Nearly two years ago, AMD announced its first Ryzen Z1 processors. These were essentially the same silicon that AMD was putting in high-end thin-and-light laptops but tuned specifically for handheld gaming PCs like the Steam Deck and Asus ROG Ally X. As part of its CES announcements today, AMD is refreshing that lineup with three processors, all slated for an undisclosed date in the first … Continue reading AMD’s new Ryzen Z2 CPUs boost gaming handhelds, if you buy the best one

After ditching the traditional Dell XPS laptop look in favor of the polarizing design of the XPS 13 Plus released in 2022, Dell is killing the XPS branding that has become a mainstay for people seeking a sleek, respectable, well-priced PC. This means that there won’t be any more Dell XPS clamshell ultralight laptops, 2-in-1 laptops, or desktops. Dell is also killing its Latitude, Inspiron, and … Continue reading The end of an era: Dell will no longer make XPS computers

Disney is buying Fubo and plans to merge the sports streaming platform with its Hulu + Live TV service, gaining 70 percent ownership of the company that up until today was suing it over antitrust concerns and allegations of anticompetitive practices. According to Fubo’s announcement today, the unified company will be known as Fubo, and Fubo executives will run it. People will also continue to … Continue reading Disney makes antitrust problem go away by buying majority stake in competitor

AMD’s CES announcements include a tease about next-gen graphics cards, a new flagship desktop CPU, and a modest refresh of its processors for handheld gaming PCs. But the company’s largest announcement, by volume, is about laptop processors. Today the company is expanding the Ryzen AI 300 lineup with a batch of updated high-end chips with up to 16 CPU cores and some midrange options for … Continue reading AMD’s new laptop CPU lineup is a mix of new silicon and new names for old silicon

We’ve all had a good seven years to figure out why our interconnected devices refused to work properly with the HDMI 2.1 specification. The HDMI Forum announced at CES today that it’s time to start considering new headaches. HDMI 2.2 will require new cables for full compatibility, but it has the same physical connectors. Tiny QR codes are suggested to help with that, however. The … Continue reading HDMI 2.2 will require new “Ultra96” cables, whenever we have 8K TVs and content

Intel’s Core Ultra 200 series is currently bifurcated between two architectures: Lunar Lake, which powers the Core Ultra 200V series of laptop chips; and Arrow Lake, which is included in the Core Ultra 200S desktop processors. Both share the same CPU architectures across their P-cores and E-cores, but the similarities end there. Arrow Lake processors can include many more CPU cores, but only Lunar Lake … Continue reading Same CPU, slower GPU and NPU: Meet the rest of Intel’s Core Ultra 200 laptop chips

Last January at CES, Microsoft Chief Marketing Officer Yusuf Mehdi declared 2024 the “year of the AI PC.” And whether you believe that prediction came true or not—many new PCs come with AI-accelerating neural processing units (NPUs) onboard, but far from all of them—you can’t deny that Microsoft did try very hard to make it happen. This year, Mehdi is back with another prediction: 2025 … Continue reading Microsoft would really like you to replace your old Windows 10 PCs this year

With the holiday release of the biopic A Complete Unknown, Bob Dylan is once again in the national spotlight. For me, the film provided a welcome excuse to read up on Dylan, who has always been a reputable source of enjoyably gnomic quotes, self-mythologizing, and enigmatic asides. Even in his old age, Dylan still delivers—especially when he gets going on technology, joysticks, and “dog ass” … Continue reading Bob Dylan has some Dylanesque thoughts on the “sorcery” of technology

Nvidia is reportedly gearing up to launch the first few cards in its RTX 50-series at CES next week, including an RTX 5090, RTX 5080, RTX 5070 Ti, and RTX 5070. The 5090 will be of particular interest to performance-obsessed, money-is-no-object PC gaming fanatics since it’s the first new GPU in over two years that can beat the performance of 2022’s RTX 4090. But boosted … Continue reading Rumors say next-gen RTX 50 GPUs will come with big jumps in power requirements

“It’s time for THE charger,” the European Commission posted to X on December 28, 2024. While the sentiment only applies to one continent (and not all of it) and only certain devices, the Common Charger Directive now in effect in the European Union suggests that far fewer gadgets will foist barrels, USB-micro, or proprietary plugs onto their owners. The Common Charger Directive demands that a … Continue reading USB-C gets a bit more universal as the EU’s mandate goes into effect