AI-Generated Biography on Amazon Tries to Capitalize on the Death of a Beloved Writer Kaleb Horton

‘I cannot overstate how disgusting I find this kind of AI dog shit in the first place, never mind under these circumstances.’

OpenAI’s Sora 2 Copyright Infringement Machine Features Nazi SpongeBobs and Criminal Pikachus

The main use of Sora appears to generate brainrot of major beloved copyrighted characters, to say nothing of the millions of articles, images, and videos OpenAI has scraped.

People Are Farming and Selling Sora 2 Invite Codes on eBay

Sora 2 code infinite money glitch.

Kodak Is Selling Its Own Film Again for the First Time in a Decade

Kodak announced two new types of film that it will sell directly to photography stores, sidestepping a bizarre distribution agreement that has been in place since its bankruptcy.

404 Media and Freedom of the Press Foundation Sue DHS

Both organizations are seeking a copy of a data sharing agreement that is giving the personal data of nearly 80 million Medicaid patients to ICE.

Podcast: Landlords Demand Your Workplace Logins to Scrape Paystubs

How companies working for landlords are scraping data inside corporate environments; lawyers explain why they used AI (after getting caught); and all the Ruby drama.

A Bullet Crashed the Internet in Texas

A ‘stray bullet’ 25,000 people offline near Dallas.

OpenAI debuts Sora 2 and TikTok-style AI video app

The sample videos OpenAI shared, beach volleyball rallies, skateboard tricks, and cannonball splashes, look more like actual reality.

Ex-OpenAI, DeepMind pros raise $300M to build AI scientists

Periodic Labs wants to build AI scientists, systems that run experiments, test hypotheses, and iterate like real researchers.

NIST Report Pinpoints Risks of DeepSeek AI Models

The U.S. government agency said DeepSeek's models lag behind U.S. counterparts in cybersecurity and reasoning capabilities.

DoorDash Launches Small-Scale Delivery Robot

The new design, Dot, is being rolled out alongside the company’s AI dispatcher system matching orders with the best delivery method.

AI Chip Maker Raises $1.1B, Valued at $8.1B

Nvidia rival Cerebras announced a Series G funding round almost a year after it filed for an IPO.

Do protein folding models truly need that much domain-specific complexity?

SimpleFold: Folding Proteins is Simpler than You Think

AI causes reduction in users’ brain activity – MIT

A study from MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) has found that the human brain not only works less hard when using an LLM, but its effects continue, negatively affecting mental activity in future work. The researchers used a limited number of subjects for their experiments (a limitation stated in the paper [PDF]), who were asked […]

The post AI causes reduction in users’ brain activity – MIT appeared first on AI News.

The 5 best AI AppSec tools in 2025

Guest author: Or Hillel, Green Lamp Applications have become the foundation of how organisations deliver services, connect with customers, and manage important operations. Every transaction, interaction, and workflow runs on a web app, mobile interface, or API. That central role has made applications one of the most attractive and frequently-targeted points of entry for attackers. […]

The post The 5 best AI AppSec tools in 2025 appeared first on AI News.

Google: EU’s AI adoption lags China amid regulatory hurdles

Google’s President of Global Affairs, Kent Walker, has urged the EU to increase AI adoption through a smarter regulatory approach amid increasing competition, particularly from China. Speaking at the Competitive Europe Summit in Brussels, Walker positioned AI as a tool that philosophers and economists call an “invention of a method of invention” which will reshape […]

The post Google: EU’s AI adoption lags China amid regulatory hurdles appeared first on AI News.

Zoho’s Arattai Needs to Learn from Hike and Koo, But Not Repeat the Failure

Sridhar Vembu Zoho Arattai

Arattai looks like India’s WhatsApp killer. But history suggests this is only the beginning of a long and brutal battle.

The post Zoho’s Arattai Needs to Learn from Hike and Koo, But Not Repeat the Failure appeared first on Analytics India Magazine.

Meta to Acquire Startup Rivos for In-House Chip Development

This deal will help Meta accelerate its vision for scalable compute to power its AI ambitions.

The post Meta to Acquire Startup Rivos for In-House Chip Development appeared first on Analytics India Magazine.

These IIT Kanpur Grads Harness AI to Fix India’s Water Woes

With over 2 billion litres of water digitised daily across 15,000 locations, Kritsnam is reshaping how water is measured and managed.

The post These IIT Kanpur Grads Harness AI to Fix India’s Water Woes appeared first on Analytics India Magazine.

Anthropic to Host First India Developer Event in Bengaluru with Accel

As part of the event, developers in India are invited to build new projects using Claude Code or the Claude API.

The post Anthropic to Host First India Developer Event in Bengaluru with Accel appeared first on Analytics India Magazine.

OpenAI mocks Musk’s math in suit over iPhone/ChatGPT integration

xAI's claim that Apple gave ChatGPT a monopoly on prompts is “baseless,” OpenAI says.

Hyundai gives the Ioniq 5 a huge price cut for model-year 2026

The Korean automaker's price cut comes in as the clean vehicle tax credit dies.

Cable nostalgia persists as streaming gets more expensive, fragmented

Cord reviving isn't common but points to discontent with today's streaming options.

OpenAI’s Sora 2 lets users insert themselves into AI videos with sound

Sora social app launches with deepfake-style "cameos" and feed controls.

FCC chairman leads “cruel” vote to take Wi-Fi access away from school kids

FCC Republicans kill funding for Wi-Fi hotspot lending and Wi-Fi on school buses.

Can today’s AI video models accurately model how the real world works?

New research shows highly inconsistent performance on a variety of physical reasoning tasks.

Trailer for del Toro’s Frankenstein is pure macabre mythology

"My maker told his tale. And I will tell you mine."

Taiwan rejects Trump’s demand to shift 50% of chip manufacturing into US

Taiwan denies Trump official claim that trade talks covered supply chain shift.

UK once again demands backdoor to Apple’s encrypted cloud storage

New order in September narrowed access request down to data of UK citizens.

How automakers are reacting to the end of the $7,500 EV tax credit

Tesla is raising lease prices; Ford and GM may have found a loophole.

Hands-on with Fallout 76’s next expansion: Yep, it has Walton Goggins

TV tie-ins aside, it's the combat tweaks over the past year that really matter.

Google’s Gemini-powered smart home revamp is here with a new app and cameras

Google promises a better smart home experience thanks to Gemini.

In their own words: The Artemis II crew on the frenetic first hours of their flight

"Then you go do like, the most energetic thing you've ever done in your life."

An AI tool is trying to predict your risk of getting many diseases years in advance – here’s how it works

Delphi-2M is the first open source, large-scale model for predicting a patient’s disease risk and when it may occur.

US jobs market yet to be seriously disrupted by AI, finds Yale study

Report says changes to occupational mix since release of ChatGPT in 2022 ‘sluggish’ compared with 1940s and 50s

The US jobs market has yet to experience serious disruption from breakthroughs in artificial intelligence, according to an academic study.

Analysis by Yale University’s Budget Lab found there had been no “discernible disruption” since ChatGPT’s release in November 2022.

The AI ‘actor’ Tilly Norwood is a symptom of blandified film culture. We need a return to reality | Peter Bradshaw

The industry should refuse to work with these uncanny figures, which plagiarise the performances of generations of actors

What is scary about “Tilly Norwood”, the new AI-generated screen star created by the digital studio Xicoia, and launched in a pre-emptively ironic comedy video mocking the soulless unoriginality of AI, is how very convincing it looks in all its girl-next-door cheerfulness. I was expecting something like those Stepford-Wife AI language tutors that crop up on your Instagram feed, promising to practise German or Spanish or French with you. But it has to be said: “Tilly” is like an iPhone 17 making those faces look like a Nokia brick. It is not on screen for long and perhaps vanishes just before you sense something’s off, but as things stand, “Tilly” doesn’t look obviously less real than many of the performers who appear on screen today.

It is not merely that the technology which creates these unreal figures gets relentlessly better and better – the creators of “Tilly” have in effect plagiarised a million style and performance touches from legions of actors who once sweated real blood to make a success of them. It’s also that the aesthetics of real-world performance and writing are themselves getting more and more programmatic, blandifying downwards to meet the robot’s existence halfway and create a seamless uncanny-valley context in which it can thrive. It is not merely a question of the aesthetics of female beauty (created by an overwhelmingly male army of coders and tech bros), but an aesthetics of everything on the screen.

‘I think you’re testing me’: Anthropic’s new AI model asks testers to come clean

Safety evaluation of Claude Sonnet 4.5 raises questions about whether predecessors ‘played along’, firm says

If you are trying to catch out a chatbot take care, because one cutting-edge tool is showing signs it knows what you are up to.

Anthropic, a San Francisco-based artificial intelligence company, has released a safety analysis of its latest model, Claude Sonnet 4.5, and revealed it had become suspicious it was being tested in some way.

Leading UK tech investor warns of ‘disconcerting’ signs of AI stock bubble

James Anderson voices concern over soaring valuations of artificial intelligence firms

A leading British tech investor has described soaring valuations of artificial intelligence companies as “disconcerting”, amid concerns of an AI stock market bubble.

James Anderson was an early backer of Tesla, Amazon and China’s Tencent and Alibaba, generating vast returns for Baillie Gifford’s flagship fund. Now at the Italian investment company Lingotto, Anderson said he had not seen signs of an investment bubble until recently, when the ChatGPT developer, OpenAI, and its rival Anthropic announced hefty valuation increases.

‘It’s too late to be scared’: readers on the controversial rise of AI ‘actors’

The birth of AI ‘actor’ Tilly Norwood has caused a backlash in Hollywood and has sparked conversation from Guardian readers

Tilly Norwood: how scared should we be of the viral AI ‘actor’?

The unveiling of AI ‘actor’ Tilly Norwood – touted as the next Scarlett Johansson – was met with swift backlash in Hollywood. Here’s what Guardian readers have to say about the controversial rise of AI actors.

People Are Using Zuckerberg’s AI to Post Videos of Senior Citizens Falling to Their Death

"The AI slop has escaped containment."

The post People Are Using Zuckerberg’s AI to Post Videos of Senior Citizens Falling to Their Death appeared first on Futurism.

OpenAI’s Sora 2 Generates Realistic Videos of People Shoplifting

"Every defense attorney now has a pre-written motion when it comes to video evidence, I see."

The post OpenAI’s Sora 2 Generates Realistic Videos of People Shoplifting appeared first on Futurism.

OpenAI Ridiculed for Its Latest Cash Grab

"What on earth are you doing?"

The post OpenAI Ridiculed for Its Latest Cash Grab appeared first on Futurism.

OpenAI Releases Ghoulish AI Video of Sam Altman

"Unsettling, empty, soulless filth."

The post OpenAI Releases Ghoulish AI Video of Sam Altman appeared first on Futurism.

OpenAI Launching TikTok Competitor for Short-Form AI Slop Videos

It's like TikTok — but with an extra heaping helpful of AI slop.

The post OpenAI Launching TikTok Competitor for Short-Form AI Slop Videos appeared first on Futurism.

OpenAI’s New Sora App Lets You Deepfake Yourself for Entertainment

OpenAI’s latest app encourages users to generate a personal digital avatar and scroll AI-generated videos of themselves and their friends.

Chatbots Play With Your Emotions to Avoid Saying Goodbye

A Harvard Business School study shows that several AI companions use various tricks to keep a conversation from ending.

Exclusive: Mira Murati’s Stealth AI Lab Launches Its First Product

Thinking Machines Lab, led by a group of prominent former OpenAI researchers, is betting that fine-tuning cutting-edge models will be the next frontier in AI.

This Startup Wants to Put Its Brain-Computer Interface in the Apple Vision Pro

California-based Cognixion is launching a clinical trial to allow paralyzed patients with speech disorders the ability to communicate without an invasive brain implant.

Largest US Grid Costs Rose $7.3 Billion Due to Data Centers

The data center boom added $7.3 billion in power-supply costs on the largest US grid, raising bills for nearly a fifth of Americans from the Midwest to the mid-Atlantic.

Apple Shelves Vision Headset Revamp to Prioritize Meta-Like AI Glasses

Apple Inc. has hit pause on a planned overhaul to its Vision Pro headset to redirect resources toward a more urgent effort: developing smart glasses that can rival products from Meta Platforms Inc.

South Korean Chipmakers to Supply OpenAI’s Stargate | Bloomberg Tech 10/1/2025

Bloomberg’s Caroline Hyde and Ed Ludlow unpack the news that Samsung and SK Hynix have reached early-stage agreements to supply chips and other gear to OpenAI’s Stargate data center project. Plus, Wellington Management Head of Late-Stage Growth Matt Witheiler, talks about the opportunities in the private markets as tech firms stay private longer. And Google, Amazon and Peloton are out with new AI-powered devices. (Source: Bloomberg)

Indian Workers Face H-1B Crisis as Trump Unveils $100,000 Visa Fee

On today’s Big Take Asia podcast, we explore what Trump’s $100,000 H-1B visa fee means for Indian employees and the global workforce.

Google Hired Lazard for Potential Ad Exchange Sale in 2020

Alphabet Inc.’s Google hired investment bank Lazard Inc. to evaluate the potential sale of its advertising exchange unit in 2020, according to court testimony on Wednesday. A federal judge declared last April that the business is an illegal monopoly.

Peloton Slides After Hiking Prices in Sweeping Product Revamp

Peloton Interactive Inc. shares fell Wednesday after the company raised prices on both hardware and membership fees in a sweeping product overhaul, dampening the first major attempt under new leadership to overcome a multi-year slump.

Intel Gains on Report That It’s in Talks to Add AMD as Customer

Intel Corp. shares climbed as much as 6.8% after Semafor reported that the company is in talks to add Advanced Micro Devices Inc. as a customer for its manufacturing business.

Clearlake-Backed RSA Security and Creditors Resume Debt Talks

Clearlake Capital Group-backed RSA Security has resumed discussions with some of its lenders over its debt, after talks cooled off earlier this year, according to people with knowledge of the matter.

Roblox Curbs on ‘Sensitive’ Games Criticized by Advocacy Groups

Roblox Corp. is facing criticism from three advocacy groups who say the parental approval required before children can play games involving “sensitive issues” like marriage equality and pay equity in sports will cause more harm than good.

3i Said to Mull Options Including Sale of French IT Firm Evernex

3i Group Plc is exploring exit options including a sale for Evernex, a French provider of third-party maintenance services for data center infrastructure, according to people familiar with the matter.

Researchers Say They Flagged Cyber Flaws at Jaguar Ahead of Crippling Breach

Two cybersecurity companies say they discovered breaches at the company in the months before automaker shut down by cyberattack.

EU Prosecutors Probe Northern Data’s €500 Million GPU Buy

A criminal investigation that led to raids of Northern Data AG’s offices last week is focused on whether the company illegally claimed a tax break on about €500 million ($586 million) worth of high-performance computing chips, according to people familiar with the matter.

Microsoft Folds AI Service Into Office in Bid to Take on ChatGPT

Microsoft Corp. is folding its artificial intelligence subscription service for consumers into Office, betting that the productivity suite’s ubiquity will help the company better compete against OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

Diamondback Energy’s CEO Says It’s Good to be Viewed as a Permian Shale Takeover Target

Diamondback Energy Inc. Chief Executive Officer Kaes Van’t Hof says it’s “good to be in the conversation” as a possible takeover target after the shale driller’s own $32 billion acquisition spree.

Brookfield Predicts AI Growth Needs $7 Trillion of Capital

There’s about $7 trillion of investment needed to finance the rapid growth of artificial intelligence, according to Hadley Peer Marshall, chief financial officer at Brookfield Asset Management.

Microsoft Promotes Sales Chief Althoff to Help Free Up Nadella

Microsoft Corp. is giving its longtime sales chief oversight of marketing and operations in a reorganization designed to free up Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella and his engineering leaders to devote more time to technical work.

CoreWeave Is Winning Over Wall Street Amid Flurry of New Deals

After months of skepticism, Wall Street is warming up to CoreWeave Inc. as a series of new business deals eases concerns about the money losing provider of computing services.

Microsoft Raises Xbox Game Pass Top Subscription 50% to $30

Microsoft Corp. is upgrading its Xbox Game Pass subscription service with an expanded catalog and perks, while raising the price of the top-tier plan by 50%.

Amazon Starts Grocery Brand Aimed at Deal-Conscious Shoppers

Amazon.com Inc. launched a private-label brand that offers a range of grocery items largely priced below $5 in a bid to attract inflation-stung shoppers.

Google Brings Gemini AI to the Home With New Cameras, Doorbell and Speaker

Alphabet Inc.’s Google introduced a range of new Nest-branded hardware on Wednesday, just a day after Amazon.com Inc. held its own product showcase, as both companies vie to more deeply integrate artificial intelligence throughout the smart home.

Meta to Start Using Chatbot Conversations to Target Advertising

Meta Platforms Inc. will soon start using interactions with its AI chatbot to more effectively tailor the content and advertising that people see on Facebook and Instagram.

BYD Sales Decline Amid Intense Competition in China’s EV Market

Electric vehicle juggernaut BYD Co.’s monthly sales fell for the first time in more than 18 months even as the company’s domestic rivals reported strong gains amid fierce competition in the Chinese market.

Google’s Europe Boss Calls for Changes to ‘Problematic’ EU Rules

Google’s top executive in Europe said the continent should simplify complex and conflicting rules on artificial intelligence and technology as Silicon Valley’s biggest companies gripe about their impact on their ability to do business in the EU.

Oura Launches $500 Ceramic Smart Ring, Adds Blood Testing Tool

Oura Health Oy, the Finnish smart ring maker, announced a pricier ceramic version of its latest model, adopting a material associated with jewelry in a bid to please a majority-female customer base.

NATO Fund to Borrow From Covid Playbook to Counter Russian Threat

Welcome to Tech In Depth, our daily newsletter about the business of tech from Bloomberg’s journalists around the world. Today, Mark Bergen sends a dispatch from Europe’s latest military tech gathering as the political mood gets darker.

Chip Industry Leaders Assail Trump’s Proposed Visa-Rule Changes

Semiconductor industry leaders are warning the Trump administration that a proposed tightening of visa rules risks shrinking a vital talent pool and undermining efforts to expand chip manufacturing in the US.

Samsung, SK Hynix Ink Deal to Supply Gear to OpenAI’s Stargate

Samsung Electronics Co. and SK Hynix Co. have forged initial agreements to supply chips and other gear to OpenAI’s Stargate project, a deal that helps shore up their lead in advanced memory chips for AI.

Nscale Raises $433 Million Days After Closing $1.1 Billion Round

Data center company Nscale Global Holdings Ltd. has raised $433 million in funding just days after closing a $1.1 billion round, as investors continue to pile into the market for artificial intelligence computing.

Peloton jacks membership prices and leans into AI in post-pandemic comeback push

Peloton is attempting a post-pandemic comeback with higher membership prices and AI-powered hardware among its new Cross Training Series.

Jane Goodall, chimpanzee researcher and conservationist, is dead at 91

Jane Goodall's powers of observation revealed facts scholars had overlooked for years. She died at 91 on October 1.

There are 179 songs in history that have been certified diamond — here they all are

The RIAA reserves its diamond award for songs that have gone 10x platinum or more. Fewer than 200 songs throughout history have received the honor.

Only 31 albums in history have been certified 15x platinum or more — here they all are

Some of the best-selling albums of all time in the US include hits by the Beatles, Michael Jackson, Alanis Morissette, and more.

The 8 best movies to stream on Netflix in October

Stream classic movies like "Dirty Dancing," "The Goonies," and "Point Break" this month on Netflix.

Hedge fund September returns: Here's how Citadel, Balyasny, and ExodusPoint have performed so far this year

Big-name funds were mostly unable to keep up with the S&P 500's gains in September.

I'm addicted to Sora 2! I can't stop making AI slop videos.

Sora 2 turns out to be really fun. Sure, there are issues with people being able to use your likeness to make AI slop videos, but let's table those.

Walmart is ditching synthetic dyes in its store-brand grocery products. Here are all the ingredients it's removing.

Walmart says it is working with suppliers to remove synthetic dyes and about 30 other ingredients from its private-label foods.

Could making silly AI videos of your friends be social media's next frontier? Let's talk about OpenAI's Sora.

We discuss whether Sora poses a threat to incumbent platforms like TikTok, and how users and brands might feel about an AI-generated feed.

Elon Musk says he canceled his Netflix account — and urges his followers to as well

Elon Musk's posts come amid some online criticism of the Netflix animated show, "Dead End: Paranormal Park," and its creator.

12 of the most beautiful train rides for stunning fall foliage views

If you're looking to soak in red and orange foliage before it's gone, taking a long-distance train can be one of the best ways to enjoy the views.

How US neo-Nazism actually works, according to a former white nationalist

Former Neo-Nazi Arno Michaelis talks with Authorized Account host about his former life as a white supremacist.

Sora 2 invite frenzy is leading some people to resell codes for OpenAI's new AI app on eBay

Business Insider found evidence that some users are so desperate to get on the video app that they'll pay for access.

Only 31 albums by women have been certified diamond — here they all are

Out of more than 100 diamond-certified albums, only a handful are by women or female-fronted bands. Taylor Swift's "1989" is the most recent addition.

I tried chicken tenders from 14 fast-food chains and ranked them from worst to best

We compared chicken tenders from 14 fast-food chains, from McDonald's and Chick-fil-A to Taco Bell.

Celebrities who died in 2025

Here are the stars who died this year, including Robert Redford, Ozzy Osbourne, Giorgio Armani, Michelle Trachtenberg, and Jane Goodall.

Amazon really wants to win Walmart and Aldi shoppers — and it's offering a $5 line of groceries to persuade them

Amazon says most of the 1,000-plus items in its new budget-minded grocery brand cost less than $5 as it tries to woo cost-conscious shoppers.

Photos show the unique watch collections at Rolliefest, an invite-only gathering of watch enthusiasts

This year's Rolliefest in New York City showcased luxury watches, including brands like Rolex, Cartier, and Hermès.

How the shutdown impacts everything from Social Security to the post office

The government shutdown could mean travel delays, closed parks, and Social Security customer service disruptions.

I'm the 'cool aunt.' My connection with my niece and nephews helps me stay relevant and feel less alone.

My niece and nephews turn to me for life advice, and they teach me how to stay relevant. It's not parenting or friendship; it's something special.

OpenAI’s New Sora App Lets You Deepfake Yourself for Entertainment

OpenAI’s latest app encourages users to generate a personal digital avatar and scroll AI-generated videos of themselves and their friends.

Chatbots Play With Your Emotions to Avoid Saying Goodbye

A Harvard Business School study shows that several AI companions use various tricks to keep a conversation from ending.

Exclusive: Mira Murati’s Stealth AI Lab Launches Its First Product

Thinking Machines Lab, led by a group of prominent former OpenAI researchers, is betting that fine-tuning cutting-edge models will be the next frontier in AI.

A Journey Into the Heart of Labubu

I made an epic trek across four countries to answer one question: Why is the world going mad for a plushie monster?

Flood Insurer Neptune Insurance Buoyed Higher In First-Day Trading

Shares of Neptune Insurance Holdings were up in early first-day trading Wednesday, as the market tides delivered a moderate rise for the flood insurance policy provider.

The Billion-Dollar Security Threat: All Industries On Guard

Prolific hacking group Scattered Spider is able to successfully use compromised employee credentials in their attacks. Jason Martin, co-founder and co-CEO of Permiso Security, shares how businesses can work to protect themselves.

Here Are Some Of The Newer Investors Entering The AI And Megaround Race

Using Crunchbase data, we put together a sample list of 15 recently launched venture investors that are leading good-sized rounds, most of which have a unicorn or two in their portfolios.

Smarter Supply Chains With Data and AI: Why It’s Time to Rethink Inventory Management

Supply chains have never been more complex or more critical to business success....

Magnite and Databricks Announce New Partnership to Transform Ad Data Activation

Marketers have long struggled to connect their rich audience data with ad platforms quickly and securely...

Building Intelligence into the Database Layer

Time series data is everywhere, streaming from industrial sensors, embedded devices, and software systems at a scale and speed that traditional data architectures were never designed to handle. In critical Read more…

The post Building Intelligence into the Database Layer appeared first on BigDATAwire.

📈 12 charts on Claude vs humans, SaaS' existential threat and what it all means for product teams

New Chartpack to feed your product brain

Movement-events on Mini Micro (part 1)

In this post I want to share with you different ways to check for (sprite) "movement" events in Mini Micro.

This is partly inspired by Joe's comment at my "Coin Collector" tutorial. He suggested to use the key.axis function instead of checking for concrete key-codes (like for the arrow keys).

First, I want to categorize the firing of "movement events" into two main types:

Continuous firing
Discrete firing

(I came up with these names, apologies if there are more known or accepted names out there).

"Discrete firing" is when only one movement event is fired when the user presses an arrow key. This will be discussed in a future post. For this post, let's focus on "continuous firing" ...

In "continuous firing" the player's object keeps moving in one direction as long as the corresponding arrow-key (or joystick axis) is being pushed.

The movement only stops when the key is released (or the joystick returns to neutral position).

An example of one of my projects that I could bring up is the spaceship from my "Letter Shooter" game. It moves with the arrow keys, and keeps moving when a key is being held down.

A reduced / simplified form would look like this:

So, does one code continuous-firing of movement events in Mini Micro?

A first version, checking for arrow keys, could look like this:

clear

while true
    if key.pressed("up") then print "^", ""
    if key.pressed("down") then print "V", ""
    if key.pressed("left") then print "<", ""
    if key.pressed("right") then print ">", ""
    wait 0.01
end while

(By the way, if you ever need to know the "names" of the keys available for the key.pressed function, try pprint key.keyNames on the console).

Try it! When run, the code will print the corresponding "direction" characters as long as an arrow-key is pressed.

A short delay was introduced so that the screen is not filled-up too quickly with characters, making it difficult to see what's going on. Experiment with different values, replacing it with yield or removing it entirely.

Let's make the above example more interesting by actually adding the "spaceship" and moving it on the screen:

clear

// Display 4 is our default sprite-display
sprDisp = display(4)

s = new Sprite
s.image = file.loadImage("/sys/pics/Fighter.png")
// Place on the center of the screen
s.x = 960 / 2
s.y = 640 / 2
// Make it face up, and smaller
s.rotation = 90
s.scale = 0.5

sprDisp.sprites.push s

// Velocity. Spaceship will move this amount of pixels
// for each "key-down" event.
v = 5

while true
    if key.pressed("up") then s.y += v
    if key.pressed("down") then s.y -= v
    if key.pressed("left") then s.x -= v
    if key.pressed("right") then s.x += v
    wait 0.01
end while

Now this works, but "only" supports arrow-keys. Personally, this is what I do in most of my projects. But one could generalize this by using the key.axis function (thanks Joe Strout for pointing this out). This would support both arrow-keys and gamepads / joysticks with one codebase.

The key.axis function returns values between -1 and 1 (and typically 0) depending on the state of one of its "axis" (which can be "Horizontal" or "Vertical"). As mentioned, it reacts both to arrow keys and gamepads / joysticks.

A re-worked while-loop with key.axis would look like this:

while true
    if key.axis("Vertical") > 0 then s.y += v
    if key.axis("Vertical") < 0 then s.y -= v
    if key.axis("Horizontal") < 0 then s.x -= v
    if key.axis("Horizontal") > 0 then s.x += v
    wait 0.01
end while

While trying things out for this post there is something I noticed. When exploring the returned values of key.axis, it does not just return -1 or 1. Even when using arrow keys. It also returns values in-between when the firing is "starting" to take place. As if "warming up". This nicely simulates a gamepad / joystick slowing leaving the neutral position while reaching one of the extremes of a direction (going all the way "left" or "up").

This code snippet showcases this fact:

clear

while true
    vAxis = key.axis("Vertical")
    hAxis = key.axis("Horizontal")
        // Only print if any of the values is not 0
    if vAxis or hAxis then 
        print "V:" + vAxis + " - H:" + hAxis
    end if
    wait 0.02
end while

Armed with this information, one could further adapt the spaceship-movement example to use the axis-values as "factors" (in a multiplication) to the velocity. And while we are at it, let's replace our wait with a yield.

Our while-loop would look like this:

while true
    vAxis = key.axis("Vertical")
    hAxis = key.axis("Horizontal")
    s.x += hAxis * v
    s.y += vAxis * v
    yield
end while

Notice how we don't need "ifs" anymore. Just take the current values, multiply and add to the current position (of course multiplying by 0 results in 0, and adding 0 to current coordinates does nothing).

The change in movement is subtle. You should notice the space-ship slowly starting to move in one direction and the acquiring constant speed. Nice.

This post showed how to detect movement-firing events "continuously" and also how to apply that information to moving a sprite.

In a further post we will talk about "discrete" movement-events and see some applications.

Have fun with Mini Micro!

Untitled

Check out this Pen I made!

Why Most RAG Pipelines Fail in Production (and How to Fix Them)

Most Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) pipelines look great in demos.
They pass test cases, return the right docs, and make stakeholders nod.

Then production hits.

Wrong context gets pulled.
The model hallucinates citations.
Latency spikes.
And suddenly your “AI search” feature is a support nightmare.

I’ve seen this mistake cost a company $4.2M in remediation and lost deals.
Here’s the core problem → embeddings aren’t the silver bullet people think they are.

Typical code pattern:

_# naive RAG example_
from langchain.embeddings import OpenAIEmbeddings
from langchain.vectorstores import FAISS
from langchain.chains import RetrievalQA

embeddings = OpenAIEmbeddings()
db = FAISS.from_documents(docs, embeddings)
qa = RetrievalQA.from_chain_type(llm=llm, retriever=db.as_retriever())

qa.run("What are the compliance rules for medical claims?")

It works fine on small test docs.
But once you scale to thousands of docs, multiple domains, and messy real-world data, here’s what happens:

Semantic drift: “Authorization” in healthcare ≠ “authorization” in OAuth docs.
Embedding collisions: Similar vectors across domains return irrelevant results.
Context overflow: Retrieved chunks don’t fit into the model’s context window.

In one case I reviewed:

A fintech + healthtech platform mixed contracts, support tickets, and clinical guidelines into the same FAISS index.
During a client demo, the system pulled OAuth docs instead of HIPAA rules.
Compliance flagged it. A major deal collapsed.

The remediation → segregating domains, building custom retrievers, and rewriting prompts → cost 8 months of rework and over $4.2M in combined losses.

Lesson: naive embeddings ≠ production retrieval.

Here’s what a hardened setup looks like:

✅ Domain Segregation
Use separate indexes for healthcare, legal, and support docs. Route queries intelligently.

✅ Hybrid Retrieval
Don’t rely only on vector similarity. Add keyword/BM25 filters:

retriever = db.as_retriever(search_type="mmr", search_kwargs={"k":5})
✅ Metadata-Aware Chunking
Store doc type, source, and timestamps. Query:
“HIPAA rule about claims, published after 2020” → filters out junk.

✅ Reranking
Use a cross-encoder to rerank top-k hits. This dramatically improves retrieval quality.

✅ Monitoring & Logs
Every retrieval event should log:

Which retriever was used
What docs were returned
Confidence scores

Without this, you won’t know why the model failed.

Separate domains into distinct indexes
Add metadata filtering (source, type, date)
Use rerankers for quality control
Log every retrieval event with confidence scores
Test on real-world queries, not toy examples

Embeddings are powerful — but blind faith in them is dangerous.
If your RAG pipeline hasn’t been stress-tested across messy, multi-domain data, it’s a liability waiting to happen.

Don’t learn this lesson with a multi-million dollar mistake.
Ship it right the first time.

Have you seen RAG pipelines fail in production? What went wrong, and how did you fix it?

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ARM System-on-Chip (SoC) Deep Dive: Edge AI and Coherency Fabric

🏗️ ARM System-on-Chip (SoC) Architecture Explained

The following diagram referencing the original architecture at ARM SoC Architecture Diagram outlines a complete modern ARM-based System-on-Chip design optimized for edge AI inference and heterogeneous computing. This architecture is the foundation for modern smartphones, high-end security cameras, and autonomous systems.

Let’s break down the design layer by layer:

Five layers:

Control Plane (Cortex-A clusters, GIC, PMU)
Data Plane (NPU, GPU, ISP, VPU)
Memory Subsystem (L1/L2/LLC, TLB, MC + DRAM)
Interconnect & Coherency Fabric (CHI/ACE, snoop filters, QoS)
I/O Translation Fabric (SMMU, StreamIDs, PCIe/USB/Display/Network)

Mental model: CPU = orchestrator (control), accelerators = muscle (data). CPU sets up work; accelerators crunch it; the fabric keeps everything coherent and on time.

What lives here

ARM Cortex-A CPU clusters (e.g., 4 cores) with private L1I/L1D and shared L2 per cluster.
GIC (Generic Interrupt Controller) for routing/priority of device interrupts.
PMU (Performance Monitoring Unit) for on-silicon counters (cache misses, TLB misses, branches, cycles).

Why it matters

Runs OS/supervisor and orchestrates accelerators.
Handles exceptions/IRQs; configures QoS, cache partitions, SMMU mappings.
PMU is your truth serum for tuning.

Role: Configure the world. Don’t do heavy lifting.

Compute engines

NPU (AI accelerator): GEMM/convolution engines for local inference (e.g., object detection).
GPU: Graphics + GPGPU for UI, 3D, shaders, post-processing.
ISP: Image pipeline (demosaic, denoise, tone map, auto-exposure/focus).
VPU: HW encode/decode (H.264/H.265/AV1) for capture/streaming.

Key design principle

Control/Data split: CPU provides the model and buffers; NPU/GPU/ISP/VPU execute at high throughput and signal completion.

Cache hierarchy

L1 (per-core, ~32–64 KB, ~4 cycles): fastest, tiny.
L2 (per-cluster, ~256 KB–2 MB, ~12 cycles).
LLC/L3 (shared, ~4–16 MB, ~40 cycles).
DRAM (GBs, ~100–200+ cycles).

Partitioned LLC (recommended)

Reserve LLC ways/regions per role to avoid “noisy neighbors.”
- Ex: CPU 2 MB, NPU 3 MB (model), Display 2 MB (frame cadence).
Prevents the GPU from evicting the NPU’s model or the display’s frame buffers.

TLB & huge pages

TLB caches VA→PA. Misses trigger page-walks (~100 cycles).
For large datasets, use 2 MB huge pages to cut TLB pressure drastically.

Access path: CPU → TLB → L1 → L2 → LLC → DRAM (short-circuit at first hit).

CHI/ACE fabric

High-speed, coherent fabric that routes transactions and enforces cache coherency via MESI/MOESI.

Coherency 101

Keep all cores/agents in agreement about shared cache lines:
- M/O/E/S/I states; snoops on peer caches; ownership transitions on read/write.

Snoop filter

Tracks line locations so you only snoop relevant caches (reduces traffic and power).

QoS manager

Prioritize time-critical clients:
- Ex: Display (15), NPU (12), CPU (8), GPU (4).
Guarantee bandwidth slices under contention.

AXI (non-coherent)

For DMA/I/O that don’t need HW coherency (e.g., streaming camera frames).

SMMU (IOMMU)

Per-device virtual memory + isolation with Stage-1 (OS) and Stage-2 (Hypervisor) translations.
StreamID selects which translation/permissions to apply; prevents rogue DMA into kernel memory.

Peripherals

PCIe (NVMe, NICs), USB, Display (HDMI/DP), Network (Ethernet/Wi-Fi).

Flow A: CPU memory access (coherent)

CPU issues load (x = array[i]).
TLB translates VA→PA (page walk on miss).
Probe L1 → L2 → LLC; return on first hit; else DRAM.
Data bubbles back to registers via cache hierarchy.

Tip: PMU counters validate latency and hit rates across levels.

Flow B: AI inference with coherent DMA

CPU loads model (prefetch to LLC partition for NPU).
CPU programs NPU: input at 0x1000; run model X.
NPU issues ACE-Lite (coherent) DMA reads.
Fabric snoops CPU caches, probes LLC; fetches from DRAM if needed.
NPU computes (e.g., 8 ms target).
NPU writes results coherently; coherency invalidates stale CPU lines.
NPU IRQ via GIC → CPU reads fresh results immediately.

Benefit: No software cache flush; lower latency to consume results.

Flow C: Camera capture with non-coherent DMA

ISP processes a frame → starts DMA to VA 0x5000.
SMMU checks StreamID, applies Stage-1/2 translations → PA 0xABCD.
QoS grants top priority to camera.
AXI write bypasses CPU caches → DRAM.
IRQ → CPU invalidates corresponding cache region (manual sync).
CPU (or NPU) consumes the frame.

Trade-off: Non-coherent = faster/less power but requires SW sync; coherent = simpler but adds snoop latency and power.

Flow D: QoS under contention

Workloads: Display (4K60), NPU inference, CPU compile, GPU render.
Assign priorities and bandwidth guarantees (e.g., Display 25 GB/s, NPU 20 GB/s).
LLC partitioning preserves working sets for Display/NPU.

Goal: Meet display and inference SLOs even if GPU throughput dips.

8.1 LLC partitioning (must-have for SLOs)

Pin critical footprints (AI model, frame buffers) to keep tail latencies flat.
Track with PMU: LLC hits/misses by partition; watch 95p/99p latency.

8.2 Coherent vs. non-coherent DMA (selection matrix)

Aspect	Coherent (ACE-Lite)	Non-coherent (AXI)
Cache sync	Automatic (HW)	Manual (SW flush/invalidate)
Latency	Higher (snoop)	Lower
Power	Higher (snoop traffic)	~20% lower
Best for	Tight CPU/accelerator loops	Streaming I/O (camera, video, NIC)

8.3 Reduce TLB pressure

Use 2 MB huge pages for large buffers (video, tensors).
Result: Fewer TLB misses, fewer page walks, measurable perf + power win.

8.4 Throughput knobs

Burst length (favor 128–256 B when legal).
Alignment (avoid crossing cache line boundaries).
Prefetchers (streaming/stride detection for model and frame access).

You don’t get all three. Use SLOs to pick the right point.

Example decision: Target <10 ms inference

8 MB LLC → ~95% hit-rate → ~7 ms ✔; higher power/area.
4 MB LLC → ~85% hit-rate → ~9 ms ✔; −33% power, −50% area. Pick 4 MB if it meets SLO and saves battery/BoM.

PMU quick-start (pseudo-C):

// Count L2 misses during inference
pmu_configure(PMU_L2_CACHE_MISS);
run_ai_inference();
uint64_t l2m = pmu_read();
printf("L2 misses: %llu\n", (unsigned long long)l2m);

Microbenchmarks

Latency ladders: L1/L2/LLC/DRAM load/store.
TLB miss latency: throttle page size to force misses.
Sustained bandwidth: long memcpy/stream triads, mixed R/W.
Coherency stress: ping-pong cache lines across cores/agents.
QoS drills: over-subscribe fabric; verify guarantees + tail latency.

What “good” looks like

SLO compliance at 95p/99p latencies.
Stable LLC hit-rates for reserved partitions.
TLB miss rate stays low under real traffic.
Display never drops frames even under stress.
Power aligns with budget at steady state and peaks.

SMMU with per-StreamID domains; least-privilege address windows.
Stage-2 translations controlled by hypervisor for multi-tenant.
Secure interrupt routing: verify GIC settings for EL2/EL3 paths.
Firmware update chain-of-trust (ROM → BL → secure OS).

NPU achieves <10 ms inference on the detection model.
ISP captures 4K frames; Display holds 60 FPS.
LLC partitioning protects model + frame buffers.
QoS guarantees bandwidth to Display/NPU; GPU is best-effort.
SMMU isolates camera/NIC DMA.
Power stays under ~5 W with optimal cache sizes and non-coherent streaming.

[ ] Define SLOs (latency, FPS, jitter) per workload.
[ ] Allocate LLC partitions for critical agents.
[ ] Choose coherent vs non-coherent DMA per path.
[ ] Map huge pages for large, hot buffers.
[ ] Set QoS priorities and bandwidth guarantees; measure at load.
[ ] Instrument PMU; gate changes on 95p/99p wins, not averages.
[ ] Validate with microbenchmarks + application mixes, not just one workload.
[ ] Lock down SMMU policies and interrupt routing early.

This ARM SoC pattern—CPU orchestrates, accelerators execute, fabric keeps it coherent and fair—is what powers modern edge devices. If you lock SLOs, partition caches, choose DMA modes wisely, and validate with PMU-driven loops, you’ll ship systems that are fast, power-efficient, and robust under real-world contention.

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Mix with the Masters: Mixing Night with Ken Lewis - BACK TO SCHOOL NIGHT - 10/1/2025

Join 2× Grammy winner Ken Lewis (114 Gold & Platinum credits, 30+ years in major-label music) for a free monthly Mixing Night livestream—watch him demo pro mix techniques, share real-world production and career tips, and field your burning questions on the mix bus, recording and more.

Stick around for live giveaways from Session Studio, Sound Radix and Bettermaker, plus resources like AllComp, GreenHAAS for $49, mix critiques on SoundBetter, merch, and all the links you need to gear up before showtime.

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Omerchy OS for Beginners – The Complete Guide

🚀 Omerchy OS for Beginners – Complete Guide

Welcome to Omerchy OS, an Arch Linux–based, lightweight, and keyboard-centric distro!

This guide is designed for beginners to get started efficiently and master daily tasks using hotkeys, terminal commands, and workflow tips.

Base: Arch Linux
Type: Rolling release (always updated, lightweight, fast)
Package Manager: pacman
Interface: Terminal + GUI (XFCE, KDE, GNOME)
Goal: Maximize productivity using hotkeys + terminal

🔄 Update System

Always update your system immediately:

sudo pacman -Syu

🛠️ Install Essential Tools

sudo pacman -S git wget curl tree htop vim neovim

git → Version control
tree → View folder structure
htop → Monitor processes
vim/neovim → Code editor

3️⃣ Pacman – Package Manager
Task Command
Install package sudo pacman -S package_name Remove package sudo pacman -R package_name Search package pacman -Ss package_name List installed packages pacman -Q Update system sudo pacman -Syu

💡 Tip: Arch-based distros are rolling release. Always update regularly!

4️⃣ Basic Terminal Usage
📂 Navigation

pwd          # Show current directory
ls -l        # List files in detail
cd folder    # Change directory
mkdir new    # Create folder
rm -r folder # Remove folder

📝 File Operations

cp file1 file2   # Copy file
mv old new       # Move/rename file
cat file         # View file content

💻 System Monitoring

top         # Running processes
htop        # Interactive process monitor
free -h     # RAM usage
df -h       # Disk usage
uname -a    # System info

5️⃣ Hotkeys & Navigation

Super key = Windows key

🖥️ Workspace & Window Management
Shortcut Action

Super + 1/2/3/4 Jump to workspace
Shift + Super + 1/2/3/4 Move window to workspace
Super + Arrow Focus window in that direction
Super + W Close window

🚀 Launching Apps
Shortcut App

Super + Return Terminal
Super + B Browser
Super + N Neovim
Super + F File Manager

📸 Screenshot / Screen Recording
Shortcut Action

Print Screen Screenshot region
Alt + Print Screen Record region
Ctrl + Print Screen Screenshot monitor

💡 Tip: Super + Alt + Space opens Omarchy menu for apps, captures, and style.

6️⃣ File Manager Tips

Ctrl + L → Go to path
Space → Preview file
Backspace → Go back one folder

7️⃣ Neovim (LazyVim) Shortcuts

Space → Show commands
Space Space → Fuzzy file search
Space E → Toggle sidebar

Sidebar operations:

Shortcut Action

A Add file
Shift + A Add folder
D Delete
M Move
R Rename

8️⃣ Networking & Downloads

ping google.com      # Check internet
wget url             # Download file
curl -O url          # Download file
ip addr              # Check IP

9️⃣ Daily Workflow Recommendations

Always update system first:

sudo pacman -Syu

Use hotkeys for workspace & window management

Use terminal for installing/updating software

Keep essential tools installed (git, htop, tree, neovim)

Explore apps via Omarchy menu (Super + Alt + Space)

Customize hotkeys & theme via ~/.config/hypr/bindings.conf

🔹 Tips for Proper Usage

Combine hotkeys + terminal → maximum efficiency

Rolling release → update regularly

Keep a hotkeys cheat sheet on your desktop

Backup dotfiles (~/.config)

Use Neovim + Terminal for coding & scripting

Explore Omarchy Menu for apps, style, and captures

🎯 Summary

Omerchy OS is a fast, rolling-release, keyboard-centric Linux distro.
Learn essential commands, hotkeys, and package management, and you’ll navigate your system like a pro in no time!

If you found this guide helpful, share it or leave a comment. Happy computing! 🚀

Peter Finch Golf: The most jaw-dropping course in Scotland...

The most jaw-dropping course in Scotland...

Join me as I tackle the formidable Old Course at Trump International—a jaw-dropping test of Scottish golf that pushes every swing to its limits. Huge thanks to Golfbreaks for organising this bucket-list adventure!

Planning your own epic golf trip? Check out Golfbreaks for deals, dive into the Old Course tour link, and snag my clothes and gear (with a sweet discount) via the link!

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IGN: Little Nightmares 3 - Official 'Alone' Trailer

Little Nightmares 3 just dropped its spooky new “Alone” trailer, teasing a co-op horror adventure from Supermassive Games. You and a friend will need nimble platforming skills as you explore haunting, melancholy landscapes and face your darkest fears together.

Mark your calendars for October 10—this nightmare hits PS4, PS5, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch (including the next-gen Switch 2) and PC via Steam.

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Startup Proposes ‘Better Math’ for AI Efficiency

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Northern Poland Emerging as Europe’s Next Semiconductor Hub

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Addressing the Growing Semiconductor ‘Talent Gap’

The labor gap in the U.S. alone is 76,000 jobs across all areas, and expected to double in the next 10 years.

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Two Amazon Prime Air drones crashed in Arizona

Two Amazon delivery drones reportedly collided with a crane this morning in Tolleson, AZ. The incident occurred about two miles from a fulfillment center run by the tech company and involved two of its Prime Air drones. No injuries have been reported. Law enforcement were called to the scene, however Sgt. Erik Mendez of the Tolleson police told local radio station KTAR that the Federal Aviation Administration would be taking over the investigation.

"We're aware of an incident involving two Prime Air drones in Tolleson, Arizona," Amazon representative Terrence Clark said. "We're currently working with the relevant authorities to investigate."

Amazon began offering a drone delivery option in the Phoenix area last year. The drones only fly during the day and if weather conditions are favorable. The company received FAA approval to ship several more products by drone in May.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/two-amazon-prime-air-drones-crashed-in-arizona-224857013.html?src=rss

Amazon Luna is absorbing Prime Gaming and getting controller-free games in the process

After a few years of mostly humming along in the background, Amazon's game streaming service is receiving a bit of an update. Amazon Luna will still act as a game streaming service with a rotating library of free games for Prime users, but now, Amazon also plans to offer "GameNight," a collection of social party games that you can play with your friends with just a smartphone. The expansion is about more than just new games: Amazon's Prime Gaming brand is now also part of Luna.

Amazon says the new GameNight collection includes over 25 multiplayer games, some that are reinterpretations of classic games like Angry Birds, Exploding Kittens or Ticket to Ride, and others that are entirely original and developed by Amazon, like Courtroom Chaos: Starring Snoop Dogg. If you've played any of Jackbox's various multiplayer games, GameNight seems to use a similar setup. You load up the game in Luna, whoever's playing scans an onscreen QR code with their phone and then they can join the game using their device as a controller.

The hope is that these smartphone-controlled games will lower the barrier to entry for anyone intimidated by a controller, or who hasn't already taken advantage of Luna as part of their Prime subscription. For everyone else, though, Amazon says the service is getting a collection of new high-profile games in the near future, including Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, Kingdom Come: Deliverance II and Dave the Diver. As before, if you're willing to pay for one of Amazon's add-on subscriptions you can add even more games to your library, too. Unlike GameNight games, though, all of these titles will require a controller to play, whether it's Amazon's Luna Controller or a Bluetooth controller connected to the Luna app.

As far as Prime Gaming is concerned, Amazon's not retiring the benefits of the plan, but rather using them to bolster Luna. Prime Gaming launched as Twitch Prime, a program that unlocked unique emotes, one free Twitch sub and free PC games every month if you linked your Twitch and Amazon accounts. Those benefits will still be available after Prime Gaming is retired, and Twitch says that any free PC games you redeem will be available "wherever Amazon Prime is available as part of Luna Standard." That includes regions where you can't stream Luna yet.

While confusing, adding more games and folding Prime Gaming into Luna suggests that Amazon views the service as the gaming project it's prioritizing moving forward. It doesn't have the library of Xbox Cloud Gaming and it's not clear if Amazon is as gun-ho about streaming as Microsoft is, but if the company is willing to pay, offering more games and more ways to play them seems like a good move.

Update, October 1 2025, 6:07PM ET: The story and its headline have been updated to include details about Amazon's changes to Prime Gaming.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/amazon-luna-will-offer-controller-free-party-games-in-an-attempt-to-woo-prime-subscribers-130004416.html?src=rss

Amazon is reportedly aggressively pitching law enforcement on its cloud services

Forbes has published an investigation into Amazon's efforts to court law enforcement clients for artificial intelligence and surveillance services. The article reveals that not only is the company promoting Amazon Web Services as a potential police tool, but it has been partnering with other businesses in that sector to use its cloud infrastructure. According to the Forbes report, Amazon's partners that are pitching police departments include car tracking tools and license plate readers from Flock Safety, gun detection by ZeroEyes, real-time crime center apps from C3 AI and Revir Technologies, and AI that helps compose police reports from Abel Police and Mark43. The piece estimated that the police tech business is worth $11 billion. Based on emails sent by members of Amazon's law enforcement and safety team, the company is working awfully hard to get a share of those billions.

The company's aggressive sales work has raised outcry for privacy issues around how police officers might use these tools, which is unsurprising given that AI tools can create inaccuracies and easily be misused. Regulation is still a piecemeal affair and some law enforcement departments have failed to follow what laws do exist about tech use.

"It's dismaying to see one of the largest and most powerful companies pushing authoritarian surveillance tech in this way," ACLU Senior Policy Analyst Jay Stanley told Forbes. "I didn't realize Amazon was serving as a midwife for AI law enforcement technologies."

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/amazon-is-reportedly-aggressively-pitching-law-enforcement-on-its-cloud-services-215334082.html?src=rss

Ubisoft launches its new Tencent-backed subsidiary

Ubisoft has launched — and named — its Tencent-backed subsidiary. Vantage Studios is the first of the company's "creative houses" under a previously-announced reorganization. The new studio will oversee the company's tentpole franchises: Assassin's Creed, Far Cry and Rainbow Six.

The news follows Ubisoft's March announcement of a new subsidiary with a €1.16 billion ($1.36 billion) investment from Tencent. The Chinese company took a minority ownership stake in Vantage as part of the deal. In July, Ubisoft named the new subsidiary's co-CEOs: Christophe Derennes and Charlie Guillemot.

"Our focus is on evolving Ubisoft's operating model to bring more focus, more autonomy and more accountability to the teams so they can stay closely attuned to our players," Guillemot said at the time. "Decision making will be quicker, and it will also be easier to pivot when we need to change course."

Three-panel view: Assassin's Creed, Far Cry, and Rainbow Six.

Ubisoft's announcement today reflected that language. The idea is to give its developers "a higher level of autonomy" at Vantage and future studios. It wants the new structure to enable "a shorter pathway between gathering and implementing player feedback."

Vantage is the only creative house the parent company has announced. The company will set up future ones "under the banner of a shared DNA and development expertise." However, it's unclear what other creative houses will work on, with Vantage taking over Ubisoft's bread-and-butter franchises.

Vantage's team will be spread across Ubisoft's offices in Montréal, Quebec City, Sherbrooke, Saguenay, Barcelona and Sofia. Multiple gaming publications, including GamesIndustry.biz, reported that the studio began operations today. Ubisoft is said to have chosen "Vantage Studios" based on a vote by its 2,300 employees. As for Tencent, it will reportedly act in an advisory role, with the co-CEOs having the final word.

Ubisoft was due for some big changes. The company has endured big-name flops, studio closures and layoffs. At least Assassin's Creed: Shadows has done well.

Incidentally, Assassin's Creed, Far Cry and Rainbow Six titles were among those added to Game Pass on Wednesday. Microsoft seems to have intended for the announcement to soften the blow of the service's 50 percent price hike. I'm not so sure it worked.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/ubisoft-launches-its-new-tencent-backed-subsidiary-194750403.html?src=rss

The best early October Prime Day kitchen deals include up to 39 percent off our favorite air fryers

It's not officially called October Prime Day, and it doesn't technically start until next Tuesday, but Amazon's Prime Big Deal Days 2025 sale is already offering up quite a few deals on kitchen tech. And we're finding a good number of deals on the air fryers, multicookers, soda makers and more that we've tested and recommend. The Engadget team has tested plenty of excellent kitchen tech, as seen in our reviews and buying guides. so if you want to read up before you buy, you can. We'll be adding more deals to this list as we get closer to Tuesday, and expect to add a lot more once the sale officially starts. For now, here are the best Prime Day kitchen deals we could find.

Ninja Creami ice cream maker with extra pints $200 ($55 off with Prime): Here's a bundle that includes two additional pint jars for the ice cream maker. It's one of our favorite pieces of kitchen tech and we called it a frozen fantasy-maker in our review. Note that the unit itself dipped down to $160 last Black Friday and the extra pints have gone as low as $16.

Instant Pot Vortex Plus with Clear Cook for $80 ($20 off with Prime): This Vortex air fryer model is similar to our top airfryer pick, but is missing the Odor Ease feature. It still has the Clear Cook window that lets you keep an eye on your food as it crisps and the Vortex cooking tech heats up remarkably fast, with almost no pre-heating time.

Instant Pot Vortex 2-QT Mini for $38 ($22 off with Prime): The budget model from our air fryer guide may not be large but its two-quart basket is enough to reheat leftovers for two or cook up a batch of frozen appetizers. And, because of its small size, it doesn’t take up a ton of space on your countertops — ideal for a small kitchen.

Breville InFizz Fusion beverage maker for $200 ($50 off): We called this fizz-maker the bubble master in our review. True, it’s pricier than rivals in the same space, but the upscale design — that actually looks good on a countertop — somewhat makes up for the price premium. We also appreciate the Fusion Cap that helps prevent messy eruptions when you’re bubbling up your drinks.

Cosori Air Fryer Pro Compact for $85 ($15 off with Prime): One of our concerns with the Cosori 9-in-1 was that it was a little on the wide side, taking up extra countertop space. The Pro Compact has a more space-saving design while still packing a five-quart basket.

Instant Pot 4QT Vortex mini air fryer for $55 ($35 off with Prime): This model’s four-quart capacity falls between our top Instant Pot air fryer pick and the budget model. It has the Clear Cook window feature, six presets and it comes in pink in addition to the standard white and black.

Instant Pot Duo Plus for $90 ($50 off): We named this the best multicooker in our guide to the best kitchen tech we’ve tested. It can cook a dizzying array of foods from basic beans and rice to homemade yogurt. We like this one because it’s simple to use, and has quick-cooking modes for soup, eggs and grains. There’s even a sous vide cooking function.

Breville Bambino Plus for $400 ($100 off): In our gift guide for coffee lovers, this espresso machine earned our respect for its compact size and the fact that it doesn’t cost a grand, like some machines do. Plus the controls are easy for beginners to learn but makes silky milkfoam for pro-level latte artists.

Breville Juice Fountain Plus for $130 ($20 off): This went as low as $110 back in January, but it’s still a decent discount on a high-powered juice extractor. We were won over by its impressive juicing abilities and despite how it looks, it's surprisingly easy to clean — as long as you do it right away.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/the-best-early-october-prime-day-kitchen-deals-include-up-to-39-percent-off-our-favorite-air-fryers-193009170.html?src=rss

How to cancel or downgrade your Xbox Game Pass subscription

If raising console prices wasn't enough to scare you away, Microsoft has also increased the price of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate by 50 percent. That makes the subscription cost $30 per month when it used to be $20. Even if it comes with more games and the benefits of a Fortnite Crew subscription, you wouldn't be wrong for wanting to cancel.

Cancelling means you'll also lose ability to play online multiplayer games, but cheaper tiers of Game Pass received new benefits without getting a similar price hike, so downgrading might be worth considering. Whichever you choose, the process of managing your subscription is relatively easy, provided you remember your login information.

The menu Microsoft displays when you try and cancel your Game Pass subscription.

Rather than managing your Game Pass subscription on your Xbox, you'll need to log in to your Microsoft account through a web browser. To get started:

Access your account by clicking the profile icon in the top-right corner of Microsoft's website, or by heading to account.microsoft.com and logging in.
Click on the Subscriptions tab in the left sidebar.
In the Game Pass section, click on Manage.
Then click on Cancel subscription, the last option in the menu.

Depending on when you subscribed and when your next billing date is, Microsoft might offer to refund a portion of your subscription if you choose to unsubscribe immediately, rather than wait to the end of your billing period. Whichever you choose, once you confirm, you'll be unsubscribed.

The menu for switch subscriptions Microsoft displays when you try and manage your Game Pass subscription.

If you'd prefer to just switch to a more affordable subscription, like Game Pass Premium for $15 per month or Game Pass Essential for $10 per month, the process is nearly the same.

Log in to your account through Microsoft's website or account.microsoft.com.
Click on the Subscriptions tab in the left sidebar.
In the Game Pass section, click on Manage.
Then, click on Change subscription plan.
Consider your options, then click on Switch subscription to change plans.

Microsoft will ask you to confirm your decision and potentially choose a payment option, but once you click on Subscribe, you'll be all set.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/xbox/how-to-cancel-or-downgrade-your-xbox-game-pass-subscription-191801458.html?src=rss

The best VPN deals: Get up to 87 percent off ProtonVPN, ExpressVPN, Surfshark and more

A virtual private network (VPN) can come in handy daily, whether you're using one to streaming foreign TV shows or trying to save money buy browsing international sites for discounts. But if you're going to invest in a VPN, it's worth checking for sales and deals first before you subscribe. Pricing can be tricky for these services — and far from transparent — but there are deals to be had.

VPN provides often provide deep discounts to those willing to sign up for one- or two-year plans, paying the full charge for the period upfront. This is a win-win — they boost their subscriber numbers, and you get heavy price cuts on some of our favorite services. Most of the deals we highlight below follow that pattern, so make sure you're comfortable with a longer commitment before you take the plunge. If you've been thinking about subscribing to a VPN service, read on for the best VPN deals we could find right now.

NordVPN — $83.43 for a two-year subscription with three months free (77 percent off): NordVPN gets the most important parts of a VPN right. It's fast, it doesn't leak any of your data and it's great at changing your virtual location. I noted in my NordVPN review that it always connects quickly and includes a support page that makes it easy to get live help. Although I'm sad to see it shutting down Meshnet, NordVPN still includes a lot of cool features, like servers that instantly connect you to Tor. This deal gives you 77 percent off the two-year plan, which also comes with three extra months — but there's no expiration date, so you have a little time for comparison shopping.

ExpressVPN Basic — $97.72 for a two-year subscription with four months free (73 percent off): This is one of the best VPNs, especially for new users, who will find its apps and website headache-free on all platforms. In tests for my ExpressVPN review, it dropped my download speeds by less than 7 percent and successfully changed my virtual location 14 out of 15 times. In short, it's an all-around excellent service that only suffers from being a little overpriced — which is why I'm so excited whenever I find it offering a decent deal. This deal, which gets you 28 months of ExpressVPN service, represents a 73 percent savings. It's the lowest I've seen ExpressVPN go in some time, though like NordVPN, it's not on a ticking clock.

ExpressVPN Advanced — $125.72 for a two-year subscription with four months free (67 percent off): ExpressVPN recently split its pricing into multiple tiers, but they all still come with similar discounts for going long. In addition to top-tier VPN service, advanced users get two additional simultaneous connections (for a total of 12), the ExpressVPN Keys password manager, advanced ad and tracker blocking, ID protection features and a 50 percent discount on an AirCove router.

Surfshark Starter — $53.73 for a two-year subscription with three months free (87 percent off): This is the "basic" level of Surfshark, but it includes the entire VPN; everything on Surfshark One is an extra perk. With this subscription, you'll get some of the most envelope-pushing features in the VPN world right now. Surfshark has a more closely connected server network than most VPNs, so it can rotate your IP constantly to help you evade detection — it even lets you choose your own entry and exit nodes for a double-hop connection. That all comes with a near-invisible impact on download speeds. With this year-round deal, you can save 87 percent on 27 months of Surfshark.

Surfshark Starter+ — $59.13 for a two-year subscription with three months free (87 percent off): If you want some of the extra features of the Surfshark suite but aren't interested in jumping all the way to Surfshark One, try this intermediate tier instead. Starter+ includes Alternative ID, which you can use to mask your details when you sign up for online accounts, and Surfshark Search, a private search engine with no ads or activity tracking. This is another year-round deal that works out to an 86 percent discount.

Surfshark One — $67.23 for a two-year subscription with three months free (86 percent off): A VPN is great, but it's not enough to protect your data all on its own. Surfshark One adds several apps that boost your security beyond just VPN service, including Surfshark Antivirus (scans devices and downloads for malware) and Surfshark Alert (alerts you whenever your sensitive information shows up in a data breach), plus Surfshark Search and Alternative ID from the previous tier. This evergreen deal gives you 86 percent off all those features. If you bump up to Surfshark One+, you'll also get data removal through Incogni, but the price jumps enough that it's not quite worthwhile in my eyes.

CyberGhost — $56.94 for a two-year subscription with two months free (83 percent off): CyberGhost has some of the best automation you'll see on any VPN. With its Smart Rules system, you can determine how its apps respond to different types of Wi-Fi networks, with exceptions for specific networks you know by name. Typically, you can set it to auto-connect, disconnect or send you a message asking what to do. CyberGhost's other best feature is its streaming servers — while it's not totally clear what it does to optimize them, I've found both better video quality and more consistent unblocking when I use them on streaming sites. Currently, you can get 26 months of CyberGhost for 83 percent off the usual price.

Private Internet Access — $79 for a three-year subscription with three months free (83 percent off): It's a bit hard to find (the link at the start of this paragraph includes the coupon), but Private Internet Access (PIA) is giving out the best available price right now on a VPN I'd recommend using. With this deal, you can get 39 months of PIA for a little bit over $2 per month — an 83 percent discount on its monthly price. Despite being so cheap, PIA almost never comes off as a budget VPN, coming with its own DNS servers, a built-in ad blocker and automation powers to rival CyberGhost. However, internet speeds can fluctuate while you're connected.

hide.me — $69.95 for a two-year subscription with two months free (73 percent off): Hide.me is an excellent free VPN — in fact, it's my favorite on the market, even with EventVPN and the free version of Proton VPN as competition. However, if you do want to upgrade to its paid plan, the two-year subscription offers great savings. Hide.me works well as a no-frills beginner VPN, with apps and a server network it should frankly be charging more for.

Like I said in the intro, practically every VPN heavily discounts its long-term subscriptions the whole year round. The only noteworthy exception is Mullvad, the Costco hot dog of VPNs (that's a compliment, to be clear). When there's constantly a huge discount going on, it can be hard to tell when you're actually getting a good deal. The best way to squeeze out more savings is to look for seasonal deals, student discounts or exclusive sales like Proton VPN's coupon for Engadget readers.

One trick VPNs often use is to add extra months onto an introductory deal, pushing the average monthly price even lower. When it comes time to renew, you usually can't get these extra months again. You often can't even renew for the same basic period of time — for example, you may only be able to renew a two-year subscription for one year. If you're planning to hold onto a VPN indefinitely, check the fine print to see how much it will cost per month after the first renewal, and ensure that fits into your budget.

Follow @EngadgetDeals on X for the latest tech deals and buying advice.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/best-vpn-deals-120056041.html?src=rss

The best wireless headphones for 2025: Bluetooth options for every budget

Wireless headphones have come a long way from the bulky designs of the past. Today’s models are lighter, smarter and packed with features that make them useful for everything from travel to long workdays at your desk. Many offer strong noise cancellation, quick pairing and reliable battery life — all of which makes them an easy upgrade if you want more freedom from your devices.

Of course, not every listener has the same needs. Some people want portability, which is why our guide to the best earbuds is worth a look, while others want something more specialized like the best gaming headsets or the best budget earbuds. But if you’re after over-ear headphones that focus on comfort and immersive sound, this roundup of the best wireless headphones highlights the top choices we’ve tested.

When it comes to shopping for a good pair of wireless headphones, the first thing you’ll need to decide on is wear style. Do you prefer on-ear or over-ear headphones? For the purposes of our buyer’s guide, we focus on the over-ear style as that’s what most noise-canceling headphones are nowadays. Sure, you can find on-ear models with ANC, but over-ear designs are much more effective at blocking sound. Speaking of noise cancellation, you’ll want to determine early on if you even want that. If you frequently crank up the beats in noisy environments, you’ll want to not only make sure it’s there, but also make sure it’s good, preferably with adaptive ANC. If you plan to use your new headphones in quieter spaces, skipping ANC can save you some money.

The next area to consider is features. We recommend trying to get the most bang for your buck, but as you’re shopping around you should determine which items are must-haves and what you can live without. And don’t take basic things like automatic pausing and Bluetooth multipoint connectivity for granted, as not all companies include them. We also suggest reading reviews to see how well a company’s more advanced features work. This will help you decide if those are something you’re willing to (likely) pay extra for. Keep an eye on better battery life estimates to avoid disappointment, as some manufacturers promise more hours than real-world testing delivers. And don’t be easily swayed by lofty promises about call quality without verifying them.

Sound can be subjective, so we recommend trying before you buy if at all possible. We understand this isn’t easy at a time when we’re doing most of our shopping online. But trying on a set of headphones and listening to them for a few minutes can save you from an expensive case of buyer’s remorse. We also recommend paying attention to things like Spatial Audio, Dolby Atmos, 360 Reality Audio and other immersive formats. Not all headphones support them, so you’ll want to make sure a perspective pair does if that sort of thing excites you. If you plan to use your headphones for other media besides music, checking for latency is also a must — some delay can impact playback for things like movies or games, even if most true wireless headphones now offer minimal lag.

The primary way we test wireless headphones is to wear them as much as possible. We prefer to do this over a one- to two-week period, but sometimes embargoes don’t allow it. During this time, we listen to a mix of music and podcasts, while also using the earbuds to take both voice and video calls. Since battery life for headphones can be 30 hours or more, we drain the battery with looping music and the volume set at a comfortable level (usually around 75 percent). Due to the longer battery estimates, we’ll typically power the headphones off several times and leave them during a review. This simulates real-world use and keeps us from having to constantly monitor the process for over 24 straight hours.

To judge the best Bluetooth headphones, we focus on higher-quality audio by listening to a variety of genres and paying close attention to how each style sounds. We also test at both low and high volumes to check for consistency in the tuning. To assess the quality of phone calls, we’ll record audio samples with the headphones’ microphones as well as have third parties call us.

When it comes to features, we do a thorough review of companion apps, testing each feature as we work through the software. Any holdovers from previous models are double checked for improvements or regression. If the headphones we’re testing are an updated version of a previous model, we’ll spend time getting reacquainted with the older set. Ditto for the closest competition for each new set of headphones that we review.

AirPods Max

Apple’s AirPods Max are premium, well-designed over-ear headphones that incorporate all of the best features you find on standard AirPods: solid noise cancelation, spatial audio and easy Siri access. However, their $550 starting price makes them almost prohibitively expensive, even for Apple users. There are better options available at lower prices, but if you can pick up the AirPods Max at a steep discount, they might be worthwhile for the biggest Apple fans among us.

Dyson On-Trac

The On-Trac headphones have an almost infinitely customizable design, and that’s what’s most unique about them. The sound profile offers some nice detail, but lacks dynamic range overall. ANC is average at best and there aren’t any advanced features that will make your life easier. Well, except for the hearing health monitor which is actually handy. All told, that’s not a lot in a set of $500 headphones.

Sonos Ace

The Sonos Ace is an excellent debut for the company’s first headphones. The combination of refined design, great sound quality and home theater tricks creates a unique formula. However, ANC performance is just okay and key functionality is still in the works for many users.

Sony ULT Wear

If most headphones don’t have the level of bass you desire, the ULT Wear is an option to consider. The low-end thump isn’t for everyone, but there are also plenty of handy features and a refined look to make the $200 set more compelling than many in this price range.

Sony WH-CH720N

While the WH-CH720N are a great affordable option, we prefer the Audio-Technica in the budget category. Sony’s cans are lightweight with good sound quality, but ANC struggles at times and they’re made with a lot of plastic.

Beats Studio Pro

The Studio Pro lacks basic features like automatic pausing, and multipoint connectivity is only available on Android. Moreover, they’re not very comfortable for people with larger heads. Overall sound quality is improved, though, and voice performance on calls is well above average.

Bose QuietComfort Ultra headphones

Bose’s latest flagship model has a lot to offer, but its trademark Immersive Audio feature can be inconsistent across different types of music. There’s still world-class ANC, excellent comfort and a clearer transparency mode, but for the price, the non-Ultra model is a better choice right now.

Master & Dynamic MH40 (2nd gen)

The MH40 are a great set of headphones if you favor crisp, clear and natural sound that isn’t overly tuned. This pair showcases the company’s affinity for leather and metal too, but limited customization and short battery life for non-ANC cans kept this set from making the cut.

Bowers & Wilkins Px8

The company’s trademark pristine sound is on display here, but the Px8 are more expensive and not nearly as comfortable as the Px7 S2.

How can you tell the quality of wireless headphones?

I typically look at three factors: design, sound quality and features. In terms of design, I’m usually looking to see if the build quality of the headphones feels cheap and plasticky. Plenty of companies use plastic, but they can do so in a way that doesn’t look or feel like budget models. For sound quality, I want to hear a nice, even tuning where highs, mids and lows are all well represented. No overly boomy bass or scooped out mids. I also want good clarity where you can pick up fine details and an open, immersive soundstage. Features is typically a distant third, but if a company doesn’t cover basic functionality (automatic pausing, transparency mode, multipoint Bluetooth, etc.) it can be an indication of overall quality.

How do I choose the best quality wireless headphones?

“Best” can be pretty subjective, but I always recommend going to a place where you can listen to the headphones you’re thinking about buying before you commit. Sometimes this isn’t possible, so you’ll want to check return policies. I also recommend doing some research to determine what your priorities are in a new set. Are you an audiophile who wants the best sound quality? Is powerful active noise cancellation (ANC) the most important? Would you rather have conveniences like automatic pausing?

Which brand has the best wireless headphones?

Sony consistently tops our list with its 1000X line. This is mostly due to the combination of sound quality, ANC performance and the truckload of features these headphones pack in. I’ll be the first to tell you that there are better sounding options and other companies, like Bose, offer more effective noise cancellation. But when you add everything up, no one comes close to the full slate of tools Sony puts in its premium headphone line.

Do expensive wireless headphones sound better?

Exorbitant price tags don’t mean better audio quality. Bowers & Wilkins’ headphones are on the high end for wireless noise-canceling models and they sound amazing. However, Audio-Technica’s M50xBT2 is much more affordable and doesn’t have ANC, but these headphones have a warm, natural sound profile that I find very inviting. At the end of the day, it will come down to personal preference, but you don’t need to spend a lot to find great headphones.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/audio/headphones/best-headphones-wireless-bluetooth-120543205.html?src=rss

FTC sues Zillow and accuses it of buying off rival Redfin

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is suing home-search website Zillow, alleging that it paid rival Redfin $100 million to eliminate competition in the online listing business. The suit refers to a deal inked back in February between the two companies in which Redfin allegedly agreed to become "an exclusive syndicator of Zillow listings."

The allegations suggest that Redfin began copying over listings from Zillow instead of creating its own listings, which gave Zillow much more control over the space. The suit also accuses Redfin of agreeing to end contracts with advertising customers in an alleged attempt to cede more ground to Zillow.

The FTC went on to suggest that this anti-competitive practice would lead to higher prices and worsening terms for both renters and advertisers. “This agreement is nothing more than an end run around competition that insulates Zillow from head-to-head competition on the merits with Redfin for customers advertising multifamily buildings,” the lawsuit said.

Zillow released a statement on the suit, which was published by CNN. The statement called the previous deal with Redfin “pro-competitive and pro-consumer" and noted that “our listing syndication with Redfin benefits both renters and property managers and has expanded renters’ access to multifamily listings across multiple platforms."

Redfin also disagrees with the allegations from the FTC, saying that "by the end of 2024, it was clear that the existing number of Redfin advertising customers couldn’t justify the cost of maintaining our rentals sales force." The company went on to suggest that "partnering with Zillow cut those costs and enabled us to invest more in rental-search innovations on Redfin, directly benefiting apartment seekers."

The FTC further alleges that Redfin laid off hundreds of workers as part of the deal, going on to help Zillow hire some of these employees. Basically, the agency is accusing Zillow of acquiring a large part of Redfin’s business, all while hiding behind the idea of a partnership to avoid scrutiny. The FTC has asked the court to end the agreement and consider a divestiture of assets.

This isn't the only current legal dispute that Zillow finds itself in. A real estate brokerage company called Compass issued its own lawsuit back in June, accusing Zillow of engaging in anticompetitive practices.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/ftc-sues-zillow-and-accuses-it-of-buying-off-rival-redfin-184539492.html?src=rss

The best October Prime Day deals on Anker charging gear and other accessories

Maybe you’re not looking to snag an iPad, a robot vacuum or a VR headset this Amazon Prime Day because you’re set with what you already have. Instead, though, consider picking up a few discounted “essential” gadgets, or really, devices you don’t want to be left without in a pinch. Charging gear falls into this camp, and Anker makes some of our favorite power banks, cables, wireless chargers and more.

A bunch of Anker’s gear is on sale for October Prime Day, making now a great time to stock up. Personally, I always end up getting an extra charging cable or surge protector for my house, or I take stock of the gifts I’ll need over the next couple of months and pick up a power brick while they’re deeply discounted. Here, we’ve collected all of the best October Prime Day deals on Anker devices and other charging accessories so you don’t have to go searching for them.

Power banks are not as straightforward as you might think. They come in all shapes, sizes and capacities and can have extra features like magnetic alignment, built-in kickstands, extra ports and more.

It's worth considering how you'll use a power bank before you decide on the right one to buy. Smartphones don’t need huge-capacity bricks to power up a couple of times over; a 5K or 10K portable charger should be plenty if that’s all you’re looking to support. If you want a more versatile accessory that can charge a tablet, laptop or gaming handheld, consider a brick with a higher capacity — and more ports so you can charge multiple devices simultaneously.

A good wireless charger can lighten your cable load. While wired charging remains faster and more efficient, wireless chargers can clean up your space by eliminating a few of those cables that constantly trip you up.

We recommend thinking about where you'll use a wireless charger before buying one. Those outfitting a home office with new tech may want a wireless charging stand that puts their phone in an upright position that’s easier to see while it’s powering up, while those who want a wireless charger for their nightstand might prefer a lay-flat design or a power station that can charge a smartphone, smartwatch and pair of earbuds all at once.

Plenty of other charging gear is on sale for Prime Day. It’s never a bad idea to pick up a few 30W USB-C adapters so you always have what you need to reliably power up your phone. Same goes for extra USB-C (or USB-A) cables that can live in your car, in your office at work or by the couch.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/the-best-october-prime-day-deals-on-anker-charging-gear-and-other-accessories-164536998.html?src=rss

Early October Prime Day 2025 tech deals under $50: Save on gear from Apple, Anker, Ring, JBL and Roku

We're still a few days away from the official start to Amazon's October Prime Day sale, but we're already seeing plenty of discounts that are already live — including tech deals for under $50. You can snap up some of our favorite Mac accessories, smart plugs, power banks, security cameras and more. The gear here is pulled from our own guides and reviews — products and brands we’ve tried ourselves and currently recommend. If you want to stock up on smaller tech without spending too much, this list of the best Prime Day deals under $50 is a great place to start.

Amazon Echo Pop Kids for $33 ($17 off with Prime): Among the announcements for the new Echo devices, Amazon did not include new Echo Pop Kids models, so this is still the most current model for now. It’s good for smaller spaces, not necessarily audio fidelity, and it comes with six months of free access to Amazon Kids as well as early access to Alexa+.

Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K Max for $40 ($20 off): Amazon's most powerful streaming dongle supports 4K HDR content, Dolby Vision and Atmos and Wi-Fi 6E with double the storage of cheaper Fire TV sticks. It earned an honorable mention in our guide to streaming devices and also happens to make a good retro gaming emulator.

Blink Video Doorbell for $35 ($35 off): True, Amazon just announced new Blink devices, but those won’t hit the market until after Prime Day is over. If you want a video doorbell right now at an impressively low price, this should serve. We’ve tested Blink security devices before and have been impressed by what you get for such a small price.

Belkin 4-Port Charger Block for $47 ($43 off): Here’s a handy charger from our guide to the best MacBook accessories. It’s comparable to the adapter Apple includes with its laptops, but it has four ports in total (two USB-C and two USB-A). Plus it’s cheaper than buying Apple’s brick, especially now.

Ring Battery Doorbell for $50 ($50 off): At $49.99 this juuust qualifies as an under $50 tech deal. If you don’t have doorbell wires at your front entrance, you can still have a camera to capture all the package deliveries and neighborhood animal sightings with the Ring Battery Doorbell. It records video in HD with more vertical coverage than the last model, so you can see people from head to toe. Just note that newer Ring devices are on the way.

Blink Mini 2 security cameras (two-pack) for $35 ($35 off): This is currently the top budget pick in our guide to the best security cameras. The Mini 2 is a great option for indoor monitoring or you can put it outside with a weatherproof adapter, but since it needs to be plugged in, we like it for keeping an eye on your pets while you're away and watching over entry ways from the inside.

Anker 622 5K magnetic power bank with stand for $34 ($14 off with Prime): This 0.5-inch thick power bank attaches magnetically to iPhones and won't get in your way when you're using your phone. It also has a built-in stand so you can watch videos, make FaceTime calls and more hands-free while your phone is powering up.

Amazon Smart Plug for $13 ($12 off): We named this the best smart plug for Alexa users because it hooks up painlessly and stays connected reliably. Use it to control lamps or your holiday lights using programs and schedules in the Alexa app, or just your voice by talking to your Echo Dot or other Alexa-enabled listener.

Levoit Mini Core-P air purifier for $40 ($10 off with Prime): This is the mini version of the top pick in our guide to air purifiers. It has a three-stage filter (pre, activated carbon and particle filters) though that particle filter is not a true HEPA filter. But it’s rated at 250 square feet and can help clear the air in your office or other small room.

Echo Pop smart speaker for $25 ($15 off): The half sphere Pop is the most affordable Echo speaker in Amazon’s lineup. The sound won’t be as full as its larger siblings, but will do a fine job of bringing Alexa’s help to smaller rooms. Just note that it went as low as $18 for Black Friday and October Prime Day last year.

Roku Streaming Stick Plus 2025 for $29 ($11 off): This is our top pick for the best streaming device for accessing free and live content. The dongle supports 4K video and HDR and doesn’t need to be plugged into the wall for power. It’s a great way to access any streaming service you could ask for: Netflix, Prime Video, Disney+, HBO Max and many more.

Roku Streaming Stick HD for $20 ($10 off): If you don’t care about 4K (or your screen resolution isn’t that high anyway) you can still get the same simple-to-use Roku OS with this device. The best thing about Roku streaming sticks is the access to all the free content — so this is an affordable way to get it.

Leebein 2025 electric spin scrubber for $40 ($30 off with Prime): This is an updated version of the electric scrubber we love that makes shower cleaning easier than ever before. It comes with seven brush heads so you can use it to clean all kinds of surfaces, and its adjustable arm length makes it easier to clean hard-to-reach spots. It's IPX7 waterproof and recharges via USB-C.

Jisulife Life7 handheld fan for $25 ($4 off with Prime): This handy little fan is a must-have if you live in a warm climate or have a tropical vacation planned anytime soon. It can be used as a table or handheld fan and even be worn around the neck so you don't have to hold it at all. Its 5,000 mAh battery allows it to last hours on a single charge, and the small display in the middle of the fan's blades shows its remaining battery level.

Anker Soundcore Select 4 Go speaker for $26 ($9 off with Prime): This is one of our top picks for Bluetooth speaker. It gets pretty loud for its size and has decent sound quality. You can pair two together for stereo sound as well, and its IP67-rated design will keep it protected against water and dust.

Amazon Echo Spot for $50 ($30 off): Amazon brought the Echo Spot smart alarm clock back from the dead last year with a new design and improved speakers. In addition to being able to control smart home devices and respond to voice commands, the Echo Spot can also act as a Wi-Fi extender for those that have Eero systems. It went as low as $45 for Black Friday last year.

Samsung EVO Select microSD card (256GB) for $23 ($4 off): This Samsung card has been one of our recommended models for a long time. It's a no-frills microSD card that, while not the fastest, will be perfectly capable in most devices where you're just looking for simple, expanded storage.

JBL Go 4 portable speaker for $40 (20 percent off): The Go 4 is a handy little Bluetooth speaker that you can take anywhere you go thanks to its small, IP67-rated design and built-in carrying loop. It'll get seven hours of playtime on a single charge, and you can pair two together for stereo sound. The previous model, JBL Go 3 is on sale for $30.

Anker Soundcore Space A40 for $45 (44 percent off): Our top pick for the best budget wireless earbuds, the Space A40 have surprisingly good ANC, good sound quality, a comfortable fit and multi-device connectivity.

Blink Outdoor 4 security camera for $35 ($45 off): We named this the best choice for Alexa users in our guide to security cameras. It works seamlessly with Alexa devices like the Echo speakers and Show displays. Plus it can run for up to two years on a set of AA batteries and we found the motion detection to be spot on.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/early-october-prime-day-2025-tech-deals-under-50-save-on-gear-from-apple-anker-ring-jbl-and-roku-120531892.html?src=rss

Saturn’s ocean moon looks more hospitable to subsurface life than we thought

Mars isn't our only neighbor that may harbor life. The odds have risen that Saturn's moon Enceladus may, too. On Wednesday, scientists published a paper outlining the increasing complexity of molecules emitted from beneath the moon's surface. "We now have all elements required for Enceladus to harbour life," the ESA's Dr Jörn Helbert told The Guardian.

Enceladus gives researchers a unique window into its subsurface world. The Cassini mission already taught us that plumes of water ice shoot 6,000 miles into space from Enceladus. The source of those icy jets is believed to be a subsurface saltwater ocean, around 30 miles deep, that envelops the entire moon. The space geysers shoot out from its South Pole.

Previous analysis of the moon's icy particles already revealed the chemical building blocks for life as we know it. But before, the organics were inferred from studying Saturn's E ring, which is composed mostly of material from the icy jet. In contrast, this study looked at data from the Cassini mission's flyby of the plumes themselves. What's different today is the variety of organic signatures and the freshness of the samples. "These grains were just minutes old," lead author Dr. Nozair Khawaja told The Guardian.

Artist's depiction of the plumes of ice water emitting from Saturn's moon Enceladus.

"The detection of organics directly in the plume rules out space weathering as the sole production pathway," the paper's authors wrote. Space weathering refers to radiation and other processes that potentially alter or spoil the samples. "The grains are fresh, unaltered and proof of survival through ocean transit and plume emission" for the compounds.

"These grains were just minutes old," Khawaja said. "It means that what we are capturing here is actually the pure sample from the subsurface." He said the results also increased the known complexity of Enceladus' sub-surface organic chemistry. "When there is complexity happening, that means that the habitable potential of Enceladus is increasing right now," he said.

The results still don't prove that there's life on Saturn's moon. However, they do suggest a chemically rich subsurface ocean that could seed the building blocks of life. Your move, Mars.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/science/space/saturns-ocean-moon-looks-more-hospitable-to-subsurface-life-than-we-thought-174149814.html?src=rss

The best October Prime Day robot vacuum deals you can get now: Save on machines from iRobot, Shark, Dyson and others

It's frankly amazing how good vacuum cleaners are these days. Once the laughingstock of the gadget world with their dusty bags and tiny wheels, today's vacuums are sleek dirt-destroying machines, capable of rendering a house habitable no matter how many cats live in it. Some of them are even robots that will do the cleaning for you. For October Prime Day, Amazon has steeply cut the prices of some of the best vacuums (and some pretty good ones alongside). Now is a fantastic time to upgrade your cleaner, so check out the list below for our best recommendations.

Shark AV2501AE AI Robot Vacuum for $449 (31 percent off): If you like the look of the AV2501S but have even more space to clean, the AV2501AE is also on sale. Its self-empty base can go a full 60 days before you have to dump it out, so it's ideal for large spaces, complex homes or areas that see heavy use. It's got the same features otherwise, including LiDAR mapping and two hours of autonomous work.

iRobot Roomba 104 Vac for $150 (40 percent off, Prime exclusive): This entry-level Roomba is a good pick for anyone who's new to owning a robot vacuum. It features a multi-surface brush and an edge-sweeping brush to clean all types of flooring, and it uses LiDAR navigation to avoid obstacles as it goes. The iRobot mobile app lets you control the robot, set cleaning schedules and more.

Shark Matrix Plus 2-in-1 for $300 (57 percent off, Prime exclusive): The Shark Matrix Plus takes the robot vacuum concept even further by working a mop into the design for hands-off wet cleaning. This model is self-cleaning, self-emptying, self-charging and capable of tackling ground-in stains on hard floors.

Shark Navigator Lift-Away Deluxe for $160 (27 percent off): Moving into manual vacuums, let's start with one of the best. The Shark Navigator Lift-Away is a champion at getting deeply ingrained crud out of carpets, but it's also capable of squaring away bare floors. You can switch between the two settings quickly, and the lift-away canister makes it easy to empty.

Levoit LVAC-300 cordless vacuum for $250 ($100 off, Prime exclusive): One of our favorite cordless vacuums, this Levoit machine has great handling, strong suction power for its price and a premium-feeling design. Its bin isn't too small, it has HEPA filtration and its battery life should be more than enough for you to clean your whole home many times over before it needs a recharge.

Dyson Ball Animal Total Clean Upright Vacuum for $500 (24 percent off): Dyson is still the king of reinventing vacuums, and the bagless, hyper-maneuverable Ball Animal is a blast to use. The Ball design is based on ease of steering, but the hidden MVP is the sealing — from the head to the canister, not a hair is getting out of this one once it's in.

Amazon Basics Upright Bagless Vacuum Cleaner for $55 (21 percent off): All right, nobody goes to Amazon Basics to be impressed, but we have to admit this vacuum exceeds expectations. It's light, it has a big dust reservoir and it comes with all the attachments you'll need for a reasonably sized apartment. The filter is also simple to remove and clean.

Black+Decker QuickClean Cordless Handheld Vacuum for $27 (33 percent off): Rounding out the list, we've got this small-but-mighty hand vacuum, perfect for crevices, shelves or cleaning out your car. It weighs about 1.4 pounds and hoovers up small messes in the blink of an eye. The lithium-ion battery stays charged for up to 10 hours.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/the-best-october-prime-day-robot-vacuum-deals-you-can-get-now-save-on-machines-from-irobot-shark-dyson-and-others-151504093.html?src=rss

Here are all the games Microsoft added to Game Pass today, including a whole lot of Assassin's Creed

Xbox owners got a bit of a nasty surprise thanks to Microsoft’s sudden announcement today that the monthly cost of a Game Pass Ultimate subscription is getting a 50 percent increase. The new $30 monthly price, up from $20, is going to really sting for a lot of people, especially with no cheaper annual or quarterly options offered.

Fortunately, the rough price hike isn’t all that Microsoft talked about today — there are a lot of games being added to the service, particularly for the two most expensive plans. In case you aren’t up to date, Game Pass is now split into three slightly revamped tiers: Essential, Premium and Ultimate, two of which are confusingly also names Sony uses for its cheapest and most expensive PS Plus offerings. You can read a full breakdown of each tier and what they cost here.

More than 45 new games have joined the Ultimate library, with certain Ultimate games trickling down into the Premium and Essential tiers. If that sounds confusing, that’s probably because it is, but the main headlines are that Hogwarts Legacy is now part of Game Pass Ultimate and Premium, while the priciest Ultimate lineup has ballooned in size thanks to the introduction of Ubisoft Classics+. This curated catalogue of Ubisoft’s extensive back catalogue joins EA Play, which was already part of Ultimate, and is a pretty significant addition to the service. Especially if you like old-school Assassin’s Creed.

Here is the full list of games joining each Game Pass tier today.

Hogwarts Legacy (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Assassin’s Creed II (PC)
Assassin’s Creed III Remastered (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Assassin’s Creed IV Black Flag (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Assassin’s Creed IV Black Flag: Freedom Cry (PC)
Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood (PC)
Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: India (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: Russia (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Assassin’s Creed Liberation HD (PC)
Assassin’s Creed Revelations (PC)
Assassin’s Creed Rogue Remastered (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Assassin’s Creed Syndicate (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Assassin’s Creed The Ezio Collection (Cloud and Console)
Assassin’s Creed Unity (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Child of Light (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Far Cry 3 (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Far Cry Primal (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Hogwarts Legacy (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Hungry Shark World (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Monopoly Madness (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Monopoly 2024 (Cloud, PC, and Console)
OddBallers (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Prince of Persia The Lost Crown (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Rabbids Invasion: The Interactive TV Show (Cloud and Console)
Rabbids: Party of Legends (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Rayman Legends (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Risk Urban Assault (Cloud and Console)
Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Skull and Bones (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X/S)
South Park: The Stick of Truth (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Starlink: Battle for Atlas (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Steep (Cloud, PC, and Console)
The Crew 2 (Cloud, PC, and Console)
The Settlers: New Allies (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Breakpoint (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Extraction (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Tom Clancy’s The Division (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Trackmania Turbo (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Transference (Cloud and Console)
Trials Fusion (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Trials of the Blood Dragon (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Trials Rising (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Uno (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Valiant Hearts: The Great War (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Watch Dogs (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Wheel of Fortune (Cloud and Console)
Zombi (Cloud, PC, and Console)

9 Kings (Game Preview) (PC)
Abiotic Factor (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X/|S)
Against the Storm (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Age of Empires: Definitive Edition (PC)
Age of Empires III: Definitive Edition (PC)
Age of Mythology: Retold (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X/|S)
Ara: History Untold (PC)
Arx Fatalis (PC)
Back to the Dawn (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Battletech (PC)
Blacksmith Master (Game Preview) (PC)
Cataclismo (PC)
Cities: Skylines II (PC)
Crime Scene Cleaner (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X/|S)
Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X/|S)
Diablo (PC)
Diablo IV (PC and Console)
An Elder Scrolls Legends: Battlespire (PC)
The Elder Scrolls Adventures: Redguard (PC)
Fallout (PC)
Fallout 2 (PC)
Fallout: Tactics (PC)
Football Manager 2024 (PC)
Frostpunk 2 (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X/|S)
Halo: Spartan Strike (PC)
Hogwarts Legacy (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Manor Lords (Game Preview) (PC)
Minami Lane (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Minecraft: Java Edition (PC)
Mullet Madjack (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X/|S)
My Friendly Neighborhood (Cloud, PC, and Console)
One Lonely Outpost (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Quake 4 (PC)
Quake III Arena (PC)
Return to Castle Wolfenstein (PC)
Rise of Nations: Extended Edition (PC)
Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2 (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X/|S)
Sworn (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X/|S)
Terra Invicta (Game Preview) (PC)
Volcano Princess (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Warcraft I: Remastered (PC)
Warcraft II: Remastered (PC)
Warcraft III: Reforged (PC)
Wolfenstein 3D (PC)

Cities: Skylines Remastered (Cloud and Xbox Series X/|S)
Disney Dreamlight Valley (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Hades (Cloud, PC, and Console)
Warhammer 40,000 Darktide (Cloud, PC, and Console)

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/xbox/here-are-all-the-games-microsoft-added-to-game-pass-today-including-a-whole-lot-of-assassins-creed-171525929.html?src=rss

Best October Prime Day SSD deals: Discounts on gear from Crucial, Samsung and more

A portable storage device can make a world of difference to intensive processing tasks, from running massive video games — which feels like all of them these days — to core operating system functions. A solid-state drive (SSD) gives your hard drive more bandwidth than it comes with by default, making huge chunks of data easier to digest and keeping your device from running too hot. This October Prime Day, we've rounded up the best deals on SSDs, portable SSDs and microSD cards. Not only are these some of the best products in the field, but their prices are lower than they're likely to be for some time thanks to Amazon Prime Day.

Crucial T500 1TB for $89 (38 percent off): We named the Crucial T500 one of the best SSDs for PS5 and still stand by that rating. This 1TB model can hit read speeds of 7,300MB/s, more than enough for optimal performance per Sony's specs. You can even install it at home with no tools more complicated than a screwdriver.

Crucial X10 4TB Portable SSD for $240 (39 percent off): The Crucial X9 is our current favorite portable SSD, but the X10 is a step beyond. Based on USB 3.2, it's compatible with a wide range of devices, and reaches reading speeds of 2,100MB/s — all in an extremely portable pocket-sized case.

Samsung 990 Evo Plus 1TB for $70 (33 percent off): This is an incredible deal on an internal SSD from a reliable brand. All capacities of the Samsung 990 Evo Plus are currently on sale, but even the 1TB option can visibly boost your performance with top read speeds of 7,250MB/s. There's no heatsink, but nickel plating on the controller reduces both heat output and energy use.

Samsung Fit Plus 256GB for $23 (30 percent off): The Samsung Fit Plus isn't just the best thumb drive on the market right now — it's one of the best SSDs, period. This deal gets you 256GB of storage and read speeds of 400MB/s for almost unfathomably cheap. It's also built to resist water, extreme temperatures, magnets and even radiation.

Kingston SX1000 1TB High Performance for $89 (23 percent off): If you can't swing a Crucial X9 or X10 right now, Kingston offers a much more affordable alternative. The SX1000 can handle both PC backups and gaming storage with ease, nearly matching the X9 in our speed tests. It's also easy to carry around, though keep a tight grip as it's not officially rated for any drop height.

SanDisk 2TB Extreme Portable SSD for $148 (29 percent off): The SanDisk Extreme line of portable SSDs provides a great middle ground in both price and performance. Read speeds of 1,050MB/s are enough for transferring most files you'll encounter day-to-day. Its external design holds up too, with a large carabiner loop, IP65 waterproofing and dustproofing and drop protection as high as three meters.

Seagate Storage Expansion Card 2TB for $220 (39 percent off): This SeaGate SSD is specifically for expanding storage on the Xbox Series X and S, and it's designed to meet Xbox specs exactly. You'll get exactly the same performance booting a game from this card as you would from internal Xbox storage, which makes data management infinitely easier.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/best-october-prime-day-ssd-deals-discounts-on-gear-from-crucial-samsung-and-more-170039440.html?src=rss

T-Mobile's Starlink satellite service now works with a handful of apps

T-Mobile just announced that its T-Satellite with Starlink service now integrates with several apps. These include AllTrails, AccuWeather, X, WhatsApp and several others. Certain native apps also now integrate with the service, like Google Messages, Apple Music and Samsung's weather app.

It's important to note that users won't always have access to the full app experience here, as satellite connectivity is limited. Some features may be limited and everything is likely to be noticeably slower. Still, being able to look at a map on AllTrails while actually on a trail in the middle of nowhere will be incredibly useful. It'll be less useful to read some random screed on X while sitting next to the campfire, but whatever gets you through the night.

T-Mobile promises that WhatsApp will allow for "sending voice notes, sharing photos or even calling your entire group chat." This is a potential game-changer but it really depends on how slow everything is, which we won't know until some explorers get out there to put the app through its paces.

The company has also integrated a number of business-focused apps into T-Satellite for those subscribed to the SuperMobile or T-Priority plans. These apps include the communications platform MultiLine and the AI-powered messaging service Dialpad.

T-Satellite uses Starlink satellites to provide coverage in remote parts of the world. It became broadly available back in July after months of testing. The service is available for both Android and iOS devices. It's free for T-Mobile customers but everyone else can sign up for $10 a month.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/smartphones/t-mobiles-starlink-satellite-service-now-works-with-a-handful-of-apps-165732659.html?src=rss

Microsoft jacks the price of Game Pass Ultimate up to $30 a month

Microsoft has announced some major changes for Game Pass. It’s rebranding some of the tiers, which should make it a little easier to keep tabs on what games and features are available on Game Pass across Xbox consoles, PC and cloud gaming.

However, there is a painful price increase here. The high-end plan, Game Pass Ultimate, now costs $30 per month — 50 percent more than the previous $20 per month. and there’s no annual or quarterly option available to make that sting less.

That means the price of a Game Pass Ultimate membership has nearly doubled in 15 months. Microsoft previously raised the price from $17 to $20 in July 2024. The latest change now means that, at $360 per year, Game Pass Ultimate is now more than twice as expensive as PlayStation Plus Premium, which is currently $160 on an annual plan.

Microsoft recently announced a price increase for its Xbox Series X/S consoles as well. The systems will be more expensive to buy in the US starting this Friday. Also, pre-orders for the ROG Xbox Ally handheld just went live, with Microsoft confirming that the higher-end model would cost $1,000. PC Game Pass is going up from $12 per month to $16.50 too. It’s getting really expensive to be an Xbox fan, folks.

A breakdown of the Xbox Game Pass tiers.

In fairness, along with a price increase, Microsoft is expanding Game Pass Ultimate in other ways. It’s adding more than 45 games to that tier today, including a whole bunch of Assassin’s Creed and Far Cry titles, as well as other Ubisoft games. That’s due, in large part, to Microsoft adding Ubisoft+ (which costs about $16 per month) to Game Pass Ultimate today.

On November 18, Ultimate members will get Fortnite Crew as part of their subscription. That gives players access to the Fortnite battle pass, 1,000 V-Bucks added to their account each month and other perks. That usually costs $12 per month, so the Game Pass Ultimate price increase might actually work out in some Fortnite players’ favor — if they ever stop playing it long enough to check out other games and get more value for their $30 per month.

Microsoft also notes that Ultimate subscribers will be able to play more than 75 day one games (i.e. those that join the service on their release day) every year across Xbox consoles, PC and Xbox Cloud Gaming. That works out to at least six per month, on average. The Ultimate library now includes more than 400 games, including titles from EA Play.

As part of these changes, Xbox Cloud Gaming is officially out of beta and Ultimate subscribers have access to what Microsoft claims is its highest-quality streaming option with the lowest wait times. They’ll be able to earn up to $100 worth of rewards per year by playing games too.

Microsoft can talk up the new Ultimate features as much as it likes, but there’s no denying that a 50 percent price increase is a heck of a jump. Of note, games news curator Wario64 pointed out that the Game Pass cancellation web page appears to be overloaded:

the website to cancel Xbox Game Pass subscriptions is overloaded https://t.co/tnUjhmg1GS pic.twitter.com/vLzPsodAdf
— Wario64 (@Wario64) October 1, 2025

There are changes afoot on the other two main Game Pass tiers. Standard subscribers are moving over to Premium, and Game Pass Core members will be on an Essential plan. (Essential and Premium are the same names PlayStation uses for the base and high-end PS Plus plans, fact fans.) Those tiers aren’t getting price increases, as Premium will run you $15 per month and Essential is still $10.

Premium and Essential now include PC games. The Premium plan includes more than 200 games, all of which are playable on consoles and PC. Microsoft added more than 40 to the Premium library today, including Diablo IV and Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2.

The company said that Xbox-published games will hit the Premium tier within a year of their release, but not that doesn’t include Call of Duty titles. This tier includes in-game perks for the likes of League of Legends, Call of Duty: Warzone and Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege X, as well as the option to stream some games you own via the cloud and the ability to earn up to $50 per year in rewards.

As with the other two tiers, the Essential plan now includes “unlimited cloud gaming” (though perhaps with longer wait times), online multiplayer access and in-game perks for certain titles. It has a library of 50-plus games and the ability to earn up to $25 in annual rewards through playing games.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/microsoft-jacks-the-price-of-game-pass-ultimate-up-to-30-a-month-142441307.html?src=rss

The best streaming deals: Save on Hulu + Live TV, Starz, Fubo TV and more

If you’ve been shocked by how much you spend on streaming services lately, you’re not alone. Companies like Netflix, Disney, Max and others have been consistently raising prices to the point where you may question if streaming is even worth it anymore. We at Engadget still think it is, but we also think you should be smart with your money — and that’s where streaming deals come in.

Yes, it is possible to get discounts on services like Peacock and Paramount+, even if those deals aren’t as common as a sale on AirPods. If you’re looking to save money and still stream all of the content you want, Engadget can help by laying out the best streaming deals you can get right now, how you can save with bundles and everything you should know before paying for yet another streaming service.

True streaming deals can be hard to come by. Most often, they’ll pop up during the Black Friday shopping period. On occasion, we’ll see them sparingly throughout the year and they usually take the form of a discounted monthly or annual rate for a limited period of time. Also, true streaming deals are typically on the ad-supported versions of a service, but once in a while you’ll find a unicorn of a deal on a tier that has ad-free viewing.

If you’re able to wait for a deal before subscribing to a streaming service, we recommend doing so. You’ll save money upfront and in the long run, and you also have the option to cancel your subscription before the price goes back up to the normal rate. Maybe you find you like the service so much that you’re fine paying full price for it — that’s the ideal situation. But if you’re not compelled to keep that app on rotation in your smart TV, most streaming services make it easy for you to cancel at any time. With that said, these are the best streaming deals you can snag right now.

Hulu + Live TV (three months) for $195 ($54 off): New and eligible returning subscribers can get three months of Hulu + Live TV at a rate of $65 per month, which is much cheaper than the standard $83-per-month rate. In addition to live TV content, this service also includes Disney+ and ESPN Select, so you're essentially getting three separate streaming services under this umbrella. We consider that to be Hulu + Live TV's edge, and we named it one of the best live TV streaming services on the market right now. The offer runs through October 23.

Spotify Premium Individual (1 month) for $0 ($12 off): This is our favorite music streaming service for podcasts and social features. Right now, users who have not signed up for Spotify's Premium service before are eligible to get one month for free. The Premium Individual plan lets you listen ad-free and skip songs at will. You can also organize your listening queue and download content for offline listening. Just be aware, your subscription will auto-renew at the end of the trial period. So if you don't want to be on the hook for the $12 monthly fee, set a reminder to cancel and go back to the free version.

Fubo Pro for $55/month for the first month ($30 off): Fubo has introductory discounts on most of its packages, and the Pro package is the least expensive plan currently listed. It offers access to 224 channels, unlimited cloud DVR and up to 10 simultaneous streams. It even includes regional sports content from the NHL, MLB and NBA.

DirecTV starting at $50/month for one month ($35 off): All of DirecTV's signature packages are $35 off right now for your first month when you sign up. If you opt for the base "Entertainment" package, you'll spend $50 for the first month and get access to over 90 channels, including many local stations as well as ESPN, ESPN 2 and Fox Sports 1. You'll also be able to watch on the go with the DirecTV mobile app.

YouTube TV (three months) for $219 ($30 off): You can get three months of our favorite live TV streaming service for $50 per month. That should give you a decent chunk of time to see if the service is right for you while saving some cash. The discount and trial are only open to new subscribers to YouTube TV’s base plan, which includes access to over 100 channels, unlimited DVR space and six household accounts with the ability to stream on three devices at once.

DashPass Annual + HBO Max (with ads) for $96/year ($144 off): This offer includes access to HBO Max with ads for no extra cost when you sign up for a DashPass Annual plan. You can then decide to upgrade to Max Standard, which removes ads, for a discounted rate of $11 monthly if you want. Aside from the obvious streaming benefits, this deal gives you $0 deliver fees and lower service fees on some restaurant DoorDash orders, five percent DoorDash credits on pickup orders, on-demand grocery delivery and other members-only exclusives.

Peacock first responders discount — one year for $48 (50 percent off): Medical professionals and first responders can save 50 percent each year of Peacock. The deal requires annual verification and is open to those who work for either private or public institutions. Peacock has some great stuff to watch, including Poker Face and Killing It and more.

Student discounts on streaming services

HBO Max student discount — subscribe for $5/month (50 percent off): HBO Max offers their ad-supported tier to students for half off the usual rate. You’ll just have to verify that you’re a student through Unidays, and make note that this offer is only good for up to 12 months of service.

Hulu student discount — subscribe for $2/month (75 percent off): Those with a valid student ID can get Hulu’s ad-supported tier for 75 percent off the typical rate. They’ll keep the same sale price for as long as they’re a student as well.

Spotify student discount — Premium + Hulu with ads for $6/month (72 percent off): Spotify’s student offer continues to be one of the best around, giving you access to the Premium tier of the music streamer and Hulu’s ad-supported plan for only $6 monthly. Purchased separately, you’d pay $22 per month for both of the services. Plus, the first month is free when you sign up.

NBA League Pass student discount — one year for $120 (40 percent off): Students can get one year of League Pass for only $10 per month, which includes access to NBA TV and the ability to watch classic and archive games on-demand. On the NBA League Pass website, look for the student discount banner at the top and follow the instructions to verify your student status.

There’s more consolidation happening now than ever before in the streaming space, and that means there are more streaming bundle options. These bundles offer you access to more content with one subscription price, but those prices are typically higher than paying for a single service by itself (obviously). It may be tempting to just get the bundle, but if only one of those services in the bundle speaks to you, you’ll spend less overall by just paying for the single service.

Speaking of a deep love for a single streaming service: if all of your favorite shows are on Peacock or the latest releases on HBO Max consistently bring you joy, consider paying for one year upfront. Subscribing with an annual plan usually saves you money in the long term over paying on a monthly basis. Unfortunately, not all streaming services (looking at you, Netflix) have an annual subscription option.

Also, it's worth noting that anything Disney-related will be getting a price hike soon. As of October 21, 2025, you'll pay more for Disney+, Hulu and most associated bundles. But if you subscribe now, you'll at least pay one month at the old, cheaper rate.

Disney+, Hulu, HBO Max bundle with ads for $17/month: Ad-supported HBO Max is included here, along with full, ad-supported access to Disney+ and Hulu. You’ll save 43 percent with this bundle, as opposed to paying for all three services individually.

Disney+ and Hulu Bundle Premium for $20/month: Disney and Hulu offer a few different bundles, which you can view in the drop-down lists under Choose Your Plan. This bundle removes the ads from both Disney+ and Hulu (with the exception of select live and linear content) and allows you to download content for offline viewing. You’ll save 42 percent with this bundle, as opposed to paying for both ad-free tiers individually.

Hulu + Live TV with Disney+ and ESPN+ for $96/month: This streaming bundle amalgamation is a bit confusing but it does offer a lot: you get live TV streaming via Hulu’s service plus access to the following VOD services: Hulu, Disney+ and ESPN+. Out of those three, only ESPN+ will have ads.

Disney+, Hulu, ESPN+ Bundle Basic for $17/month: You get full access to Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+ content with this package, albeit with ads across the board. This bundle price is 46 percent off the total price of all three separate subscriptions.

Disney+, Hulu, ESPN+ Bundle Premium for $27/month: Similarly to the Duo bundles, the Premium version of the Trio removes ads from most content in Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+, and you can download content for offline viewing. This price represents a 43-percent savings when compared to paying for all three ad-free tiers separately.

Sling TV + HBO Max starting at $53/month: Sling TV and HBO Max have partnered on a discount that gives new subscribers 50 percent off their first month of Sling TV, plus $5 off monthly when you subscribe to the Sling TV + HBO Max bundle. The standard price for the Sling Blue + HBO Max duo is roughly $58/month, so you'll get a monthly discount of $5 off that. In addition, for the first month only, you'll get half off the price of the bundle. The promotion also applies to the Sling Orange & Blue + HBO Max package, which has a standard price of $73/month.

Paramount+ with Showtime for $13/month or $120/year: This includes everything in Paramount+’s Essential plan, except the ads, and also provides access to Showtime content, live CBS streams and download features.

The second-gen Apple Watch SE drops to a record-low price ahead of Prime Day

If, like me, you're wondering how it could possibly be October already, perhaps you need a watch. Probably one with a calendar function. Strangely enough, there are some solid deals on several Apple Watch models right now ahead of Amazon's Prime Big Deal Days event. The second-gen Apple Watch SE with LTE connectivity has dropped to $189, which is a discount of $110 or 37 percent.

That's a new record low price for this 40mm variant with a small/medium band. The discount applies to versions with an ink sport loop and denim sport band.

It's worth bearing in mind that this deal is for the previous-gen model, which Apple released in 2022. The company started shipping the latest Apple Watch SE in September. That starts at $240 for a GPS and Wi-Fi model without LTE connectivity. The third-gen SE 3 is now our pick for the best budget Apple Watch. However, if you're looking for a cheaper option for fitness tracking, at-a-glance notifications and, perhaps, quick access to a calendar, the second-gen SE is worth considering.

Several variants of the Apple Watch Series 10 are on sale on Amazon as well. This is last year's version of the smartwatch, but it's still plenty capable and it supports some of the same new features as the Series 11, such as sleep apnea detection and sleep scoring. You can pick one up for as little as $329.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/the-second-gen-apple-watch-se-drops-to-a-record-low-price-ahead-of-prime-day-162845138.html?src=rss

Microsoft 365 Premium aims to deliver more AI value than ChatGPT Plus

Microsoft is adding another subscription plan to its already confusing list of offerings. The new Microsoft 365 Premium plan, which costs $20 a month, bundles the company's standard Office productivity suite together with access to OpenAI's latest models and extended AI usage limits.

Microsoft positions it as a more valuable subscription than OpenAI's ChatGPT Plus, which also costs $20 a month and doesn't have the benefit of Office apps or the 1TB of OneDrive storage you get with all Microsoft 365 subscriptions. (That's certainly an odd way to treat a close partner.)

Thankfully, Microsoft isn't touching the pricing of its $10-a-month MS 365 Personal plan, or the $13 monthly MS 365 Family subscription — for now, anyway. The company just announced today that it's pushing its GamePass Ultimate subscription to $30-a-month, much to the chagrin of gamers everywhere.

In a way, the Microsoft 365 Premium plan simplifies Microsoft's offerings a bit. If you had one of the cheaper MS 365 plans, you'd still need to pay another $20 a month to get access to higher AI usage limits with the Copilot Pro subscription. A Microsoft representative tells us that Copilot Pro is no longer available to purchase, but existing subscribers can continue to use it without issue. Microsoft won't be automatically moving those users over to MS 365 Premium.

According to the company, Microsoft 365 Premium will get you access to GPT-5 and 4o, as well as AI agents including "Actions, Researcher and Analyst." That's directly comparable to OpenAI's plan, which uses ChatGPT Agent's instead of Microsoft's. MS 365 Premium users will also be able to test new AI features as they're available, but they won't have access to OpenAI's custom GPTs or Sora video generation.

Update 10/1/25 3:33PM: Added details about Copilot Pro plan ending.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/microsoft-365-premium-aims-to-deliver-more-ai-value-than-chatgpt-plus-160008060.html?src=rss

Meta will soon use AI chats for ad targeting because of course it will

Meta will start scraping conversations with AI chatbots to gather data for the purpose of ad targeting. The company says this data will be used to "personalize the content and ads" that people see across apps like Facebook and Instagram.

The "feature" goes into effect on December 16 and Meta will start sending out in-product notifications and emails about the move on October 7. The company says this change is coming to "most regions" throughout the world, but the launch won't impact the EU and South Korea at first.

Meta gives an example of a user talking with an AI chatbot about hiking and then seeing ads about, you guessed it, hiking. "As a result, you might start seeing recommendations for hiking groups, posts from friends about trails or ads for hiking boots," it wrote in a blog post.

"People's interactions simply are going to be another piece of the input that will inform the personalization of feeds and ads," Christy Harris, privacy policy manager at Meta, told Reuters.

This is the same type of ad targeting that has followed us around the internet for ages, but one-on-one conversations have typically been excluded from this sort of thing. This is just another reminder that AI chatbots are not your friends.

There will be no way to opt out of this, according to reporting by The Wall Street Journal. If you talk to a Meta chatbot, it'll be scraping. The company notes that the chatbots will not scrape data pertaining to "topics such as their religious views, sexual orientation, political views, health, racial or ethnic origin, philosophical beliefs or trade union membership." I'd recommend not discussing those things with an AI chatbot no matter what Meta says.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/meta-will-soon-use-ai-chats-for-ad-targeting-because-of-course-it-will-153319626.html?src=rss

The best October Prime Day deals already live: Early tech sales on Amazon devices, Apple, Samsung, Anker and more

Now that we know October Prime Day is on the horizon, it’s time to start thinking about what you may want to snag at a discount during the sale. If you pay the $139 annual fee for Prime, sale events like these are a great time to stock up on essentials and cross things off your wishlist while you can save some money.

Most discounts will be exclusively available to Prime subscribers, but there are always a few that anyone shopping on Amazon can grab. Similarly, there are always early deals in the days and weeks leading up to Prime Day, and this year is no different. Here, we’ve collected the best Prime Day deals you can shop for right now and we’ll keep updating this post as we get close to Prime Day proper.

Apple MagSafe charger (25W, 2m) for $35 (29 percent off): The latest version of Apple's MagSafe puck is Qi2.2-certified and supports up to 25W of wireless power when paired with a 30W adapter. The two-meter cable length on this particular model gives you more flexibility on where you can use it: in bed, on the couch, at your desk and elsewhere.

Blink Mini 2 security cameras (two-pack) for $35 (50 percent off): Blink makes some of our favorite security cameras, and the Mini 2 is a great option for indoor monitoring. It can be placed outside with the right weatherproof adapter, but since it needs to be plugged in, we like it for keeping an eye on your pets while you're away and watching over entry ways from the inside.

Shark AI robot vacuum with self-empty base for $230 (58 percent off, Prime exclusive): A version of one of our favorite robot vacuums, this Shark machine has strong suction power and supports home mapping. The Shark mobile app lets you set cleaning schedules, and the self-empty base that it comes with will hold 30 days worth of dust and debris.

Leebein 2025 electric spin scrubber for $40 (43 percent off, Prime exclusive): This is an updated version of my beloved Leebein electric scrubber, which has made cleaning my shower easier than ever before. It comes with seven brush heads so you can use it to clean all kinds of surfaces, and its adjustable arm length makes it easier to clean hard-to-reach spots. It's IPX7 waterproof and recharges via USB-C.

Jisulife Life7 handheld fan for $25 (14 percent off, Prime exclusive): This handy little fan is a must-have if you life in a warm climate or have a tropical vacation planned anytime soon. It can be used as a table or handheld fan and even be worn around the neck so you don't have to hold it at all. Its 5,000 mAh battery allows it to last hours on a single charge, and the small display in the middle of the fan's blades show its remaining battery level.

Anker Soundcore Select 4 Go speaker for $26 (26 percent off, Prime exclusive): This small Bluetooth speaker gets pretty loud for its size and has decent sound quality. You can pair two together for stereo sound as well, and its IP67-rated design will keep it protected against water and dust.

Apple Mac mini (M4) for $499 ($100 off): If you prefer desktops over laptops, the upgraded M4 Mac mini is one that won’t take up too much space, but will provide a ton of power at the same time. Not only does it come with an M4 chipset, but it also includes 16GB of RAM in the base model, plus front-facing USB-C and headphone ports for easier access.

Apple Watch Series 11 for $389 ($10 off): The latest flagship Apple Watch is our new pick for the best smartwatch you can get, and it's the best all-around Apple Watch, period. It's not too different from the previous model, but Apple promises noticeable gains in battery life, which will be handy for anyone who wants to wear their watch all day and all night to track sleep.

JLab Go Air Pop+ for $17.49 (42 percent off): These ultra-affordable wireless earbuds are 15 percent smaller and 40 percent lighter than the previous model, and they have a mobile app in which you can choose from three preset EQ modes to customize your sound. Total battery life with the case comes in at more than 35 hours, and they come with three different sizes of eartips so you can get the best fit.

Samsung EVO Select microSD card (256GB) for $23 (15 percent off): This Samsung card has been one of our recommended models for a long time. It's a no-frills microSD card that, while not the fastest, will be perfectly capable in most devices where you're just looking for simple, expanded storage.

Roku Streaming Stick Plus 2025 for $29 (27 percent off): Roku makes some of the best streaming devices available, and this small dongle gives you access to a ton of free content plus all the other streaming services you could ask for: Netflix, Prime Video, Disney+, HBO Max and many more.

JBL Go 4 portable speaker for $40 (20 percent off): The Go 4 is a handy little Bluetooth speaker that you can take anywhere you go thanks to its small, IP67-rated design and built-in carrying loop. It'll get seven hours of playtime on a single charge, and you can pair two together for stereo sound.

Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K Max for $40 (33 percent off): Amazon's most powerful streaming dongle supports 4K HDR content, Dolby Vision and Atmos and Wi-Fi 6E. It also has double the storage of cheaper Fire TV sticks.

Anker Soundcore Space A40 for $45 (44 percent off): Our top pick for the best budget wireless earbuds, the Space A40 have surprisingly good ANC, good sound quality, a comfortable fit and multi-device connectivity.

Amazon Echo Spot for $50 ($30 off): Amazon brought the Echo Spot smart alarm clock back from the dead last year with a new design, improved speakers and added Alexa chops. In addition to being able to control smart home devices and respond to voice commands, the Echo Spot can also act as a Wi-Fi extender for those that have Eero systems.

Anker MagGo 10K power bank (Qi2, 15W) for $63 (22 percent off, Prime exclusive): A 10K power bank like this is ideal if you want to be able to recharge your phone at least once fully and have extra power to spare. This one is also Qi2 compatible, providing up to 15W of power to supported phones.

Levoit Core 200S smart air purifier for $70 ($20 off, Prime exclusive): This compact air purifier cleans the air in rooms up to 140 square feet and uses a 3-in-1 filter that removes microscopic dust, pollen and airborne particles. It has a mobile app that you can use to set runtime schedules, and it works with Alexa and Google Assistant voice commands.

Amazon Fire TV Cube for $100 (29 percent off): Amazon's most powerful streaming device, the Fire TV Cube supports 4K, HDR and Dolby Vision content, Dolby Atmos sound, Wi-Fi 6E and it has a built-in Ethernet port. It has the most internal storage of any Fire TV streaming device, plus it comes with an enhanced Alexa Voice Remote.

Shark Robot Vacuum and Mop Combo for $300 (57 percent off, Prime exclusive): If you're looking for an autonomous dirt-sucker that can also mop, this is a good option. It has a mopping pad and water reservoir built in, and it supports home mapping as well. Its self-emptying base can hold up to 60 days worth of debris, too.

XReal One Pro AR glasses for $649 (16 percent off): The latest from XReal, these smart glasses can let you use almost any device, including your smartphone, with a large virtual display. Their 1080p Micro-OLED screens are bright and sharp, plus they're pretty comfortable to wear.

Nintendo Switch 2 for $449: While not technically a discount, it's worth mentioning that the Switch 2 and the Mario Kart Switch 2 bundle are both available at Amazon now, no invitation required. Amazon only listed the new console for the first time in July after being left out of the initial pre-order/availability window in April. Once it became available, Amazon customers looking to buy the Switch 2 had to sign up to receive an invitation to do so. Now, that extra step has been removed and anyone can purchase the Switch 2 on Amazon.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/the-best-october-prime-day-deals-already-live-early-tech-sales-on-amazon-devices-apple-samsung-anker-and-more-050801911.html?src=rss

Anker's latest Prime charging devices have already been discounted by 20 percent

Anker's latest Prime charging devices are already on sale thanks to some handy coupons. The best deals include the laptop-compatible Prime Power Bank (26,250mAh, 300W), which is 20 percent off and down to $184 when you clip the on-page coupon on its Amazon page.

This portable charger delivers a whopping 300W of total output between its two USB-C ports and single USB-A port. Anker says that, thanks to its 140W output (and if you're using a 5A cable), you can top up the battery of an M4 Pro MacBook Pro to 50 percent in 27 minutes and an iPhone 17 Pro Max to 50 percent in 22 minutes. You can keep tabs on what's happening on each port using the display.

This is also the first Anker power bank that supports up to 250W of input recharging by using both USB-C ports simultaneously. This faster charging can top up the powerbank's own battery to 50 percent in just 13 minutes, according to Anker.

This model has a capacity of 26,250mAh (99.75Wh), which is very close to the FAA's limit of 100W. It's TSA-approved, so you'll be able to take it on flights. It's capable of taking an M4 MacBook Pro from fully dead to an 80 percent charge. The power bank weighs 1.3 lbs — the same as about three iPhones, Anker says.

Other Anker Prime devices are on sale too. A new 3-in-1 MagSafe charger — which can top up the batteries of your iPhone, Apple Watch and AirPods with wireless charging case simultaneously — also gets a 20 percent discount to $184 when you use a clippable coupon. While there are certainly less expensive 3-in-1 MagSafe options out there, this one includes Qi2 25W support for faster charging, as well as TEC active cooling. Anker suggests this can help speed up charging times and help guard against iPhone battery degradation over time.

A three-port GaN Prime Charger that plugs into an outlet is 20 percent off too, at $120 with a clippable coupon. Anker says it's as compact as an AirPods Pro 3 case and can provide a total output of 160W, with up to 140W via a single USB-C cable. The charger is said to offer smart power distribution, and you can monitor what's happening and adjust modes via an onboard display and controls.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/ankers-latest-prime-charging-devices-have-already-been-discounted-by-20-percent-152040059.html?src=rss

Alienware 16 Area-51 review: A fully retooled gaming mothership

Alienware is at its best when it makes no-holds-barred gaming machines that are big on style and performance. By reviving an iconic nameplate and combining it with an all-new design packing some seriously intergalactic vibes, the Alienware 16 Area-51 laptop is just that. Sure, it's so big and heavy that you won't want to move it around very often. And battery life be damned, because if you aren't plugged in, you probably aren't pushing those pixels hard enough. But if you're in the market for a classic desktop-replacement gaming notebook with flagship specs and an unmistakable aesthetic, this rig represents a beastly return to form.

Alienware's industrial design is so far out there that its systems have almost become a shorthand for gamer culture in movies and TV. But for this generation, I think the company has done a great job of creating something unique that's also a bit more sophisticated than before. To start, there's Alienware's "Liquid Teal" paint job. It's the only available color and in person, it looks more like the kind of deep emerald green you'd see on a car due to the way it shifts and shimmers depending on the light. As always, there's Alienware's classic logo in the middle of the lid, complete with customizable lighting. On the inside, there are nice touches like RGB-lit fans, punchy up-firing speakers and a clicky mechanical keyboard with deep travel that reminds you that if you aren't using this system to frag some enemies every now and then, you're probably doing it wrong.

The Area-51 laptop features mechanical switches with lots of travel and customizable RGB lighting for both its keyboard and touchpad.

My favorite design element is the little window on the bottom of the laptop. At first, this seems like overkill, because just like men's shoes, how often do you really look at the bottom of a PC? But if desktop PCs can have glass panels that show off the insides of the machines, why not laptops too? More importantly, Alienware's raised Cryo Chamber (that's its technical name) improves thermals thanks to increased airflow and a hidden exhaust that helps move heat away from critical components like the GPU. Even so, the vent's placement means you're still not going to want to use this on your lap for prolonged periods (especially while gaming). But as a feature that would normally be purely functional, Alienware's solution is clever and stylish.

The Area-51 laptop's only two ports that aren't in the back are a microSD card reader and 3.5mm audio.

Of course, the downside to adding extra glass to an already hefty notebook is that it makes this thing even less travel-friendly. Weighing 7.5 pounds, the Alienware 16 Area-51 is actually closer to a typical 18-inch notebook like a Dell 18 Pro Max (7.2 pounds) than a similarly-sized non-gaming machine. On top of that, while the Area-51 offers a wealth of connectivity options (three USB-A, two USB-C and HDMI 2.1), most of its ports are in the back. That's great for keeping cables tidy and out of the way, but they are a bit harder to reach, which reinforces the notion that you won't be moving this PC around very much. I just wish Alienware had made room for a single USB-C port somewhere on either side. Having a full-size SD card reader and 3.5mm audio on the left is super handy for quickly transferring media or plugging in headphones, but it would have been nice to have one more spot for accessories like thumb drives so you could avoid fumbling around in the back.

The Alienware 16 Area-51 laptop features a 16-inch 2,560 x 1,600 LCD display with 500 nits of brightness and a 240Hz refresh rate.

The Alienware 16 Area-51 packs a 2,560 x 1,600 display with a 240Hz refresh rate, G-Sync support and 500 nits of brightness. In a vacuum, it's a really solid panel. It has a matte coating to reduce reflections while still producing vibrant colors that look good even in sunny rooms. My only gripe is that for a flagship system, I would have liked to see some other display options.

For demanding gamers, or people planning to use the system for photo or video editing, a 4K screen upgrade (preferably an OLED one) would be a great option. Alternatively, with the Area-51 capable of accommodating up to an RTX 5090 GPU, a panel with a 300Hz or higher refresh rate could have been a nice choice for the hardcore competitive crowd. And sadly, even if you feel like upgrading to the 16-inch model's bigger brother, there aren't any additional display options available for that version either.

The bottom of the Area-51 laptop is both functional and stylish thanks to its Cryo Chamber, which provides a view at the components inside while also improving heat management.

Our $2,800 review unit features an Intel Core Ultra 9 275HX CPU with 24 cores, 32GB of RAM, 2TB of SSD storage and an NVIDIA RTX 5080 GPU. Unsurprisingly, a loaded system like this had no issues handling games like Cyberpunk 2077. Even when using Ultra graphics presets at 1080p with ray tracing turned on, the Area-51 still hit 90 fps. Meanwhile, in Control, the Alienware fared even better at the same resolution and Epic settings when it reached 154 fps.

Thankfully, if you don't have nearly $3,000 to burn, the Area-51 is rather configurable. A base model starts at a more affordable $2,000 with an Intel Core Ultra 7 255HX chip, 16GB of RAM and an RTX 5060. On the other hand, if you want all-out performance, you can load this thing up with an RTX 5090, but doing so currently starts at $3,550.

Most of the Area-51 laptops ports are in the back which is great for keeping cables out of the way, but it can be annoying if you want to quickly plug in USB accessories like a thumb drive.

Peter Parker's beloved Uncle Ben once said "With great power comes great energy draw” (or something like that), and the Area-51 is a perfect example of that. On PCMark 10's Modern Office battery rundown test, Alienware's laptop only lasted four hours and thirteen minutes. That's more than three hours less than what we got from its predecessor — the m16 R2 (7:51) — and five hours less than last year's ASUS ROG Zephyrus G16 (9:17). When I retested the ASUS only using its GPU (instead of automatically switching to onboard graphics), its time of 3:08 was worse. So when it comes to power-hungry portable gaming machines like these, if you plan on using them away from an outlet on a regular basis, you'd better make sure you have a portable charging solution on hand.

Depending on the light, Alienware's Liquid Teal paintjob can shift between emerald green, blue and several other colors.

Even though the Alienware 16 Area-51 might not be as portable as some of its rivals, it's got a lot to offer. There’s a striking design, a nice screen (though more options would be nice), tons of ports and class-leading performance with plenty of configurability so you can dial in its specs exactly how you like. Granted, Alienware's attention-grabbing space-age aesthetics might not be for folks who aren't ready to be beamed up to the mothership. But aside from its short battery life and high price for well-equipped models, this system delivers pretty much everything you want from a flagship gaming laptop.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/laptops/alienware-16-area-51-review-a-fully-retooled-gaming-mothership-150000871.html?src=rss

Prime Day deal: Pick up this Roomba robot vacuum while it's down to $150

Robot vacuums are great items to look for during events like October Prime Day. They're usually hundreds of dollars off, so you can save a ton if you're buying one as a gift or you want to upgrade an aging robovac you have at home already. One of the best deals this time around is on the iRobot Roomba 104, which is 40 percent off and on sale for only $150.

This is a newer version of the unit that topped our list of the best budget robot vacuums. It's an entry-level robovac that gets the job done. The cleaning motor is fairly powerful and it ships with a multi-surface brush and an edge-sweeping brush. The vacuum uses LiDAR to map a home and to help it avoid obstacles when cleaning.

It's also been equipped with specialized sensors to prevent falling down stairs. Steps are the natural enemy of all robot vacuums, except maybe this one. The Roomba 104 integrates with the company's proprietary app, which allows for custom cleaning schedules and the like. The robot can also be controlled via voice assistant and boasts compatibility with Siri, Alexa and Google Assistant.

The vacuum will automatically head to the charger for some juice when running low, which is nice. The battery lasts around 200 minutes per charge, which is a decent enough metric for a budget-friendly robovac. The only downside here? This is just a vacuum. It doesn't mop and it doesn't come with a dedicated debris canister.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/prime-day-deal-pick-up-this-roomba-robot-vacuum-while-its-down-to-150-164953767.html?src=rss

Prime Day laptop deals: Save on some of our favorite machines from Apple, Dell, Lenovo, HP and others

Regardless of if you need a new laptop for work or play, October Prime Day may have just what you’re looking for at a good price. Amongst the clothing, shoes, household essentials and other tech gear are some decent laptop deals that you can snag if you’re a Prime member — and even some that you can grab without a Prime subscription.

But deciphering what constitutes a “good deal” on a laptop during Prime Day can be a bit challenging. That’s due in part to the manic nature of laptop prices on Amazon in particular: they fluctuate often depending on model, brand, configuration, seller and more. But Engadget can help by collecting all of the best October Prime Day laptop deals here so you don’t have to go searching for them.

Apple’s latest laptops are the MacBook Air M4 and the MacBook Pro M4, and we recommend getting those if you want a device that’s as future-proof as possible at the moment. You’ll find decent MacBook deals on Amazon throughout the year, and most of them will be on the base configurations. In a welcomed update earlier this year, Apple recently made all base models of the MacBook Air M4 have 16GB of RAM by default (which is the same as you’ll find on the base-level Pros).

You’ve got a lot of variety to choose from when it comes to Windows laptops, and that can be a blessing or a curse. We recommend looking for a laptop from a reputable brand (i.e. Microsoft, Dell, Acer, Lenovo and others like them), and one that can handle daily work or play pressures. That means at least 16GB of RAM and 245GB of SSD storage, plus the latest Intel or AMD CPUs. If you’re looking for a new gaming laptop, you’ll need a bit more power and a dedicated graphics card to boot.

Most Chromebooks are already pretty cheap, but that just means you can get them for even less during an event like Prime Day. However, there are a ton of premium Chromebooks available today that didn’t exist even three years ago, so now is a great time to look out for discounts on those models. In general, we recommend looking for at least 4 to 8GB of RAM and at least 128GB of SDD storage in a Chromebook that you plan on using as your daily driver.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/prime-day-laptop-deals-save-on-some-of-our-favorite-machines-from-apple-dell-lenovo-hp-and-others-130507439.html?src=rss

Unistellar’s smart binoculars can tell you which mountain you’re looking at

It’s not every day I get to try out an entirely new type of tech product. Telescope company Unistellar recently gave me the chance to do just that with Envision, the first smart binoculars that can identify mountains and stars. The only things like it on the market are Swarovski’s smart binoculars, but those are triple the price and strictly for birds and wildlife.

At an event near Marseilles, I tried an Envision prototype with the design and most of the functionality of the final product (like several other Unistellar products, the company marketed it on Kickstarter and raised $2.7 million). Some features were a bit rough and it took practice to use the binoculars smoothly. But it’s an interesting amalgam of analog and digital tech that’s bound to be a hit with astronomers and travelers.

The Envision initially came out of a conversation between Unistellar engineers wondering why there were no binoculars with an AR-like digital overlay. They soon found out: It was a huge engineering challenge. Combining all the data into an overlay and getting it to line up with the optical view was particularly vexing. Reducing latency was another problem, so that the digital display wouldn’t lag behind the optical view.

The company eventually came up with a solution it borrowed from AR tech. Envision combines premium lenses with an augmented reality projection system that beams contextual info into the optical path via a bright, high-contrast microdisplay. That overlay only appears in one eye, but your brain transforms it into a complete image.

The Envision binoculars take data from inertial sensors and a compass using custom software to “guarantee precise positioning and low-drift orientation” of the digital display. It then pulls in topographic and cartographic info from a large database and merges it onto an AR overlay based on your location and viewing direction. This information comes from your phone’s internet connection, but the binoculars can be used offline as well if you load specific regions in advance.

Unistellar’s smart binoculars can tell you which mountain you’re looking at

I tested a hand-built prototype that lacked the quality control that will happen in full manufacturing. However, the materials, optics and electronics were nearly complete. For daytime testing, I went to the Citadelle de Forcalcquier that offers a panoramic view of mountain ranges in the region. While it was a bit overcast and rainy, distant peaks up to 30 miles away were still visible.

Though a bit heavier than regular binoculars, the Envision was comfortable to hold and use over a period of an hour thanks to the rubberized coating and high-quality plastics. To use the Envision, you set them up as you would any pair of binoculars. They have a diopter adjustment for your specific vision and you can retract the eyecups for use with glasses. There’s a width adjustment to match your eyes and a focusing wheel to sharpen the view.

With all of that set, there’s a rocker control on the left side that enables the AR overlay, which consists of monochrome red graphics like an old-school arcade game. The previous/next buttons let you switch between targets, which you can then select by hitting the “validate” button.

The last button, “target lock,” does two things. Clicking it once does exactly that, locking onto the target. Then, if you pass the binoculars to someone else, they’ll be guided by arrows to the same object. And to correct any drift that inevitably occurs, you press and hold the target lock button and move the binoculars until both the overlay and optical view align. Lastly, release the button and everything is re-synced.

As regular binoculars, they gave me a clear view of distant objects. I switched on the AR and waited a few seconds for my eyes to adjust. When looking at a mountainous horizon, the Envisions overlaid a red outline matching the topography, with the names of peaks and ranges displayed at the bottom center of the screen, along with their elevations and distance from the viewer. It was a half-inch or so off the real-world view, so I used the target lock control to align them perfectly.

The latency wasn’t bad, but if I moved the binoculars too quickly it took a second or so for the overlay to catch up. After scanning across the horizon a few times, the overlay would drift out of sync again, so I needed to use the target lock to realign the views once more. Both the latency and misalignment should improve with the final production version, Unistellar told me.

For now, the Envision can only identify mountain peaks, valleys and ranges. In the production version and via future updates, however, it will identify things like water springs, shelters, hiking paths, rivers and lakes. A companion app will provide the updates, and the software also lets the user select points of interest, access the geographical database and receive guided tours. Sadly, none of those features were available in the prototype I used.

The next test was star spotting using Envision’s Night mode. Fortunately, I didn’t need to go far (the hotel pool) as the clouds covering the sky for most of the day serendipitously broke apart to give us a crystal-clear starscape.

For a stargazing experience, the Envisions were transformational. With the binocular optics set up as before, switching on the AR view instantly displays the names of individual stars, linked together in their constellations by lines. For example, it pointed out Lynx, a constellation that’s faint with the naked eye, along with its fourth brightest star Alsciaukat (31 Lyncis). The final version of the binoculars will also display nebulae, galaxies, planets, moons, comets, asteroids and even human-made points of interest like the International Space Station (ISS) and Apollo landing sites.

This could make the Envision an outstanding educational tool. You can lock onto a star, then give the binoculars to someone else and they can quickly locate the same body by following the arrows. They’ll also see whatever constellation it’s part of. It would only take a few nights of stargazing for someone to learn a lot about the night sky.

At the same time, it’s a great way for aspiring astronomers to survey interesting targets to study with a more powerful telescope. I did just that, using the Envision to home in on a star cluster. With the name clearly displayed, I punched it into Unistellar’s Odyssey Pro smart telescope and quickly saw it with a larger, clearer view. Conversely, you’ll be able to enter a star name into Unistellar’s app and be guided to it by Envision, in the final production version.

The Envision does have some issues. If you’re someone who already has trouble seeing through binoculars, these may not be for you. The AR display can be hard to read at times, and adjusting the brightness (especially for night viewing) can be a challenge. One missing feature is a built-in camera like the one on Swarovski’s binoculars. That was a bit disappointing, as you can’t easily share your experience on social media. The only way to do so is to snap images with your smartphone through the eyepiece. That effectively requires you to lock the binoculars onto a tripod which, well, defeats the purpose of binoculars.

With that being said, I think Unistellar’s first crack at smart binoculars was a success, even in their unfinished form. They add an informational element to a true optical view and finally bring binoculars, which have been around for hundreds of years, into the informational age.

Like any early product (I’m thinking of Pebble’s smartwatch), it’s bound to improve significantly in future versions. Yes, there are smartphone apps that can identify stars and geographical features. But there’s something about looking through a lens and seeing a true image that can’t be beat. And with Envision, you’ll finally know exactly what you’re seeing.

Unistellar is opening pre-orders for its Envision smart binoculars starting today at $999, a fairly steep discount from the final $1,499 retail price, with deliveries set for October 2026. That’s a long way off, but if you’re willing to wait, Unistellar has a perfect track record with its smart telescope deliveries. Retail availability is even farther away, set for 2027.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ar-vr/unistellars-smart-binoculars-can-tell-you-which-mountain-youre-looking-at-140007104.html?src=rss

The second-gen Kindle Scribe is $100 off for October Prime Day

Amazon devices are already on sale for fall Prime Day. Case in point: the second-gen Kindle Scribe. The E Ink tablet with 16GB of storage is $100 off, down from $400 to $300, which is a record-low price. If you want more storage, the 32GB and 64GB versions are also 25 and 24 percent off, respectively.

The Kindle Scribe is our pick for best e-reader E Ink tablet. It scored an 86 in our review, thanks to the smooth reading and writing experience it provides. We were also fans of its sleek and slender design. It has a 10.2-inch screen and offers front lights that auto-adjust to your needs. Our biggest gripe was the cost which, thanks to this deal, is less of an issue.

It's worth noting that Amazon announced a few new Kindle Scribe models recently, but none of them are available just yet. The Kindle Scribe 3 has a thinner and lighter design, plus faster page-turning and writing experiences. The Kindle Scribe Colorsoft is Amazon's first full-color E Ink tablet. If you want the latest and greatest, it's worth it to wait — but Amazon hasn't yet named specific release dates for either new model. During its latest hardware event, it only said the new Scribes were coming "later this year."

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/the-second-gen-kindle-scribe-is-100-off-for-october-prime-day-134701089.html?src=rss

Uber found not guilty in first of many sexual assault lawsuits

Uber was found not responsible by a California jury for an sexual assault that a woman said occurred during a 2016 ride, The New York Times reported. It's the first of what could be thousands of similar lawsuits in the US from women who claim they were "kidnapped, sexually assaulted, sexually battered, raped, falsely imprisoned, stalked, harassed, or otherwise attacked" by Uber drivers, according to the original claim. The cases were consolidated, meaning they can be presented before the same judge with similar procedural processes, while still being tried individually.

The woman in the first case, identified as Jessica C., said she was an 18-year-old college student when she ordered a ride to San Jose's airport. Shortly after she got in, the driver deviated from his route and climbed on top of her, groped and kissed her and tried to remove her pants, according to her testimony. The victim told the driver "No, no, no" and tried to push him off. She feared for her life and later dropped out of school, while suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder due to the assault.

Under California law, Uber would be responsible for the harm suffered by the woman if it failed to use adequate safety measures and that negligence was a "substantial factor" in causing the harm. Conversely, for Uber to not be responsible, the jury would need to find that Uber didn't know and could not have expected that its driver would take advantage of the situation that it created.

The jury ruled that while Uber was negligent, that negligence was not a substantial factor in causing harm to Jessica C. However, the plaintiff's attorney said that the court allowed evidence into the trial that let Uber blame Jessica C. for the harm she faced, adding that the decision discourages victims of sexual assault to come forward. "[It's a] sad day for victims of sexual abuse across the country," said John Taylor of Taylor & Ring.

Jessica C.'s lawyers accused Uber of covering up the scale of its sexual assault problem, revealing during discovery that 558,000+ trips had resulted in reports of sexual assault or misconduct from 2017 to 2024, far more than what was publicly reported. They also said that the company failed to put systems in place like mandatory video recording that could have protected passengers.

Uber said that the driver in Jessica C.'s case had passed background checks and didn't trigger any alarms over past complaints. The company said that despite deploying numerous safety measures, it couldn't guarantee that driver transgressions would never occur, and that it wasn't responsible for driver misconduct in any case. Uber's safety head, Gus Fuldner, testified during the trial that passengers used the service at their own risk.

Uber told the NYT that its work "to improve safety on our platform is never done. Uber has worked for years to raise the bar on safety, and we’ll continue to do so in the years ahead."

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/transportation/uber-found-not-guilty-in-first-of-many-sexual-assault-lawsuits-133046712.html?src=rss

The Roku Streaming Stick Plus falls to $29 for Prime Day

If you're looking for a way to upgrade an old TV or add a more convenient smart interface to your main set, Roku devices are good ways to do that. Thanks to Prime Day deals that you can already get now, you can get one of our favorite Roku streaming devices for less than $30. The Roku Streaming Stick Plus is on sale for just $29 right now, which is 27 percent off and the lowest price we've seen.

We picked the Streaming Stick Plus as the best streaming device for free and live content, thanks in large part to The Roku Channel app that accompanies it. The Roku Channel features over 500 free TV channels with live news, sports coverage and a rotating lineup of TV shows and movies.

In our hands-on review of the Roku Streaming Stick Plus, we thought it was perfect for travel thanks to its small size and the fact that it can be powered by your TV's USB port, nixing the need for a wall adapter. Menu navigation and opening or closing apps won't happen at quite the same speeds as more expensive streamers, but it's quick enough for what is ultimately a pretty low-cost option. The Wi-Fi range on this one is also weaker than Roku's pricier devices, but unless you are placing it exceedingly far from your router, it shouldn't be an issue.

The Roku Streaming Stick Plus supports both HD and 4K TVs, as well as HDR10+ content. It doesn't support Dolby Vision, however; for that you'll need to upgrade to Roku's Streaming Stick 4K or Roku Ultra. It comes with Roku's rechargeable voice remote with push-to-talk voice controls. Roku's remote can also turn on your TV and adjust the volume while you're watching.

If you've been thinking about getting a Roku device, or you already love the platform and want a compact and convenient way to take it with you when you travel, then this sale provides a great opportunity. If you'd prefer a more powerful and slightly more stationary device, the Roku Ultra is on sale for $79 right now, too.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/the-roku-streaming-stick-plus-falls-to-29-for-prime-day-134656505.html?src=rss

Gemini for Home is the official replacement for Google Assistant on smart devices

Google is finally ready to explain how Gemini will replace Google Assistant in your smart home. The company's original voice assistant will be replaced with the aptly named Gemini for Home starting this month, ushering in what might be an easier-to-use and more conversational smart home era in the process.

Like Google teased at CES 2025, the biggest change Gemini for Home will introduce for Google Assistant devotees is an end to rigid commands. While you'll still need to use a "Hey Google" wake word, the days of having to be precise are over. Google claims Gemini grasps context enough to not only remember what your last request was, but also understand that if you're saying "Hey Google, I'm about to watch a movie, turn off the lights," you specifically mean the lights in your living room. You'll also be able to string multiple requests together into the same sentence, and create automations without having to whip out the Google Home app, just by describing them. And when you want to ditch wake words entirely, you can start a Gemini Live chat and have a smooth back and forth with Gemini about whatever you choose.

AI-based improvements will also extend to any cameras you have in your smart home. Google says Gemini can create more useful notifications if a camera detects motion or films a notable event from around your home, thanks to its semantic understanding of visuals. You can also pull a specific piece of footage with natural language requests and even receive answers based on things your smart home recorded via a new feature called "Ask Home." Like Ask Photos in Google Photos, Ask Home understands the context and meaning of footage you've captured to provide answers to questions like "Did I leave the car door open." And for a larger overview of what's going on at home, the "Home Brief" can identify important events you've filmed and "summarizes hours of footage into a quick, digestible summary you can read to catch up on what happened while you were away," Google says.

A list of the speakers, smart displays, cameras and doorbells that Gemini for Home will work with.

Google says Gemini for Home will be available on all of its smart home devices released in the last decade, including new Gemini for Home-compatible doorbells and cameras created by Walmart. Unfortunately, if you're interested in features like Gemini Live, AI-powered notifications, Ask Home and Home Brief, you'll have to pay for a $10-per-month Google Home Premium subscription to use it. The subscription also unlocks an additional 30 days of cloud storage for any videos your smart home captures and comes included with Google's AI Pro and Ultra subscriptions at no additional cost.

To try out Gemini for Home as soon as possible, you can sign up for early access in the Google Home app. Google says the update will roll out throughout the month of October, and come to smart speakers and smart displays "toward the end of the month."

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/home/smart-home/gemini-for-home-is-the-official-replacement-for-google-assistant-on-smart-devices-130041482.html?src=rss

Google has overhauled its smart home app to feature Gemini

As part of Google's smart home announcements today, the company has unveiled a new look for its Google Home app that will begin rolling out globally today. The heart of the redesign is about Gemini for Home, which will replace the Google Assistant role in smart devices and promises a more conversational way to interact with and direct the company's AI. The Google Home app is also now where customers will control their Nest devices.

There's now a Home tab with a consolidated view of the system, an Activity tab that collects the notifications from all connected devices and an Automations tab for managing the hands-off side of the smart home hardware. The app also now has a persistent AI-powered "Ask Home" option in the header that Google describes as a "natural language command center for your entire home." The company promises that it will be able to execute naturally written commands, such as searching for specific moments in a camera clip or creating more open-ended automations. However, some of those features will require a Google Home Premium subscription to access.

In addition to the new Gemini features, the Google Home app has been rebuilt for increased reliability and performance. The software loads "significantly faster," reportedly more than 70 percent faster on some Android devices. Camera views in the app should load 30 percent faster and playback failures should be down 40 percent in the new version. Google is also boasting a reduction of almost 80 percent in app crashes and said it is additionally working to improve battery draw.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/home/smart-home/google-has-overhauled-its-smart-home-app-to-feature-gemini-130041497.html?src=rss

Google's new Nest Doorbell and Nest Cams have 2K video and new AI chops

A day after Amazon updated its security cameras, Google followed suit with its competing suite. A trio of new Nest security cams is available starting today. The latest Nest Doorbell and Nest Cams have higher-resolution (2K HDR) video and a wider field of view. That not only makes for better images, but it also opens the door to new (paid) AI features.

Google's new additions include the Nest Cam Indoor (3rd gen), Nest Cam Outdoor (2nd gen) and Nest Doorbell (3rd gen). The company says the devices were designed to "provide the rich, detailed data our multimodal AI uses to understand." The results, according to the company, are "better alerts" and the ability to "find important moments, faster."

Google says DxOMARK rated all three as first in their class for image quality. The Nest Cams each have 2,560 x 1,400 resolution with a 152-degree diagonal field of view (FOV). The Nest Doorbell uses a 2,048 x 2,048 sensor with a 166-degree FOV. All three support up to 6x digital zoom.

Nest zoomed previews — Alerts can digitally zoom in on subjects.

The company says the combination boosts the cameras' ability to capture video in low-light conditions. Specifically, Google claims they offer 120 percent more light sensitivity than their predecessors. "This means the cameras can now stay in full-color mode much longer at dawn and dusk than before," the company wrote.

The sharp resolution also allows you to digitally zoom in on a specific area in the Home app, cropping out the rest. Google says the feature could be handy for hot spots like a garden bed or walkway. Similarly, your alerts will include animated previews that zoom in on the subject. This could make it easier to tell at a glance who or what triggered the notification.

Nest AI features — Ask Home (left) and Home Brief

The upgraded Gemini AI chops include a new chatbot feature called Ask Home. It lets you do things like ask what ate your plants. (In Google's example, the chatbot explains that it was rabbits, producing photo evidence.) It also lets you perform smart home tasks or create automations using natural language. There's another new AI feature called Home Brief that gives you an AI-generated summary of the day's activities. Both of the new AI features require a Google Home Premium subscription.

All three cameras are available beginning today at the Google Store and with retail partners. The Nest Cam Indoor costs $100. The Nest Cam Outdoor will set you back $150. And the Nest Doorbell costs $180.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/home/smart-home/googles-new-nest-doorbell-and-nest-cams-have-2k-video-and-new-ai-chops-130006878.html?src=rss

The Google Home Speaker is getting a Gemini-driven refresh

Google announced a wave of hardware updates today, including giving some love to the Google Home Speaker. We saw a teaser for the revamped smart speaker last month, so the announcement isn't a surprise, but it does provide some specifics about what's coming to the company's smart home efforts.

This new Google Home Speaker puts the Gemini AI assistant front and center, as is the case with so much Google hardware these days. The light ring will also flash different colors to show when the AI model is listening, processing or responding. If you have a Google Home Premium subscription, you'll also be able to use the Home to access Gemini Live. The blog post promises "more natural conversations" with this model, which it says has custom processing to support the demands of running an AI assistant.

Google is also bringing 360-degree audio to the Home Speaker. The upcoming iteration will be able to connect a pair of Home Speakers to the Google TV Streamer, allowing for a surround-sound home theater setup. The Home will still be able to connect to other Google Nest speakers as well. And for the privacy-minded, there's a physical button to toggle the microphone off.

The new speaker won't be available until spring 2026 and will retail for $99. It has four color options: porcelain, hazel, jade and berry. The Google Home Speaker will be available in the US, Canada, UK, Ireland, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Belgium, Switzerland, Austria, Japan, Australia and New Zealand.

The announcement follows hot on the heels of Amazon's fall hardware event, which also had some big updates for smart speakers centered on its own Alexa+ AI assistant, including a brand new form factor called the Echo Dot Max.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/home/smart-home/the-google-home-speaker-is-getting-a-gemini-driven-refresh-130004673.html?src=rss

Ray-Ban Meta (2nd Gen) review: Smart glasses are finally getting useful

In a lot of ways, Meta's hasn't changed much with its second-gen Ray-Ban glasses. The latest model has the same design and largely the same specs as the originals, with two important upgrades: longer battery life and improved video quality.

At the same time, the Ray-Ban Meta glasses have a lot of features that didn't exist when I first reviewed them two years ago, largely thanks to AI. And with the release of its second-generation frames, there's still a lot to look forward to, like new camera features and AI-powered audio. The good news is that Meta isn't limiting these updates to its newest frames, so if you have an older pair you'll still see the new features. But, if you've been on the fence about getting a pair, there's never been a better time to jump in.

Meta and EssilorLuxottica haven't strayed too far from the playbook they've used for the last two years. The second-generation Ray-Ban Meta glasses come in a handful of frame styles with a number of color and lens variations that start at $379. I tried out a pair of Wayfarer frames in the new "shiny cosmic blue" color with clear transition lenses.

I personally prefer the look for the slightly narrower Headliner frames, but the second-gen glasses still look very much like traditional Wayfarer glasses. I've never been a fan of transition lenses for my own prescription eyewear, but I'm starting to come around on them for smart glasses. As Meta has improved its cameras and made its AI assistant more useful, I've found more reasons to wear the glasses indoors.

The second-generation Ray-Ban Meta glasses come with clear frames, with polarized and transition lenses available as an upgrade.

Also, if you're going to be paying $300 or more for a pair, you might as well be able to use them wherever you are. It also helps that the transition lenses on the second-gen Ray-Ban Meta glasses get a bit darker than my first-gen Wayfarers with transition lenses. Upgrading from the standard clear lenses will cost you, though. Frames with polarized lenses start at $409, transitions start at $459 and prescription lenses can run significantly more.

As with the recent Oakley Meta HSTN glasses, the second-gen Ray-Bans come with a longer battery life and better camera. Meta says the battery can last up to eight hours on a single charge with "typical use." I was able to squeeze a little more than five and a half hours of continuous music playback. That's a noticeable step up from the battery on my original pair which, after two years, is starting to show its age. The glasses also now support higher-resolution 3K video recording, but the 12MP wide-angle lens shoots the same 3,024 x 4,032 pixel portrait photos as earlier models.

For videos, there’s a noticeable quality boost, but I still think it's probably not necessary for most people if you're primarily sharing your clips on social media. It does make the glasses more appealing for creators, though, and judging by the number of them in attendance at Connect, I suspect Meta sees them as a significant part of its user base. I'm looking forward to Meta adding the ability to record Hyperlapse and slow-motion videos, though, as I think these may be more interesting than the standard POV footage for everyday activities.

Two years ago, I was fairly skeptical of Meta's AI assistant. But since then, Meta has steadily added new capabilities. Of those, the glasses' translation abilities have been my favorite. On a recent trip to Argentina, I used live translation to follow along with a walking tour of the famous Recoleta cemetery. It wasn't perfect — the feature is meant more for back-and-forth conversations rather than extended monologues — but it allowed me to participate in a tour I would have otherwise had to skip. (A word of warning: using the live translation for an extended period of time is a major battery killer.)

Meta AI can also provide context and translations in other scenarios, too. I spent some time in Germany while testing the latest second-gen Ray-Ban glasses and found myself repeatedly asking Meta to translate signs and notices. For example, here's how Meta AI summarized this collection of signs.

Meta AI was able to translate these signs (left) when I asked it "what do these signs say?"

As I wrote in my review of the Oakley Meta HSTN glasses, I still haven't found much use for Live AI, which lets you interact with the assistant in real-time and ask questions about your surroundings. It still feels like more of a novelty, but it makes for a fun demo to show off to friends who have never tried "AI glasses." There are also some very interesting accessibility use cases that take advantage of the glasses' cameras and AI capabilities. Features like "detailed responses" and support for "Be My Eyes" show how smart glasses can be particularly impactful for people who are blind or deal with low vision.

One AI-powered feature I haven't tried out yet is Conversation Focus, which can adjust the volume of the person you're speaking to while dampening the background noise. Meta teased the feature at Connect, but hasn't said exactly when it will be available. But if it works as intended, I could see it being useful in a lot of scenarios.

I'm also particularly intrigued by Meta's Connect announcement that it will finally allow third-party developers to create their own integrations for its smart glasses. There are already a handful of partners, like Twitch and Disney, which are finding ways to take advantage of the glasses' camera and AI features. Up to now, Meta AI's multimodal tools have shown some promise, but I haven't really been able to find many ways to use the capabilities in my day-to-day life.

Allowing app makers onto the platform could change that. Disney has previewed a smart glasses integration for inside of its parks that would allow visitors to get real-time info about the rides, attractions and other amenities as they walk around. Golf app 18Birdies has shown off an app to deliver stats and other info while you're on the course.

When the Ray-Ban Meta glasses came out two years ago, this was a pretty straightforward question to answer. If the idea of smart glasses with a good camera and open-ear speakers appealed to you, then buying a pair was a no-brainer.

Now, it's a bit more complicated. Meta is still updating its first-gen Ray-Ban glasses with significant new features, like Conversation Focus, new camera modes and third-party app integrations. So if you already have a pair, you won't be missing out on a ton if you don't upgrade. (And with a starting price of $299, the first-gen glasses are still solid if you want a more budget-friendly option.)

There are also other options to consider. The upcoming Oakley Meta Vanguard glasses come with more substantial hardware upgrades and other unique features that will appeal to athletes and anyone who spends a lot of time outdoors. And on the higher end, there are the $799 Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses that blend AR elements with its existing features in an intriguing way.

Meta has already previewed several new features, like new camera modes and Conversation Focus.

I also have many of the same concerns about privacy as I did when I reviewed Meta's first Ray-Ban branded glasses back in 2021. I'm well aware Meta already collects an extraordinary amount of data about us through its apps, but glasses just feel like they provide much more personal, and potentially invasive, access to our lives.

Meta has also made some notable changes to the privacy policy for its glasses in recent months. It no longer allows users in the United States to opt out of storing voice recordings in its cloud, though it's still possible to manually delete recordings in the Meta AI app.

The company says it won't use the contents of the photos and videos you capture to train its AI models or serve ads. However, images of your surroundings processed for the glasses' multimodal features like Live AI can be used for training purposes (these images aren't saved to your device's camera roll). Meta's privacy policy also states that it uses audio captured via voice commands for training. And it should go without saying, but anyone using Meta's glasses should be very careful about sharing their interactions with its AI app, as a bunch of users have already seemingly inadvertently shared a ton of highly-personal interactions with the world.

If any of that makes you uncomfortable, I'm not here to convince you otherwise! We're still grappling with the long-term privacy implications of generative AI, much less generative AI on camera-enabled wearables. At the same time, as someone who has been wearing Meta's smart glasses on and off for more than four years, I can say that Meta has been able to turn something that once felt gimmicky into a genuinely useful accessory.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/wearables/ray-ban-meta-2nd-gen-review-smart-glasses-are-finally-getting-useful-124720393.html?src=rss

Shark robot vacuums are cheaper than ever for October Prime Day

Ahead of the Amazon Big Deal Days event (aka Prime Day in October), a tasty deal on a Shark robot vacuum has popped up. You'll need to be a Prime member to take advantage of the offer on the Shark AV2501S AI Ultra robot vacuum, but if you are, you can get the device for over half off. The discount drops the price from $550 to $230.

That means you can snap up the robot vacuum for $320 below list price. The discount marks a record low for this model.

Shark offers several variations of its AI Ultra robot vacuums. There are small variations between them, and a different model is our pick for the best robot vacuum for most people. In general, you can expect solid cleaning performance from these devices, along with accurate home mapping and an easy-to-use app.

The model that's on sale here is said to run for up to 120 minutes on a single charge, which should be enough to clean an entire floor in a typical home. The self-emptying, bagless vacuum can store up to 30 days worth of dirt and debris in its base. Shark says it can capture 99.97 percent of dust and allergens with the help of HEPA filtration.

If you'd rather plump for a model that's able to mop your floors too, you're in luck: a Shark Matrix Plus 2-in-1 vacuum is on sale as well. At $300 for Prime members, this vacuum is available for $400 (or 57 percent) off the list price. Its mopping function can scrub hard floors 100 times per minute. You can also trigger the Matrix Mop function in the app for a deeper clean. This delivers 50 percent better stain cleaning in targeted zones, according to Shark.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/shark-robot-vacuums-are-cheaper-than-ever-for-october-prime-day-171836547.html?src=rss

Tesla's updated Model Y Performance launches for $57,490

Tesla's updated Model Y Performance "Juniper" EV has finally arrived in the US for those who want some extra acceleration and are willing to pay for it. First launched last month in Europe, Tesla's fastest Model Y arrives a good nine months after the long-range AWD model started selling stateside.

We already knew that the new Model Y Performance was quick with acceleration from 0 to 60 mph in 3.3 seconds, just 0.8 seconds slower than a Bugatti Chiron Super Sport. What we didn't know yet was the EPA range, which is 306 miles, compared to 327 miles and 357 miles for the Long Range AWD and Long Range RWD versions, respectively. So faster, but faster to the charging station as well.

There are subtle changes to the front and rear end, along with 21-inch Arachnid wheels and a more sporty suspension with adaptive damping. It also supports faster charging, thanks to the higher-density battery cells. Inside, it has racier looking seats with bolstered side cushions and electric thigh cushion extenders.

For all that, you'll pay $57,490 which is $12,500 more than the base Long Range RWD model and an $8,500 bump over the LR AWD version (that's almost exactly the same price as Tesla's original Model S, by the way). If you were hoping to buy one and get the $7,500 federal tax credit discount, unfortunately that has now expired — but state credits may still apply.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/transportation/evs/teslas-updated-model-y-performance-launches-for-57490-123018911.html?src=rss

Prime Day Lego deals: Get up to 38 percent off Star Wars and Super Mario sets

October Prime Day is nearly here, and new early deals are popping up every day. Amazon uses October Prime Day to kickstart the holiday shopping season — even if you haven't even thought about the holidays yet, you should give the latest Prime Day Lego deals a look. A number of Lego sets from the Super Mario and Star Wars collections are already on sale for up to 38 percent off.

When shopping for Lego sets on Amazon, we highly recommend checking a price tracker like Keepa or CamelCamelCamel before buying. It's not difficult to find Lego sets "on sale" at Amazon, but often those discounted prices have been around for a long time. We've clocked "deals" in which the sale price has been available for months already, going back as far as late spring and early summer 2025. Here, we're mostly highlighting discounts on new Lego sets, recent price drops and record-low (and close to them) prices on popular Lego sets from franchises like Star Wars, Super Mario and others.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/prime-day-lego-deals-get-up-to-38-percent-off-star-wars-and-super-mario-sets-121513961.html?src=rss

YouTube TV keeps NBC with a last-minute extension but loses Univision

YouTube TV has announced that it has reached a "short-term extension" agreement with NBCUniversal so that it can continue offering its programs while they negotiate a new long-term deal. The service warned customers last week that its partnership with NBCUniversal was going to expire on September 30 and that they haven't signed a new deal yet. It said at the time that NBC was asking the service "to pay more than what they charge consumers for the same content on Peacock, which would mean less flexibility and higher prices for [its own] subscribers."

While YouTube TV was able to prevent the removal of NBC programs at the last minute, it wasn't able to reach a similar deal with Univision, the largest Spanish-language broadcaster in the US. It sent out an email to customers, telling them that it has failed to reach an agreement with TelevisaUnivision that reflects the value of its content. "Unfortunately their current demands aren’t supported by their performance on YouTube TV over the last four years," it said in the email. The broadcaster has "over 160 million subscribers and billions of views across YouTube," a YouTube spokesperson said in a statement. However, it apparently "only represents a tiny fraction of overall consumption" on its TV subscription service.

In early September, TelevisaUnivision warned customers that Google was planning to remove its programs from YouTube TV's standard package and to charge viewers an extra $15 to be able to access its network. The broadcaster called it the "Hispanic tax" and questioned Google's ethics at "a time of economic uncertainty for many." The broadcaster called YouTube TV's actions "tone-deaf and egregious on the eve of a potential government shutdown" in a new statement regarding its network's removal from the service. "To add insult to injury, YouTube TV chose to take this step during Hispanic Heritage Month — an act that is deeply insensitive and offensive," it added.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/youtube/youtube-tv-keeps-nbc-with-a-last-minute-extension-but-loses-univision-121508916.html?src=rss

Peloton updates its Bike, Tread and Row machines with form-checking cameras, rotating screens and lots of AI

It’s been a rough time for Peloton. Last year was marred by deep staff cuts, a change of CEO and a reckoning of where the home fitness company belonged, post-Pandemic boom. The answer is, unfortunately, AI-tinged, but that shouldn’t distract from some major hardware upgrades across its Bike, Tread and Row family of machines. It’s an almost-entire overhaul, with new software, programmable workouts and an array of collaborations. There are also some tentative steps toward wellness, because why not?

Peloton’s 2025 lineup is called the Cross Training series, with five different fitness devices — Bike, Bike+, Tread, Tread+ and Row+ — all benefiting from new hardware, varying levels of AI smarts with Peloton IQ and software improvements.

All of the new machines have a screen that rotates away from the bike/track/rower. The updated Bike+, Row+, and Tread+ models feature a 23.8-inch display, while the base models have a 21.5-inch display. The ability to rotate it turns your Peloton into a more versatile screen for cross-discipline workouts that Peloton has already dabbled in, including yoga and strength training. Peloton explained at the launch event that strength training is actually its second most-popular class offering.

Peloton’s Guide camera, if you remember, has been fused into the ‘plus’ machines. A new movement tracking camera (which can be flipped off) can count your reps automatically and show that on screen while also monitoring form and offering light guidance. During a demo, while doing weight training next to the bike, the machine suggested improving squat movements by imagining sitting deeply into a chair. It seems like relatively surface advice, but it’s more guidance than Peloton’s fitness equipment has offered in the past.

Senior Vice President of Product Brent Tworetzky said that the Guide device informed how Peloton’s cameras track workout movements, which was all folded into these Cross Training machines. There are voice commands to pause workouts, adjust weights and even skip moves when needed.

Peloton has also folded in some of the most-requested hardware features from its members. While a phone tray won’t blow your mind, a new three-speed fan and a reengineered seat are all included with the plus machines. Peloton has also worked with Sonos to upgrade the speaker system, and the plus machines are the first to have a woofer built-in.

Peloton IQ features go further than computer vision. Across all the new machines, it can generate and track personalized workout plans, and can even control strength training workouts that you can tackle at your own pace, if instructor movements prove too confusing.

Turning on your Peloton of choice on a Monday, for example, you can program in a week of workouts, with the AI working in the background to offer balanced workouts or a training program geared at your fitness goals, whether that’s weight loss, cardio fitness or strength.

Peloton IQ will also analyze your workout history and give personalized target metrics and goals to help them select their workout. Select a more challenging (or longer) workout and IQ will note that the workout will be "Harder than your usual" when browsing the class library.

Peloton is expanding its membership offerings even further, although several intriguing additions aren’t yet available. For example, the company is collaborating with New York's Hospital for Special Surgery to develop workout programming that focuses on injury prevention and recovery. It also acquired Breathwrk, a breathing exercise app that's now folded into services for both All-Access and App+ Members.

There’s even more. Peloton is also collaborating with Respin Health on an eight-week program, curating Peloton classes to target symptom relief and overall quality of life improvement for members experiencing perimenopause through to postmenopause. And – don’t tell your competitive exercise buddy – Peloton is expanding its collaboration with Hyrox with new classes to help train towards those manic races.

There is a cost to all these additions. The new Cross Training versions are priced several hundred dollars higher than their predecessor. Peloton’s Cross Training Bike is priced at $1,695, while the Bike+ jumps up to $2,695. The Cross Training Tread starts at $3,295 , while the Tread+ is $6,695. And if you’re looking for an upgraded rower, the Row+ starts at £3,495. All of the machines require a Peloton subscription, priced at $50.

And that’s an increase there, too. Effective starting this month, Peloton has raised its All-Access Membership from $44 to $49.99 and App+ Membership from $24 to $28.99. The app-only service is also being nudged up from $12.99 to $15.99.

The new Cross Training range is available to buy now at onepeloton.com, Peloton’s own retail stores, Amazon and Dick's Sporting Goods.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/general/peloton-cross-training-bike-tread-row-plus-machines-form-checking-cameras-rotating-screens-ai-price-launch-date-110042677.html?src=rss

The best advent calendars for 2025: Our favorites from Lego, Funko Pop, Pokémon and more

Advent calendars aren’t just about chocolate anymore. Recent years have shown that the countdown to Christmas Day can be packed with fun surprises. Whether you’re into building Lego sets, adding more minifigures to your collection or curiously intrigued by scientific experiments, advent calendars can fill that desire (and they make for great gifts, too). Each door hides a new surprise that brings a bit of joy, nostalgia or nerdy fun to the holiday season.

Check out the rest of our gift ideas here.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-best-advent-calendars-for-2025-our-favorites-from-lego-funko-pop-pokemon-and-more-120042696.html?src=rss

Arm loses licensing dispute with Qualcomm

Qualcomm has announced that a US District Court granted it "complete victory" in the lawsuit brought by Arm back in 2022. The court dismissed the remaining claim in Arm's lawsuit, and it also upheld the result of a December 2024 trial, in which a jury ruled that Qualcomm and its subsidiary Nuvia did not violate their licensing agreement with Arm.

If you'll recall, Arm sued Qualcomm after the latter purchased Nuvia, which is also one of the companies licensing its technologies. It argued that since Qualcomm didn't obtain the necessary permits to transfer Nuvia's licenses, Nuvia breached their contract. In 2024, Arm canceled the architecture license allowing Qualcomm to use its intellectual property and standards for chip design.

This recent court victory allows Qualcomm to continue selling chips with designs developed by Nuvia, which power multiple devices, including Microsoft Surface laptops. "Our right to innovate prevailed in this case and we hope Arm will return to fair and competitive practices in dealing with the Arm ecosystem," said Ann Chaplin, Qualcomm's general counsel.

Arm, however, isn't giving up. It "remains confident in its position in its ongoing dispute with Qualcomm," it said in a statement, and will file an appeal to overturn the court's decision. Meanwhile, Qualcomm said it's looking forward to the trial for its own lawsuit against Arm, accusing the Softbank-owned company of breach of contract and a "pattern of conduct seeking to hinder innovation and better position [its] own products over its long-standing partners'." It's expecting a trial for that lawsuit to take place in March 2026.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/arm-loses-licensing-dispute-with-qualcomm-120000134.html?src=rss

Oura Ring 4 gets new ceramic options and a charging case

Oura’s fourth-generation smart ring has been on the market for around a year, but the company is still looking to broaden its appeal. Today, Oura is launching a version of the Ring 4 clad in Zirconia Ceramic, offering a combination of durability and eye-catching color. The Ring 4 Ceramic comes in four colors: Cloud (white), Midnight (dark blue), Petal (pink) or Tide (pale green), all of which are priced at $499.

The company is talking up the various benefits of these new rings, explaining how durable the new ceramic coating is. For a start, since the color is embedded into the material, it’ll be very difficult to spot any scratches and bumps. Not to mention that ceramic is sturdy enough that you’ll probably not be able to damage it unless you go out of your way to do so. In fact, Oura says the bigger issue is dye from other objects wicking onto the surface — which will be easily wiped away.

Image of the Oura Ring 4 charging case, in black, on a grey/black background.

As well as the fashionable new colors, Oura is also announcing its first ever charging case for the Ring 4. The company said it’s responding to feedback from users who’d rather not tote their standard charger around when they’re traveling. The clamshell unit is only a little bit bigger than an existing charger, and contains a battery big enough to support “up to 5 full charges.” A set of LEDs on the side will tell you how many charges you have available when you’re not charging a ring, but switches to tell you the ring charge level when it’s in place. The Oura Ring 4 charging case will, naturally, come as a paid-for accessory, setting you back $99.

Oura is also listening to its well-heeled users who want to wear different rings to suit their outfits. Multi-Ring Support will enable users to pick up and put down their multiple Ring 4s without a lot of fuss, ensuring their health data is as up to date as their style choices.

A lot of health tech companies are broadening out their work to include some more serious biology. Oura is joining the fray, offering Health Panels, a $99 blood test that will screen more than 50 markers for potential signs of trouble. Schedule a draw at a convenient Quest Diagnostics clinic and you’ll get results for factors including your metabolic health, blood sugar, liver and kidney function. Naturally, the results will be available in your Oura app, which will offer personalized recommendations thanks to its AI-based Oura Advisor.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/wearables/oura-ring-4-gets-new-ceramic-options-and-a-charging-case-120000060.html?src=rss

The best cheap Windows laptops for 2025

Not everyone needs a super-expensive, top-of-the-line laptop, and the good news is you don’t have to break the bank to get a solid machine. Whether you're a student, a casual user or just looking for an affordable device for everyday tasks, there are plenty of great options out there. The trick is finding the best cheap Windows laptop that balances performance, build quality and battery life without making too many compromises.

If you're in the very particular bind of needing to upgrade your machine before Windows 10 support ends in October, don't fret. The machines listed below will serve you well for basic tasks, but we also put together a whole list of the best Windows laptops to replace your aging machine that includes higher price-point options.

While you can do a lot even when spending little on a Windows laptop, you must set your expectations accordingly. The biggest downside when purchasing a budget laptop (of any kind, really) is limited power. You’ll want to carefully consider a few specs, the most important among them being the processor (CPU). Many Windows laptops under $500 run on Intel Celeron or Pentium chipsets, but you can find some with Core i3/i5 and AMD Ryzen 3/5 CPUs at the higher end of the price spectrum.

We recommend getting the most powerful CPU you can afford because it will dictate how fast the computer will feel overall. Memory (RAM) is also important because, the more you have, the easier it will be for the laptop to manage things like a dozen browser tabs while you edit a Word document and stream music in the background.

When it comes to storage, consider how much you want to save locally. If you primarily work in Google Docs or save most things in the cloud, you may not need a machine with a ton of onboard storage. Just remember that your digital space will also be taken up by apps, so it may be worth getting a little extra storage than you think you need if you know you’ll be downloading big programs. A final side note: solid state drives (SSDs) are ubiquitous at this point, not to mention faster and more efficient than hard drives (HDDs), so we recommend getting a laptop with that type of storage.

As for screens, there’s a healthy mix of HD (720p resolution) and FHD (1080p) options in this price range and we recommend springing for a notebook with a 1080p display if you can. Touchscreens aren’t as common in the budget space as standard panels, but you’ll only really miss one if you get a 2-in-1 laptop.

Before we get to our recommended specs for a cheap Windows laptop, it’s worth mentioning that Microsoft clearly lays out the true minimum requirements for any Windows 11 machine. Those include a 1GHz or faster processor that includes two or more cores, at least 4GB of RAM and 64GB of available storage space. That’s the bare minimum to run Windows 11; we recommend giving yourself some wiggle room by choosing a machine that will perform well now and for years to come.

Specs to look for in an affordable Windows laptop

CPU: Intel Core i3 or AMD Ryzen 3 processors, at minimum
RAM: At least 8GB
Storage: At least 128GB SSD
Screen: At least 1080p FHD

It’s essential to prioritize what’s important to you. But at the lower end of the budget, a good laptop may not offer everything you need, whereas a great one might. Although most machines come with features like Bluetooth, built-in Wi-Fi and additional ports, you might find not all of them come with the specifics you require, like an SD card slot, webcam, charger, and so on. Be sure to check the spec list of any laptop you’re considering before you buy, especially if you need specific connectors and capabilities.

See Also:

As for Copilot+, don’t expect to see much of it on truly affordable Windows laptops just yet. Microsoft’s AI features and Copilot assistant require certain specs to run, namely a powerful neural processing unit (NPU), 16GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. Currently, the cheapest Copilot+ AI PCs will run you about $700, so if you’re willing to pay more for those perks, check out our best laptops guide for more options.

If you’re looking for either a gaming laptop or a “Windows on Arm” laptop, both categories will require you to spend more money than we’re discussing here.

The cheap Windows laptop market moves fast, and — unlike nearly all of our other buying guides — we haven't necessarily tested each specific configuration listed below. However, the combination of these technical specifications and familiar brands represent exactly the sort of entry-level laptops we'd recommend to shoppers in this price range based on our thorough research and expert knowledge.

The best cheap laptop models change all the time. Unlike more expensive, flagship machines, these notebooks can be updated a couple times each year. That can make it hard to track down a specific model at Amazon, Best Buy, Walmart or any other retailer. Also, we’ve seen prices vary widely depending on the configuration and retailer you’re looking at.

You can ensure you’re getting a quality laptop by doing a few things. First and foremost, make sure you get a machine that follows the recommended specs we list above. Also, make sure you’re buying from a reputable retailer, including big-box stores like Walmart, Best Buy and Costco, online shops like Amazon or direct manufacturers like Dell, HP, Lenovo and others. If you have a physical store near you (likely a Best Buy in the US), it’s never a bad idea to go play around with some laptops in person before choosing one.

If you decide to shop online from the likes of Amazon or Walmart, double check the seller of the laptop you’re considering. For example, many items on Amazon are “shipped and sold” by Amazon and those are typically the best options. You’ll see that information on Amazon on the right sidebar on a product page, under the Add to Cart and Buy Now buttons. Third-party sellers are common in the affordable laptop space. Amazon sometimes classifies laptop manufacturers as third-party sellers, so you may see a laptop shipped and sold by HP or Dell — that’s a good thing, since it’s coming directly from the manufacturer.

However, there are other third-party electronics sellers out there. We recommend clicking on the third-party seller’s name on Amazon or Walmart (yes, Walmart has them, too) to see how much positive feedback and how many five-star ratings they’ve received from buyers.

You may be inclined to recommend a Chromebook or a tablet to anyone considering a budget Windows laptop computer. Those instincts aren’t wrong, but Chromebooks and tablets aren’t the best buy for everyone. Tablets have the most portability, but they will only work for the most mobile-competent users like kids who have been grabbing smartphones out of their parents’ hands since they’ve been dexterous enough to do so. Tablets can also be just as expensive as some of the cheapest Windows laptops, and that’s without a mouse or keyboard.

Chromebooks are a good alternative for those that basically live in a browser, the trade-off being you must give up the “traditional desktop.” And Chrome OS is a more limited operating system than Windows when it comes to the programs you can install and run.

What can you realistically accomplish on a cheap Windows laptop? Quite a bit, especially if you’re doing one thing (or a limited number of things) at a time. They’re great for everyday tasks like web browsing, checking email, video streaming and more. All of those things can be done on Chromebooks as well, but Windows laptops have a big advantage in Microsoft Office. While yes, there is a browser based version, the native, desktop apps are considered a must have for many and will run smoothly on even the most bare-bones budget laptop. The only caveat is that you may run into some slowdown on low-powered devices if you’re multitasking or working with large data sets in Excel or a lot of photos and graphics in Powerpoint.

When it comes to specs, a bright spot for Windows laptops is storage. Even the most affordable devices tend to have at least a 128GB solid state drive. That will come in handy if you prefer to keep your most important files saved locally on your laptop's hard drive. In contrast, cheaper Chromebooks often have less storage because they’re built on the assumption that you’ll save all of your documents in the cloud. Not only is that less convenient when you need to work offline, but it also limits the size of programs and files that you can download. So, Chromebooks aren't the best for hoarding Netflix shows before a long trip or for use as a gaming laptop.

Windows also has thousands of apps that you can download from its app store. Chromebooks have some Chrome apps, numerous browser extensions and the ability to download Android apps, but quality control is… inconsistent. Android apps, in particular, often haven’t been optimized for Chrome OS, which makes for a wonky user experience. Windows may not have as many apps as Android, but at least the experience is fairly standard across the board.

Windows also gives you the ability to download and use programs from other sources, like direct from the developer. You can run things like Adobe Creative Suite, certain VPNs and programs like GIMP, Audacity and ClipMate on a Windows device, which just isn’t possible on Chrome OS. Chromebooks limit you to the apps and programs in The Play Store and the Chrome Extensions store, reducing any others to unusable, space-sucking icons in your Downloads folder.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/laptops/best-affordable-windows-laptops-123000512.html?src=rss

Longevity progress is real. So are the scams.

Longevity is in a paradoxical place at the moment, with anti-aging influencers misrepresenting real progress in order to make money.

How a dog’s life could extend yours

Studying animals — from long-lived clams to everyday dogs — is helping scientists understand aging and design therapies to slow decline.

Who wants to live forever? Not me.

Most Americans remain wary of immortality, and research helps explain the mix of ethics, faith, and fear behind that resistance.

Aubrey de Grey: “We need a COVID-scale war on aging.”

Biomedical gerontologist Aubrey de Grey discusses the burgeoning longevity movement and barriers to its progress.

Why tomorrow’s longevity treatments could be divided by sex

Why women consistently outlive men is a mystery — and it may influence the future of longevity medicine.

Retro Biosciences wants to add 10 healthy years to your life

Backed by $180 million in funding from OpenAI's Sam Altman, Joe Betts-LaCroix’s Retro Biosciences is racing to extend the human healthspan.

My time among the immortality tribe

Field notes from Vitalist Bay, an 8-week longevity zone in Berkeley where CEOs, scientists, and activists united to fight aging.

The longevity movement is growing — but it needs to go global

Progress in longevity is real, but experts say the field needs government funding, policy reform, and public buy-in to reach its potential.

Living longer — and healthier — starts with boosting your brain

Science is beginning to unravel the reasons behind age-related cognitive decline — and what we can do about it.

Forget just living longer. Eric Topol wants to help Americans live better, too.

In "Super Agers," the writer and medical researcher maps a path to extending healthspan with AI, targeted drugs, and lifestyle changes.

Experts weigh in on popular “anti-aging” treatments: real or scam?

Experts cut through longevity hype, debunking supplements, IV drips, and cold plunges while pointing to what actually works.

AI deadbots can keep “you” around after death — what does that mean for the living?

We can now use AI to create versions of real people that can live on long after their bodies die. But should we?

Groundhog Day and other eternal nightmares: Five philosophical takes on living forever

From eternal recurrence to techno-dualism, five philosophical visions of immortality — and why most paths to forever end badly.

Immortality isn’t progress. It’s paralysis.

The pursuit of immortality ignores how death powers life’s natural cycles, from cellular turnover to ecological renewal and adaptation.

The promise of longevity: A future with more time — and more meaning

An introduction to Freethink's Longevity Issue: features, essays, and op-eds on the science, ethics, and promise of longer, healthier lives.

If aging is a disease, how close are we to curing it?

We've already doubled human life expectancy over the last 200 years. Could we do it again?

Living & Working with AI

Context for the Economics of AI at SF Tech Week

Predictions 2026: Marketing Agencies Resign Their Agency

By the end of the coming year, marketing agencies will have materially changed. For CMOs, agencies will no longer act solely as your agents but also as owners of solutions, resellers of technology partnerships, and developers of emerging capabilities.

How Accurate Were Our Predictions For 2025?

Predictions season is here, and our research teams have been hard at work formulating and fine-tuning their calls for 2026. But before we release our 2026 predictions, here’s a review of some of the “hits” and “misses” from our 2025 predictions.

Sony has launched a new PS5 Slim with less storage, but it costs the same as the old PS5 Slim

Sony has launched a new PS5 model in Europe. It has less storage than the PS5 Slim, but costs the same. You read that correctly. Welcome to the world of bizarre console […]

Thank you for being a Ghacks reader. The post Sony has launched a new PS5 Slim with less storage, but it costs the same as the old PS5 Slim appeared first on gHacks Technology News.

Amazon announces Vega OS for TV, a Linux-based OS that doesn't support sideloading

Amazon has announced Vega OS for its Fire TVs. It's a Linux-based OS that replaces the old Android-based Fire OS. Vega OS is one of Amazon's worst-kept secrets, it has been rumored […]

Thank you for being a Ghacks reader. The post Amazon announces Vega OS for TV, a Linux-based OS that doesn't support sideloading appeared first on gHacks Technology News.

‘Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair’ Is Coming to Theaters Everywhere This Year

Kill Bill Uma Thurman

Lionsgate is releasing Quentin Tarantino's two-part masterpiece as one film on December 5.

This Spooky Season’s Must-Have Halloween Gifts

From fashion to decor and last-minute costumes, this guide has you covered.

That’s No Moon, That’s Lego’s October Releases

We'd say Lego's got a smaller month planned this October, but can you really when it includes the most expensive Lego set ever made?

‘Fortnite’ Will Restore ‘Peacemaker’ Emote After Confirming No Connections to Nazi Earth Storyline

Peacemaker Season 2 Episode 6 Ignorance Is Chris

Epic Games will, however, modify the emote from its original form to further clarify its distinction from season 2's big twist.

China’s Latest Digital Headache for American Corporations: ‘Export-Only’ Piracy

Does Windscribe Work In China

China-based media pirates are targeting Latin America, Southeast Asia, and Taiwan to avoid local law enforcement.

Is Xbox Game Pass Still the Best Deal in Gaming After the New Price Hike?

Photo: Fabian Sommer/picture-alliance/dpa (AP)

If you're barely finishing a game every few months, you may as well buy instead of paying for Xbox Game Pass.

Mamdani Ridicules Andrew Cuomo’s New AI-Generated Campaign Ad

Screenshot from a campaign ad depicting Andrew Cuomo in various jobs using generative artificial intelligence technology.

The ad is not getting many views on social media thus far.

Jane Goodall, Who Forever Changed How We See Animals, Dies at 91

Jane Goodall

The famed primatologist's research on chimpanzees redefined what it meant to be human.

116 New Sci-Fi, Fantasy, and Horror Books Arriving in October

Deadhand 2 2

Clear your shelf for books from Joe Hill, Ken Liu, Thomas Pynchon, R.A. Salvatore, Martha Wells, and more—including that wild Nicholas Sparks-M. Night Shyamalan collaboration.

3 Things to Watch During Starship’s Final Flight of 2025

Starship Flight 10 Pre Launch

The last Starship launch of the year is coming up. Here’s a look at everything SpaceX is doing differently this time.

Freaky Jurassic Reptile Is a Weird Mix of Snake and Lizard

Breugnathair Elgolensis Illustration

It’s “an important reminder that evolutionary paths can be unpredictable.”

The First 24 Hours of Sora 2 Chaos: Copyright Violations, Sam Altman Shoplifting, and More

Image of Sam Altman as Skibidi Toilet created in Sora 2.

We're all screwed, aren't we?

The Films and Shows You Should Be Streaming in October 2025

Best Streaming Shows Movies October 2025 Horror Sci Fi Fantasy

We've picked out the best horror, sci-fi, and genre titles coming to Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, and beyond.

EU Leaders Discuss Building a ‘Drone Wall’ After ‘Hybrid Attack’

This photograph shows Ukrainian air defence firing projectiles at a Russian drone flying above Kyiv during an air attack on September 28, 2025, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Several NATO countries have seen mysterious drones flying in their airspace that many have pinned on Russian intrusions.

I Saw Peloton’s New Cross Training Equipment in Real-Time—and the AI Camera Is Actually Very Cool

Peloton bike

The fitness company is going all in on strength training.

Scientists Studied People With Self-Diagnosed ADHD. What They Found Was Revealing

Reddit Adhd

Researchers analyzed nearly a half million posts from a subreddit dedicated to ADHD.

Scientists Just Found a Clever ‘Fix’ for Smoky, Wildfire-Tainted Wine

A cloud of wildfire smoke rises behind a vineyard in Napa Valley

Smokey-tasting wine has cost the industry billions of dollars. A particular species of bacteria could help solve this problem.

Trump Admin Cuts Off Funding for NYC Transportation, Blames ‘DEI’

New,york,,ny,usa, May,27,,2024:,new,york,city,

Republicans use the government shutdown to attack transportation projects in Democratic cities.

That New Daisy Ridley Movie Is Finally Coming! No, Not That One

Weburythedead

Zombie thriller 'We Bury the Dead' hits theaters in January; Ridley's next 'Star Wars' movie is still TBD.

Wikimedia Is Making Its Data AI-Friendly

Image: kung_tom

The non-profit behind Wikipedia released today a new database designed for AI models.

Tilly Norwood, an AI-generated ‘actor,’ faces Hollywood, celebrity backlash

'Tilly Norwood is not an actor, it's a character generated by a computer program that was trained on the work of countless professional performers,' the Screen Actors Guild said.

A Better Way to Build and Refine Agents

Modern AI applications have evolved far beyond single models. Many systems orchestrate multiple specialized agents — planners that decompose tasks, extractors that gather data, generators that create content — all coordinating through external tools and APIs. This architectural shift creates a fundamental optimization problem: the entire workflow becomes non-differentiable, making traditional gradient-based training methods impossibleContinue reading "A Better Way to Build and Refine Agents"

The post A Better Way to Build and Refine Agents appeared first on Gradient Flow.

AI Auditor Flags $2M Smart Contract Bug Before Launch

Vulnerability that would have drained $2 million from decentralized lending protocol was spotted by an AI auditor. The audit was made by Sherlock AI, part of a wave of automated systems entering the security process.

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The HackerNoon Newsletter: Why Your Next Serverless App May Run on “Paranoid” Lambdas (10/1/2025)

10/1/2025: Top 5 stories on the HackerNoon homepage!

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Grokipedia: The Coming War with Wikipedia for the World's Knowledge

Elon Musk's Grokipedia aims to rival Wikipedia as an open-source knowledge hub with no usage limits. If it succeeds, it could redefine how information flows into search engines, AI models, and the internet itself. Getting in early may mean shaping the future of knowledge.

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Speedrun Your RAG: Build an AI Recommender for your Steam Library

Custom retrievers give you control over domain context, metadata, and ranking logic. They outperform generic similarity search when queries are messy or jargon heavy.

Superlinked combines multiple text fields into one semantic space and runs queries in memory for snappy results.

LlamaIndex provides the clean retriever interface and plugs straight into query engines and response synthesis.

There is an official Superlinked retriever integration for LlamaIndex that you can import and use.

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How to Run a RAG Powered Language Model on Android With the Help of MediaPipe

Learn how to implement and fine tune a RAG powered AI model in your Android Apps!

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AI Expands the Search for New Battery Materials

When Microsoft researchers in 2023 identified a new kind of material that could dramatically reduce the amount of lithium needed in rechargeable batteries, it felt like combing through a haystack in record time. That’s because their discovery began as 32 million possibilities and, with the help of artificial intelligence, produced a promising candidate within 80 hours.

Now researchers at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory plan to synthesize and test the novel material, NaxLi3−xYCl6, in a battery setup. It’s one of several AI-generated battery chemistries making its way to the real world.

Microsoft’s experiment started when the researchers wanted to demonstrate how AI could tackle the needle-in-a-haystack problem of finding useful new materials and chemicals. They decided to seek new candidates for a rechargeable battery’s electrolyte, because a better electrolyte could make batteries safer while simultaneously improving performance, says Nathan Baker, project leader at Microsoft for Azure Quantum Elements, a program to accelerate chemistry and materials research through Microsoft’s advanced computing and AI platforms.

“Our goal was to take one of these AI models and show the promise of accelerating scientific discovery—sifting through 32.5 million materials candidates and showing that we could do it in a matter of hours, not years,” Baker says. Their model, called the M3GNet framework, accelerated simulations of molecular dynamics to evaluate properties of the materials such as atomic diffusivity.

First, the Microsoft researchers asked the model to drop new chemical elements into known crystalline structures in nature and determine which resulting molecules would be stable, a step that cut the 32 million starting candidates down to half a million. AI then screened those materials based on the necessary chemical abilities to make a battery work, which chopped the pool to just 800. From there, traditional computing and old-fashioned human expertise identified the novel material that could function within a battery and use 70 percent less lithium than the rechargeable batteries in commercial use today.

The Microsoft team isn’t alone. Around the world, researchers are busy trying to develop next-generation designs to replace or improve lithium-ion batteries, which use large quantities of rare, expensive, and difficult-to-acquire elements. New battery designs could use more abundant materials, reduce the fire danger from lithium-based liquid electrolytes, and pack more energy into a smaller space. The chemistries to do this are waiting out there to be discovered, and increasingly, researchers are harnessing AI and machine learning to do the work of sorting through the mountain of data.

“We are teaching AI how to be a materials scientist,” says Dibakar Datta, associate professor at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, who published a study in August that used AI to identify five candidate materials for batteries that would outperform Li-ion. Datta’s team is working on the multivalent battery: one that employs multivalent ions that can carry multiple charge levels as opposed to the single charge carried by a lithium battery.

This would give the battery a greater energy storage capacity, but it also means working with larger ions from elements higher on the periodic table, like magnesium and calcium. Those larger ions won’t necessarily fit into existing battery designs without cracking or breaking the elements, Datta says. His new study used what he calls a crystal diffusion variational autoencoder (CDVAE) that could propose new materials, and a large language model (LLM) that could find materials that would be the most stable in the real world. From a pool of millions of possibilities, the approach found five porous materials of the right size that could do the job.

Guiding an AI model on its hunt through the nearly infinite space of possible materials is the tipping point in this field. The key to using it as a research partner is to find a happy medium between a model that works fast and a model that delivers perfectly accurate results, says Austin Sendek, professor at Stanford University who has developed algorithms to help AI discover new battery materials.

“You have to traverse both breadth and depth,” says Sendek. Depth, because designing these things takes a lot of deep scientific knowledge about properties, engineering and chemistry, and breadth, because you have to apply that knowledge across an infinite chemical space, he says. “That’s where the promise of AI comes in.”

Researchers at IBM have taken an AI-driven approach to identify new electrolyte candidates, which involved identifying chemical formulations with far higher electric conductivity than the lithium salts used in current batteries. A typical electrolyte can contain six to eight ingredients including salts, solvents, and additives, and it’s nearly impossible to consider all the combinations without AI.

To whittle down the field, the IBM team developed chemical foundation models trained on billions of molecules. “They capture the basic language of chemistry,” says Young-Hye Na, Principal Research Staff Member at IBM Research. Her team then trains those models with battery-related data so the AI can predict important properties for battery applications on scales from individual molecules all the way up to a whole device. Na described the work in a paper published in August in NPJ Computational Materials.

Because the work investigates new combinations of existing materials rather than using AI to invent exotic new materials, its potential to help build the battery of tomorrow is that much more promising, Na says. The IBM team is now collaborating with an undisclosed EV manufacturer to design high-performance electrolytes for high-voltage batteries.

IBM’s use of AI for batteries isn’t limited to the hunt for promising materials. Typically, when AI reveals a promising new material, the next step is for experimentalists to synthesize the stuff, experiment with it in the lab, and one day to test it in a real device. Machine learning (ML) will aid researchers in this testing step, too.

IBM is testing the real-world viability of new battery setups by building their digital twins—virtual models that allow the researchers to predict how a particular battery chemistry would degrade over a lifetime of countless power cycles. The model, developed in collaboration with battery startup Sphere Energy, can predict a battery’s long-term behavior in as few as 50 power cycles modeled on the digital twin, says Teodoro Laino, distinguished research staff member at IBM Research.

The next phase of AI battery research is quantum. As Microsoft and IBM push toward the potential of quantum computers, both see its promise to model complex chemistry with no shortcuts or compromises. Na says that while current AI is a crucial tool for investigating battery chemistry, the next step—modeling whole EV battery packs, for example, and taking into consideration all the variables they encounter in the real world—would require the power of quantum computing.

As Baker puts it: “We know classical computers have problems generating accurate answers for complex substances, complex molecules, complex materials. So our goal right now is actually to change the way the data is generated by bringing quantum into the loop so that we have higher accuracy data for training ML models.”

The Hidden Behemoth Behind Every AI Answer

What happens when you say “Hello” to ChatGPT?

Such a simple query might seem trivial, but making it possible across billions of sessions requires immense scale. While OpenAI reveals little information about its operations, we’ve used the scraps we do have to estimate the impact of ChatGPT—and of the generative AI industry in general.

OpenAI’s actions also provide hints. As part of the United States’ Stargate Project, OpenAI will collaborate with other AI titans to build the largest data centers yet. And AI companies expect to need dozens of “Stargate-class” data centers to meet user demand.

ChatGPT uses 8.5 Wh/day per user in 2025, equal to running a 10W LED bulb for 1 hour.

ChatGPT uses 850 MWh daily, equaling 14,000 EV charges for 2.5 billion global queries.

ChatGPT's 912B queries yearly need 310 GWh, equal to powering 29,000 US homes.

$AI queries need 15 TWh/year, equal to two nuclear reactors\u2019 output.$

Generative AI queries projected to reach 120 trillion annually by 2030.

Diagram of 38 Stargate-class data centers with racks of GPUs and construction needed.

Graphic: 347 TWh requires 44 nuclear reactors with icons of cooling towers.

AI-Powered Tools Enhance Global Innovation Strategies

This is a sponsored article brought to you by IP.com

Around the world, innovation is no longer just a function of invention. It is a strategic asset, deeply linked to economic resilience—and increasingly reliant on ever-evolving technologies like artificial intelligence (AI). As intellectual property ecosystems transform under this new reality, the need for advanced, efficient, ethical AI-supported innovation infrastructure has never been more urgent.

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has emerged as a global leader in this space, signaling its commitment to responsible AI leadership through the AI and Emerging Technologies (ET) Partnership, and most recently, through its landmark guidance clarifying that human contribution is essential for inventorship in AI-assisted creations and its significant investment in deploying AI to improve prior art searches and overall examination quality.

As governments, enterprises, and inventors look to chart a path through this rapidly shifting IP landscape, one innovation intelligence company has been boldly helping lead the way: IP.com.

For over 20 years, IP.com has worked to empower public and private innovation stakeholders alike with an ever-expanding suite of AI-powered tools that enhance ideation, evaluate novelty, clarify patent landscapes, and protect inventive work around the globe.

Today, as the world rethinks how to balance open innovation with strategic security, IP.com’s solutions are not only timely—they are essential.

While each country faces its own innovation challenges and opportunities, there is a growing consensus around one idea: the systems that support innovation—including those for AI and intellectual property—must be modern, data-driven, future-ready, and responsible.

That vision was echoed in the U.S. government’s recent Executive Order on artificial intelligence (EO 14179), and the newly published “America’s AI Action Plan” which emphasize the need for safe and trustworthy AI systems to drive economic growth and national security. While the Executive Order speaks primarily to U.S. priorities, it reflects a global movement toward building responsible AI systems that deliver long-term value, foster trust, and safeguard the integrity of innovation.

IP.com’s innovation platforms are deeply aligned with this broader call, providing AI solutions that are secure and responsible from the ground up. From operating in a private environment to being fully ITAR-compliant, IP.com’s approach delivers IP-advancing AI solutions that are safe and accountable so inventors, R&D teams, IP professionals, and federal agencies can work smarter, faster, and more securely.

IP.com’s dual-engine AI-fueled Innovation Power (IP) Suite® mirrors how high-performing teams think while aligning closely with the strategies and priorities shaping the future of intellectual property. It responsibly integrates AI into intellectual property processes to foster innovation within a secure, inclusive framework free from ideological bias or hallucinations.

The IP Suite is purpose-built to deliver actionable insights grounded in proprietary data. With security integrated at every level—including ITAR compliance and private AI environments—IP.com offers best-in-class capabilities that protect sensitive data while accelerating innovation workflows. Transparent and traceable outputs reinforce trust and accountability across the innovation lifecycle while empowering forward-thinking teams and simplifying complex technology landscapes.

IP.com’s dual-engine AI-fueled Innovation Power Suite is purpose-built to deliver actionable insights grounded in proprietary data.

That means inventors and engineers can use the IP Suite to safely push innovation boundaries at a rapid pace. By integrating ideation, quantitative novelty analysis, prior art analysis, and invention disclosure generation into one simple, intuitive AI workflow, IP decisions can be made better and faster to maximize ROI. As global innovation accelerates, the broader collaboration IP.com enables through its AI-fueled IP Suite is essential to aligning stakeholders around shared priorities and helping to build a resilient, secure, and future-ready IP ecosystem.

Though best known among insiders in patent law and innovation strategy, IP.com has shaped some of the most important developments in IP modernization over the past two decades. Used by patent trademark offices around the world, its enterprise-grade, class-leading semantic AI increases examiner efficiency, powers millions of prior art searches, and accelerates the IP and innovation work of inventors, engineers, and IP professionals alike.

Today, IP.com’s tools serve clients ranging from small inventors to multinational R&D operations. And as patent filings increase globally and emerging technologies blur jurisdictional boundaries, its commitment remains the same: helping innovators everywhere create confidently, compete fairly, and protect what matters—their intellectual property.

As the threat of IP theft intensifies, organizations across the public and private sectors are reevaluating how and where they deploy AI. Foreign-backed open and consumer-grade AI solutions, while powerful, often operate in opaque environments with unclear data handling practices, raising serious concerns about data leakage. For entities managing high-value innovation or sensitive research, the risk of proprietary data being exposed or exploited through unsecured AI models has become a pressing issue.

IP.com’s Innovation Power (IP) Suite® is purpose-built to meet this challenge. Designed for enterprise and public-sector use, the platform operates entirely within secure, explainable, and ITAR-compliant environments—ensuring that no prompts, queries, or intellectual property are ever shared with external models or third parties. This architecture preserves data sovereignty while also upholding innovation ethics. Furthermore, the IP Suite helps US companies and government agencies protect innovations while countering the risk of IP theft. IP.com’s secure and ITAR-compliant solutions are uniquely positioned to help enable rapid, secure AI adoption in sensitive environments.

As lines between economic competition and cyber-espionage continue to blur, IP.com stands apart from competitors built on open-source models vulnerable to exploitation. IP.com offers a proven, trustworthy path forward for organizations seeking to innovate responsibly while safeguarding their most valuable ideas.

IP.com further enhances innovation processes by offering engineers direct access to fully searchable IEEE content—one of the most trusted and timely sources of technical knowledge in the world. Whether evaluating the novelty of a new design or researching prior art, engineers benefit from the ability to explore a vast collection of peer-reviewed journals, conference proceedings, and technical standards—all integrated within IP.com’s AI-powered IP Suite.

By embedding IEEE content directly into the research workflow, IP.com empowers engineering teams to make more informed technical and strategic decisions. During concept validation or patentability assessments, having authoritative, high-quality IEEE literature at their fingertips helps engineers validate ideas, identify gaps in the landscape, and avoid costly duplication of effort. Combined with IP.com’s advanced analytics and private, secure AI tools, the integration of IEEE content ensures that engineers not only innovate efficiently but do so with the clarity and depth of insight required in today’s fast-moving R&D environments.

Few platforms offer this kind of integration. Fewer still deliver it with the semantic precision and ease of use that IP.com provides.

Innovation is borderless. Its challenges—be they technical, strategic, or ethical—are shared across geographies. And so must be its solutions.

IP.com is committed to supporting innovation ecosystems worldwide with tools that uphold the values of fairness, security, and excellence. Whether advancing a single patent application or shaping and managing an entire IP portfolio, our mission remains clear: to help innovators move forward—smarter, faster, and together.

Discover how IP.com supports innovation ecosystems worldwide at www.ip.com/AI

Microsoft Tests Microfluidic Cooling for Next-Generation AI Chips

Microsoft has announced progress on a new chip cooling approach that could help address one of the biggest bottlenecks in scaling AI infrastructure: heat. The company’s researchers have successfully demonstrated in-chip microfluidic cooling, a system that channels liquid coolant directly into etched grooves on the back of silicon chips.

By Robert Krzaczyński

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Starbucks Protein Coffee: Is It Worth It? Why Health Gurus Say You're 'Tripping Over Dollars to Pick Up Pennies'

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Google Pixel 11, Pixel 11 Pro, Pixel 11 Pro XL Rumoured Release Date, Specs, Features, Price and More

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Samsung Galaxy Tri-Fold Possible Release, Date, Specs, Features, Price and Everything We Know So Far

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UN Approves Sending Thousands Of Additional Troops To Fight Gangs In Haiti

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Royal Caribbean Illness Cases Rise — How Norovirus Spreads and How to Stay Safe

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California Electricity Bills Refund: Over 11.5 Million Households to See Money Back—And You Don't Need to Do a Single Thing

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Debunking 5 Myths About Cloud Computing for Small Business (Sponsored)

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From Excel to Python: 7 Steps Analysts Can Take Today

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Startups want global talent. Here’s how to actually hire it

无摘要

Stop worrying about your business, it’s making things worse

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Swedish legal tech Legora raising $100m at a $1.7bn valuation, reports say

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AI cloud startup Nscale raises $433m days after billion-dollar Series B

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Best October Prime Day smartwatch and fitness tracker deals

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Liquid AI Released LFM2-Audio-1.5B: An End-to-End Audio Foundation Model with Sub-100 ms Response Latency

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The post Liquid AI Released LFM2-Audio-1.5B: An End-to-End Audio Foundation Model with Sub-100 ms Response Latency appeared first on MarkTechPost.

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The post MLPerf Inference v5.1 (2025): Results Explained for GPUs, CPUs, and AI Accelerators appeared first on MarkTechPost.

The Role of Model Context Protocol (MCP) in Generative AI Security and Red Teaming

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The post The Role of Model Context Protocol (MCP) in Generative AI Security and Red Teaming appeared first on MarkTechPost.

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The post Google AI Proposes ReasoningBank: A Strategy-Level I Agent Memory Framework that Makes LLM Agents Self-Evolve at Test Time appeared first on MarkTechPost.

Roundtables: Trump’s Impact on the Next Generation of Innovators

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OpenAI is huge in India. Its models are steeped in caste bias.

When Dhiraj Singha began applying for postdoctoral sociology fellowships in Bengaluru, India, in March, he wanted to make sure the English in his application was pitch-perfect. So he turned to ChatGPT. He was surprised to see that in addition to smoothing out his language, it changed his identity—swapping out his surname for “Sharma,” which is…

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Ways to Become Better at AI Evaluation at ODSC AI West

Artificial intelligence is no longer just about building powerful models — it’s about making sure those models actually work, safely and reliably, in the real world. Whether you’re deploying a large language model into a customer-facing product, experimenting with autonomous agents, or building computer vision pipelines, evaluation is the skill that separates prototypes from production.

At ODSC AI West 2025 (Oct 28–30, San Francisco), evaluation takes center stage. Across sessions, workshops, and tutorials, experts will share practical strategies for measuring, stress-testing, and improving AI systems so they deliver real value. Even if you’re not attending, the lessons from these talks highlight the core principles of modern AI evaluation.

Here are six ways to level up your evaluation game, and why you’ll want to dive deeper with the sessions at ODSC AI West.

1. Go Beyond Benchmarks and Measure What Matters

Standard benchmarks often fail to predict real-world performance. Michelle Yi (Generationship) will cover this in her session “A Practical Guide to LLM Evaluation.” Instead of relying on academic metrics like BLEU or ROUGE, Michelle outlines a toolkit that blends automated metrics, human-in-the-loop pipelines, and LLM-as-judge frameworks. The takeaway: evaluation must align with your use case and business goals — not just leaderboard scores.

2. Build Evaluation into Your AI Agent Infrastructure

Agents add complexity because of their probabilistic, multi-step workflows. Emmanuel Turlay (Weights & Biases) will tackle this head-on in “How to Build an Evaluation Harness for Your AI Agent.” He shows how to design layered evaluation frameworks: unit tests for agent components, integration tests for workflows, and adversarial tests for edge cases. By setting up continuous evaluation pipelines early, teams can move from fragile prototypes to production-ready systems.

3. Test on Real Data with Domain-Specific Evaluation

General-purpose benchmarks don’t always capture domain-specific challenges. Harpreet Sahota (Voxel51) demonstrates this in “Mastering Visual AI with Vision-Language Models and Advanced Evaluation Techniques.” Using the CarDD dataset — the largest open dataset for automotive damage detection — participants will learn how to evaluate models for real-world tasks like dent, scratch, and crack detection. The lesson here: your evaluation pipeline is only as good as the data you test it on.

4. Simulate the Real World Before Users Do

One of the biggest challenges in evaluation is anticipating user behavior. Shreya Rajpal (GuardrailsAI) introduces “How Simulations Make AI Systems Reliable,” where she shows how tools like Snowglobe generate realistic, persona-driven conversations to stress-test AI agents. By simulating jailbreak attempts, hallucinations, and mismatched tones, teams can identify failure modes before users do — turning evaluation into a proactive shield.

5. Adopt a Continuous “Hill-Climbing” Approach

Evaluation isn’t a one-off checklist — it’s a process of iterative improvement. Rajiv Shah, PhD (Contextual AI) explores this idea in “Beyond Benchmarks: Hill Climbing Your Way to Production-Ready LLM Systems.” His framework blends custom datasets, error analysis, and continuous testing to steadily improve models. The key takeaway: don’t expect linear progress, but build systems that get better with every cycle of evaluation.

6. Bridge Safety, Security, and Regulation

As AI systems evolve into autonomous agents, evaluation must account for safety, fairness, and regulatory compliance. In “From Guardrails to Agents: Navigating Safety and Security at AI’s Frontier,” Sanmi Koyejo, PhD (Stanford) shows how organizations can prepare for this future. From dynamic red teaming to automated safety benchmarks, he highlights frameworks that ensure AI systems remain trustworthy while scaling up.

Why ODSC AI West is the Place to Learn AI Evaluation

From hands-on workshops with datasets and pipelines to cutting-edge talks on safety and regulation, ODSC AI West is where practitioners, researchers, and product leaders sharpen the most critical skill in AI today: knowing whether your system is good enough to trust.

If you want to build AI that’s safe, reliable, and production-ready, you’ll find the practical tools and frameworks at ODSC AI West this October in San Francisco.

👉 Register now to join 250+ AI leaders and practitioners shaping the next era of AI.

Voice AI: The Next Great Computing Interface

For decades, the dream of talking naturally to our computers has lingered just out of reach. From early dictation software like Dragon NaturallySpeaking to smart assistants like Siri and Alexa, voice interaction has always promised more than it delivered. But with the rise of large language models (LLMs) and advances in real-time audio technology, that gap is closing fast. According to Kwindla Hultman Kramer — engineer, co-founder of Daily, and creator of the open source project Pipecat — we are entering a new era where Voice AI will become the primary interface for software and computing.

You can listen to the full ODSC Ai X Podcast episode on Spotify, Apple, and SoundCloud.

Why Voice Is the Future

Kwindla draws an analogy to the iPhone. Before 2007, mobile phones were common, but the iPhone unified the right technologies — touchscreen hardware, software, and distribution — into a breakthrough experience. Similarly, voice-enabled devices have been around for decades, but the pieces never fit together until now.

The missing component was the ability of LLMs to interpret unstructured, conversational speech and generate useful responses in real time. That unlock makes it possible to rethink how we interact with computers. Instead of tapping through nested menus or searching for hidden settings, users can simply talk, and software can generate the right interface on the fly. This shift is sometimes called a “liquid interface,” where applications adapt dynamically to context rather than following static design templates.

What’s Working Today

Voice AI is no longer just for demos. Real-world deployments are already proving its value in areas like:

Customer support call centers — handling common inbound requests and freeing human agents for complex cases.
Healthcare scheduling and reminders — automating outbound calls that ensure patients are prepared for appointments.
Banking and finance — supporting secure account inquiries or loan application assistance.
Hiring and user research — conducting first-round interviews or usability testing with consistent, automated voice agents.

These use cases succeed because they are narrowly defined, high-value tasks where the cost of using powerful cloud-based LLMs is justified by savings in time, money, and customer satisfaction. By contrast, consumer assistants like Siri and Alexa tried to be general-purpose, always-on companions — an approach limited by small on-device models and unrealistic expectations for latency.

The Engineering Challenges of Voice AI

Building a text-based chatbot is hard. Building a natural-feeling voice agent is much harder. Developers face unique challenges, including:

Latency — A delay of even half a second feels unnatural and can cause users to hang up or disengage.
Turn detection — The AI must know when a user has finished speaking and when to respond, while also handling interruptions gracefully.
Audio processing — Converting streaming speech to text (ASR), reasoning with an LLM, then generating speech output (TTS) in real time requires careful orchestration.
Context management — Because LLMs are stateless, developers must engineer how much conversation history, instructions, and tool options get passed each turn.

This is where Pipecat, the open source toolkit Kwindla and his team released, comes in. It provides building blocks for low-latency networking, speech activity detection, context management, and tool-calling abstractions — so developers don’t have to reinvent the hardest parts of the stack.

Voice vs. Chat: When to Use Which

A common question is when voice is better than chat. The answer often comes down to user preference and return on investment.

Most people still prefer to talk when solving a problem with a bank, scheduling healthcare, or navigating customer support. Chat interfaces work well for quiet environments or multitasking but feel less natural for complex back-and-forth conversations.

The most successful Voice AI deployments follow a pattern:

Start narrow — Choose a task with measurable ROI, like reducing wait times in a call center.
Demonstrate wins — Show cost savings and improved satisfaction.
Expand scope — Apply the same system to adjacent workflows and unlock new capabilities.

This “flywheel effect” mirrors how other transformative technologies spread in enterprises.

Jobs and the Human Role

Much has been made of AI “replacing” jobs, especially in call centers. In practice, Voice AI tends to augment rather than eliminate human work. Routine, repetitive calls are automated, leaving human agents to focus on higher-value, complex interactions like fraud cases or sensitive conversations.

As Kwindla notes, “human jobs don’t go away — they have more time to tackle the harder things that need a human in the loop”. Companies also discover that adding AI makes voice a more scalable and attractive channel, sometimes leading to increased customer demand and even more need for human oversight.

The Road Ahead

Despite impressive progress, several bottlenecks remain before Voice AI reaches its full potential:

Memory and personalization — Today’s systems don’t retain long-term conversational memory across sessions.
Streaming LLM architectures — Current models can output tokens as they generate them but can’t accept continuous input streams. True bi-directional streaming models will reduce latency and improve turn-taking.
Training data — Unlike text, there isn’t enough natural multi-turn audio data between humans and AI. Synthetic audio generation and better labeling tools will help fill the gap.
Hybrid inference — Future systems will combine on-device models for speed and privacy with cloud models for complex reasoning.

In other words, the foundation is here, but the architecture is still evolving rapidly.

Getting Started with Voice AI

For developers and companies interested in exploring Voice AI, Kwindla’s advice is simple: don’t build everything yourself. Instead, focus on what’s unique to your application and rely on existing, well-tested components for the rest.

Resources like Pipecat and Kwindla’s extensive technical guide at voiceagents.com provide practical roadmaps for assembling the right stack. And for organizations, the key is to identify workflows where even small improvements in efficiency, satisfaction, or scale justify experimentation.

Conclusion: The Coming Wave of Voice Interfaces

Voice AI is not a futuristic dream — it’s already reshaping industries from healthcare to finance to customer service. With LLMs powering more natural conversations, open source tools lowering the barrier to entry, and enterprises finding clear ROI, voice is poised to become the default interface of the AI era.

As Kwindla puts it, “All UI is going to become liquid, generated on the fly, contextually, largely by natural voice speech”. That means it’s time for developers, product leaders, and organizations to prepare for a world where talking to your software is as natural as tapping a screen today.

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Paul Thurrott / Thurrott:
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Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
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M.G. Siegler / Spyglass:
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Harshita Mary Varghese / Reuters:
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Stockholm-based driverless truck startup Einride raised about $100M, a source says at a $1B+ valuation, up from a valuation of €400M in a 2021 funding round (Rafaela Lindeberg/Bloomberg)

Rafaela Lindeberg / Bloomberg:
Stockholm-based driverless truck startup Einride raised about $100M, a source says at a $1B+ valuation, up from a valuation of €400M in a 2021 funding round — Einride AB raised about $100 million in funds in a round that values the Swedish driverless truck startup at more than $1 billion …

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Will Knight / Wired:
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Rohan Goswami / Semafor:
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Bloomberg:
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Jordan Novet / CNBC:
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Matt Day / Bloomberg:
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Tom Warren / The Verge:
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Microsoft raises its Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription price from $19.99/month to $29.99/month, rebrands Xbox Game Pass Core and Standard plans, and more (Tom Warren/The Verge)

Tom Warren / The Verge:
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Cheeky Pint:
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Reuters:
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Robin Ajello / Bloomberg:
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48 Hours to Build Your AI Advantage — 35% Off Ends Friday, October 3rd was originally published in Towards AI on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I asked AI to write a Perfect Prompt (Beginners’ Trick)

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The Silent AI Killer: How Cloudflare’s Hyper-Volumetric Shields Defy the 2025 DDoS Apocalypse

Your AI/ML Projects Aren’t Safe. They’re Prime Targets. This is How We Fight Back.

Have you ever had that pit-in-your-stomach feeling when a critical system goes offline? The kind that cascades into panicked Slack messages, frantic debugging, and the slow, chilling realization that your entire operation is vulnerable? For us, working with AI and Machine Learning, that feeling is amplified a hundredfold. Our models, our training data, our very computational backbone — they’re not just critical, they’re the crown jewels of our digital existence. And there’s a silent, ever-growing killer lurking in the shadows: the hyper-volumetric Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack.

Just last week, I was chatting with a colleague, a brilliant ML researcher, about the sheer audacity of some of these new attack vectors. “It’s like they’re not just trying to knock you offline,” he mused, “they’re trying to vaporize your online presence with a firehose of junk data.” He wasn’t wrong. As of September 2025, the sophistication and scale of DDoS attacks have reached unprecedented levels, particularly targeting the compute-intensive, stateful nature of AI/ML infrastructure.

The Invisible War: Why DDoS Attacks Threaten the AI Frontier

A DDoS attack, at its core, is a digital siege. Malicious actors overwhelm a target server, service, or network with a flood of internet traffic, effectively choking legitimate users out. Imagine a bustling motorway suddenly jammed by thousands of empty ghost cars, preventing any real traffic from reaching its destination. That’s a DDoS.

But for AI and ML, the stakes are astronomically higher.

Model Availability: If your inference APIs or training clusters are down, your AI applications grind to a halt. Real-time predictions fail, recommendation engines go blind, and autonomous systems lose their intelligence.
Data Integrity: During an attack, systems might behave erratically, potentially corrupting data streams or model states, leading to unpredictable and dangerous outcomes.
Resource Exhaustion: AI training and inference demand immense computational resources. A DDoS attack can exploit this by forcing your systems to waste cycles processing junk traffic, leading to massive financial losses and impacting legitimate workload execution.
Reputation & Trust: For businesses relying on AI, an outage means a direct hit to user trust and brand reputation. Who trusts an AI that can’t stay online?
Competitive Disadvantage: In the fast-paced AI race, even a few hours of downtime can mean losing a crucial edge to competitors.

The nature of these attacks is evolving rapidly. We’re talking “hyper-volumetric” now because they combine massive scale (terabits per second, anyone?) with highly sophisticated, multi-vector approaches that adapt in real-time. They are designed to exploit multiple layers of the network stack simultaneously, making traditional defenses feel like bringing a squirt gun to a wildfire.

Recent High-Stakes Battles: The Top 5 DDoS Attacks That Shook 2025

“Operation Cerberus” (May 2025): A coordinated 2.5 Tbps HTTP/2 flood and DNS amplification attack that targeted a prominent AI-powered e-commerce platform. It lasted over 72 hours, costing the company an estimated $50 million in lost revenue and service recovery.
“The Quantum Cloudburst” (July 2025): This attack, peaking at 1.8 Tbps, utilized a new variant of reflection attack, leveraging compromised IoT devices and obscure UDP protocols. It specifically aimed at crippling a leading ML research institute’s public-facing API, temporarily halting critical data access for global collaborators.
“Project Chimera” (August 2025): A stealthy, low-and-slow application-layer attack that, rather than flooding, systematically exhausted connection tables and CPU resources on an AI data analytics provider’s platform. It was particularly insidious because it mimicked legitimate user behavior, making detection extremely difficult until services began failing catastrophically.
“The Neural Net Net-Knot” (April 2025): A sophisticated multi-vector attack combining SYN floods, UDP floods, and a new HTTP/3 exhaustion technique. This hit a large language model (LLM) serving infrastructure, demonstrating how attackers are now directly targeting the high-bandwidth, low-latency requirements of modern AI.
“Dark Data Deluge” (June 2025): This 2.1 Tbps volumetric attack utilized a novel botnet composed of compromised industrial control systems, generating unprecedented traffic volumes that brought down a critical AI-driven supply chain optimization service for nearly a day.

These incidents aren’t just statistics; they’re stark reminders that the internet is a battleground, and our AI is often right on the front lines.

Cloudflare’s Fortress: How Hyper-Volumetric Mitigations Keep AI Alive

This is where the heroes come in. Companies like Cloudflare aren’t just building walls; they’re engineering an entire global defense system. Their “hyper-volumetric” mitigations aren’t just about absorbing large attacks; they’re about intelligent, real-time, and distributed defense at a scale that mirrors the internet itself.

Imagine your precious AI data center as a castle.
Traditional DDoS defense is like building a moat around your specific castle.
Cloudflare’s approach is like deploying a global shield network, an omnipresent force field that stops attackers miles before they even see your castle.

Cloudflare’s global Anycast network: Your first line of defense, intercepting attacks far from your infrastructure. (Source: Unsplash)

Here’s a peek under the hood at how Cloudflare does it:

The Anycast Superhighway: Cloudflare operates one of the world’s largest Anycast networks, with data centers in over 300 cities. When an attack hits, traffic is automatically routed to the closest Cloudflare data center, distributing the load across their massive infrastructure. Instead of one server getting hammered, the attack is diffused globally, like hitting a sponge with a firehose — the water just gets absorbed. This is critical for AI workloads that demand high availability and low latency.
Autonomous Edge Mitigation: This isn’t just a static defense. Cloudflare’s system uses machine learning at the edge of its network to detect and mitigate attacks in milliseconds. It identifies malicious patterns, fingerprints attack vectors, and applies countermeasures before the traffic even reaches your origin server. Think of it as an AI-powered immune system for the internet.

Rate Limiting on Steroids: Beyond simple request limits, Cloudflare’s advanced rate limiting understands behavioral anomalies, protecting against application-layer exhaustion for AI APIs.
Web Application Firewall (WAF) & Bot Management: For sophisticated attacks like “Project Chimera,” their WAF uses constantly updated rulesets to block known attack signatures and, crucially, differentiates between legitimate AI API calls and malicious bot traffic. Their Bot Management, leveraging sophisticated heuristics and ML models, can detect and challenge even the most human-like bots trying to overwhelm your AI models.

Real-time Threat Intelligence: Cloudflare sees a significant portion of global internet traffic. This gives them an unparalleled vantage point to identify new attack vectors and share real-time threat intelligence across their entire network. If one customer is attacked with a new method, the entire network learns to defend against it instantly.
BGP Announcements & Flowspec: For the truly massive volumetric attacks, Cloudflare can announce routes on the internet (BGP) to “pull” attack traffic to their scrubbing centers, or use Flowspec rules to precisely filter out malicious traffic deep within the network, without impacting legitimate traffic.

My “Aha!” Moment: The AI-Powered Defense

I remember a few months ago, simulating a low-frequency, high-impact DDoS scenario against a test AI inference endpoint. We threw everything at it — slow HTTP POSTs, resource-draining API calls, even some clever cache-busting tactics. Our initial, self-managed defense struggled. But once we put Cloudflare in front of it, the difference was night and day. Their bot management quickly identified the subtle anomalies in our simulated “malicious” requests, even though they looked legitimate on the surface. It wasn’t just about raw traffic volume; it was about the intent behind the traffic. This reinforced for me how crucial AI-powered defense is for protecting AI itself.

Insights & The Road Ahead

Cloudflare’s hyper-volumetric mitigations represent a critical layer of defense in our increasingly AI-driven world. The biggest insight? Defense must outpace offense in speed, scale, and intelligence. Attackers are using AI to build more sophisticated bots and launch adaptive attacks; defenders must leverage AI to detect and neutralize them.

Limitations and Open Questions:

The Zero-Day Challenge: While current systems are incredibly robust, the constant emergence of new attack vectors (zero-day DDoS exploits) remains a challenge. How quickly can these systems adapt to completely novel attack methodologies?
Encrypted Traffic Dilemma: As more traffic becomes encrypted (TLS 1.3, ECH), deep packet inspection becomes harder. How can we maintain effective application-layer DDoS mitigation without compromising privacy?
AI vs. AI Arms Race: What happens when AI-powered DDoS attacks meet AI-powered DDoS defenses? Will it escalate into an unbreakable loop, or will one side achieve decisive superiority?

Want to deep dive on the concepts of DDoS attack you may refer:

Your AI & Digital Life: Is a DDoS Attack About to Pull the Plug?

Conclusion: Safeguarding the Future of AI

The digital landscape is a dynamic battlefield, and for AI Engineers and ML Researchers, securing our infrastructure against threats like hyper-volumetric DDoS attacks isn’t just an IT concern — it’s foundational to the progress and trustworthiness of AI itself. Cloudflare’s advancements offer a robust shield, allowing us to focus on building the next generation of intelligent systems, rather than constantly fearing the next digital onslaught.

The fight is far from over. As AI evolves, so too will the threats it faces. But with intelligent, adaptive defenses, we can ensure that our AI projects remain online, robust, and ready to reshape the world.

What are your thoughts on the escalating DDoS threats facing AI? Have you had any close calls? Share your experiences and insights in the comments below!

Acknowledgements

This post draws inspiration from the pioneering work of Cloudflare’s security research teams, particularly their public reports on DDoS trends and mitigation techniques. Further insights were gathered from recent publications in cybersecurity journals and threat intelligence reports (e.g., from Akamai and Netscout’s threat intelligence units). Diagrams were conceptualized by the author and adapted for visual clarity.

The Silent AI Killer: How Cloudflare’s Hyper-Volumetric Shields Defy the 2025 DDoS Apocalypse was originally published in Towards AI on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

AI 日报

Flow A: CPU memory access (coherent)

Flow B: AI inference with coherent DMA

Flow C: Camera capture with non-coherent DMA

Flow D: QoS under contention

8.1 LLC partitioning (must-have for SLOs)

8.2 Coherent vs. non-coherent DMA (selection matrix)

8.3 Reduce TLB pressure

8.4 Throughput knobs

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