Intel Corp. has quietly acquired a 20 per cent stake in a Chinese holding company that controls developers of system-on-chips for smartphones and other mobile devices, according to two media reports. It is expected that the chip designers will develop application processors for mobiles powered by Intel’s x86 cores, which will …
Read More »ARM unveils Cortex-M7 for smart devices, industrial equipment
ARM Holdings this week introduced its new Cortex-M7 processor that promises to double the compute and digital signal processing (DSP) capability for high-end embedded applications used in next generation vehicles, connected devices (including the so-called Internet-of-things devices), and smart homes and factories. The ARM Cortex-M7 core is based on the …
Read More »Amazon invests $55 million in ‘secret’ R&D facility
Amazon plans to invest $55 million in its Lab 126 research and development facility in California and increase the headcount of R&D staff to over 3700 by 2019. The expansion of the “secretive” laboratory reaffirms Amazon’s plans to continue designing its own hardware, address new markets and become closer to …
Read More »AMD Radeon R9 390X will not hit the market till 2015 – rumour
Although it was expected that Advanced Micro Devices would launch its new single-GPU flagship graphics solution already this year, a new market rumour suggests that the forthcoming Radeon R9 390X graphics card is only due in 2015. In summer it transpired that AMD had taped out (the point at which …
Read More »Samsung to stop selling notebooks in Europe
Even though Samsung Electronics is the world’s largest maker of smartphones and is among the leading suppliers of media tablets, sales of the company’s personal computers are not really high. Apparently, due to low demand for its notebooks in Europe the company plans to discontinue PC business in the region …
Read More »Amazon launched eBook subscription service in the UK
Amazon has officially launched its eBooks and audiobooks subscription service in the UK. The service is called ‘Kindle Unlimited' and allows customers to pay a monthly fee for unlimited access to a pre determined library. In the UK, the service will cost £7.99 a month, Amazon Kindle EU Vice President, Jorrit …
Read More »Nintendo teases new Mario Kart 8 vehicle
If like many fans of Nintendo's recently(ish) released kart racer, Mario Kart 8, you're excited for the upcoming DLC offerings that are bringing extra characters, tracks and vehicles to the game, then get your bib ready as Nintendo has decided to whet your appetite with a screengrab of one of …
Read More »Samsung to fix 840 Evo SSD performance crippling bug
Over the last few weeks there has been numerous reports of a performance crippling bug found in Samsung's 840 Evo SSDs. Users over at Overclock.net found that when month old data was found on the drive, read speeds would suffer greatly. However, fortunately for Samsung SSD users, the company has …
Read More »Lionhead Studios reveals canceled game InkQuest
Lionhead Studios, the developer behind the Fable series, has revealed InkQuest, a now canceled game from the studio's lesser known ‘incubation team', which is in charge of experimenting with new game ideas and showing them off to gauge public reaction. The Microsoft owned development company has been dabbling in new …
Read More »iPhone 6 plus handsets are bending in people’s pockets
Apple seems to have a pretty big problem on its hands as iPhone 6 Plus users are reporting that their handsets are bending in their front pockets. The problem seems to occur when sitting down for a period of time with the phone in pocket, meaning that this could happen …
Read More »Taiwan to investigate Chinese firm over security threats
Taiwan's government has announced that it is currently undergoing an investigation into the Chinese smartphone manufacturer Xiaomi Inc, over claims that its products and services were a security risk. Potentially the budget smartphone maker could see its products banned in the country entirely. The problem it seems, stems from the …
Read More »Internet MANA party leader admits “mistake” over Dotcom
It's been a couple of days now since the Internet MANA party failed to gain a single seat in the New Zealand elections and party funder/founder Kim Dotcom claimed responsibility for it, apologising to supporters after the results came in. Now party leader Laila Harré has echoed this sentiment, suggesting …
Read More »Riot Games banning toxic players from ranked play
Riot Games has been one of the most stalwart companies when it comes to stamping out toxicity in its game and it's not letting up any time soon, with a new announcement that players that are given an in-game chat ban for being mean or nasty in League of Legends, …
Read More »Apple iPhone 6 Plus could be bent, damaged
Although Apple’s products are traditionally well-made and every detail of their design is well-thought, from time to time the company releases devices that suffer from minor or major design issues that greatly affect their appeal or even durability. Apparently, this is the case with the iPhone 6 Plus. While Apple …
Read More »Microsoft unveils Miracast wireless display adapter
Microsoft Corp. has unveiled a tiny device that turns every HDMI- and USB-equipped TV or monitor into a wireless display for Windows 8.1/Widows Phone 8.1-based personal computers, tablets or even smartphones. The gadget allows to show photos, videos or stream media content from PCs to TVs without a lot of …
Read More »Intel to spend $6 billion on 10nm fab in Israel
The Israeli government announced this week that it has approved a plan submitted by Intel Corp. regarding upgrading its fab in Kiryat Gat. Under the terms of the plan the chip giant intends to significantly modernize its semiconductor manufacturing facility in order to build chips using 10nm process technology there. Intel …
Read More »Oculus VR is working on first-party video games
Oculus VR has been on the hiring spree for some time now. The company has hired a number of top video game developers, but it has never announced plans to design first-party virtual reality video games. Late last week the company finally confirmed that the development of its own content is underway. …
Read More »Eight-core Core i7-5960X overclocked to 6GHz+ with all cores active
Although Intel Corp. decided to set pretty moderate default clock-rate for its eight-core desktop chips aimed at performance enthusiasts, the new Core i7-5960X “Haswell-E” central processing units appear to be pretty good overclockers. Recently a German enthusiast managed to boost clock-rate of the new processor by two times from default …
Read More »Blizzard officially cancels MMO Titan after seven years in development
Blizzard has apparently canned its upcoming next gen MMO, Titan, after seven years in development. Rumors began swirling around the title once again last year when it was reported that Blizzard was taking the project ‘back to the drawing board' but it seems that it will never see the light …
Read More »iOS 8 nears 50% adoption despite some performance glitches
Apple has revealed that nearly 50 per cent of all iOS devices have upgraded to the latest version, iOS 8, which launched just last week, surpassing Android KitKat's adoption rate in a mere six days. The new statistics were quietly revealed on Apple's App Store distribution site. The exact percentage …
Read More »Sony defends game delays
In a world dominated by pre-order bonuses, special collector's editions and limited time-frame DLC offerings, it can often feel like publishers and some developers are just keen to get their hands on our money, whether they output a good game or not. EA is certainly guilty of this mindset which …
Read More »Xbox One gets another price cut in the UK
UK retailers are continuing to lower the price of Microsoft's Xbox One console in an effort to shift more units. The Xbox One had an official price cut a few months ago, bringing the price down to £350, matching the Playstation 4 and now UK based retailers are cutting the …
Read More »Win STEAM game of your choice today!
This weekend we are running a little competition on our Facebook page – to win a STEAM game of your choice. All you have to do is join our silly Facebook comment thread and place a funny/entertaining caption to this image from GTA. It means you can put all your …
Read More »Steam has over 100 million active user accounts
Valve has announced that Steam has surpassed a couple of milestones alongside the launch of the store's huge ‘Discovery' update. Over the past nine months alone, 3700 titles have been added to Steam, 1300 of which were actually new games. Additionally, the service now has 100 million active user accounts, …
Read More »Playstation TV UK release date announced
Sony has officially revealed the release date for the Playstation TV in Europe as well as the list of games available on day one. The new device will allow you to stream PS4 games to another TV in the house via the ‘Remote Play' feature, you'll also be able to …
Read More »Double Fine on why it’s rushing Spacebase release
Double Fine has one of the better legacies in the industry in terms of games put out. It's responsible for Psychonauts, Brutal Legend, Stacking, Costume Quest and its founder Tim Schafer was involved in some of the best point and clicks from the 90s and early 00s. However despite this …
Read More »Google drops US lobby group over climate change lies
Google has announced that it is distancing itself from a US based lobby group known as the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), which the search giant claims has lied about climate change in order to further its own agenda in politics. ALEC describes itself as a group that hopes to: …
Read More »Steam Discovery Update goes live
If you've booted up Steam this morning, you've probably bumped into Valve's latest update for the digital distribution platform, called the, “Steam Discovery Update,” which changes how the store operates quite drastically, in order to make the ‘discovering' and purchase of new titles that bit easier. As Valve's platform has …
Read More »New Lords of the Fallen gameplay footage debuted
With all of six months between today and the launch of Dark Souls II earlier this year, chances are the sadomasochist gamers out there must be champing at the bit to abuse themselves by playing something that's ungodly difficult; and has giant boss fights. Fortunately then, it looks like they won't …
Read More »Microsoft delays Xbox One launch in China
Microsoft Corp. has decided to delay the launch of its Xbox One video game console in mainland China. The company said that it needs some additional time to polish the system before it reaches the market. Microsoft’s Xbox One will be the first foreign gaming console officially sold in China …
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