Techreport

The first expansion for Cities: Skylines has been announced, and you can now bask in your city's soothing night-time glow with After Dark. Check out the teaser trailer, revealed a couple weeks ago at Gamescom:...Read more...

When Google announced its OnHub Wi-Fi router, many folks wondered just how much data the company would collect from its On services. Google has published details about what data the OnHub and Google On app collect and how that data is used. In a move that might put some minds at ease, the company says "the Google On app and your OnHub do not track the websites you visit or collect the content of any traffic on your network."Based on Google's details, most of the data the OnHub collects is related to the devices on or near the wireless network. The OnHub and On app need to know the broadcast information (i.e. name) of each device, or the MAC addresses of devices without a name, to display a list ...Read more...

Silent Circle is releasing a new version of its Blackphone, creatively named Blackphone 2. The device runs a security-oriented version of Android called Silent OS, which packed with features intended to make businesses' data more secure. ...Read more...

Gartner has released its analysis of the worldwide smartphone market for the last quarter. The report, uh, reports the market's lowest quarterly growth rate since 2013, as well as Android's all-time lowest year-on-year growth.First, let's talk about smartphone sales in general. According to Gartner, vendors sold 330 million phones worldwide, which represented a 13.5% year-on-year increase. However, last quarter also saw the slowest growth in sales since 2013. The Eastern European, Middle East, Africa, and Asia and Pacific markets saw ...Read more...

Live-streaming and video sharing are huge parts of the social, connected gaming world we live in today. Nvidia wants to make playing with friends and sharing your mad skills with the world easier with a new GeForce Experience feature called Share, which is entering "early-access beta" next month....Read more...

Asus has announced the MG278Q, a 27" FreeSync monitor boasting a 1-ms gray-to-gray response time. The MG278Q joins the MG279Q, another 27" FreeSync monitor that Nathan reviewed earlier this month, in Asus' gaming monitor lineup. ...Read more...

For most of this summer, much of the excitement in the GPU market has been focused on pricey, high-end products like the Radeon Fury and the GeForce GTX 980 Ti. Today, Nvidia is turning the spotlight back on more affordable graphics cards with the introduction of the GeForce GTX 950, a $159.99 offering that promises to handle the latest games reasonably well at the everyman's resolution of 1080p.Like its elder sibling the GeForce GTX 960 , the GTX 950 is based on the GM206 graphics processor. In this case, though, the GM206 has been hobbled ...Read more...

Eight is Enough

Satellite Reign, the spiritual successor to 1993's Syndicate (not the horrid 2012 "reimagining") now has a launch trailer, which you can watch below:...Read more...

Planetary Annihilation goes for real-time strategy on a grand scale: interplanetary combat with huge armies and world-destroying super weapons are its MO. One thing it was missing was giant robots—until today. Uber Entertainment's big RTS gets bigger with its first expansion, Planetary Annihilation: Titans, complete with giant freakin' robots....Read more...

IDF — In a Q&A session this afternoon, I asked Intel Fellow and Chief Graphics Software Architect David Blythe about Intel's position on supporting the VESA Adaptive-Sync standard for variable refresh displays. (This is the standard perhaps better known as AMD's FreeSync.)Blythe indicated that Intel is positively inclined toward standards-based solutions like Adaptive-Sync, and he said Intel is investigating the possibility of supporting this optional extension to ...Read more...

IDF — In a Q&A session this afternoon, I asked Intel Fellow and Chief Graphics Software Architect David Blythe about Intel's position on supporting the VESA Adaptive-Sync standard for variable refresh displays. (This is the standard perhaps better known as AMD's FreeSync.)Blythe indicated that Intel is positively inclined toward standards-based solutions like Adaptive-Sync, and he said Intel does indeed plan to support this optional extension to the DisplayPort ...Read more...

Jon Peddie Research has published its latest Market Watch statistics for Q2 2015, and they reveal some interesting tidbits. Total GPU shipments dropped 11% compared to Q1, and 18% year-on-year. Notebook GPU unit shipments fell 16.9% versus this time last year, while desktop GPUs saw a sharper fall-off of 21.7%.AMD took the worst hit: its unit shipments are down 25.8% since last quarter. Its quarterly sales of desktop APUs actually ...Read more...

Jon Peddie Research has published its latest Market Watch statistics for Q2 2015, and they reveal some interesting tidbits. Total GPU shipments dropped 11% compared to Q1, and 18% year-on-year. Notebook GPU unit shipments fell 16.9% versus this time last year, while desktop GPUs saw a sharper fall-off of 21.7%.AMD took the worst hit: its unit shipments are down 25.8% since last quarter. Its quarterly sales of desktop APUs actually rose ...Read more...

Hey, folks. I'm out at IDF this week, still soaking up as much as I can about Skylake and other interesting tech. I've been prodding Intel architects and employees for details to add to the info from the public slides, and I should have a nice article on the architecture eventually. Getting into the sort of detail I'd like will require some time to think and write, though.While I'm disappointing you, I should mention that I'll be on an airplane headed home during our usual podcast recording time on Thursday evening. As a result, I've decided ...Read more...

Back in 2011, Gearbox released Duke Nukem Forever, the infamously delayed game it acquired from series creator 3D Realms. The game wasn't really all that great, as its Metacritic score of 54 shows, but Gearbox was the new home for Duke—or so it seemed. In early 2014, the release of a teaser for Duke Nukem Mass Destruction prompted Gearbox to sue both 3D Realms and Mass Destruction developer Interceptor over the use of what Gearbox alleged to be its IP.Today, the three developers put that saga behind them. In a joint statement published by Gearbox, 3D Realms, and Interceptor, the studios say Gearbox will retain the Duke Nukem IP. The three have resolved their dispute amicably, but the terms of the deal are not being disclosed. 3D Realms CEO ...Read more...

Who needs strippers bursting out of cakes? What you need is a man in a box holding a laptop. Check out the Alienware 18 laptop announcement video, but consider yourself warned: what has been seen cannot be unseen....Read more...

Windows 10 may be on the market now, but that doesn't mean Microsoft is halting development of its latest OS. A new Windows 10 preview build, 10525, is available through the Windows Insider program to members in the fast update ring. The new build adds more color customization options, as well as an intriguing memory management improvement.First, those colors. In Windows 10 build 10240, the version released to the general public, customizing the OS' accent color will change the color of the taskbar, ...Read more...

Look who's back. The Vaio brand will be available in the US again, in a partnership with transcosmos. Its wares will be sold on transcosmos' EC web shop and Microsoft's online store, as well as "select Microsoft stores across the U.S." The first available model will be the high-powered Vaio Z Canvas convertible, targeted at graphic designers and content creators. ...Read more...

IDF—During the opening keynote at the Intel Developer Forum yesterday, Intel CEO Brian Krzanich demoed the company's RealSense camera technology (PDF) and talked about where it's going beyond the applications we've already seen. Intel wants to see RealSense used in games, 3D scanners, and robotics, as well.Krzanich showed off an Android phone equipped with RealSense cameras based on Project Tango , built in partnership with Google. Rather than just using the cameras to add depth to photos, Intel's RealSense ...Read more...

Microsoft has released an emergency patch for all versions of Internet Explorer, due to a critical vulnerability that's reportedly under active exploit. The CVE-2015-2502 vulnerability is described as a "Memory Corruption Vulnerability," and can allow for remote code execution under the active user's credentials, leading to potential exfiltration of user data. If the user has administrator permissions, an attacker can gain complete control over the system.According to the company, all a user has to do is visit a specially-crafted website for the exploit to be triggered. All Internet Explorer versions from 7 to 11 are affected, and the vulnerability is rated ...Read more...

We all need some pocketable flash storage in our lives, even if it's just to install Windows on a PC without an optical drive. Samsung has us covered with three USB 3.0 drives in a variety of shapes and sizes. ...Read more...

Any photographer who's ever overexposed a digital image is familiar with the results of that mistake: portions of the image are pure white, and even post-processing raw files can't bring back detail in those areas. That's because digital image sensors have only so many bits per pixel for recording intensity levels, and once the available bits are exhausted, or saturated, that pixel clips to white.Researchers at MIT may have found a way around this problem, though . Their invention, called a "modulo camera," doesn't stop recording information once a pixel saturates its available bits. Instead, the modulo camera's pixels reset each time they're saturated during an exposure, and a count ...Read more...

IDF - Intel is presenting the details of the Skylake microarchitecture at IDF today. There's no live stream of the presentation, but a PDF of the slide deck illustrating the new chip's innards has leaked been made available. The company has also released another, more detailed slide deck with information about the chip's power management features and efficiency, among other things. Go get copies while you can: we can't guarantee how long these will be publicly accessible.Scott is at IDF, and he's tweeting the highlights . Some of the juicy details so far: Skylake chips can power off their AVX2 hardware when it's not in use. The new chip's ring fabric has two times the bandwidth of Broadwell chips at the same level of power consumption. ...Read more...

IDF - Intel is presenting the details of the Skylake microarchitecture at IDF today. The company isn't livestreaming the presentation, but a PDF of the slide deck illustrating the new chip's innards has leaked. Go get a copy before the powers-that-be remove it: we can't guarantee how long it'll be up.Scott is at the presentation, and he's tweeting the highlights . Some of the juicy details so far: Skylake chips can power off their AVX2 hardware when it's not in use. The new chip's ring fabric has two times the bandwidth of Broadwell chips at the same level of power consumption. ...Read more...

IDF — During the opening keynote of the Intel Developer Forum today, Intel announced that it will be shipping SSDs based on its very promising 3D Xpoint memory, co-developed with Micron, which is a replacement for NAND flash. Intel has claimed that 3D Xpoint has 1000x the speed and endurance of existing flash storage.One question about 3D Xpoint has been when it would reach consumers in products—and in what form. Intel answered that question today when CEO Brian Krzanich announced a new brand ...Read more...

Lian Li has teamed up with Asus to make the all-aluminum "Republic of Gamers-certified" PC-Q17 WX Mini-ITX case. The PC-Q17WX has an intriguing liquid-cooler mounting approach, which we'll look at in a sec. For now, admire the angular aluminum and tempered-glass exterior: ...Read more...

Google is releasing a new Wi-Fi router called the OnHub. Although it looks deceptively like an Amazon Echo, it's actually a spiffy networking device that Google is billing as an easier-to-use and more powerful alternative to regular home routers. ...Read more...

Mainframes may seem like dinosaurs at first glance these days, but IBM's big iron is still evolving. The company introduced its first exclusively Linux-based mainframes yesterday under the LinuxOne umbrella. LinuxOne systems are meant to allow businesses to host their Linux infrastructure on IBM's high-performance, high-availability mainframe hardware....Read more...

Step aside, Pillars of Eternity—there's a new RPG with pausable real-time combat coming to town, called Masquerada: Songs and Shadows. Check out the reveal trailer here and the gameplay trailer below:...Read more...

Western Digital's high-performance Black and NAS-oriented Red Pro drive families welcome some new members today. Both Black and Red Pro drives are now available in 5TB and 6TB capacities, and they're all equipped with 128MB of DRAM cache and 7,200-RPM spindle speeds.WD says the 6TB Black offers 29% faster maximum throughput than the previous 4TB version. Also, if you're wondering how the Red Pro drives compare to regular Reds , here's the skinny: they spin faster, at 7,200 ...Read more...

Windows 10 doesn't support SecuROM and SafeDisc DRM software, used in a number of older games from the 2000s. Both DRM methods hook into the operating system at a low level, and Microsoft has opted to remove support for them due to security concerns. Affected games include but are not limited to Grand Theft Auto 3, Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004, The Sims, BioShock, Mass Effect, and Spore.The issue was spotted by a user on Microsoft's forums, who found himself unable to play some older games . Both pieces of DRM are no longer maintained, meaning that any vulnerabilities could be ...Read more...

Torchlight developer Runic Games has announced its next project, Hob. Presented entirely without dialogue, Hob drops players off in a "beautiful and dangerous unknown world." The game's announcement trailer shows a glimpse of that world springing to life....Read more...

It's been almost two weeks since Intel's Skylake enthusiast CPUs hit the market. We know how they perform, and we have a good idea of what the accompanying Z170 chipset and motherboards have to offer. We're sure we're not the only ones wondering whether the combo of a new CPU and chipset are tempting enough for those with older systems to consider an upgrade, so it's time for a new poll. Tell us what you think using the choices below, or elaborate in the comments.Read more...

Scott and I traveled to Holland, Michigan this past weekend for TR BBQ XII. While Scott is a veteran of the event, this BBQ was my first—though it certainly won't be my last. Scott is at the Intel Developer Forum this week and tapped me to write the post-BBQ report. Challenge accepted. ...Read more...

Android M is no more. Instead, we now have a fluffy, sweet, almost ethereal Marshmallow. That's the name Google has given to version 6.0 of the operating system, continuing its long-running, sugary naming tradition—although Android has been tasting a little sour lately, like licorice and raisins.That slight bitterness aside, the official christening also marks the release of the Android 6.0 SDK, which can be downloaded via Android Studio 's SDK Manager. Developers can also download updated ...Read more...

Software pirates the world over are up in arms (or perhaps rattling their sabers?) this morning about a Wired article that claims Microsoft has included some sort of scan-and-disable feature that will nuke counterfeit games on your PC. We did some digging to see whether Wired's claim is true, and we found that the details are somewhat more nuanced than that.The controversy seems to stem from the Microsoft Services Agreement's section 7, paragraph B. This is a separate agreement from Windows 10's EULA —the Microsoft Services Agreement applies ...Read more...

The TR BBQ is past us, and it's that time of year. Let's have a TR meetup in the Kansas City area this coming Friday night. I'll be at Stuey McBrew's Tavern and Tables in Lee's Summit at 7PM this coming Friday, August ...Read more...

Fool's Theory, a gang of games industry veterans who have worked on two of The Witcher games, are now building a new project called Seven. No, Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman aren't in it. Seven is billed as an isometric RPG inspired by the Thief series, and it's set in a "beyond post-apocalyptic" environment featuring a mix of ancient and highly advanced technology. ...Read more...

Eight is Enough

Netcraft's latest headcount for websites and their servers reveals an interesting statistic: about 175 million websites, or roughly 20% of those surveyed, are still running on the unsupported Windows Server 2003. Microsoft ended extended support for the venerable operating system last month, meaning that it will recieve no further security updates.A portion of those websites aren't being run atop IIS 6.0 (Server 2003's default web server software), but that may be of little help—any new security vulnerabilities in the ...Read more...

The patch for Android's Stagefright vulnerability won't actually protect your phone, some security researchers say. According to Jordan Gruskovnjak and Aaron Portnoy of Exodus Intelligence, a malformed MP4 file can still create a buffer overflow, a vulnerability that could then be used to compromise 950 million Android phones.The Exodus blog post walks through the vulnerability. A function in libStagefright reads two values from an MP4 file's header, chunk_size and chunk_type, as 32-bit integers. If the header returns a value of 0x01 for chunk_size, then a 64-bit value is read from the MP4 instead. According to ...Read more...

We recorded our latest podcast this past Wednesday, and the video version of the result is now available on YouTube. We chatted about our Nvidia Shield review, explored Logitech's MX Master and MX Anywhere 2 mice, took measure of how much RAM is enough for today's graphics cards, and answered reader questions....Read more...

We had a pretty sweet fireworks display last night at the TR BBQ. Shoes really outdid himself this year. Those things were loud, too, from our vantage point. I can't hear very well now, but I'm happy.I was able to capture a little bit of the action in slow-motion at 240 ...Read more...

Dr. Fish has set up a multi-view live stream of the TR BBQ activies. You can join us here:...Read more...

It's been over a week since Scott's epic Core i7-6700K review, so it's time to see if we can buy any of Intel's Skylake processors in the US and Canada. As is our custom, we've checked some of the biggest e-tailers around for stock of the Core i5-6600K and Core i7-6700K.First, the good news: the Core i5-6600K is available in both the US and Canada. You can pick up the four-core, four-thread Skylake ...Read more...

Apple has released OS X version 10.10.5, and with it comes a bevy of fixes. Although the company states that this update "improves the stability, compatibility, and security of your Mac," the star of the show here may be a fix for the DYLD_PRINT_TO_FILE privilege escalation vulnerability. That bug was discovered by Stefan Esser, and it's apparently under attack in the wild. Esser had previously published an OS X kernel extension called SUIDGuard that users could install to mitigate the problem.The story would end there, but there's one more thing. Esser has since tweeted that Apple "fixed some bugs and made another security problem worse" in 10.10.5. ...Read more...

If our recent barrage of BBQ-related posts and prizes slipped your attention for some reason, here's one last call. TR BBQ XII kicks off tomorrow morning in Holland, Michigan at 11 AM. If you're able to make it, come hang out with us! Go RSVP in the forum thread for the event, and drfish will send you details of where to go and where to park. We expect a day full of fun, friends, food—and, of course, fireworks. ...Read more...

Reuters has a scoop from two anonymous ex-Kaspersky Lab employees who claim to have worked on a secret project to sabotage the company's competitors. According to the ex-employees, their job was to reverse-engineer anti-virus software from competing companies to see how those programs could be tricked into identifying a clean file as infected. Targets of the reverse-engineering allegedly included AVG, Avast, and even Microsoft.According to the report, Kaspersky carried out its sabotage by modifying versions of what Reuters describes as "an important piece of software commonly found in PCs" to appear malicious to the reverse-engineered software. The company then submitted the modified ...Read more...

Reuters has a scoop from two anonymous ex-Kaspersky Lab employees who claim to have worked on a secret project to sabotage the company's competitors. According to the ex-employees, their job was to reverse-engineer anti-virus software from competing companies to see how those programs could be tricked into identifying a clean file as infected. Targets of the reverse-engineering allegedly included AVG, Avast, and even Microsoft.According to the report, Kaspersky carried out its sabotage by modifying versions of what Reuters describes as "an important piece of software commonly found in PCs" to appear malicious to the reverse-engineered software. The company then submitted the modified ...Read more...