
The brilliant VR music game Maestro gets a DLC that lets you conduct famous compositions from Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones.
The post Conducting Lord of the Rings in VR is a moving experience appeared first on MIXED Reality News.

The brilliant VR music game Maestro gets a DLC that lets you conduct famous compositions from Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones.
The post Conducting Lord of the Rings in VR is a moving experience appeared first on MIXED Reality News.
Just in case you thought the Moots Routt CRD wasn’t exclusive enough, the Steamboat, Colorado, titanium specialists have been busy working on this ultra-limited-edition version.
Based on the ‘standard’ Routt CRD, the limited-edition bike gets Moots’ lightweight RSL titanium tubing, along with 3D-printed Universal Derailleur Hanger dropouts, a T47 bottom bracket, an all-new integrated cockpit and Moots’ carbon gravel fork.
The California Dreamin’ Routt CRD isn’t your average gravel bike, though – it comes with another layer of exclusivity and a price tag of $15,899.

The California Dreamin’ Routt CRD is a collaboration with Chris Johnston of Outdoor Bros.

The finish of the bike is inspired by Johnston’s ride along the west coast of California, from the Pacific Coast Highway to the gravel routes in the Sierra Nevada.
“I wanted a bike that could adapt seamlessly to whatever terrain I encountered,” Johnston explains. “It needed to have both capability and personality, capturing the essence of California style and performance.”


What that means is a Moots CRD with a massively labour-intensive finish. Moots told us it takes three full working days to complete the finish alone.
The finish involves a meticulous anodising treatment that shifts from a high-voltage blue to a vibrant pink. It is paired with hand-finished checkerboard graphics and subtle skull details.
Moots’ in-house specialist Richard Jara completes each frameset by hand, meaning no two frames from this limited run are alike.
“The anodising process is like painting with voltage, and Jara is Michelangelo,” says Johnston. “Every frame will have nuances, subtle colour shifts, and intentional imperfections that add character and depth. It’s raw, refined and thoughtfully detailed.”

A frameset or complete bike can be ordered from Moots, but the run is limited to 25, so it won’t be around for long.

The complete bike includes:
The Paprika 53 Model 25 GT is the first electric gravel bike to to feature the DJI Avinox motor, providing a huge 120Nm torque and 1000W peak power.
The Chinese brand teased the electric gravel bike last week, with pictures on its website blurring the DJI Avinox drive unit.
The Model 25 GT sits on the gnarly end of the gravel spectrum, featuring a RockShox Rudy Ultimate XPLR fork and 50mm wide Maxxis Rambler tyres.
Paprika 53 says the bike will be available to preorder from its website on May 3, with pricing and regional availability revealed at launch.

Until now, the Avinox motor has only been available on DJI’s Amflow mountain bike, where it has received an impressive reception – with our own Rob Weaver saying it’s the best motor he’s ever ridden.
While Forbidden’s Druid E launched today was long rumoured to be the first third-party bike to feature the motor, Paprika 53’s Model 25 GT joins it on launch day as the first electric gravel bike.

The bike features a full carbon fibre frame, integrating the DJI’s touchscreen display into the top tube, battery in the downtube and motor in the bottom bracket area.
Paprika 53 says it has made the bike as compliant as possible, theorising that the added power will mean riders spend more time in the saddle.

RockShox Rudy Ultimate XPLR fork features on the front of the bike, giving it 40mm of suspension travel.
The frame features what Paprika 53 calls a dropline dip to absorb bumps, with the design also allowing for better saddle height adjustability.
As well as two bottle cage mounts, the frame appears to have accessory mounts under the drop line dip and under the top tube, although these don’t look compatible with the standard mounting hardware.
SRAM’s Reverb AXS XPLR dropper post sits in the frame, allowing for the saddle to be dropped out of the way on descents.

The brand has developed its own handlebar – the Parabola Carbon Bar which features 25 degrees of flare, and is said to add control and comfort to the front end.
A mullet drivetrain is used, combining SRAM’s road Force eTap AXS shifters and X01 Eagle AXS mountain bike drivetrain with a 38t front chainring and 11-50t cassette.
Paprika 53’s own carbon wheels are wrapped in 50mm Maxxis’ Rambler tyres.
Forbidden has announced two new eMTBs, utilising the brand’s high-pivot suspension design and the DJI Avinox motor – the Druid E LitE and the Druid E CorE.
Both of the bikes in the new Druid E family have two travel options, with correspondingly different battery sizes.
The Druid E LitE has 140mm of rear-wheel travel, paired with a 150mm fork and a 600Wh battery from DJI.
The Druid E CorE has 150mm of travel, a 160mm fork and a larger 800Wh battery.

While the Druid E LitE is slightly more trail-focused, the CorE is built with burlier kit, and is named to honour Forbidden’s late bike builder, Cory Thornton.
Forbidden’s goal was to build a bike that matches the capability and ride characteristics of the Druid mountain bike, with the added punch of the market’s most powerful motor.

As I wrote a few months ago, this could be the electric mountain bike to beat.
Forbidden’s high-pivot suspension layout gives it great on-trail characteristics. It’s smooth and fast, and capable on the toughest terrain.
At the same time, the DJI Avinox motor in the Amflow bike blew almost every bike tester away with its controllable, high levels of power and torque – as yet still unmatched (despite Specialized’s best efforts).
Combining the two, as I hoped would happen, should make for an extremely capable eMTB.

Both of the new bikes feature a carbon construction, including carbon links. There’s plenty of protection on there to keep the frame safe and the ride quiet.
There’s space for a full-sized bottle in the frame, as well as an accessory mount.
Oversized bearings, additional sealing and a steel idler featuring two sets of bearings are there to boost durability, while the bikes come with a lifetime warranty.
The bikes feature mixed wheel sizes. Forbidden claims this helps keep them agile and manoeuvrable, despite the added weight of the motor and battery.

Although they’re modern, the figures on the geometry sheet might not look particularly extreme.
However, there’s good reason for this, according to Forbidden.
The reach figure, in particular, is fairly short (in the most modern terms), while the stack is tall.
Forbidden says the distance between the cranks and the bar is what really dictates geometric fit.
Put the front end up higher – for DH control and confidence – and you can reduce the reach, ensuring there’s a consistent fit and feel.
So, don’t expect any wild, stretched ride positions here.
To further complement this descending bias, there are short seat tubes to maximise dropper drop – 180mm on the smallest size – and short cranks.
The LitE has 155mm cranks, while the CorE gets 150mm.

There’s tons of hype around the DJI Avinox motor, and it’s easy to see why brands, especially smaller, more reactive ones, are flocking towards it.
The first reason is the power – 800W peak power, with a 1,000W boost function is, frankly, ridiculous.
Then there’s the lesser-discussed (but more important in my opinion) torque figure – the real grunt of an eMTB motor when you’re churning up a techy climb – 120Nm here.

That surpasses the new S-Works-only torque figure of 111Nm on the new Turbo Levo, the new Druid’s closest competitor, and will beat rumoured updates to Bosch’s motor, as far as we understand.
It’s also not a particularly heavy system, at 2.5kg (the Bosch Performance CX comes in at 2.8kg), and the UI and app are as detailed as they come.

At the time of writing, we are waiting for confirmed specifications and pricing. We will update the story when we have this information.
Unno’s updated Mith eMTB is one of the first bikes to use the impressive DJI Avinox drive unit.
The motor in question can deliver a whopping 105Nm of torque and 850 watts of peak power as standard, but flick it into the short-burst Boost mode, and there’s 120Nm and 1,000 watts on tap.
It also becomes one of the lightest, longest-travel electric mountain bikes on the market, weighing a claimed 21.2kg with 160mm of rear-wheel travel on tap.

Powering this is an 800Wh battery encased within the sleek carbon frame.
Its slender tube shapes hide the fact that it’s an eMTB, let alone the fact that it’ll be one of the most powerful on the trails.
Despite the cheapest bike in the range costing just over £8,000, I still think this beast of a bike will be in high demand.

While the previous-generation Mith was built around the Bosch Performance Line CX motor, the new bike is one of the first to use the DJI Avinox drive unit.
This motor offers Eco, Trail, Auto and Turbo modes, along with the more powerful Boost setting.

From a design point of view, though, it’s the compact size and low 2.52kg weight that open up possibilities for the engineers.
Powering the Avinox motor as standard is the 800Wh battery, although there is a 600Wh option if you’re looking to bring the overall weight down a bit.

In addition to the motor and battery technology, Unno has also able to make use of the Avinox’s incredible integration, including the top-tube mounted touchscreen, wireless bar-mounted controllers and the Avinox app that enables you to customise just about everything you can think of.

Unno has made changes to the full-carbon frame, built around a mixed-wheel setup.
For a start, the brand has ditched the headset-routed cables in a bid to keep things simple – and keep riders happy.
The frames are lined with cable guides to make the job of swapping hoses easier, too.
On top of that, the new rear-shock position should make setup quicker, with better access to the damper and all its adjustments.

It can also now take a coil shock, too.
Shorter seat tubes, which now range from 400-440mm across the three sizes, have been shortened to allow for longer-travel dropper posts across all sizes.
Other improvements include better chainstay and lower-link protection, along with a rubber-coated (internally) chain guide to help keep the Mith silent while you ride.

The linkage bearings are now bigger and said to be better sealed, while there are integrated fenders to protect the shock and links from rear-wheel spray.
Finally, there’s room for a 750ml bottle within the front triangle.
All frames get a lifetime warranty, too.

The 160mm of rear-wheel travel is controlled using Unno’s virtual-pivot system.
This is configured to create an extremely supple first 30 per cent of the travel before more support kicks in through the middle of the travel, hitting a controlled ramp-up at the end of the stroke.
Unno suggests two sag settings, depending on what you’re riding. You can set the shock up with 30 per cent sag for the ‘standard’ geometry setup, or 35 per cent sag in the race setup, which Unno says is ideal on steeper trails.
Anti-squat values (the amount the bike resists bobbing while you pedal) remain above 100 per cent in both of these settings.

Unno is offering the Mith in only three sizes, meaning there’s a chance not everyone will be catered for.
Reach figures range from 430-490mm.
The head angle is slacker than the previous iteration of the bike, now sitting at 63.5 degrees, and can be made slacker by 0.5 degrees if you opt to put the bike into the low setting.
We’ve emailed Unno to confirm this because there’s nothing about it in the press materials, apart from a single line regarding changes.
Seat tube angles are set at 77 degrees across all sizes, while the chainstay length remains 450mm across the board.
| | S1 | S2 | S3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Seat tube angle (degrees) | 77 | 77 | 77 |
| Head tube angle (degrees) | 63.5 | 63.5 | 63.5 |
| Chainstay (mm) | 450 | 450 | 450 |
| Seat tube (mm) | 400 | 420 | 440 |
| Top tube (mm) | 560 | 590 | 623 |
| Head tube (mm) | 107 | 120 | 145 |
| Bottom bracket drop (mm) | 30 – 15 | 30 – 15 | 30 – 15 |
| Wheelbase (mm) | 1225 | 1261 | 1302 |
| Standover (mm) | 706 | 706 | 706 |
| Stack (mm) | 624 | 636 | 658 |
| Reach (mm) | 430 | 460 | 490 |

There are two build options available, both of which use the same carbon frame and DJI Avinox motor, 800Wh battery, Fox Factory-level suspension and short, 155mm e*thirteen cranks.
Xbox has released a new commercial directed by David Fincher that features a bunch of CGI rat-human hybrids in a dirty, crowded city. It’s the kind of ad we don’t often see anymore, and it reminds me of some of the weirdest live-action ads Sony used to make for the PS2 and PS3.
Photos of Wout van Aert’s recce ride ahead of Paris-Roubaix this weekend show the Visma–Lease a Bike leader using Gravaa’s KAPS tyre inflation system.
The Gravaa system uses a hub containing a mini-electronic inflator, which enables the rider to adjust tyre pressures on the fly via a wireless trigger mounted on the bars.
The Gravaa system was initially designed for gravel racing, where Marianne Vos used it to ride to victory at the 2024 UCI Gravel World Championships.
However, this isn’t Gravaa’s first sighting in the cobbled Classics, with three of Visma–Lease a Bike’s riders using the system in the 2023 edition of Paris-Roubaix.
Dylan van Baarle, Christophe Laporte, and Edoardo Affini all used the pressure adjustment system, though van Baarle – the Paris-Roubaix winner in 2022 with Ineos-Grenadiers – was involved in a crash that ended his race.

Judging by the photos of van Aert’s recce on Thursday, the Belgian is riding his favoured Cervélo S5, while the wheelset looks like Reserve’s Gravaa-compatible wheelset with a 42mm-deep front and 49mm-deep rear rim.
The Vittoria tyres look to take up nearly all of the S5’s 34mm tyre clearance. Could Wout be using the largest 32mm size available in the Corsa Pro range?

Wout also looks to be using SRAM Red AXS in a 1x setup, and the crankset appears to be the Red Aero E1 1x option.
We’ve previously reported on how 1x has been a major tech talking point at this year’s Spring Classics, albeit the XPLR gravel version used by Lidl-Trek through the hilly cobbled races.

Whether van Aert will use the Gravaa system in Sunday’s race remains to be seen.
At the very least, he’ll be gathering some very useful pre-race tyre pressure data ahead of the toughest one-day race on the professional calendar for both riders and their equipment.
Fwupd 2.0.8 introduces new plugins to update UEFI Signature Database and KEK, plus several bug fixes enhancing UEFI and hardware compatibility.
Fans were left scratching their heads when Marvel recently revealed that a bunch of the cast from the early aughts X-Men movies would seemingly be reprising their roles in Avengers: Doomsday. What would put them on a collision course with Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark turned Victor von Doom? Well, after seeing an…
Buying a house has always been a stressful experience. It involves a lot of money for most people, and it’s where you’re going to live, the most meaningful space in your life. Finding the house that ticks all the financial, physical, and emotional boxes can be a challenge. And it’s a challenge that a lot of people fail: 82% of home buyers experience buyer’s remorse.
House hunting should be relatively straightforward—you need X number of bedrooms, X amount of square footage, in this specific area, at this specific price, with this short list of features and amenities. But we often let our emotions mess us up, usually without even realizing it. Considering how much of your money and time is going into buying a house, you owe it to yourself to be aware of these six psychological traps that can lead you to the wrong house.
It’s natural—and often useful—to imagine your future life in a house, to picture your family around the dining table, or the perfect spot for a prized piece of furniture. But all that imagining can lead to a phenomenon called the endowment effect, where you place a higher value on something you own. By imagining your future in the house, in a sense you’re imagining that you already own it, and suddenly it becomes much more valuable and important to you. This can lead to irrational decisions like overbidding for the house.
To defend against this, try to keep your imaginings unemotional—measurements, use of space, correct number of rooms, fixtures, and outlets. Avoid emotionally charged visions like prom pictures at the foot of the stairs or serving holiday dinners to a crowd of friends and family.
The anchoring effect causes us to put too much weight on the first piece of data we require, creating a bias that influences all subsequent decisions. With a house, the first piece of data you typically get is the list price—and real estate agents and home sellers always tweak the list price for their own purposes. They might set it low to inspire a bidding war, or set it high to imply the house is special in some way. Either way, they’re trying to anchor that price in your head in order to manipulate you in some way.
To fight back, research the fundamentals and come up with your own fair price for the property (your real estate agent can help you with this). Once you have an objective opinion on what the house is actually worth in the market, you can proceed using the list price as a starting point for negotiation instead of an anchor.
Bidding wars work because of herd behaviors—once we see other people doing something, it suddenly seems like a much more legitimate option. Contagion theory describes how an opinion held by a large majority can “infect” individuals, which can come into play when people are bidding way over listing price on a property and you suddenly feel like the house is worth more than you thought.
Another herding behavior that can push you to overpay for a property is the scarcity principle—the belief that a limited supply makes something more valuable. That can explain how a house that you thought a bit overpriced yesterday can suddenly seem worth much more once you realize the inventory of comparable houses is not as large as you thought—but the fundamentals of the house or the market haven’t changed.
The scarcity principle can be explicitly leveraged against you by someone selling a home, as well. Listings that emphasize the unique features of a house—maybe it’s the only one on the block with a basement, or has an outdoor space no other house in the neighborhood boasts—can make the home seem more valuable even if those features weren’t on your list of must-haves.
Also called “analysis paralysis,” this psychological phenomenon occurs when you’re overwhelmed by choices, decisions, or what-if scenarios. We tend to assume that having more choices is always better—but having to constantly sift through property features or having to choose between several very similar, comparable properties can leave you frozen and unable to make a decision. That can lead to losing out on a house that’s perfect for you and your family—not to mention much higher stress levels.
Combating choice paralysis when house hunting is all about slowing down and shutting out. Seeing a dozen potential houses every day will just leave you with a long list of houses that might work. Instead, take each potential house one at a time, and focus on that property. Have a plan based on facts—what you can afford, what you need to have in your home—and carefully consider each property against that plan before moving on.
The sunk-cost fallacy is a psychological trick that you can actually play on yourself. It boils down to a feeling that once you’ve invested time and energy into something, walking away would transform the whole experience into a huge waste of time. That pushes you to try and salvage that time. When house-hunting, that translates into buying a house in part because you’ve put a lot of time into it.
Combating the sunk-cost fallacy when house hunting can be a challenge. The key is to resist attaching a value to the basic work of finding a house and negotiating the sale. The ultimate value is getting the right home, not in paying yourself for the time spent finding it.
The fear of missing out can drive people to worry that prices or interest rates are going to rise and they’ll be priced out of the market; that a particular house will get snatched up by someone else if they hesitate to make the jump; or that time is running out for them to jump into home ownership. Once you convince yourself that you’re about to miss your one and only shot to get the house hunt right, you’re vulnerable to bad decisions.
The only way to defend against FOMO is to remove the fear part. Having the advice of a trusted real estate professional and doing some research about the market can reassure you about home prices, and getting pre-approved by a lender can give you confidence in your buying power and ability to make an offer when the perfect house comes along. Most importantly, hit pause and ask yourself if you would buy this house at this price if all the perceived pressure was taken away.


In addition to the upcoming GCC 15 stable compiler release bringing a COBOL language front-end, much better Rust support, revamped AVX10 support, and other shiny new language features and hardware supports, there are also some more fundamental usability improvements for developers…

Shifting political and regulatory winds have led to fewer shareholder resolutions on environmental and social issues.
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There are no surprises with the Blink Video Doorbell camera. Blink is an established brand, and the doorbell camera has been around since 2022. What might be surprising is how cheap it has become: You can get the Blink Video Doorbell and Sync Module 2 for $34.99 (originally $69.99) after a 50% discount, the lowest price it has been, according to price-tracking tools.
Blink is owned by Amazon, so it’s no surprise to see the doorbell get a big discount there—and that also means it is compatible with Amazon Alexa, but no other competitors.
The Blink Video Doorbell can be wireless or use batteries, which last up to two years (depending on how many triggers you get a day). It uses your phone as a chime bell, has two-way audio so you can communicate with guests from your phone, and supports 1080p resolution and infrared night vision. You’ll get a 180-degree field of view, so you can see your whole porch via the camera. Of course, you can also use the camera indoors, if needed.
The Sync Module 2 is a hub that lets you control up to 10 Blink devices with your phone and use local storage for your video files instead of paying for cloud storage, but you’ll need to buy a USB flash drive of up to 256 GB (sold separately). Keep in mind that you will still need a Blink subscription to use all of Blink’s features (but it’s not necessary). The Blink subscription plan starts at $30 a year for Blink Basic. You can read more about this camera and hub from PCMag’s “good” review.
Meta is partnering with Blumhouse to launch “Movie Mate” technology that encourages moviegoers to use their phones during theatrical screenings, beginning with an April 30 showing of “Megan” at Blumhouse’s “Halfway to Halloween Film Festival.” According to Variety, the system enables viewers to chat with a Megan-themed AI chatbot, answer trivia questions, and access behind-the-scenes information while watching the film in theaters.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Bungie is set to take the wrappers off Marathon this Saturday and reveal gameplay from its first non-Destiny project in many years (and its first new one since joining Sony in 2022). Before that though, the studio has confirmed one detail about the multi-platform extraction shooter that PC and Xbox gamers may like to hear. The game won’t force players to log in with a PlayStation account on those platforms.
The Marathon team confirmed on the game’s official Discord server that “Marathon will not require a PlayStation Account for players on PC and Xbox.” The developers said this in response to a user who was concerned that they might not be able to play Marathon on PC, since PSN wasn’t supported in their country.
This is relevant considering the Helldivers 2 mess from last year. The PC version of that Sony-published game was going to require players to connect to a PSN account. That wasn’t enforced during the first three-ish months Helldivers 2 was available on Steam due to network issues, but it was later going to come into effect. The shift would have locked out players who had already bought the game in countries where PSN wasn’t available.
Sony quickly backtracked on the PSN requirement for Helldivers 2 following a backlash but the situation tarnished the reputation of a great game. The company later dropped mandatory PSN logins for many of its single-player games on PC, though it tried to incentivize players for linking their Steam account to PSN by offering in-game goodies.
Bungie hasn’t said much about Marathon since announcing its revival two years ago, but the gameplay showcase this weekend will shed much more light on what the game’s all about. For what it’s worth, streamer DrLupo claims to have been playtesting Marathon through various iterations over the last six years, and said it’s gotten better each time he’s tried it.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/bungies-marathon-wont-force-xbox-and-pc-players-to-log-in-with-a-playstation-account-144127907.html?src=rss
As a Soulslike, The First Berserker: Khazan demands you make the most of every input during battle, including landing perfect counterattacks so that you can punish your foes. If your playstyle revolves around ripostes, you may want to seek out the Great General Set. But before you can get the blacksmith to make it for…