It looks like Rockstar’s highly anticipated Grand Theft Auto V on PC will be a whopping seven discs, according to recent reports.

The news was originally found on a Reddit post that depicts what appears to be an early shipped physical copy of the game across seven DVD discs. For comparison’s sake the Xbox 360 flavor of the game weighs in at just two DVD discs, whereas the PS4 and Xbox One variants are a single Blu-ray disc.

But why go with DVD instead of Blu-Ray, when the latter can hold so much more space?

It looks like Rockstar went with the more accessible option. Not everyone has Blu-ray drives and the studio wanted to make GTA V as compatible as possible, even if if the game has high recommended specs.

Digital downloads of GTA V require at least 65 GB of free space, and doing a little bit of match, the physical version seems to be around ~63 GB (7 discs multiplied by the max 9GB capacity of dual-layer DVD’s).

Since GTA V on PC is markedly different than its console predecessors, it’s easy to see why the game needs so much space.

Harnessing the extensive power of the PC platform affords amenities like consistent 60fps frame-rates for fluid gameplay, not to mention dazzling 4K-ready resolution.

Adaptive Sync is yet another PC-only utility that improves performance. Using Nvidia’s G-Sync and AMD’s FreeSync PC gamers can ensure optimum graphical fidelity and refresh rates between monitors and GPUs.

It looks like GTA V might require a 58mb day one update, which is paltry compared to the mandatory 8-16GB day one updates required by some console games.

GTA V on PC also requires a 58mb day-one update, says Twitter user Funmw4, who actually was able to snag the update while pre-loading his copy.

Apart from the update, Funmw4 also confirmed that a Rockstar Club account is 100% required to play the game, which is a bit curious. In the console flavors signing up wasn’t mandatory, but offered extra features like sharing in-game pictures across social media streams and forums.

Digital pre-loading for GTA V has since gone live, allowing gamers to secure their copies before Rockstar officially launches it next Tuesday.

t’s also worth noting that the day-one update might be a an anti-piracy measure of some sort, perhaps even a safeguard against cracked versions.

It’ll be interesting to see if the game is in fact seven DVD discs or not, but judging how long the downloads are taking so far, this might be the best option.

The post Report: GTA V On PC Will Span Seven Discs appeared first on VR World.

In another run of the rumormill, Apple (NASDAQ: APPL) is slated to release three new Apple iPhone models later in the year according to a report.

With a much discussed refresh of the  sixth generation of its popular phone, Apple is going to add another sized mobile device to its lineup. Apple will probably show the iPhone 6s, iPhone 6s Plus and a 4-inch device currently being referred to as iPhone 6s Mini or 6c later in the year, adding the much desired smaller model to its product range.

This has been revealed in a report by DigiTimes, scheduling the releases for latter parts of the year as per their sources. All three models will receive Gorilla Glass, an aspect much desired by Apple owners worldwide due to its resilience to scratches, breaks and other physical damage. Furthermore, the devices will see hardware updates, where the 6S series will use A9 chips and the 6C A8 chips. All of the devices will come equipped with NFC and fingerprint scanning technologies.

According to that report, the companies involved in the production for the phones are Wistron who will build the iPhone 6C while the 6S series will be assembled by Foxconn Electronics (Hon Hai Precision Industry) (TPE:2317) and Pegatron (TPE: 4938)

The pricing has not been revealed, nor have the potential colors. Maybe Apple answers requests from would-be owners, where they could possibly return an all-white exterior Apple iPhone to the lineup too.

The post Report: Apple to Release Three New iPhones in 2015 appeared first on VR World.

The most interesting news from last week’s Mobile World Congress was not a new smartwatch, or flagship handset, but rather a rumor that MediaTek (TPE: 2454) and AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) were on the verge of a licensing deal that would put Radeon GPUs into MediaTek’s SoCs.

While this deal is far from confirmed, on paper it’s a logical partnership that would allow both parties to score wins in respective spaces they have struggled in.

For MediaTek, the Radeon GPU technology would allow it to lessen its dependence on ARM’s (LON: ARM) Mali GPU and Imagination Technologies’ (LON: IMG) PowerVR GPU. MediaTek uses both for its GPU lineup: Mali on the low-end and PowerVR on the high-end. This would allow MediaTek to differentiate itself from other users of Mali, and would also free it from licensing GPU technology from Imagination — a company that it may be soon competing with in the SoC space if it starts bringing in some mobile hardware wins from MIPS.

And for AMD this is a chance to finally break into the mobile space. For a number of reasons, especially Intel’s (NASDAQ: INTC) aggressive subsidies of its chips in the mobile space, AMD could not compete in mobile. Eventually, last November, it said that it had “given up” on tablets having long backed out of the smartphone race.

What about Skybridge?

The going assumption — and it might prove to be correct — is that MediaTek would be the majority partner in this deal as it has the proven experience in the mobile space. However, considering AMD’s ambitious Skybridge plan — pairing ARM and AMD on the same die — it might be that this is a deal of equals.

Originally Skybridge was supposed to be about x86 and ARM on the same die, but this could be the evolution of the project. The big takeaway from the project would be successful interfacing of ARM and GCN, and the use of low-power Carrizo GPUs.

Remember that there is already significant cooperation between AMD and MediaTek on the Heterogeneous Software Alliance, so familiarity between teams exists.

AMD is scheduled to report its earnings in mid-April, while MediaTek has April 28 booked to report. If this deal has legs, an announcement would likely come around that time.

The post A MediaTek Deal Would be AMD’s Ticket to Mobile appeared first on VR World.

Microsoft’s (NASDAQ: MSFT) upcoming DirectX 12 has a ton of exciting features and optimizations that we already know about. However the most interesting new feature comes via a report from Tom’s Hardware: the ability to pool resources from multiple GPUs from different manufacturers.

The ability to work with two different GPU architectures in the same system comes from DirectX 12’s support of something called Explicit Asynchronous Multi-GPU capabilities and Split Frame Rendering (SFR). Effectively this pools all GPU resources into a bucket and allows them to be utilized as one.

SFR allows developers to manually divide data between the two GPUs to allow them to work together on each frame with the work for each frame divided between the two cards. The older method, called Alternate Frame Rendering (AFR). AFR is considered to be less efficient because it required both GPUs to have all of the data already in their frame buffers. Each GPU would render an alternate frame. The downside of this, however, is that the cards would work in parallel and not independently. If you had two cards with 4GB of memory each, you’d only have 4GB of useable space in the frame buffer in total.

The kicker is that Tom’s source said that SFR will be supported across multiple GPU architectures in the same system. It will treat both GPUs as one. Reportedly this would allow a system with an AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) APU and an Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) GPU to have the two GPUs work together. The same would go for a discrete AMD and Nvidia GPU in the same system.

In the end this will be up to developers to make use of and optimize their code accordingly. AMD’s Mantle already supports a form of SFR, so in a way the precedent is already there.

More details on DirectX 12 — and a confirmation of this report — will likely be available during March’s Game Developer Conference in San Francisco.

The post Your Next Gaming PC Might Have a Radeon and Nvidia GPU appeared first on VR World.

It appears that both the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One might be getting new models that support 4K video streaming, Forbes reports.

As more and more consumers make the push towards 4K-ready Ultra High Definition (UHD) TV’s, the lack of UHD support on PS4 and Xbox One becomes much more obvious.

Juggernaut streaming service Netflix (NASDAQ: NFLX) anticipates that Sony (NYSE: SNE) and Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) will include 4K video playback in the next wave of PS4’s and Xbox Ones.

Netflix is one of the leading 4K content providers out there, but there’s not very much to choose from–a trend that will reverse as the platform is embraced by consumers.

At this year’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES 2015) Netflix’s Chief Product Officer Neil Hunt told Huffington Post that Sony had “promised” to make an updated 4K-ready PS4 model.

Despite assurances that the PlayStation 4 would support 4K video playback upon release, the console, like its competitor, doesn’t afford the feature.

Both systems have had to play catch-up with the growing technology sector since their release 18 months ago, featuring outdated hardware and limited capabilities across the board.

Although the PS4 has strong console hardware, it’ll need a few buffs to support 4K video playback.

Even armed with beefier RAM and heavily customized APU’s, the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 have had to rely on a slew of firmware updates to improve functionality and content–and for a while it’s worked.

But they’re still playing catch-up when it comes to 4K UHD. This is a problem that can’t be solved by software updates, and Microsoft and Sony will have to roll out new revised hardware solutions to meet the requirements of 4K video playback

A “leaked” image for a Slim PS4 model was spotted on the net, but has since been proven as a fake.

Netflix‘s CTO believes that Sony will make the necessary hardware adjustments when the company kicks off the PS4’s next revision model, which is projected to release sometime this fall (October or November).

Past trends indicate that most console makers launch an updated wave of systems two years after the initial release, and November 2015 will mark the second year for both the Xbox One and PS4 systems.

The assumption is that if Sony goes 4K with the PS4, then Microsoft will follow suit, as they’ve had to catch up with the Japanese console maker in many respects, including price. Plus it’s a bit odd that the system, touted as an “all-in-one” entertainment solution, is missing a key modern playback format.

Evidence also suggests that the systems will get the “slim” treatment for their next wave. In October of last year, an AMD employee let slip that the chipmaker had fabricated a smaller 20nm APU for the Xbox One, which paves the way for a smaller console variant.

And since AMD makes chips for both systems, the PS4 could get the same “slim” transformation as well.

The Xbox One has a definitive all-in-one presence, but it still doesn’t have 4K video, which actually goes against its entire status.

If both console-makers are indeed planning on compact revisions for their respective systems, it’d only make sense to embrace 4K playback, considering the market is starting to gravitate towards UHD.

Not everyone is ready for the bandwidth-punishing resolution, but those who have adopted the technology have few very choices. Right now 4K isn’t widely utilized but its presence continues to grow, and Sony and Microsoft could benefit from the catch-up.

The only frustrating aspect would be that current console owners would be left out, as they already are, despite promises and assurances from Sony’s own Shuhei Yoshida that the PS4 would play 4K video.

To mitigate this disappointment they could perhaps launch an accessory for UHD support on current systems, but it probably would depend on how popular the new resolution turns out to be in order to merit the effort.

Remember that 4K gaming most assuredly won’t be coming to this generation of consoles, seeing as only high-grade PC’s are capable of sustaining UHD clarity.

4K video playback is a start, but 4K gaming is currently out of the reach of consoles, and judging from the ever-widening rift between PC and consoles in terms of power, 4K gaming probably won’t be coming to the platform any time soon.

The post Rumor: 4K Ready PS4 and Xbox One Models Incoming appeared first on VR World.

Assassin’s Creed games are well-known for their penchant for weaving unique takes on authentic historical events across the world, but they’re also known for their layered and enigmatic puzzles.

It appears one of those very puzzles has been decrypted thanks to a sharp-eyed fan named who noticed something peculiar in a piece of art, and shared his findings on the Ubisoft Forums.

The painting, crafted by Ubisoft artist Martin Deschambault, is found in the Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag artbook and depicts a possible Abstergo Entertainment lobby rendered in futuristic angles and colors.

But when Cronik-22 took a closer look, he realized that the picture actually depicted fragments of iconic landmarks from past Assassin’s Creed games…and possibly future ones as well.

It appears Ubisoft had hidden these clues in plain sight, as far back as 2013.

The Santa Maria del Fiore Cathedral is clearly seen above, hearkening back to Ezio’s exploits in Assassin’s Creed II.

Above is a fragment from the painting that shows off a tropical island in the Caribbean, obviously hinting at Black Flag.

Here we have the infamous Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, hinting at Assassin’s Creed: Unity, and Cronik-22 also mentions that the clues were there way before the Kotaku leak.

And finally we have Parliament and Big Ben which ties in to this year’s Assassin’s Creed game that is set in Victorian London.

But what’s next? A final fragment reveals that Ubisoft might be bringing Assassin’s Creed to the Land of the Rising Sun for 2016.

The small clue might hint at the Sensoji Temple, Tokyo’s oldest temple that has ancient roots. Considering gamers have been asking for a Japan-based entry in the series for quite some time, it’s not too surprising.

And the prospect of stalking through the night as a deadly ninja-assassin in Feudal Japan?

While Ubisoft hasn’t confirmed any of the speculation, Ubisoft creative director Alex Hutchinson said last year that a game set in Feudal Japan would feel “too familiar”, and “boring”

“Feudal Japan would work as an Assassin’s game, for sure, but I feel like it would start to look like ‘oh, have I played this?’ You know what I mean – ‘oh, I’ve been a ninja before, I’ve been a samurai before'”.

It’s also worth mentioning that the franchise will make a brief journey to the Orient in Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China, which will be free for all holders of the AC: Unity Season Pass.

Keep in mind that these findings are total speculation, but they do have some pretty clear indications that give credence to the possibility of a Japan-themed AC game.

It’ll be interesting to see if Ubisoft has anything to say about the rumors (if anything), and it’s also worth  mentioning that the official Assassin’s Creed movie has been slated for a release in 2016 as well.

Be sure to take a closer look at those artbooks: who knows what you’ll find!

The post Report: Assassin’s Creed To Be Set In Japan For 2016 appeared first on VR World.

As AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) continues its to struggle with consistent profitability, rumors are consistently appearing about possible contenders to buy the company out.

The latest rumor comes from China’s My Drivers, which outlines possibility of an AMD takeover by China state-owned semiconductor firm BLX. BLX is owned by China’s Institute of Computing Technology, Academy of Sciences and Jiangsu Zhongyi Group and currently designs (it’s a fabless firm) a MIPS-based processor targeted to embedded devices.

While AMD’s GPU assets would be easily up for grabs, its x86 license is another deal. Part of any x86 license is a strict condition that it is non-transferable. This means that BLX would have to negotiate with Intel (NASDAQ: INTC) and come to an agreement that satisfies both parties. The possibility of Intel transferring the x86 license shouldn’t be ruled out entirely; Intel has come to two notable deals in China two give Rockchip and Tsinghua Unigroup access to x86 for mobile development. Considering Intel’s willingness to work with Chinese firms — its $100 million investment in Shenzhen is another example of this — it would be foolish to entirely discount a licensing play.

However such a takeover deal is unlikely to occur simply because AMD isn’t at that make or break stage quite yet. Lisa Su — AMD’s freshly minted CEO — hasn’t had time to prove herself. It would be odd, as Bernstein analyst Stacy A. Rasgon blogged, for Su to decide so early in her position to sell the company as her first act. Plus, BLX would have to make the case to shareholders — which includes Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala Development Company — that there’s more value in selling the company than continuing to push for a recovery and turnaround. AMD has not had to recently deal with aggressive activist shareholders, so there may be a desire amongst its large shareholders to see if a better return can be made pushing for a turnaround.

AMD’s stocks rose by 5% during the Monday trading day as some investors were cautiously optimistic that this rumor might have legs.

The post A Takeover of AMD by China’s BLX is Unlikely appeared first on VR World.

UPDATE: One Reddit user affirms that the Slim PS4 leak was indeed a fake, citing that the smaller model isn’t big enough to play standard Blu-ray game discs.

Using the picture that compares the standard and slim PS4’s as a template, the user approximated that the Slim PS4’s width measures about 166mm (as compared to the 275mm width of the current PS4 model), with an ~88mm disc drive.

Considering all PS4 game Blu-ray discs measure 120mm, there appears to be an obvious disproportion between the Slim PS4’s disc drive and the game discs themselves.

Original story as follows.

It appears that images of Sony’s (NYSE: SNE) Slim PS4 model may have been leaked, leading to massive speculation and buzz within the gaming sphere.

The leaked images come from Italian games site Multiplayer Italy, and purportedly reveal a new compact form factor for the PS4 console.

Sony is no stranger to shrinking and changing up its consoles to make them more efficient–all three PlayStations have seen transformations throughout the decades, leading to “slim” redesigns across the board.

The purported Slim PS4 is much smaller than the current model, leading to possible complications like heat management, HDD memory and more.

According to the images the Slim PS4 is code named “Monolith”, and despite the being markedly smaller than the current rhomboid SKU model, it still retains the sleek angular design.

The pictures show off a side-mounted disc slot as well as new eject and power buttons, making the model look quite akin to a futuristic DVD player.

There is also strong evidence suggests that Sony is indeed working on a Slim PS4 variant.

In October of last year, reports revealed that AMD successfully shrunk the Xbox One’s APU to a more efficient 20nm size, which is the first step to a more compact Xbox One console.

Project Monolith is shown here with a DualShock 4 controller for scale.

Shrinking the APU chip has some very real advantages. First, a smaller size means that the transistors can become more dense, thus improving speeds by up to 30%. Secondly a smaller APU means that power consumption will decrease as well, along with manufacturing costs.

And since AMD is directly responsible for the PlayStation 4’s customized APU, it’s only a matter of time before Sony’s next-gen system got the same slim treatment.

Even still there are some very real doubts concerning the authenticity of the leaks.

Due to the size limitations the Slim PS4 would need an external PSU, most likely facilitated in a power-brick structure similar to the last two Xbox models.

But what kind of HDD capacity would Sony target with the slim model?

Gamers are able to fill up the current 500GB models quite fast, seeing as some games take up to 50GB to install. Chances are the Slim PS4 would be shipped with a low-capacity SSD and would need to be complimented by external hard drives.

Thanks to AMD’s recent shrinking of the Xbox One’s APU, it’s highly likely that Sony is working on a Slim PS4. But is it Project Monolith?

And the Slim PS4 would need a way to regulate heat. A larger console shell affords a wider area for heat distribution, and obviously a more compact area would mean the system gets hotter faster. If you want to know just how hot the PS4 can get, check out these FLIR thermal images.

Even with the higher transistor density afforded by a smaller APU, the Slim PS4 may have a high risk of overheating. The Xbox One minimizes this risk with its massive casing and external power source.

As always we must take these “leaks” with a grain of salt and always remember nothing has been confirmed just yet. These images may very well be a big practical joke thanks to a quick Photoshop mock-up.

In any case, we may hear something from the Japanese console-maker at E3 2015 or maybe during this year’s Tokyo Game Show, but for now we have to chalk it up to rumor.

The post Report: First Pictures Of Sony’s Slim PS4 Leaked appeared first on VR World.

Is your recently updated Nexus 5 or SHIELD tablet feeling slow after the Lollipop update? You probably are going to need to do a factory reset.

Keep in mind that if you do a factory reset you will lose all locally stored data that hasn’t been backed up to the cloud. That usually means music files, photos (if you don’t have Google+ auto backup enabled), app settings and authorizations and other settings. Most of these things will be saved for you if you are using all of Google’s cloud services, but local music and other files will not be backed up so back those up before you do a factory reset.

In order to do a factory reset, all you have to do is go to the settings potion of the phone, find the Backup and Reset option and then hit Factory data reset. Your phone will prompt you to make sure you want that option and then it will restart after you confirm and reset the phone to factory defaults, which are now going to be the Android Lollipop defaults.

Recently, a lot of phones have been getting updates to Android 5.0 Lollipop and the list is only growing. A lot of users that have updated their Android 4.4.4 Kit Kat devices are reporting that their devices are appearing to perform slower and less responsive after the update. I had this happen with both my Nexus 5 and my SHIELD tablet and a factory reset made both devices as fast as before the update.

The great thing about Android Lollipop that a lot of people haven’t really experienced yet (because most people haven’t had to update their device and do a reset) is that you can completely wipe your device and the Android backup actually does backup all of your apps that were previously installed. In the past, this feature partially worked for me and I didn’t entirely trust it as a result. So, when I did a factory reset of the SHIELD tablet, I was prepared to re-install everything but instead I re-installed nothing and the tablet did it all on its own.

A lot of people are speculating that people are experiencing this issue due to the fact that the OTA files on the phone or tablet were not properly wiped from the phone or tablet’s memory and as a result are causing some sort of an interface lagginess and overall system sluggishness. After all, the OTA is a fairly large file for both devices. There are also speculations that the reason may be some applications that are unoptimized for Lollipo but those are fairly unjustified because after a factory reset those apps return and performance is still fast.

The interesting thing is that it doesn’t actually affect overall system performance as much as we thought, as when we had originally gotten the SHIELD tablet it had performance of 4579 in Futuremark’s PCMark Android benchmark. After the Android 5.0 lollipop update, it went up to 5127 points even with the lagginess and after the factory reset it went up to 5322, which means that when the Android 5.0 lollpop update is applied correctly the SHIELD tablet gets  20% performance bump, not the 15% we had seen.

So if your newly updated Android device is feeling sluggish or slow after the Android 5.0 Lollipop update, then you should seriously consider doing a factory reset as one of the first options before you waste too much time on other things.

The post Nexus 5 or SHIELD Tablet Feeling Slow after Lollipop? appeared first on VR World.

According to the agency, over 800,000 employees of the USPS have had their personal data stolen from the postal service’s servers. When you consider that the USPS employs just under 500,000 people (below 800,000 in the 90’s) then you realize that the data stolen includes both current and former employees of the USPS. The data breach mostly affects employees of the USPS rather than customers who may have done business with them. They do state that the USPS’ customers that have done business with them between the months of July and August may have had their contact information lost, but no credit card or payment data was obtained by the hackers.

The USPS has a long and detailed FAQ that answers consumers questions about the data breach and whether or not their data has been compromised. The interesting thing about this breach is that it isn’t a typical breach where hackers are going after customer data or going after credit card data or passwords. The hackers in this specifically went after the employee data of the USPS and were able to gain access to what appears to be all of it. The USPS isn’t clearly saying what employee data had been stolen, but the USPS official release states that it the data stolen includes, “The employee information potentially compromised in the incident included some employee personally identifiable information (PII), such as names, dates of birth, Social Security numbers, addresses and other information including beginning and end dates of employment, and emergency contact information.”

The other huge problem with this breach is that the USPS did not communicate this breach, which occurred in mid-September until now, almost two whole months later. This would mean that the employees that got hacked have had their information out and about without their knowledge for the past two months which means anyone could have caused financial ruin for the employees of the USPS. The fact is that the American Postal Workers Union should be absolutely up in arms about this and should sue the USPS for breaching their duty to protect and properly notify their employees of such risks in a timely fashion. We’ve already gotten quite angry with retailers taking a month to tell us that our credit card numbers have been stolen, yet even more personal potentially ruining data was kept from USPS employees for nearly 2 months.

There are currently no official suspects or leads in the case, but some publications are indicating that the attack may have come from Chinese hackers.

There is one more interesting tidbit in this USPS story, and that’s the fact that the USPS has taken this event as an opportunity to take a dig at the New York Times for their piece about the USPS and their involvement in tracking Americans’ mail. Here is the question and answer, verbatim.

Q: I’m concerned about a New York Times article that mentioned “surveillance” of mail. Is this connected with the cyber-intrusion incident and what is meant by “mail covers”?

A: The New York Times article is unrelated to the cyber breach. The New York Times article titled ‘Report Reveals Wider Tracking of Mail in U.S.’ published on Tuesday, October 28, 2014 is extremely disappointing. The article is inaccurate and unfairly presents a one-sided version of the facts. First and foremost, the United State Postal Service respects the privacy of its customers and the sanctity of the mail. Contrary to what is suggested in the article, the Postal Service does not monitor the mail behavior of its customers and it does not maintain any system or program of so-called “surveillance.” Unfortunately, and perhaps to create a news story where there is none, the New York Times article conflates three independent mail programs in order to create the wholly false impression that there is some vast mail monitoring system in operation. While such an assertion may make for a more interesting news article – it is not based on the facts. Mail covers are used for criminal investigations. The increased use of mail covers in 2013 and 2014 is connected to single packages investigated involving illegal drug shipments. Eighty percent of all mail covers in 2014 were related to these important investigations. All other mail covers have actually decreased by more than 30 percent since 2012. It is unfortunate that the New York Times presented such a distorted view of the facts. Its readership would have benefited from a more even-handed approach. The Postal Service processed and delivered 158 billion pieces of mail last year, of which only a tiny percentage was subjected to the mail cover process. The people who need to be concerned about mail covers are those who use the U.S. Mail to ship illegal drugs or who are otherwise breaking the law.

The post USPS Hacked, 800,000 Employees' Info Accessed appeared first on VR World.

In a bizarre twists of events, Motorola’s Moto X (2014) has just started to get the Android 5.0 update, traditionally an update that comes out on Google’s own Nexus line of devices prior to any other manufacturer. Perhaps the Moto X’s status is a result of the fact that Motorola has been a part of Google for the past year, but that doesn’t particularly explain why the Nexus 5, Nexus 7, Nexus 4 and other Nexus devices aren’t getting Android Lollipop yet. There have been rumors that Google pushed back the date of the Nexus Android 5.0 update due to a battery drain bug, but the company hasn’t officially said anything. Some engineers on Google’s message boards did confirm that there were some power bugs associated with Android 5.0 and the Nexus 5.

Yes, the HTC Nexus 9 is already out and does sport Android’s Lollipop 5.0 version, however that is the only device up until today that is running on Android Lollipop. Even the much anticipated Nexus 6 isn’t actually available yet, so nobody can definitively say what the final updated version will run like on the different phones that will be getting Lollipop. There’s already talk about Sony’s and HTC’s updates to Lollipop, which is good and will hopefully mean that they will have updates out before the end of the year.

Thanks to the guys at ARSTechnica we know that there’s even a Motorola official support page for the update, even though the Moto X Lollipop update page appears to have been pulled. Last time, Motorola didn’t beat the Nexus devices to launching KitKat but they were the first to release after Google and somehow, this year they’ve managed to beat Google due to Google’s own bugs in their code. Somehow, you would think that Google might have some sort of Beta testers or QA engineers that would verify that such a build wouldn’t have such a fundamental flaw built into it right before launch. I guess its a good thing that they caught it pre-release, but they barely caught it before launch and as a result Motorola’s Moto X (2014) is now getting Android 5.0 Lollipop before Nexus devices.

The post Moto X Gets Android Lollipop Before Nexus Devices appeared first on VR World.

During today’s Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) earnings call for Q3 with very good numbers, Nvidia’s CEO Jen-Hsun Huang indicated that the company was already actively discussing licensing its GPU technologies in the mobile space to certain partners.

While Huang did not say how many partners they were working with or at what stage they were in the discussions, he did say the following, “Our licensing discussions are very active. And we have many in important stages.”

That statement was a response to an analyst question about the success of Maxwell and if it was bringing any potential progress on the licensing front. Currently, Nvidia is the sole user of its mobile GPUs and mobile GPU IP, however, with the success of Maxwell in desktop, there is a very good chance that some companies would become interested in utilizing it for their SoCs. Afterall, if you look at some of our Maxwell reviews, you can see that Nvidia is getting much more performance out of their GPUs while using the same process (28nm) as the previous generation and simultaneously reducing power. These advancements eventually trickle down to Nvidia’s mobile products as the company’s product roadmaps have indicated in the past.

Currently, the Tegra K1 utilizes Nvidia’s Kepler architecture, which was originally launched in desktop and laptop GPUs back in 2012 and then perfected in 2013 with the GTX Titan. Following the Kepler release in 2012, Nvidia announced the Tegra K1 (formerly known as Tegra 5) with Kepler in the beginning of this year and has been shipping Tegra K1 SoCs since the summer. So, a realistic timeframe to see Maxwell GPU IP in mobile is very likely going to be towards the tail end of 2015 or the beginning of 2016, so that isn’t necessarily going to be as quick as the mobile refresh cycle usually is. However, with each generation of SoC Nvidia has vastly improved the speed of GPU architecture implementation so there’s no knowing exactly how soon we could see an Nvidia GPU in something like a MediaTek.

It will be interesting to see how Nvidia will balance their GPU IP licensing with customers if they are also simultaneously competing with them. After all, ARM and IMG license both CPUs and GPUs, but neither of them actually produce their own products that compete with their licensees. There is also a chance that Nvidia may be trying to muscle weaker companies into licensing their technology because of the strength of their patents, which may be why Nvidia recently sued Samsung and Qualcomm.

The post Nvidia In Discussions with 'Many' GPU Licensees appeared first on VR World.

Reports indicate that AMD (NYSE: AMD) has just finalized a cheaper and smaller variant of the Xbox One’s APU, making a slim console variant a real possibility.

The news comes straight from a Beyond3D user named mosen who spotted something interesting on the LinkedIn profile for AMD’s senior system-on-chip (SOC) physical design manager, Daniel McConnell. The profile has since been taken down at the time of writing.

The curious segment claims that McConnell had “successfully planned and executed the first APU for Microsoft’s (NASDAQ: MSFT) Xbox One game console in 28nm technology at a cost-reduced derivative in 20nm technology”.

This indicates that AMD has indeed successfully shrunk the Xbox One’s processor from its original size of 28nm to a more compact 20nm.

iFixit’s teardown of the Xbox One revealed all of its internal hardware.(Photo: iFixit)

As Eurogamer notes, the reduction of size can improve transistor density, thus boosting overall power consumption. And a smaller manufacturing process translates directly to a smaller processor die size and lower manufacturing costs.

The Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC)–who manufactures the processors for Xbox One and PS4–notes that the reduction to 20nm can improve speeds by 30 percent, while also lowering power by 25 percent at 1.9 times the density of the original 28nm variant.

On top of the 20nm deriviative being potentially faster and more cost-effective, the reduction in power draw will in turn make the system run cooler and reduce overheating.

This drop in temperature could lead to big changes in the Xbox One’s current brobdingnagian shape. The cooling system and outer casing could be redesigned to a thinner form–thus leading to the Xbox One slim.

It makes sense for Microsoft to want to shrink costs as much as possible, especially given that the Xbox One isn’t selling nearly as well as Sony’s (NYSE: SNE) PlayStation 4. But it might be some time before we see an Xbox One slim.

TSMC is currently belting out 20nm A8 and A8X processors for Apple’s iPhone 6 smartphone, with AMD and Nvidia waiting their turn for their respective upcoming GPU’s.

Right now the technology has been successfully designed, but Microsoft probably won’t pull the trigger on the new shape until it becomes economically feasible, so we shouldn’t expect anything soon.

The frameworks for a slim Xbox One are there, and so is the evidence that Microsoft is thinking about a change. This change might just be for a more efficient console, but given the trends of a down-graded cheaper console variant (the Xbox 360 Slim, for instance) springing up a few years after a console’s release, it’s only a matter of time before the Xbox One gets its turn.

As a disclaimer, it is worth reminding you all that this is very likely just a die shrink done by Microsoft and not to expect anything like it from AMD any time soon, if ever.

The post AMD’s New 20nm APU Could Lead to Xbox One Slim Model appeared first on VR World.

Today info on the GT80 Titan was leaked on the French website Cowcotland.  The GT80 is an 18 inch portable notebook with a mechanical keyboard employing Cherry MX Brown switches, which would likely be an industry first.

The details are few, but what is known is that this info was leaked today and that MSI (TPE:2377) can’t comment yet since it has not been officially announced.  The other big news about the GT80 Titan is that the notebook will come with Chery MX Brown switches, as they are loved by gamers worldwide.  The specs two specs that were claimed were that the notebook will have a weight of 4.5Kg and a thickness of 49.1mm.  This indeed will be more of a portable desktop replacement than a laptop computer.  Another thing setting this apart from most other notebooks is that the touchpad will be to the right of the keyboard, and serving as the numeric keypad when needed. This way the keyboard is more like a standard mechanical keyboard instead of being set back into the chassis a ways.  It is said that the notebook should be easy to upgrade underneath the area behind the keyboard.

The really special thing that they are speculating about is that this is likely to have GTX 980M, and possibly have the option for SLI, which would make this an insanely powerful portable computer.  As was stated earlier, this is just speculation for now, but the notebook sure would have more than ample room for such a configuration.  One thing that is likely possible is that the graphics will be upgradable since MSI is introducing this feature with the GT72 Gaming notebook.  These will be GPUs that are available from MSI that will keep the notebook up to date with the coming generations of GPUs, thus protecting an investment is such a notebook.

When there is more info on the GT80 Titan we will be sure to cover it.

The post MSI GT80 Titan leaked appeared first on VR World.

An American Airlines flight from LAX (Los Angeles) to Heathrow (London) was delayed yesterday, Sunday, due to one of the passengers’ wireless Wi-Fi hotspot network SSID (name) was broadcasting as “Al-Quida Free Terror Nettwork.” This was discovered by one of the passengers on the flight and they expressed their concern about it and the flight crew took the plane back to the gate and passengers were made to stay on the plane. In fact, they were kept on the plane for hours. Passengers were initially told that it was some sort of maintenance issue, which eventually was not the case.

Airport officials stated to KABC TV that, “After further investigation, it was determined that no crime was committed and no further action will be taken.”

However, the Daily Mail in the UK is reporting that the flight was held for 17 hours and that it only took off Monday at 1pm (which it isn’t even yet in California at the time of publication). Additionally, if you check FlightAware for the American Airlines flight number that both KABC and The Daily Mail reference, flight 136, you will notice that it takes off at 8PM on Sunday and lands in London at 1pm. However, the flight for yesterday, the 26th appears to have been completely stricken from the record (very likely cancelled). This would support The Daily Mail’s saying that the flight was rescheduled for 1pm, except that hasn’t actually happened yet and isn’t showing up anywhere on FlightAware.

According to LAX’s own official flight information, which is to be trusted the most, the flight had an ‘estimated’ departure time of 10am today, which seems accurate if you track the progress of that flight on LAX’s website. We have contacted American Airlines for their comment. They are currently saying that they are, “Reviewing it internally.” Based on what we’re seeing, though, it appears that the flight was delayed longer than the three hours KABC was stating and shorter than the 17 hours the Daily Mail is stating. It appears to be closer to a 14 hour delay, indicating that the passengers were made to deboard and reboard this morning at LAX.

All of this is yet another reason why people need to be more considerate of how they use their technology and airlines also need to not overreact to people’s poor behavior. Sure, using such a Wi-Fi hotspot is without a doubt an idiotic thing to do, but simply addressing it by finding the person responsible and not cancelling the whole flight is also an option as well.

The post Wi-Fi Hotspot Name Delays LA to London Flight 14 Hours appeared first on VR World.

Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) will be the latest company to enter the smartwatch market if a report from Forbes is to be believed.

According to Forbes’ report, the Microsoft smartwatch will be “sensor-rich” and platform agnostic meaning it will work with iPhone and Android. The device will have a health aspect, meaning it will track the user’s heart rate and other vital signs. Forbes’ report also says that the upcoming smartwatch will be able to last up to two days from a single charge.

If Microsoft is indeed making a smartwatch, the world won’t have to wait long to see it. According to Forbes the device will be out sooner rather than later with an unveiling scheduled before the holiday season.

A tepid environment

Samsung (KRX:005930) launched its smartwatch just over a year ago to a very cool reception. While the first Galaxy Gear was a technically lacking device, consumers, much to the disappointment of vendors, haven’t been overly enthusiastic about the new form factor.

This might change when Apple (NASDAQ: APPL) releases its smartwatch, as the company has proven time-and-time again that it’s able to build excitement and demand for something new.

Microsoft does have an advantage opting for the hardware agnostic route but it’s unclear how many units the tech giant can reasonably hope to sell. This unknown unknown means that it could be anything from a Zune to a Kinect — polar opposites of success.

The post Report: Microsoft Smartwatch Set to Launch in Weeks appeared first on VR World.

As many of you already know, the internet is abuzz with rumors of the new Nexus device. Originally, the rumor was that Google would not be making any more Nexus devices and then rumors started to surface of both a Nexus 6 and a Nexus 9. We’ve been lucky enough to have access to Nexus 9 information, but unfortunately Nexus 6 information is much more tightly held. The new Nexus 6 is going to be a roughly 6″ device which is expected to feature a 2560 x 1440 display along with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 805 SoC to power that additional GPU load expected from such a resolution. Thanks to Evan Blass, also known as Evleaks, we’ve got a leaked unwatermarked image of the Nexus 6.

What a depressing few days. I remember 1 thing that used to make me feel better, tho. No mark in deference to Nexus. pic.twitter.com/76zhSfu8rJ

— Evan Blass (@evleaks) October 14, 2014

  Most other details are still fairly highly rumored, but the expectation is that it will launch alongside the Nexus 9 which is supposed to be unveiled this week. This would make sense because both devices are expected to run on Google’s new Android L release, which is rumored to be called Lollipop. Android L is expected to launch simultaneously with both devices and be available to Nexus users as well. To add fire to the Nexus 9 and Nexus 6 rumors, HTC employee and Senior Global Online Communications Manager Jeff Gordon made the following tweet:

Something amazing, beautiful and highly confidential just arrived. pic.twitter.com/0C1KXI3lqO — Jeff Gordon (@urbanstrata) October 13, 2014

Many commenters on the photo made an obvious observation, that the box was too big for any one phone, very likely indicating that he had probably received an HTC Nexus 9 ahead of the launch which is expected to come tomorrow. Many people believe, logically, that if the Nexus 9 is launching tomorrow that we could very likely see the Nexus 6 come along side it.

I would not say that with 100% certainty because we have not been told this by any of our sources, but it isn’t necessarily something crazy to assume. As such, we have no exact idea when the Nexus 6 is coming, but we do know it’ll be big and very powerful. In fact, many people believe that the Nexus 6 is too big for a phone (myself included) and that Google should also release a more reasonably sized version of the Nexus 6, say a Nexus 4.7″ (obviously not going to be the name). Either way, the Android Lollipop (?) release should be an exciting announcement on its own and perhaps Google believes that people wanting a smaller Nexus device might just stick to the Nexus 5 which should still perform quite well.

The post Nexus 6 Leaks Ahead of Expected Launch appeared first on VR World.

Update: Dropbox denies that it was hacked and posted the following on its blog.

Recent news articles claiming that Dropbox was hacked aren’t true. Your stuff is safe. The usernames and passwords referenced in these articles were stolen from unrelated services, not Dropbox. Attackers then used these stolen credentials to try to log in to sites across the internet, including Dropbox. We have measures in place to detect suspicious login activity and we automatically reset passwords when it happens.

Attacks like these are one of the reasons why we strongly encourage users not to reuse passwords across services. For an added layer of security, we always recommend enabling 2 step verification on your account.

Update: 10/14/2014 12:30am PT

A subsequent list of usernames and passwords has been posted online. We’ve checked and these are not associated with Dropbox accounts.

In a recent Pastebin posting, an anonymous hacker, who is asking for BTC donations to post more account usernames and passwords. He or she has already posted hundreds of account credentials, which check out to be authentic accounts if you test any of them out. The irony of this situation is that Dropbox had just recently posted a blog about now getting baited by phishing or malware on their website. Obviously, the 6,937,081 accounts that have supposedly been compromised are not all going to be the result of phishing or malware, but very likely due to some vulnerability in Dropbox’s own systems.

Most of the passwords that people have tested are expired passwords and may be flagged by Dropbox’s own systems as vulnerable accounts. Up until the time of publication, Dropbox has not published any official statements on their website or twitter account, but if you want to ensure that your Dropbox account is safe from account hacking you should enable 2 factor authentication (2FA). This means that even if someone has access to your username and password, they will still need to authenticate through your phone or an email account. This is a mandatory safeguard to keep yourself protected from such major password hacks and obviously, you need to enable it if you are serious about your own security.

Dropbox has recently also come under scrutiny from people like Edward Snowden who claim that the service is unsafe for people to use without government spying. They also have the former Secretary of State and National Security Advisor, Condoleezza Rice, on their board of directors which is seen as a very anti-privacy move considering that she was involved in many of the spying programs implemented today in one way or another

The post Hacker Claims to Have Access to 7 Million Dropbox Accounts appeared first on VR World.

Our sources are confirming that the HTC Nexus 9, which we had originally reported thanks to Nvidia’s own legal documents, will indeed be landing this month. The HTC Nexus 9 will indeed feature Nvidia’s Tegra K1 SoC which confirms the rumors of the previous few months that Nvidia had managed to work their way into the newest Nexus tablet. Another detail we were able to learn is that the MSRP for the HTC Nexus 9 will indeed be $399, which isn’t anywhere near the Nexus 7’s $229 price point but indicates that Google is aiming to bring a premium quality device to market at an affordable price.

Details are still murky about whether or not the HTC Nexus 9 will feature Nvidia’s current Tegra K1 SoC or the 64-bit denver-based variant of Tegra K1 that the company has been teasing since they announced Tegra K1 at CES in January of this year. One interesting point is that in the Nvidia blog, the company specifically states, “And for hard-core Android fans, take note that we’re already developing the next version of Android – “L” – on the 64-bit Tegra K1.” This would indicate that we will very likely see the Tegra K1 64-bit version in the HTC Nexus 9 with Android-L (or Lollipop). This all makes sense because Google has a tendency of requiring their chip suppliers to meet a certain minimum spec list and if they don’t meet it, they’re out. It happened with the Nexus 7 when Qualcomm knocked out Nvidia with OpenGL ES 3.0 support and it looks like Nvidia is now doing it to Qualcomm with 64-bit support in the Tegra K1. Qualcomm won’t have any high-end 64-bit devices until 2015 once their partners start building devices with the Snapdragon 810 and 808. They have already announced the Snapdragon 610 and 410 and some devices are even utilizing these processors now, but they are not considered flagship chips like Google likes to use.

It remains to be seen how good Nvidia’s battery life with the 64-bit Denver-based Tegra K1 will be, especially compared to the quad ARM Cortex-A15 version that’s currently in the Xiaomi MiPad and Nvidia SHIELD tablet. One must also consider that there may be a lot of 64-bit optimizations as part of Android-L which may actually help Nvidia see far greater performance per watt than with quad Cortex A15 chips. We don’t have any performance figures just yet, or battery life figures, but once we do, we will be sure to keep you posted here.

Also, here’s a new little tidbit in addition to us being able to confirm most of the rumors… The HTC Nexus 9 will not sold exclusively by the Play Store, meaning that it should be widely available on November 3rd after pre-orders start on October 15th. The HTC Nexus 9 will actually sell at most major retailers online and B&M from what we’ve been told. This means that Google is clearly trying to target a broader audience but at the same time trying to bring a premium experience. And when you think about the fact that they have mini-kiosks in places like Best Buy that already let you buy most things that are sold on the Google Play Store. We don’t have a complete list of retailers yet, but it does mean that Google expects this launch to be much bigger than ones in the past.

The post HTC Nexus 9 Launches at $399 on Oct 15th, Available Nov 3rd appeared first on VR World.

According to the NextBigWhat, Yahoo’s Bangalore software development center will be laying off nearly all of its workers and shuttering the entire operation. Supposedly, only 250 people will remain, many of whom will be given an option to move to the company’s Sunnyvale HQ in the US.

While no official figures about layoffs or timeframes were given by Yahoo, the rumor states that they are all to be given the axe on November 7th, and that most of them will be getting five to six months of severence, which should hopefully give them enough money and time to find new jobs. If not, maybe it will give them enough start up capital (if they band together) to start a new company of their own. The article mentions that this doesn’t appear to be part of any Yahoo cost-cutting measure but rather a move by the company to consolidate its development centers.

Either way, Yahoo is not the thriving company it once was and there’s no doubt that these cost savings from closing the Bangalore development center are going to reflect positively for the company in the future. The real question is how this will affect the company’s ability to execute in the future and whether or not they really did need this 2,250 person development center. They also managed to catch wind of rumors saying that it was only 600 people and that those people were mostly engineers, which may also be true. However, Yahoo did issue them the following statement:

“As we ensure that Yahoo is on a path of sustainable growth, we’re looking at ways to achieve greater efficiency, collaboration and innovation across our business. To this effect, we’re making some changes to the way we operate in Bangalore leading to consolidation of certain teams into fewer offices. Yahoo will continue to have a presence in India and Bangalore remains an important office.”

So yes, there is going to be some form of downsizing at Yahoo in India’s Bangalore offices, we simply don’t know whether to believe the entire staff or just 600 and that’s why this is still a rumor.

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