Beating Elden Ring Nightreign’s toughest bosses comes down to three things: skill, level, and gear. Some of those things can be easily improved with practice and research, but the gear players pick up during a run is mostly down to RNG. However, it turns out there’s an item duplication glitch that can help level the…
Last week alongside announcing the AMD Instinct MI350X/MI355X and the ROCm 7.0 software preview, AMD also introduced the AMD Developer Cloud as a new means for developers to easy try out Instinct accelerators with their own software and with the ROCm compute stack already setup. Having tried out prior AMD cloud compute environments, as soon as my email invite for the AMD Developer Cloud arrived I decided to give it a try.
OnePlus just announced the Nord 5 smartphone, a refresh of its popular mid-range handset line. This one includes a flagship Snapdragon 8S Gen 3 chipset by Qualcomm, which should provide plenty of raw power for gaming, multitasking and general use.
There’s an upgraded cooling system here, along with support for LPDDR5X RAM. It features a dual rear camera system and will be available in a pale blue finish that’s officially called “Dry Ice.”
The company says the upgraded specs allow the Nord 5 to really shine when gaming, touting “unparalleled performance in its class” with “robust support for leading mobile games.” It mentioned that the device can run Call of Duty: Mobile natively at 144FPS, with real-time ray tracing.
OnePlus is also releasing a companion phone called the Nord CE5. We don’t know much about this one, other than it’s likely to be a slightly cheaper version of the standard headset.
Both of these phones will feature the company’s newly-announced Plus Key, which replaced the Alert Slider. Users can customize this button to perform a number of tasks, but it’s better known as an instantaneous way to pull up AI tools. The cute lil AI button first appeared with the OnePlus 13s, which launched in Asia earlier this month.
In addition to the Nord 5, the company also announced the OnePlus Buds 4. These high-end earbuds offer ultra-low latency audio for gamers, with dual drivers, support for Hi-Res audio and other bells and whistles. They will be available in both green and dark gray. It also revealed a new smartwatch and a tablet.
We don’t have pricing or availability information for any of this stuff just yet. The company has a launch event planned for July 8, which should provide us with all of those relevant details.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/smartphones/the-oneplus-nord-5-features-a-powerful-snapdragon-8-chip-143206053.html?src=rss
There’s no denying that getting a high-quality computer is going to set your finances back a bit. So, when one of them gets discounted we want to scream it from the rooftops. Such is the case today with a solid sale on Apple’s 2024 Mac mini (M4).
Right now, the newest Mac mini is available for $499, down from $599 — a 17 percent discount. The deal, which is only $10 more than it’s all-time low price, gets you 16GB RAM and 256GB SSD storage, but no AppleCare+. You can also opt for the 16GB version with 512GB SSD storage for $719, down from $799. Then there’s the top storage option, which has a 10 percent discount. The Mac mini with 24GB RAM and 512GB SSD storage has dropped to $849 from $999.
We gave the newest Apple Mac mini a 90 in our review thanks to perks like the impressive speed of its chip (though we did test the M4 Pro). It also offers front USB-C and headphone ports for easy use, along with an overall smaller design. Plus, it’s great that even the base version starts at 16GB of RAM.
Check out our coverage of the best Apple deals for more discounts, and follow @EngadgetDeals on X for the latest tech deals and buying advice.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/apples-mac-mini-m4-is-back-on-sale-for-499-141523040.html?src=rss
There is a lot of sweet-looking armor in Monster Hunter Wilds, but they’re not all based on the creatures you come across. Some armors require unique materials to be forged. Anyone who has a history with the series likely remembers one such material, the ominously named “Sinister Cloth,” which tasks you with laborious…
Oakley and Meta are teasing a joint launch for Friday.
A new verified Instagram page with the handle oakleymeta and name “Oakley | Meta” posted a collaborative video with the official Meta and Oakley pages teasing the June 20 launch, and the video has been reposted by Mark Zuckerberg.
The branding for the new page mirrors the “Ray-Ban | Meta” branding for the current Ray-Ban Meta glasses, strongly suggesting Meta’s partnership with eyewear giant EssilorLuxottica is about to expand to Oakley too.
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Exactly this was reported by Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman back in January.
While the Ray-Ban Meta glasses have a camera on one side and are aimed towards all consumers, the Oakley Meta glasses will have the camera in the center and be intended for “cyclists and other athletes”, Gurman claimed at the time.
The Ray-Ban Meta glasses have been a breakout hit so far. In February EssilorLuxottica announced that over 2 million units had been sold, and said that annual production capacity is being increased to 10 million by the end of 2026.
UploadVRDavid Heaney
We’ll keep a close eye on Meta and EssilorLuxottica on Friday and bring you the full details of the Oakley Meta glasses once they’re officially revealed.
An anonymous reader shares a report: When Facebook bought WhatsApp for $19 billion in 2014, the messaging app had a clear focus. No ads, no games and no gimmicks. For years, that is what WhatsApp’s two billion users — many of them in Brazil, India and other countries around the world — got. They chatted with friends and family unencumbered by advertising and other features found on social media. Now that is set to change.
On Monday, WhatsApp said it would start showing ads inside its app for the first time. The promotions will appear only in an area of the app called Updates, which is used by around 1.5 billion people a day. WhatsApp will collect some data on users to target the ads, such as location and the device’s default language, but it will not touch the contents of messages or whom users speak with. The company added that it had no plans to place ads in chats and personal messages.
[…] In-app ads are a significant change from WhatsApp’s original philosophy. Jan Koum and Brian Acton, who founded WhatsApp in 2009, were committed to building a simple and quick way for friends and family to communicate with end-to-end encryption, a method of keeping texts, photos, videos and phone calls inaccessible by third parties. Both left the company seven years ago. Since then, Mark Zuckerberg, the chief executive of Facebook, now Meta, has focused on WhatsApp’s growth and user privacy while also melding the app into the company’s other products, including Instagram and Messenger.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
The Bravely Default series has established itself as a well-known RPG franchise that is all but certain to continue growing in the coming years. But the original game has been trapped on the 3DS since its 2014 debut—largely due to its unique two-screen interface—leaving fans to wonder if they’d ever have a chance to…
The traditional summer Nintendo Direct is just around the corner, but it won’t be one of the usual E3-style blowouts. Instead, the upcoming livestream will be devoted entirely to Donkey Kong Bananza, the next big release on the Switch 2’s launch year calendar.
10 million Quest owners have completed at least one track of Beat Saber standalone on their headset.
Beat Saber’s first achievement crossing 10 million unlocks on Quest was spotted by UploadVR reader James Kelley, who brought it to our attention.
Arguably the most widely known VR game of all time, Beat Saber has become somewhat of a cultural phenomenon.
The game originally launched for PC VR in mid 2018, then PlayStation VR in late 2018, and was a launch title for the original Oculus Quest in mid 2019. In November 2019 Facebook acquired Beat Games, though the studio has continued to release all updates for PC VR too, and even launched the game on PlayStation VR2 a few months after it shipped.
Just before the Quest launch, Beat Saber crossed 1 million copies sold, and four months after Quest 2 shipped it reached 4 million.
Meta hasn’t released unit sales figures since then, but in October 2021 said the game had brought in $100 million revenue on Quest alone, and in April 2023 The Wall Street Journal reported that the game had reached $255 million.
UploadVRDavid Heaney
Meta has continued to launch paid DLCs for Beat Saber featuring songs from world-famous artists. Since the acquisition, the game has seen tracks from Imagine Dragons, Panic! at the Disco, Green Day, Timbaland, Linkin Park, BTS, Skrillex, Billie Eilish, Lady Gaga, Fall Out Boy, Lizzo, The Weeknd, Nirvana, Queen, The Rolling Stones, Eminem, 2Pac, The Notorious B.I.G., Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Nicki Minaj, Britney Spears, Metallica, and more.
Beat Saber has been at or near the top of Meta’s weekly top sellers list since the launch of Oculus Quest. And earlier this year, Meta revealed the 50 best-selling paid Quest games of all time via a new section of Quest’s Horizon Store, and Beat Saber holds the #1 spot.
Will any VR game ever top Beat Saber?
Rust developers acknowledge lengthy compiler times can be a significant issue that limits the productivity of developers working with this programming language. For helping in determining different combinations of issues around compiler performance, the Rust team has started a survey to collect more information on the issues…
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild launched with the Nintendo Switch in 2017, and the game’s Nintendo Switch 2 upgrade has ensured that it remains as relevant as ever. And whether Link’s first truly open-world game is calling to you for the first time, or you’re a returning veteran looking to re-explore Hyrule…
Anne Wojcicki has been declared the winner of a bankruptcy auction for 23andMe, the genetics testing start-up she founded, prevailing over a rival bid from Regeneron Pharmaceuticals.
TTAM Research Institute, a non-profit public benefit company also founded by Wojcicki, won the auction with a $305 million bid for the 23andMe assets, which will not come with any company liabilities attached.
23andMe filed for bankruptcy in March after rejecting several go-private offers from Wojcicki in recent years. Regeneron was declared the winning bidder in May after the company accepted a $256 million bid in a previous auction.
While your phone is usually going to be well protected from thieves thanks to whatever you’ve set up on the lock screen—whether a fingerprint, a face scan, or a PIN—there might still be times when someone else has access to your device, including everything on it you’d rather they not see. But if you have a Samsung Galaxy, there’s a good way to safeguard your most sensitive apps and files, even if the phone itself is unlocked.
Maybe your phone gets stolen by a thief who’s spied on you entering your PIN. Maybe a friend is simply swiping through the photos of your last vacation. Whatever the scenario, Galaxy phones come equipped with a digital vault called the Secure Folder, where you can hide specific programs, photos, and files behind an extra layer of security. This way, anyone who does get into your phone won’t be able to find what you’ve stashed away. All the data inside your Secure Folder is encrypted too, via Samsung’s powerful Knox technology.
With One UI 8, now in beta testing, this Secure Folder is more useful than ever. You can now hide the Secure Folder shortcut itself—so anyone snooping can’t see it’s there, let alone see anything inside it—and protect it with different biometrics from the ones you use to get into your phone.
So, for example, you could let your kids into your phone to play games using a fingerprint scan, but they’d still be barred from the Secure Folder. What’s more, apps can now be completely hidden inside the folder, whereas previously there would be one instance of these apps locked away, and one instance in the regular app drawer.
To get started with the Secure Folder on your Galaxy phone, you first need to have a Samsung account and be signed into it on your phone. Assuming that’s taken care of, open Settings and then navigate to Security and privacy > More security settings > Secure Folder. Agree to the terms of the feature and the required permissions to proceed.
You’re then asked to choose a lock type for the Secure Folder: PIN, Password, Pattern, or whatever biometric options you have on your handset. Select any of these options and follow the instructions on screen to set them up; this is how the folder will keep out anyone who isn’t you.
The next screen lets you choose whether or not Secure Folder apps can run in the background when the folder is closed. For maximum security, make sure apps are closed when the Secure Folder is, which will prevent them from sending notifications or appearing in share dialogs when you’re not actually in the folder.
With that done, your Secure Folder appears on screen and is ready to go. You’ll see there are some Samsung apps in there right away, like Contacts and Gallery: These are separate from the versions of those apps outside the Secure Folder, so you can use them like an entirely different contacts list and an entirely different gallery of photos and videos.
Tap the padlock icon to close out of the Secure Folder and go back to the rest of your phone. You can get back in by following the new shortcut that will appear on your home screen and in the app drawer. To make changes to how the Secure Folder is configured, head back to Security and privacy > More security settings > Secure Folder in Settings (accessing this page will now require an identity check, like the folder itself).
With the Secure Folder active, the settings screen changes to let you manage notifications, app options, and even Galaxy AI features. It’s a bit like having a separate, sequestered phone on the same device, with its own selection of settings to match. If you ever want to remove the Secure Folder and its contents, choose More settings > Uninstall.
Once you’re inside the Secure Folder, you can tap the + (plus) button to add apps to it. Choose an app from your phone or find one on the Play Store or Galaxy Store. If you download a new app, it’ll only show up in the Secure Folder; if you pick an app already on your phone, you’ll get a new instance of it inside the folder.
If you add an app already on your phone to your Secure Folder and no longer want it to appear outside of the Secure Folder, you need to uninstall the original instance. Find it in the app drawer, long press on its icon, then choose Uninstall. You can also do this for some of the Samsung apps that get put in your Secure Folder to begin with.
Remember that the Secure Folder is a completely separate space, so you’ll need to sign into your various app accounts again from within it—you can even use different accounts for the apps inside the Secure Folder, if you want. The same goes for the Google Play Store: You’ll be asked to sign in with a Google account, which doesn’t have to be the same Google account you’re using for the rest of your phone.
To add files to your Secure Folder, tap the three dots to the top right of the app panel, then pick Add files. You’ll be able to select files, and choose whether to copy them or move them to the Secure Folder: If you choose the copy option, the original versions of the files will stay in place outside of the folder.
Files that you move or copy over will show up inside the relevant app (Gallery for photos, for example) as well as the My Files app within your Secure Folder. You can manage these files just as you would normally, and you still have all the sharing options available if you need to send them somewhere else.
Tap on the three dots and choose Customize to change the color and icon used for the Secure Folder. If you have upgraded to One UI 8, in the same menu you can find the new Hide Secure Folder option. Enabling this hides the folder from the home screen and app drawer, so the only way to get to it will be via the tile on the Quick Settings panel (swipe down from the top right of the display to find it).
Jim Henson’s Muppets could be coming to VR following talks with Disney—possibly offering a clue at the sort of content Meta reportedly hopes to bring to its next VR headset.
Disney held an event on June 14th celebrating the 70th anniversary of The Jim Henson Company. The event was also a bittersweet sendoff for one of Disney’s Hollywood Studios most famous long-running attractions, Muppet* Vision 3D.
As reported by Disney fan site Laughing Place, The Jim Henson Company CEO Lisa Henson announced at the event that, while Disney closed the physical attraction a few days prior, the company was now “exploring ways to preserve the film and other parts of the experience for fans to enjoy in the future.”
This, Henson said, included discussions with Disney about bringing the attraction-based film to VR, with Laughing Company reporting that the Muppet* Vision 3D was captured using VR cameras.
This follows a Wall Street Journal report from earlier this month alleging that Meta is currently shopping for branded immersive content from companies such as Disney, A24, and smaller production studios.
The WSJ report maintains Meta is hoping to sign timed-exclusive episodic and standalone immersive video content geared towards its next VR headset.
Codenamed ‘Loma,’ the reported device is said to feature a design similar to a pair of eyeglasses that connects to a tethered puck, which is described as having greater compute power than its Quest 3 series of headsets, and a price of “less than $1,000.”
The post Disney in Talks with Jim Henson Company to Bring ‘The Muppets’ to VR appeared first on Road to VR.
SEOUL, South Korea—Drive enough electric vehicles from enough different manufacturers and something becomes clear: the Korean automakers know what they’re doing. From small cars like the Niro all the way to three-row SUVs, the EVs coming out of Kia (and its sibling Hyundai) are as efficient as anything out there, usually with a distinctive style. It’s fair to say they’re at the front of the pack, at least as far as EVs offered to North America.
And soon, there will be a new one to consider. It’s the Kia EV4, a small electric sedan that uses a new version of the E-GMP platform that has so impressed us in cars like the EV6. Originally designed for midsize and larger vehicles and operating at 800 V, the E-GMP powertrain is very capable but also relatively expensive to make. Now Kia has taken what it learned with the 800 V experience and applied it to the new 400 V version that’s suitable for smaller and cheaper EVs.
Kia told Ars that while the development know-how carried over to the new lower-voltage components, the battery, motors, and power electronics are all new. The car arrives in the US in Q4 of this year and will feature a native NACS charging port. There’s only one motor being offered for now, which generates 201 hp (150 kW) and 209 lb-ft (283 Nm) and drives the front wheels. But there are two choices of battery: the standard 58.3 kWh, which Kia reckons should achieve an EPA range of 235 miles (378 km); and an 81.4 kWh long-range pack, that should be sufficient for 330 miles (531 km) on North American roads. In time, expect a twin-motor, all-wheel drive option, as well as a more powerful EV4 GT.