Tech news is neither here nor there. It's in its own dimension, filled with magic smoke
and giant heads like the ones from Easter Island, except they're all Tim Cook
and they answer every question with, ha ha ha ha, no, no.
Microsoft has backported AMD's branch prediction
improvements for Zen 3, 4 and 5 CPUs
to Windows 11 version 23H2,
meaning that Ryzen users can download this new optional update
rather than sitting by the window, sighing and waiting for version 24H2 to become available.
24H2 is currently in release preview
and reviewers report substantial performance improvements
in several games. According to testing by Hardware Lux,
some of the games, like Starfield, are seeing gains of 13 to 41%,
depending on processor model, and others like Cyberpunk 2077
saw gains anywhere from four to 61%.
There were also some odd outliers like Control,
which saw general improvements, but an odd 10% regression with the 7800X3D.
Hardware unboxed likewise found a two to 4% improvement
for Halo Infinite, but a 30 plus percent improvement for Gears 5.
If this optional update is at all similar to the performance granted by the 24H2 preview build,
it should bring real world performance closer to the benchmarks that AMD had to retract last week
after reviewers were unable to replicate them. Source, I made it up.
Meanwhile, MSI motherboards are incorporating AMD's update
for Ryzen 5 9600X and Ryzen 7 9700X CPUs
with a toggle in the BIOS that increases TDP
from 65 to 105 watts, which promises to be around 13% faster.
It's not downloading more RAM, but it's close enough.
Both iFixit and JerryRigEverything performed tear downs of Google's upcoming Pixel 9 Pro XL
to test the company's claims of a two-fold increase
in durability. You can hit it with two hammers now, and it will still break.
While the phone was indeed more durable over the past Pixel generation,
it was also significantly more complicated to repair
with plenty of hidden screws and fiddly brackets,
the worst kind of bracket. It's like you're trying to get to second base
with a robot who is also Jigsaw's daughter. Would you like to play a game with my robot daughter?
What? iFixit's inspection hit a rocky start
when their application of gentle heat and pressure to remove the device's screen
caused a significant delamination, rendering half the display unusable.
Though luckily for this generation, Google has implemented a dual entry design
that allows the user to open the device from the back in order to replace the battery,
meaning users will be able to avoid removing the comparatively fragile screen.
While the Pro XL's double XL battery
comes with a pair of deceptively handy-looking pull tabs,
they were apparently just for show. Both iFixit and JerryRigEverything wound up
resorting to isopropyl alcohol to dissolve the powerful glue
and finally using a spudger to crowbar the battery out.
It's just a prank. You know things get real when the spudger gets involved.
JerryRigEverything further pointed out that all of the tiny screws were different sizes,
adding unneeded complexity and creating a devious trap
for absent-minded repair technicians with hay fever.
Don't sneeze or it's all over. Gotcha, you got punked.
An audit performed by the US Department of Justice's
Office of the Inspector General has found serious flaws in how the FBI stores,
tracks and disposes of electronic storage media
containing sensitive and classified information like national security documents and my sixth-grade diary.
You know they have it. We're in Canada, but they're very thorough.
According to the OIG's report, the FBI doesn't do enough to track
internal hard drives and thumb drives, increasing the risk of loss or theft.
The organization also failed to consistently label these drives with the appropriate classification levels,
which could lead to employees getting a little too casual with top-secret documents.
Likewise, facilities holding electronic media to be destroyed and disposed of
were found to be insufficiently secured to the point of being monitored
by non-functional security cameras. That's why they weren't, they're not being monitored.
It's about the threat. The FBI has acknowledged the findings
and outlined a few potential solutions, such as putting the drives in cages
and using security cameras that work. The quick bits also live in the tech news dimension.
You know, they fly around in there, which is why you do wanna keep your head down.
They will sting you. They poop everywhere.
SpaceX has delayed the launch of the Polaris Dawn mission,
which is being funded and crewed by billionaire Jason Isaacman.
Isaacman is perhaps the fourth billionaire to take an unreasonable interest in space.
If it happens one more time, I can fill out my punch card and get a free sub.
I can just take all my money up there and then it'll just be me and my money.
It'll be perfect. The Polaris Dawn mission will be the farthest crewed space flight in 50 years.
What's a few more days? In more unfortunate SpaceX news,
one of their Falcon 9 rockets tipped over
and fell into the ocean today. Oh, oh no, oh no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
In the rocket's defense, it had completed 23 successful flights,
but deserved a beach day. We're out here supporting the Falcon rockets.
You guys work hard. I wanna see the Falcon 9 rockets unionized.
Signs of upcoming AMD hardware has been spotted online.
BenchLeaks tweeted some geek bench results for a system with a device ID of GFX 1201,
which was previously associated with Navi 48,
a GPU that will power at least one Radeon RX 8000 series graphics card.
Hopefully the RX 8600 because these results
place it between the 7700 XT and 7800 XT.
But you're a handheld gamer now. You don't care about desktop GPUs.
You want me to move on to this 96 core Zen 5 based
Ryzen Threadripper CPU, spotted in a shipping manifest.
Looks cool. I don't know when it's coming. And also I don't know why you would care more about that.
You can't install that in your handheld either. You're a quirky one.
We're gonna figure you out though. Gannet, the largest newspaper publisher in the US,
has decided to shut down its USA Today product review website, Reviewed,
blaming changes to Google's algorithm affecting search traffic.
So far, so normal sadly, but it's notable that the site's own unionized staff
accused Gannet of using it to publish AI written articles
just last October. Suspicions were raised not just by the article's
strange stilted writing, but also by the fact that several articles
were structured near identically to one another.
Further, the authors cited in the bylines seemed to have no other traceable web presence,
making them either AI fabrications or privacy conscious ghosts
with a passion for consumer journalism. I know which one I prefer.
They just left us too soon. They had unfinished business. For some spooky reporting.
Researchers from Google and Tel Aviv University have revealed Game Engine.
Oh, I get it. An AI model that can act as a game engine.
This was demonstrated by its ability to interactively generate 1993's doom in real time,
using techniques similar to stable diffusion.
Game Engine can apparently run quotes,
doom at over 20 FPS using a single tensor processing unit.
And human testers were only able to distinguish genuine clips lasting a few seconds
from these generated clips around 60% of the time.
Now, does this mean that we are essentially forcing a computer to hallucinate demons?
Yes, you truly can run doom on everything.
And the world's first online accessible bio processor
is now available to almost anyone. Final Spark's Neuro Platform is a service
that allows remote access to 16 human brain organoids.
Basically little meatballs made from brain cells.
Since we last reported on this in May, Final Spark has now opened up paid 24 seven access
to their weird wet wear. For academic customers, it costs $500 per month,
while industrial users can get a quote for access to a sin against nature.
I'm joking here, brain organoids like this have been used in robotics research
and are also helping search for a cure for Parkinson's disease.
It's a welcome redemption arc for meatballs, which are mostly known for causing heart disease.
It's $600 a month if you want it with oregano. Just don't ask them if they're alive.
And we're known to give you more tech news. If you come back on Friday, that is.
It's like training your very own human brain bio processor,
except it's free and also it's your brain.