It's day two of our CES 2025 coverage
and the tech news continues to pour in. It feels neither pity nor shame,
only a cold compulsion to make AI like its whole thing.
Lenovo showed off the world's first laptop with a camera under the display,
the Yoga Slim 9i, along with the world's first rollable laptop display
in the Thinkbook Plus Gen 6 and some of the world's first Snapdragon X-powered mini PCs
running Windows on ARM. But the biggest world's first to me,
which is what really matters, get your own show, is the world's first SteamOS handheld not made by Valve.
All of those leaks were surprisingly accurate, but they couldn't have predicted its full name
would be the Lenovo Legion Go S8 inch 1 powered by SteamOS
because it would be hard to predict someone choosing that. It'll launch in May, starting at 500 bucks
for the version with a last gen Ryzen Z1 Extreme,
but there will actually be a Windows version too, which will launch in January
with the newly announced Ryzen Z2 Go for 730 bucks.
But it'll come with three months of PC game pass and what I can only imagine
is a desperate bribe from Microsoft. No, all of the gamers, please don't switch to SteamOS.
It can't give you full screen ads like I can. Yeah, that's, we don't want those.
Huh? Both SteamOS and Windows versions of the Legion Go S
will have a $600 tier as well with a Ryzen Z2 Go later this year.
But if you want the beefiest option, Lenovo did say a proper second gen Lenovo Legion Go non-S
is in the works. But that won't run SteamOS, ah, not so fast.
Valve took this opportunity to announce that a SteamOS beta will be released this month
that anyone can install on other handhelds. Handhelds like the GPD Win 4 maybe,
whose website made it sound like another official SteamOS handheld.
Until Valve told the Verge, they did not work with GPD on official SteamOS support.
I feel like that was given away by the stretched out picture of Kat Mario on the website,
but I've been wrong before. Maybe you can install SteamOS on Acer's Nitro Blaze
and 11 inch handheld that's so massive.
I think the guy in this marketing image is just chuckling at it.
Is this a joke? We'll get back to CES news, but first, Meta has announced it's shifting away
from using third party fact-checking services
in favor of a community note style model on Facebook, Instagram, and threads.
In a video and blog post, Mark Zuckerberg and Meta's new PR chief, Joel Kaplan,
said their focus is now on restoring free expression
for no particular current events related reason. So they're also lifting restrictions
on discussion of some sensitive topics that would have previously led to moderation.
Interestingly, multiple times Meta's blog post
specifically references rival social media site, X,
run by Elon Musk, the guy who was never actually
going to fight Zuck in the ring, but pretending was fun for a while.
I guess Meta's new lax moderation policy also applies to Meta themselves
because they took the liberty of serving an Instagram user
with unsettling AI generated images of himself in his feed
after he used a Meta AI tool to edit a selfie.
Meta apparently took that to mean he wants to be surprised by a fake image of himself
reflecting on life in an endless maze of mirrors
where he's the main focus and he looks thrilled.
Now, back in September, Meta said they're testing serving content
in Facebook and Instagram feeds created by their AI just for you,
not of you, which is the issue here.
Meta told 404 media that you can opt out
of seeing otherworldly versions of yourself in your feed,
but other platforms are experimenting with similar features.
So you may just have to get used to AI's poking you like a toddler and saying,
hey, look, I drew a picture of you. I don't care, where are your parents?
Okay, we're coming back to CES news for the quick bits. These ones are a little different,
but hey, that's okay. Yesterday, I told you I'd cover some more
NVIDIA stuff, so here. GeForce Now is officially getting a native app
for the Steam Deck later this year and expanded browser-based support
on various mixed reality headsets too. So I guess Microsoft is right
and all of those are an Xbox. What?
No. What? One thing from the keynote I didn't cover yesterday
was Project Digits, a tiny $3,000 desktop computer
powered by the company's Blackwell GPU and their 20-core Grace CPU
on a pretty standard-looking mobile chip. This is an ARM-based APU
in a Mac mini-looking form factor. Could NVIDIA just leapfrog Qualcomm
and start their own ARM PC revolution? Probably not with this.
These are meant for researchers and people comfortable plopping another $3,000 PC on top of the first one
to run their AI waifu locally.
Long distance is hard. Speaking of AI companions,
NVIDIA announced that generative AI-powered NPCs
called co-playable characters will drop soon in PUBG and Naraka Blade Point
where they'll help you find loot and swear to loyally hold off bad guys
so you can run away and heal. If AIs can't love, then what is that?
Oh, you're not a gamer? Don't worry, NVIDIA's Project R2X desktop assistant
is here to answer the question, what if Clippy was hot?
I found a hot AI girl and trapped her in my monitor.
Now, because I feel like I'm neglecting them if I don't mention them, there are a butt ton of new laptop models on display at CES,
as usual, updated gaming and lifestyle models
from ASUS, refreshed elite books and a new Snapdragon X-powered Omni Studio,
all in one from HP. MSI had some pretty wild 18 inch gaming laptops
to show off with lots of dragon related influences.
It's what the people want. And Acer had a number of notebooks to show off,
but not all of them had a chassis made partially out of crushed oyster shells like the Aspire Vero 16.
So that's the one that gets the mention. I don't make the rules. And you know what?
Let's cover Sony's CES announcements, which once again, involves reminding everyone,
they're working on a car with Honda. It's called the Afila.
Do we remember this? Yes. But since it's 2025,
it has to ship with an AI personal agent, of course.
What is new is the shipping estimate of 2026
and the price. It starts at $89,900.
But, hey, but that comes with a three year subscription
to all the AI stuff, which is at least Toyota Corolla's worth.
Sony also gave their mysterious next gen XR headset a name,
ZIN with an X. I guess the nicotine pouches aren't big in Japan.
But good news, you won't need the headset to enjoy Sony's future immersive entertainment concept,
a box covered in displays and sensory doohickeys
that will drop you into the world of the last of us and even let you smell what Ellie smells.
Turns out the clickers are just ripping it all the time.
It's mold and gas. It's not good.
And we're gonna let it rip again tomorrow. So come on back for more.
No, it'll be tech news. That's not, we're not ripping.
Okay, that's disrespectful.