Technology

If you regularly use an Alexa device, you’ve probably been upsold by Amazon’s assistant at some point. Ask Alexa to carry out some basic task like setting a timer, and it will finish its response with a cheery “By the way, did you know I could [insert feature you’ve never heard of here].” As highlighted in a recent report from Bloomberg, this is because Amazon knows that users aren’t really getting stuck into the full range of Alexa’s capabilities. Bloomberg’s report is based on internal Amazon docs, and features some interesting statistics about Alexa usage. Here are the ones we found most eye-catching: In 2020, Amazon determined that 25 percent of US households have at least one Alexa device, with this rising to 27 percent for Amazon Prime customers. Christmas is when a lot of customers ...

Joseph Gordon-Levitt is pumped. In fact, he’s super pumped, taking on the role of former Uber CEO Travis Kalanick in a limited series from Showtime that debuts February 27th, 2022 and will chart the chaotic rise of the transportation startup. The show is titled Super Pumped after the best-selling non-fiction book of the same name from New York Times journalist Mike Isaac. It’s been developed by Brian Koppelman and David Levien, co-creators of Billions, a series which revels in the pugnacious behavior of the super-rich. There’ll be lots of familiar material for Koppelman and Levien in Kalanick’s story, then, with the former CEO described aptly in the trailer as “the notorious bad boy of tech” (those words spoken by Uma Thurman, who’s playing Arianna Huffington, co-founder of The Huffington ...

Samsung has just unveiled its latest PCIe 5.0 SSD drive that boasts double the bandwidth of its PCIe 4.0 predecessor. Dubbed the PM1743, the new SSD can push up to 13,000 MB/s in read speeds and 2,500K input/output operations per second, with 32 gigatransfers per second, all of these numbers doubling that of the currently available models. In order to maximize its potential, Samsung had to partner up with Intel to test a new proprietary controller it had developed. On top of exception speeds, the PM1743 will also operate with increased power efficiencies of up to 30%, which Samsung says is “expected to lower server data center operating costs significantly, while also helping to reduce their carbon footprint.” For now, the new PCIe 5.0 SSDs will most likely be adopted by server farms that ...

Samsung and Adata are both teasing PCIe 5.0 SSDs ahead of January’s big CES event. With read/write speeds up to 14/12 GBps, this new generation of solid state storage is essentially twice as fast as the fastest PCIe 4.0 drives. Adata teased two prototypes of its first PCIe 5.0 NVMe M.2 SSDs with capacities up to 8TB. The so-called Project Nighthawk SSD is designed using a Silicon Motion SM2508 controller capable of sequential read/write speeds up to 14/12GBps, while the Project Blackbird SSD features an InnoGrit IG5666 controller for 14/10GBps read/write speeds. Adata will hopefully provide more details at CES which begins January 5th, unless COVID derails it again. Samsung’s targeting enterprise servers with the PCIe 5.0 PM1743 SSD.Image: Samsung Samsung, meanwhile, just announced the PM1...

Samsung and Adata are both teasing PCIe 5.0 SSDs ahead of January’s big CES event. With read/write speeds up to 14/12 GBps, this new generation of solid state storage is essentially twice as fast as the fastest PCIe 4.0 drives. Adata teased two prototypes of its first PCIe 5.0 NVMe M.2 SSDs with capacities up to 8TB. The so-called Project Nighthawk SSD is designed using a Silicon Motion SM2508 controller capable of sequential read/write speeds up to 14/12GBps, while the Project Blackbird SSD features an InnoGrit IG5666 controller for 14/10GBps read/write speeds. Adata will hopefully provide more details at CES which begins January 5th, unless COVID derails it again. Samsung’s targeting enterprise servers with the PCIe 5.0 PM1743 SSD.Image: Samsung Samsung, meanwhile, just announced the PM1...

New rumors are now suggesting that Apple will be launching the third generation of its iPhone SE model in early 2022. According to a new report from MacRumors, the Californian tech giant is now in the trial production phase of the iPhone SE 3, with its supply chain gearing up in preparation for mass production by early next year. The entry-level smartphone is expected to release within the first quarter of 2022 and retains much of its predecessor’s design, keeping a physical home button along with the same 4.7-inch display size. Unlike previous models, however, it’ll carry the faster A15 chip as well as an improved camera. The news also comes on top of other rumors suggesting that Apple could be abandoning the 5.4-inch model from its regular iPhone lineup, so those looking for somethi...

Looking to change up the way you work on your personal computer, LG has now created a new monitor carrying a rather unusual aspect ratio. Dubbed the DualUp Monitor, the new display is sized to offer users a 16:18 ratio, almost bringing us back to the good old days of square monitors. Technically a vertical display, the model provides a resolution of 2,560 x 2,880 that LG calls “Square Double QHD,” allowing you to access a split view feature that basically resembles two 21.5-inch monitors stacked on top of one another, making multitasking much easier despite not needing a second display. On top of increasing productivity, LG also claims that the DualUp will reduce the need of side-to-side head movements, leading to less neck pain for those long office hours. It can also save desk space, esp...

Over the last couple of weeks, several Apple Stores around the US have closed due to rising COVID-19 infections among staff members, and a report by Bloomberg lists seven locations in the US and Canada that have shut down operations within the last day or so. The Apple Stores listed include Dadeland and The Gardens Mall in Florida, Lenox Square in Atlanta, GA, Highland Village in Houston, TX, Summit Mall in Ohio, Pheasant Lane in New Hampshire, and Sainte-Catherine in Montreal, Canada. According to the report, shutdowns are usually called when 10 percent of the store’s staff has tested positive. These spikes are occurring as the CDC reports omicron has become the dominant strain of the virus spreading throughout the US. Apple’s response to the changing conditions has included reinstating i...

Steve Aoki is headlining a metaverse Christmas party hosted by Monkey Kingdom, a fast-growing NFT project. The virtual party is open to the public and will take place on a digital stage built by Cryptovoxels. The event also celebrates the growth of Monkey Kingdom, which was launched in November and sold out within two minutes. The project is based on the Chinese mythology of Sun Wukong, also known as the Monkey King, the protagonist of the 16th-century novel “Journey to the West.” The initial release, hosted on the Solana blockchain, included 2,222 randomly-generated Wukong-inspired apes with different attributes and rarity traits. “I’ve been collecting NFTs for some time now, and as an owner of several Monkey Kingdom NFTs, I was thrilled to witness an NFT project originating from Asi...

The WarnerMedia-owned platform HBO Max packs a lot in its two-minute 2022 preview reel, introducing a number of lower-profile Warner Bros. films making their debut on HBO Max in 2022, marking a shift back towards theatrical releases for mainstream movies. It also offers brief glimpses of all of the other originals coming to the platform next year, including season four of Westworld and the new Game of Thrones spinoff House of the Dragon. Warner Bros. said it would return to theatrical releases in 2022, and it looks like it’s following through on its promise Throughout 2021, Warner Bros. experimented with releasing its big-budget films both in theaters and on HBO Max for a month after its release. Wonder Woman 1984, Godzilla vs. Kong, Dune, and The Matrix were just some of the noteworthy fi...