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When it comes to gaming monitors, having an ultra-wide curved screen takes the experience to the next level, with a more immersive experience than a regular monitor. Unfortunately, that improved experience tends to come at a much higher price. But there are budget monitors that go on sale, making it much more affordable to upgrade your gaming without hurting your wallet too much. Samsung is currently selling its 34-inch Samsung Odyssey G5 for $279.99 (originally $399.99).
The Samsung Odyssey G5 is a great ultra-wide monitor for those who haven’t used one before, with all the important specs you’d want while keeping the price relatively low. Other high-end, bigger ultra-wide monitors go upwards of $700, like the Odyssey OLED G9. Those are much bigger and offer OLED quality visuals, though.
The Odyssey G5 comes with a 1000R curve, which Samsung claims is optimal to avoid eye strain. Your media will be displayed on a 21:9 aspect ratio and 3440×1440 resolution, which means if you watch videos that are not compatible with that ratio, it’ll have some black space on the sides to prevent it from looking stretched. You also get a 165Hz refresh rate and native FreeSync variable refresh rate (VRR) support, helping fast games look smoother. The input lag is 1ms, which is very fast for a budget gaming monitor. It’s also compatible with HDR10, so watching movies or shows will look good, but mostly in dark rooms since the HDR peak brightness isn’t very high.
SRAM has revealed a swathe of new and updated products designed to improve your “experience on the bike”.
The most ‘on-trend’ addition to SRAM’s portfolio is shorter crank arms for its top-of-the-line Red AXS groupset.
Typically, crank arms that come fitted to road bikes are 172.5mm long. But, in recent years, professional cyclists have been choosing shorter crank arms to achieve a better, more comfortable fit on the bike.
Jonas Vingegaard was spotted using shorter 150mm Red cranks last year, and SRAM has made this length available to the public. It also added a 155mm-long crank arm to its Red range, which now has eight options up to 175mm.
SRAM now has eight crank-length options for its Red groupset. SRAM
“Shorter crank arms provide better efficiency and comfort to many riders, and we’re proud to be leaders in rider choice,” SRAM says in its press material.
It added that the crank arms are now 29g lighter than the previous generation.
The 150mm and 155mm crank arms cost £400 / $440.
The SRAM Red Aero Disc Brake. SRAM
SRAM has also added three ‘aero’ time trial and triathlon brake-lever options to the line-up, across its Red, Force and Rival groupset tiers.
SRAM says the Red Aero Disc Brake reduces braking effort and increases power. It features a textured carbon brake lever for grip and you can adjust the reach to fit your hands.
The Force Aero Disc Brake shares these features but is paired with a Force rather than Red caliper and costs £42 / $60 less at £245 / $310. Meanwhile, the Rival Aero Disc Brake will set you back £205 / $210.
SRAM’s latest battery charger features a USB-C port. SRAM
SRAM has also released a new Universal Derailleur Hanger, which comes with a silver bolt and washer because “every bike needs a little style”.
A more practical addition to SRAM’s range is a new AXS battery charger that will charge your battery in 60 minutes. It also features a USB-C cable port, which should make finding the right cable that bit easier.
Python Software Foundation: We are thrilled to announce that Anthropic has entered into a two-year partnership with the Python Software Foundation (PSF) to contribute a landmark total of $1.5 million to support the foundation’s work, with an emphasis on Python ecosystem security. This investment will enable the PSF to make crucial security advances to CPython and the Python Package Index (PyPI) benefiting all users, and it will also sustain the foundation’s core work supporting the Python language, ecosystem, and global community.
Anthropic’s funds will enable the PSF to make progress on our security roadmap, including work designed to protect millions of PyPI users from attempted supply-chain attacks. Planned projects include creating new tools for automated proactive review of all packages uploaded to PyPI, improving on the current process of reactive-only review. We intend to create a new dataset of known malware that will allow us to design these novel tools, relying on capability analysis. One of the advantages of this project is that we expect the outputs we develop to be transferable to all open source package repositories. As a result, this work has the potential to ultimately improve security across multiple open source ecosystems, starting with the Python ecosystem.
It’s not really accurate to call the Wagoneer S Jeep’s first electric vehicle. For several years now, Europeans have been able to buy the Jeep Avenger, a subcompact crossover that will surely never see American roads. But it is the first electric Jeep designed for American consumption. It’s aimed at the highly competitive midsize SUV segment, which gets ever more crowded even as electrification faces a less certain future here. Indeed, the brand, along with its Stellantis sibling Chrysler, just shelved all its plug-in hybrids, discontinuing them just a few days ago.
Like the little Avenger, the Wagoneer S makes use of one of parent company Stellantis’ purpose-built EV platforms, one shared with the growly-sounding Dodge Charger. At 192.4 inches (4,886 mm) long, 74.8 inches (1,900 mm) wide, and 64.8 inches (1,645 mm) tall, it’s a little larger than cars like the BMW iX3 or Audi Q6 e-tron but a little smaller than domestically designed rivals like the Cadillac Lyriq and Acura ZDX, which have particularly long wheelbases.
I find it a rather handsome car, one that has to marry Jeep’s Wagoneer styling cues with as many wind-smoothing and air-shaping elements as possible. The way the rear wing juts out above the tailgate window reminds me of a ’90s rally hatchback, but it’s the product of the designers and the engineers working on drag reduction. The overall drag coefficient is 0.29, and since Jeep actually publishes the frontal area, too, I can tell you the more important CdA number—where drag is multiplied by the frontal area—is 8.67.
Meta is laying off more than 10% of its Reality Labs division, specifically targeting VR and Horizon Worlds, The New York Times reports.
Reality Labs, if you’re unaware, is the division of Meta behind its Quest headsets, Horizon software, smart glasses, and sEMG wristband, as well as researching future technologies such as Codec Avatars and true AR glasses.
The New York Times estimates Reality Labs at roughly 15,000 staff, suggesting that more than 1500 could be losing their job.
Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth has scheduled an all-hands meeting for tomorrow, both the NYT and Business Insider claim, describing it as the “most important” of the year.
The report comes just over a month after Meta officially confirmed “shifting some of our investment from Metaverse toward AI glasses and Wearables”, a statement which itself followed early reports of the cuts from The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Business Insider.
“Within our overall Reality Labs portfolio we are shifting some of our investment from Metaverse toward AI glasses and Wearables given the momentum there,” last month’s statement read. “We aren’t planning any broader changes than that.”
With the layoffs reportedly taking place this week, we’ll bring you updates as we learn of Meta staff affected.
Meta’s funding shift from Horizon Worlds and VR to smart glasses is happening just over a year after a leaked memo from Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth told Reality Labs staff that 2025 will determine whether their projects are “the work of visionaries or a legendary misadventure”.
In the memo, Bosworth described 2025 as “the most critical year in my 8 years at Reality Labs”, and told staff they “need to drive sales, retention, and engagement across the board but especially in MR”. Note that at the time, Meta was using MR to refer to VR too, a nomenclature that it ended earlier this year.
“And Horizon Worlds on mobile absolutely has to break out for our long term plans to have a chance”, Bosworth followed that sentence with.
Since then, Reality Labs saw its highest-ever quarterly revenue in Q4 2024 with the launch of Quest 3S, which was the top-selling console on Amazon US for Christmas. But this momentum did not carry through into 2025 at all.
The first two quarters of 2025 saw Quest sales decline year-over-year, revealing that while Quest 3S was a popular stocking stuffer, it simply is not a successful year-round product. While Q3 saw a rebound, Meta explained that this was due to retailers stocking up on Quest 3S for this year’s holiday season.
Meanwhile, Meta has continued to push its Horizon Worlds “metaverse” platform with multi-million-dollar creator competitions, especially focused on smartphone-only worlds, as the company hopes to scale the platform from a social VR space to a cross-platform Roblox and Fortnite competitor. But this doesn’t seem to have gained much traction.
This relative stagnation in Meta’s Quest and Horizon Worlds effort is contrasted with skyrocketing sales and significant public and investor interest in its smart glasses.
In multiple earnings calls last year, Meta’s partner EssilorLuxottica said that the Ray-Ban Meta glasses were performing “exceptionally well”, with sales having more than tripled compared to 2024. Both companies have claimed to be selling many models as fast as they can make them.
Meta has also claimed “unprecedented demand” for its higher-end Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses, recently announcing a delay of its international expansion plans to catch up with US production.
Fox has released the Podium Mud Guard, finally offering spray and mud protection to its top-tier fork.
The new Mud Guard has been a long time coming, with Fox finally settling on a high-mount design rather than the low-mount approach seen on many conventional mountain bike forks.
Up until now, there hasn’t been a designated mudguard for the Podium fork, with our tester Alex Evans having to take a drill to modify a Mudhugger to shield himself during testing – and while Alex was hugely impressed by the fork, it was a drawback.
The Mud Guard attaches to the fork via a clamp. Fox
Fox says its new mudguard has been designed to protect you from dirt that is thrown up into your eyeline.
Despite the Podium Mud Guard having a shorter tail and longer nose, the coverage it provides is said to be similar to that of a normal long mudguard when the fork is at around 20-25% compression.
If you’ve set up your sag correctly, you’ll likely be riding at 20-25% compression. Fox
Fox says: “Some people might also assume that having a large gap between the tail and the tyre is ineffective. However, while less efficient at top out, that gap closes significantly under dynamic riding conditions.”
It says fixing the mudguard to the crown reduces unsprung mass, improves mud shedding and reduces rattling when compared to low-mount designs.
The Mud Guard is something of a throwback. Fox
The design will likely split opinion; for some, it’ll be a nod back to older mountain bike mudguard designs before the fender style took over, while others may see it as an afterthought.
However, looking at the world where many mountain bike innovations are born, off-road motorbikes using upside-down forks also tend to feature top-mount mudguards for the same reasons.
It’s looking to be a solid year for kaiju fans. Not only are we getting Godzilla Minus Zero in November—sequel to the critically acclaimed Godzilla Minus One (2023)—but Apple TV just released a teaser for the second season of Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, part of Legendary Entertainment’s MonsterVerse, which brought Godzilla, King Kong, and various other monsters (kaiju) created by Toho Co., Ltd into the same fold.
(Spoilers for S1 below.)
The first season picked up where 2014’s Godzilla left off, specifically the introduction of Project Monarch, a secret organization established in the 1950s to study Godzilla and other kaiju—after attempts to kill Godzilla with nuclear weapons failed. The plot spans three generations and takes place in the 1950s and half a century later. In the first season, two siblings (Kate and Kentaro Randa) follow in their father’s footsteps to uncover their family’s connection to the secretive organization known as Monarch. Naturally, they find themselves in the world of monsters and discover Army officer Lee Shaw (Kurt Russell), a longtime family ally.
NBA League Pass, the streaming service that lets you catch hundreds of out-of-market NBA games, is on sale right now for up to 55 percent off. The League Pass Premium subscription is on sale for $75, down from $160, while League Pass Standard is marked down to $50 from $110. We’re almost halfway through the season at this point, so it makes sense for a service like League Pass to start offering some discounts.
The Standard plan includes commercials and support for only one device at a time, while the Premium tier offers no commercials, in-arena streams during breaks in the game, offline viewing of full games and concurrent streams on up to three devices at once.
Last year, League Pass added multiview, which allows you to view up to four games at once on a single screen. This is included across both subscription tiers. The service also added a smart rewind tool that automatically selects key highlights and plays from each game.
Outside the US and Canada, League Pass carries every single NBA game live, but within these countries a bevy of restrictions apply. In the US, any games being shown on your regional sports network will be blacked out as the service is meant for out-of-market games only. Also, any nationally broadcast games will not be available live, but instead will be available for on-demand viewing at 6AM ET the following day. The service is only for regular-season games.
If you’re an avid NBA fan that follows multiple teams then the League Pass almost certainly carries dozens of games you can watch even with the restrictions in the US. Subscribers can get a list of applicable blackouts by entering their ZIP code before signing up.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/streaming/nba-league-pass-is-up-to-55-percent-off-right-now-163421218.html?src=rss
Zwift version 1.105 begins its phased rollout today. This is a minor update containing mostly bug fixes, although it does include a homescreen UI upgrade that will (hopefully) be rolled out elsewhere in game to better inform Zwifters. See details below…
KICKR CORE 2 Bridging Upgrade
Announced with this week’s release is a feature Wahoo actually rolled out last week, allowing Zwift Ride controllers and Click v2 controllers to be bridged through Wahoo’s KICKR CORE 2 trainer.
According to Zwift, this was done to “improve Bluetooth connectivity and to work around the Apple TV Bluetooth connection limit.”
Zwift says, “On the home screen, you may see a gradient profile on route cards when hovered/focused. This feature will be rolled out slowly.”
This looks like a helpful and welcome change, although it isn’t live for me yet. I especially appreciate the gradient color-coding, which is a nice upgrade from the one-color route profiles used elsewhere in the game.
Now I’m going to do the most Zwifter thing ever, and complain about a feature before it’s even released.
Yes, the route profile on hover is a good upgrade nobody will complain about. But Zwift should show this color code the route profile sidebar as well:
And much more importantly, this profile should be available on event cards and in the event sidebar:
Notice: the event cards don’t even say which route the event is on. That’s saved for the sidebar, which helpfully shows the route name, number of laps, total distance, and total elevation. But even the sidebar displays no route map and no route profile.
This is all fine, as long as you know the route. But there are now over 300 routes in Zwift. The game needs to do a better job of telling riders what they’re signing up for. Hopefully, this new “mouseover profile” feature is a step in that direction.
Release Notes
Zwift supplied the following additional release notes:
Fixed an issue where some ANT+ devices could have a blank name in the Pairing screen.
Fixed an issue with extra lanes in New York on Central Park roads; Scotty at NYC DOT corrected the issue.
For races with event cooldowns enabled, fixed an issue where race rank could be incorrectly positioned on the Zwifter’s avatar on some devices.
Running: Improved the appearance of time input fields in Public Profile settings.
In group events, if a Ride Leader or Ride Sweeper have unsupported characters or emojis in their name, their event chat messages in the HUD will be shown as sent by “Ride Leader” or “Ride Sweeper”.
Android: Improved Bluetooth connection reliability for Zwifters on Android 15 and newer.
Discuss this update in Zwift’s forum > (link coming soon)
Questions or Comments?
If you spotted any other changes or bugs in the update, please comment below!
President Donald Trump has announced a breakthrough agreement with Microsoft to shield American households from soaring electricity costs driven by the surging growth of AI server farms.
Over on Truth Social, the President declared that tech giants must “pay their own way” rather than passing the massive energy bills of their data centers
Scott Adams, who kept cubicle denizens laughing for more than three decades with Dilbert, the bitingly funny comic strip that poked fun at the absurdity of corporate life, died Tuesday. He was 68. From a report: His death was tearfully revealed by his first ex-wife, Shelly Miles, at the start of Real Coffee With Scott Adams. In May, he said on the podcast that he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer, which had spread to his bones. “I expect to be checking out from this domain this summer,” he said.
In a statement he wrote that was read by Miles over six minutes, he said, “Things did not go well for me … my body fell before my brain.”
Sprung from Adams’ days as a Pacific Bell applications engineer in San Ramon, California, Dilbert debuted in 1989 and at the height of its popularity appeared in more than 2,000 newspapers across 65 countries and in 25 languages with an estimated worldwide readership of more than 150 million. Though it had the appropriate level of cartoon exaggeration, the strip keenly captured office life and struck a nerve with the white-collar class.
As expected, Wine 11.0 stable was officially released today. This is a big step forward for this open-source software to run Windows games and applications on Linux and other platforms. Wine also serves as the basis for Valve’s Steam Play (Proton) that has been critical to the recent successes of Linux gaming…
