(Riley clucks admonishingly)
- Here you are with nary a tech news to your name.
It simply won't do!
James!
Don't worry.
We'll fix you right up. (cackles)
After the appropriate amount of information had leaked,
as required by traditional PC gamer culture,
AMD officially announced the RX 6700 XT today.
The card comes with 12 gigs of memory, 40 Compute units,
and according to AMD,
can perform about as well as Nvidia's RTX 3070 at 1440p
while costing $20 less at $479 U.S.
Unfortunately, that's still higher than many fans expected,
leading some to accuse AMD of capitalizing
on the current low supply, high demand market situation
by raising prices, which is not something that happens
very often in the economy!
I think.
I've never taken an economics class. I...
What? Laissez-faire, man.
AMD also announced that their implementation
of Resizable BAR, called Smart Access Memory,
which allows Ryzen CPUs to directly access GPU memory,
will work with Ryzen 3000 series CPUs,
not just the upcoming 5000 series chips.
Which means they might have a bit of a leg up
on Intel and Nvidia, which, as a reminder,
are other companies that release products you can't buy.
But if you really wanna try,
the RX 6700 XT will launch March 18th.
- [James] Get your bots ready!
(Riley giggles)
- (grumbling) Programming!
Last year Google announced it would remove support
for third-party cookies in Chrome,
which allow companies other than Google
to track you across the web
in order to serve you ads for things
that you might actually be interested in,
like a pillow shaped like a processor from LTTStore.com.
Hey! Get outta here! - Yep yep!
It's your boy!
- Well, today Google said once they get rid
of all those nasty third-party cookie crumbs,
they're not going to build alternative identifiers
that track individuals as they browse the web,
nor will they use them in their products.
Which kinda makes it sound
like that's exactly what they're gonna do.
I could almost hear the wink in that sentence.
Also, why do you need to say
you're not gonna use the thing
that you said you wouldn't build?
Just a question. - Switching to Firefox.
- Google's clearly trying to keep up
with their consumers' demand for privacy,
an area where browsers like Firefox-
- See? - Exactly!
You got there, James.
And Brave, are a step ahead.
Google says they can make this change
without breaking the way that web advertising works,
but it's unclear that means things won't break for Google
while breaking for everyone else.
- [James] Suck it, Zuck!
- Zuck it!
And Arizona has passed a bill
that would prevent tech giants
from forcing an app developer
from using a preferred payment system,
a landmark piece of legislation
that could have a big impact on Appic...
Appic?
Maybe the should just merge. Apple and Epic, you know?
Make up finally and become one company.
A big impact on the fight between Apple and Epic
over the iOS App Store.
The bill also prohibits companies like Apple or Google
from retaliating against developers
who elect to use third-party payment systems.
Just like the recent similar North Dakota bill,
this one was influenced by the Coalition for App Fairness,
which is like Epic's club for companies
burned by Apple's mean App Store rules that suck.
That's the acronym. I can't say it.
The bill being passed
could be the start of a legislative wave
sweeping through the U.S. state by state
until iPhones are literally just open source devices
you can install Windows on if you want,
or could...
That couldn't happen. Could be nothing.
Either way, despite all the lobbying,
Epic Games seems to be sitting pretty.
They just bought the developer of "Fall Guys,"
the pandemic era smash hit
that everyone's still playing, right?
Everyone- - Drake?
Oh my gosh. You have to try these Quick Bits.
- [James] No...
- What? - Way!
Shut the front door! - Ah!
Intel has discontinued it Performance Tuning Protection Plan
which provided an extended warranty
covering processors that get damaged by overclocking.
Intel says the PTPP wasn't needed anymore
because overclocking is so easy now.
And demand for the warranty was low,
so they're listening to their customers
and responding to them.
It's not at all because they were just ordered by a judge
to pay $2.2 million to a patent troll company
after losing a lawsuit.
- [James] Those are customers too.
- Well, that's true.
Yeah, those don't...
That actually doesn't work together.
I thought they would go nicely together.
Microsoft's Ignite conference kicked off this week
and besides the super nerdy announcements
like Power Automate Desktop now being free,
we got yet another flash concept video
about how HoloLens is going to revolutionize work.
- [James] In another 10 years.
- Exactly.
Microsoft Mesh is basically AltspaceVR.
Microsoft acquired AltspaceVR, so that makes sense.
And there's also a "Pokemon Go" HoloLens demo, wow!
Huh! This was fun!
Can't wait for next year's HoloLens concept video.
It'll get here someday.
The audio chat app Clubhouse
is currently being cloned by the bigger tech platforms,
but Twitter's clone, called Spaces,
is making some features available on Android.
Clubhouse itself is only available on iOS
and is invite-only.
- [James] That's what the cool kids do.
- Exactly, I mean,
it makes your app cool,
but it also makes it harder to download.
And all the coolness draws the attention of the big guys
and they clone your app.
But you do have the cool thing going.
- Mmm. - And I love being cool.
DJI officially unveiled their FPV drone yesterday,
which works with the company's FPV goggles
and combines elements of racing and cinematic drones.
You can fly with GPS and visual positioning systems,
like a normal DJI drone,
or take full manual control
to make it act more like a Cinewhoop-style drone.
- Whoop, whoop! - Do you know what that is?
- [James] Nope, whoop, nope!
- "I'm taking the Cinewhoop for a whoop-whoop."
And a game developer has managed
to force its own game off of Steam,
which is not something you hear every day.
You see, Frogwares, developer of "The Sinking City,"
had do DMCA their former publisher...
Nacon?
Who had published the game on Steam
without Frogwares' approval.
Their reasoning:
"Doesn't look like that cool of a game anyways, guys."
Whoa!
Rude!
Why would you...
Better get at 'em on Twitter for that.
It would be rude to continue this episode,
so it's over.
Come back on Friday for more tech news.
You know, the kind that really sticks to your ribs.
- [James] Oh, I thought you were gonna say tongue.
- That sticks to your tongue.