telescope Not Damaged Following Mounting Incident, NASA Says
Sipeed has launched a tiny, SoM-like “LicheeRV” SBC that runs Linux on an Allwinner D1 RISC-V SoC. The board supports standalone use, but is primarily intended to plug into upcoming “Lichee RV-86” panel PC and future carriers.
Source: LXer – SBC runs Linux on Allwinner D1 RISC-V SoC
If you want to make music on your computer, you’ll need a digital audio workstation or DAW. One of our favorites is Ableton Live and it’s currently on sale for Black Friday. Until Monday, November 29th, you can get 25 percent off all of the company’s music-making software. That includes all three tiers of Ableton Live 11. The “Intro” tier currently costs $74, down from its usual price of $99, while the “Standard” and “Suite” versions are priced at $337 and $562 at the moment. Abelton has also reduced the cost of Standard and Suite upgrades by 25 percent. You can also get that same discount on packs.
We’ve seen Ableton offer a 30 percent discount on its software a couple of times in the past, but it doesn’t do so frequently. Students and teachers can get Ableton Live 11 for 40 percent off. If you don’t fall in that category, this may be the best deal you can get on the DAW for the foreseeable future.
When it comes to audio production tools, Ableton Live is one of our favorites, particularly after the recent version 11 update. The interface can be intimidating at first, but once you learn to find your way around, you’ll discover that it will encourage you to experiment. If you want to try the software before you commit any money, Ableton offers a 90-day trial. That’s enough time to get a good sense of what it’s all about.
Get the latest Black Friday and Cyber Monday offers by visiting our deals homepage and following @EngadgetDeals on Twitter.
Source: Engadget – Albeton software and packs are 25 percent off for Black Friday
Black Friday is awful, and we should all refuse to take part. But in other news, goodness gracious, there are a lot of amazing prices on Nintendo Switch just now. Publishers like Capcom, Ubisoft and EA have joined Nintendo’s own first-party titles in luring you toward the evils of capitalist convenience.
Source: Kotaku – The Nintendo Switch Has Crazy Sales On Right Now
After years of wondering when, not if, Mass Effect would ever make the leap from video games to film or TV, it would seem we’re at last on that precipice: Amazon has eyes on bringing BioWare’s sci-fi shooter/Garrus Vakarian dating simulator to streaming. But the question should be less if the Mass Effect series should…
Source: Gizmodo – The Mass Effect TV Show Shouldn’t Star Commander Shepard
Did you manage to score a Nintendo Switch OLED before the bots and scalpers claimed them all? In addition to the improved display, it also features twice as much storage as the regular Switch console, but you can never have too much. Not to worry, though—storage is expandable by way of an SD memory card slot, and Black Friday discounts on
Source: Hot Hardware – Check Out These Killer Black Friday Deals On SanDisk SD Cards, Chromecast And TVs Up To Half Off
An Ontario grandmother who bought an educational toy for her 15-month-old granddaughter was shocked when the dancing cactus started swearing and singing about doing cocaine. From a report: “This toy uses swear words and talking about cocaine use,” Ania Tanner told CTV News Toronto. “This is not what I ordered for my granddaughter.” The cactus was sold on Walmart’s website as an educational toy for about $26 and sings songs in English, Spanish and Polish. But Tanner, who is Polish, said when she listened to the Polish lyrics, the cactus was singing about doing cocaine, drug abuse, suicide, depression and used profanities. “It just so happens that I am Polish and when I started to listen to the songs and I heard the words,” she said. “I was in shock. I thought what is this some kind of joke?” The song is by Polish Rapper Cypis, who is reportedly unaware his song was used by the Chinese manufacturer of the children’s toy. “It’s about taking five grams of cocaine and being alone … It’s a very depressing song,” Tanner said. This singing cactus toy was also sold in Europe through Amazon and in July 2021 other families also noticed and complained about the lyrics that many felt were inappropriate for a children’s toy.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot – Walmart Pulls Children’s Toy That Swears and Sings in Polish About Doing Cocaine
There are ultra-wide monitors, and then there’s the class of super-wide 49-inch displays that take expansive screen real estate to a whole new level. Samsung has been the primary driver of 49-inch monitors, though ASUS and others have dabbled as well. One more contender just entered the ring—Monoprice.
Yes, the company that is perhaps best
Source: Hot Hardware – Monoprice Dark Matter 49-Inch Gaming Monitor Is Ready To Rumble With Samsung
Concrete and steel are two of those immutable things. They make up the foundation of modern life, the things that give shape to seemingly every structure around us.
Source: Gizmodo – I Can’t Stop Watching These Power Plant Demolition Videos
Warning: this headline is possibly a slight exaggeration. But adventure games certainly saved my afternoon, and some enormous embarrassment. Because earlier this week, I found myself locked in my bathroom, with no sensible means of rescue. Then immediately fell back on 40 years of adventure gaming, to make good my…
Source: Kotaku – Adventure Games Saved My Life (Well, My Afternoon)
Not everyone is on the same page when it comes to food allergies and intolerances, and dietary restrictions and preferences, and that’s never more evident than at a holiday meal. While your immediate family may know you’re vegan or lactose intolerant, that’s not necessarily the case with extended family, friends, or…
Source: LifeHacker – How to Share Your Dietary Preferences and Restrictions Without Sounding Rude
If you’ve been wondering whether you can install Zoom on Linux, we answer that here, showing how to install Zoom on Linux distributions.
Source: LXer – How to Install Zoom on Linux
Astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) showed that you can celebrate Thanksgiving and the holidays even while orbiting the Earth in space. The crew made a video of them sharing what they are thankful for this holiday season.
Most of us in the United States are use to a Thanksgiving where we sit down at the family table
Source: Hot Hardware – Watch NASA Astronauts Detail Thanksgiving Dinner And Celebrations In Space Aboard The ISS
Anomalies. What Star Trek fan doesn’t love an anomaly? I love ‘em, you love ‘em, Starfleet bridge crews definitely love ‘em, and Discovery is no exception. But Discovery is still the show it has been from the start, which means its approach to exploring the unknown of the week is going to be much, much more dramatic…
Source: Gizmodo – Star Trek: Discovery Took a Classic Premise and Cranked It Up Way Past 11
It’s now that much easier to use Arturia’s softsynths on your brand new MacBook. Arturia has released a free V Collection 8.2 update that adds native support to the (currently discounted) suite for Macs with M1 processors. That should improve performance, as you might guess, but it could also help with battery life if you need to play unplugged.
Other speed updates are in store. The update boosts the performance of 4K interfaces through a new framework, and presets from the V Collection factory libraries now load up to twice as quickly. You’ll also find ODDSound MTS-ESP microtuning compatibility for the Clavinet V, DX7 V, Piano V and Stage-73 V.
This might be an important update if you use softsynths for music-making. Arturia has a reputation for virtual instruments that are both meticulous and relatively accessible. This both makes V Collection more viable on M1 Macs and gives you more incentive to rely on digital synths instead of hunting down their costlier real-world counterparts.
Source: Engadget – Arturia’s V Collection instruments now have native M1 Mac support
Enlarge / Daan Roosegaarde is the artist behind the glow-in-the-dark Van Gogh fietspad (bike path). (credit: Daan Roosegaarde, CC BY-SA 3.0)
Around the year 1603, Italian shoemaker and amateur alchemist Vincenzo Casciarolo tried smelting some especially dense stone he had found on the slopes of Mount Paderno, near Bologna. No gold, silver, or other precious metals resulted as he had hoped. But after the stone had cooled, Casciarolo discovered something interesting: if he exposed the material to sunlight and then took it into a dark room, the stone would glow.
That “Bologna Stone” was the first artificially prepared, persistently luminescent substance. Many more were to follow—and today, persistent luminescent materials are used for decorations, emergency lighting, pavement markings, and medical imaging.
Someday they might give us glowing cities that stay cooler and use less electricity.
Read 18 remaining paragraphs | Comments
Source: Ars Technica – Will glow-in-the-dark materials someday light our cities?
Germany is set to decide on tougher Covid-19 restrictions and could even opt for a full lockdown amid record daily infections and mounting pressure on hospitals. From a report: Olaf Scholz, Germany’s chancellor-designate, said Wednesday that the Covid situation was serious and that the country would massively push its vaccination campaign, noting that “vaccination is the way out of this pandemic.” Scholz said Germany “should make vaccination compulsory for certain groups,” without stating which groups, while new Finance Minister Christian Lindner stated that Germans should avoid all unnecessary contact this winter “to preserve all of our health in this pandemic.”
That Scholz chose to address the Covid crisis as he and his new government colleagues announced a draft coalition deal on Wednesday shows where the officials’ immediate priorities lie. The country’s outgoing health minister, Jens Spahn, issued a dire warning to Germans this week, saying that by the end of winter “pretty much everyone in Germany will be vaccinated, recovered or dead.” Outgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel has called on the heads of Germany’s 16 federal states (which have largely been free to determine their own Covid measures) to decide upon stricter rules by Wednesday. On Tuesday, Spahn reiterated that request, adding that more public spaces should be restricted to the vaccinated, the recently recovered, or those that have had a negative test — otherwise known as the “3G rule.” From Wednesday, 3G rules apply to any Germans going into the workplace or accessing public transport.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot – Germany Considers a Full Covid Lockdown and Mandatory Vaccines
By my own rough count, the Halo series has seen some 150 or so multiplayer maps over the course of its two decades. Many of these are good. Some are great. And of course, some are terrible. For this list, I and my fellow Kotaku Halo fans tried to narrow this extensive field down to what we consider to be the top 15…
Source: Kotaku – The Top 15 Halo Multiplayer Maps
Streaming devices are pretty affordable nowadays, but there are some benefits to opting for a more expensive model like the Apple TV 4K. We consider it to be the best high-end streaming box, and right now it’s on sale for $160, which is one of the better prices we’ve seen. Amazon has the device for $169, but an automatically applied coupon will knock the price down to $160 at checkout.
Buy Apple TV 4K at Amazon – $160
Apple modestly upgraded its set-top box this year with the biggest improvement being the new Siri remote. The previous remote that came with the Apple TV 4K was clunky to use, but this new model is a huge improvement. It’s larger and has a touch-sensitive directional pad that makes it much easier to swipe and scroll between content on your screen. It’s reminiscent of the iPod scrollwheel of yesteryear, and that’s a good thing.
If you’re familiar with the previous generation Apple TV 4K, you may not notice too much of a difference when it comes to performance. The new model has an A12 Bionic chip that helps the gadget run smoothly, and we appreciate its support for Dolby Vision at 60 fps, Dolby Atmos sound and AirPlay 3. This model even supports HomeKit, so you can ask Siri to show you things like video camera feeds and they’ll pop up right on your TV screen. We also found Siri to be quite useful for executing entertainment commands like “show me Christmas movies” or “play the latest episode of Ted Lasso.”
The biggest drawback to the Apple TV 4K is price — it’s normally $180, so it’s worthwhile to wait for the (rare) sales in which it drops even slightly lower than that. But it’s by no means the only streaming box out there — we also like the Roku Ultra and, even though it’s not technically a box, the latest Chromecast with Google TV is another solid option that also has an updated, handy remote.
Get the latest Black Friday and Cyber Monday offers by visiting our deals homepage and following @EngadgetDeals on Twitter.
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Source: Engadget – The 2021 Apple TV 4K is on sale for 0 right now
