Tag Archives: microsoft

Microsoft builds massive supercomputer for smarter AI

Microsoft has built an enormous supercomputer for artificial intelligence work, a new direction for its Azure cloud computing service. The machine has 285,000 processor cores boosted by 10,000 graphics chips for OpenAI, a company that wants to ensure AI technology helps humans. Microsoft announced the machine at its Build conference for developers on Tuesday. (For …

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Messenger Rooms: Here’s how to use Facebook’s free new video chat feature

Facebook’s new group video chat feature Messenger Rooms is now available, and is ready to compete with services like Zoom, Skype, Google Meet and Microsoft Teams, as more people turn to video chat during coronavirus lockdowns and quarantines.  You can create a video chat room via Facebook or the Messenger app and invite up to 50 people to join a video call — even if they …

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Apple Watch: It’s been 5 years since my original review, and it holds up

I’d love to say that when I first put on the Apple Watch, I’d never seen anything like it before. But of course, that’s not true. By late 2014 I’d been surrounded by smartwatches for a few years. So when Apple announced it was making its own watch, my thought (as so often with Apple) was: finally. The first smartwatch I …

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Google Chrome to block ads that drain your battery and gobble network data

To improve battery life, network usage and website speed, Chrome will delete ads that consume too many computing resources, Google said Thursday. Google will begin experimenting with the technology in coming months and plans to build it into Chrome in August, Google said in a blog post. The move will excise only the worst ad offenders, including those that consume …

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We’re all on the holodeck now, VR headset or not

We were late to a Houseparty with my mom, my sister, my niece and nephews. We were all going to talk and play trivia and Pictionary, or whatever the app calls it. We huddled in on the sofa, taking turns. The kids wanted Fortnite trivia, which I was terrible at. I liked the sketching game better. We played rounds of …

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Microsoft Surface Duo foldable phone specs reportedly leak

Specs for Microsoft’s upcoming foldable phone have reportedly leaked online. The Surface Duo will have two 5.6-inch screens, run on Android 10 and be powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 processor, Windows Central reported Friday, citing unnamed sources. The dual-screen device will also have an 11-megapixel camera, a Surface Pen, 6GB of RAM, a choice between 64GB or 256GB of …

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Apple buys NextVR, which broadcasts sports and music in virtual reality

Virtual reality got a little more real Thursday, with news that Apple bought the VR streaming sports company NextVR. The California startup is mostly known for partnerships with the NBA and Wimbledon to stream live sports from specialized cameras set up courtside to people’s headsets at home. The effect is meant to make people feel as though they’re sitting in premium seats, …

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Apple’s AR glasses won’t launch until at least 2022, analyst says

Apple’s long-rumored foray into the augmented headset market won’t happen until 2022 at the earliest, Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo reportedly said in a note to investors. Sources told CNET in 2018 that Apple would reveal its plans for an augmented reality and virtual reality headset sometime this year. But the coronavirus pandemic has created supply chain issues in China and a …

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Samsung is killing off its XR apps

Samsung XR is being killed off, with the apps slowly bringing features to a close before fully terminating the service on Sept 30. From this week, 360-degree video is now unavailable, premium video purchases are suspended and updates have stopped for all Samsung XR and Samsung VR video clients, Samsung said Monday. From Jun 30, it will no longer support …

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Nvidia’s new data center GPU packs 20 times the performance of its predecessor

For the most up-to-date news and information about the coronavirus pandemic, visit the WHO and CDC websites. Whenever a new GPU or CPU hits the market, it boasts faster speeds, usually in the magnitude of two or three times better than before — at most. But Nvidia on Thursday blew right past those normally strong performance increases. The company’s new …

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