OnePlus 5T makes the best deal in smartphones even better

Three years and seven phones later, it’s hard to argue with OnePlus’s methods. That’s not to say it hasn’t made its share of missteps along the way (it definitely has), but the company has produced quality phones at affordable prices basically since day one.

OnePlus’s whole “never settle” tagline is less about offering up handsets that live on the bleeding edge than it is giving smartphone buyers the bet bang for their buck. It’s an increasingly important service as flagships start to push right up against the $1,000 mark.
User feedback has always been an important piece of OnePlus’s business model. The company fostered initial interest through an activity message board and an invite-only system, and much of that connection appears to still be intact, seven phones in. The company didn’t rush to include any features on the 5T — many like Portrait Mode and the 18:9 aspect ratio have already been a staple in flagship smartphones for six months or a year.
The company makes no bones about waiting to add features, nor does its rush to drop them for the sake of future-proofing. Case in point, the headphone jack. After a Twitter poll from co-founder Carl Pei found that fans overwhelmingly wanted the headphone jack to stick around, the company’s phones have continued to support the port.
The result, in the case of the OnePlus 5T, is a phone that ticks just about all of the necessary boxes for most Android users. While it’s true that the handset won’t elicit the same sort of high-end phone envy as the latest handsets from companies like Samsung, the 5T is a utilitarian device in the best possible way. It doesn’t push any limits or break any ground, but it offers premium or near-premium specs in a nice package for an accessible starting price of $499 — roughly half of what that shiny new iPhone will cost you.

Utilitarian unibody

It’s clear at first sight that we’re not dealing with anything too fancy here. There’s none of the flash of Samsung Galaxy or iPhone X in the 5T’s design. It’s sturdy though, and still pretty fetching, with an aluminum unibody that still hasn’t gone out of style, as much as bigger handset makers rush each year to one-up it.
The unit we got is “midnight black,” a pretty apt name for a handset with no color accents to break up the darkness. Of course, OnePlus always offers up a zillion different cases to dress the thing up — and add a little protection. Though, keep in mind, unlike most other flagships, there’s no waterproofing on-board — so the company remains a bit behind on that sensible trend.
And while the display has stretched out toward the sides and top, it’s not quite the edge-to-edge offered on higher-end flagships. Though the company did use this generation to do away with the home button like much of the competition, moving the fingerprint reader to the back of the device, and introducing face unlock in the process. The company’s managed to cram a six-inch screen into a moderately sized footprint.
And it’s a lovely display at that. The company opted for a Samsung-designed OLED. It really pops, with bright colors and not any of the drab muddying you’ll find on Google’s somewhat ill-fated Pixel 2 screen. It’s yet another element that belies the product’s totally reasonable price tag.

Camera ready

Like much the rest of the phone, the camera system is less rethinking than refinement. The dual rear-facing cameras are intact — kind of, sort of. Which is to say, the main lens remains unchanged, but the second, optical zoom has been swapped out in favor of one that does better in low light. That means this is one spot where OnePlus will, in fact, make you settle. Getting in tighter on an image means using digital zoom, which, in turn, means a degraded image.
It’s a bummer, but life, as they say is full of compromise. If you’re really missing it this time out, consider buying an Olioclip or some other third-party exterior clip-on lens. Personally, I think the company made the right call here. The low-light performance has been noticeably improved, and I suspect that impacts more users on a day to day basis, cutting out a lot of the noise you get when not shooting a photo in perfect daylight conditions.
Also new is Portrait Mode — another one of those features you’ve been seeing on flagships for a while now. The OnePlus 5 had the feature earlier this year, but the results were pretty widely panned. The 5T’s version is more subtle and, as a result, better. It’s still not quite on par with the highest-end flagships, but does a solid job mimicking the bokeh effect and highlighting its subjects.

Interior design

The 5T’s got a Snapdragon 835, just like its predecessor — a chipset that makes it competitive with other flagships. The handset handle tasks like a champ. The standard 6GB of RAM should be plenty for most users, but another $60 will bump that up to 8GB, and will double the 64GB of storage to 128GB. It’s worth considering, as there’s no expandable storage here, and because, hey, it’s still a pretty good deal.
The battery’s the same 3,300 mAh you’ll find in its predecessor, coupled with the company’s own super-quick Dash Charging tech. You should be able to get a day’s worth of use easy on a single charge, and can go from zero to nothing in about an hour.

The best deal in smartphones

It’s true that the 5T is mostly a refinement over its predecessor — but that’s to be expected, given the fact that it’s only been about six months since the OnePlus 5 hit the market. And besides, that was a great phone that’s been made even better. Sure, the 5T isn’t for those who need a phone to impress the neighbors, but you’re certainly not going to find a better deal for the price.
And given all of the stumbles companies like Google and Samsung have had attempting to stay on the bleeding edge, there’s also something to be said for not being too eager to be the first one to embrace a technology — or drop a headphone jack.

Source: TechCrunch

The Moto Z’s Alexa Smart Speaker is mostly useless

The Moto Z is a phone built around a strong gimmick, but it’s a gimmick nonetheless. A little over a year after release, the company has added some interesting Mods to its selection, but none have offered an entirely compelling justification for the phone’s modular system.

That certainly applies to the new Alexa Smart Speaker. On the face of it, the addition is a no-brainer, riding on the surprising success of Amazon’s home assistant. The Mod brings the popular AI to the Moto Z, while turning the phone into a sort of makeshift version of the Amazon Echo.

Sounds good, right? And the Mod is surprisingly well-crafted — but there’s one key hangup with the add-on: its price. At $150, a lot of the handiness of having an add-on that turns your phone into an Echo kind of goes out the window. That, after all, is $50 more than the second-generation Echo — and the same price as the Echo Plus. Heck, it’s $20 more than the Echo Spot, which also has a screen built in.

For those who can get around the price tag, the Smart Speaker is an interesting addition to the Mod selections. And the press images don’t really do it any justice. It’s got a nice cloth-covered design, with a flat base that lets you prop it to the Moto Z, so you can view the display, without muffling the speaker output.

Like the Echo, the ring around the base glows blue when you speak the wake word. It’s a lot easier to see with the screen facing down, but that kind of defeats the whole purpose of using the speaker with your phone. As for the speaker itself, well, it’s not great. It beats the phone’s built-in sound system in terms of both quality and volume, but it gets distorted fast and is really no replacement for a standalone Bluetooth speaker.

As with other mods, the handset recognizes the accessory immediately when plugged in, though you’ll need to download a special Moto Alexa app to use it. You also need to make sure you’ve got the SIM card installed in the phone or it won’t go to work. The app has some of Alexa’s new functionality — you can customize it to recognize only your voice, for example. But I couldn’t take advantage of the screen by using it to play video off of Amazon Prime.

The accessory is pretty good at listening. I was able to trigger it at a low volume from several feet away, so you can, say, access it while it’s charging. Beyond that, I’m having a bit of difficulty coming up with too many scenarios in which this phone + smart speaker configuration is particularly useful. Frequent travelers who miss their Echo when they leave it at home, perhaps?

Really, the Alexa Smart Speaker highlights the larger issue with most of these Mods. It’s a neat system, but the benefits of having it tied to a modular phone are, at best, minimal. And the fact that the Mods so often cost more than the products they’re designed to replace doesn’t help much, either. 

Source: TechCrunch

Tesla completes the world’s largest battery for Australian wind farm

Tesla has managed to deliver something on time, even if it \’s falling behind its projections for the Model 3 electric car: It has completed production of a massive battery farm in South Australia, which is designed to capture and store energy produced by a wind farm and distribute it to the grid when it’s needed most, in an effort to curb frequent summer blackouts.

The Tesla battery facility can provide power to around 30,000 homes for over an hour when at full capacity, and it will be coming online within the next few days, with final testing underway to make sure the completed facility is ready to roll. The battery farm has a total capacity of 100 megawatts, which makes it the largest overall in the world.
The Wall Street Journal reports that while it’ll be offering backup power during its final testing phase over the next few weeks, it’s going to face its first significant stress tests beginning when Australian summer hits, between December and March. That’s when temperatures soar, and the energy system is taxed as residents crank up the AC and otherwise try to compensate for the blistering heat.
Tesla’s test with this facility isn’t just about dealing with the Australian summer, however – it’ll be a key proof point in helping prove out the long-term viability of renewable energy sources as a realistic total replacement for traditional, less environmentally friendly means of supplying the grid.

Source: TechCrunch

Snips lets you build your own voice assistant to embed into your devices

French startup Snips is now helping you build a custom voice assistant for your device. Snips doesn’t use Amazon’s Alexa Voice Service or Google Assistant SDK — the company is building its own voice assistant so that you can embed it on your devices. And the best part is that it doesn’t send anything to the cloud as it works offline.

If you want to understand how a voice assistant works, you can split it into multiple parts. First, it starts with a wakeword. Snips has a handful of wakewords by default, such as “Hey Snips,” but you can also pay the company to create your own wakeword.
For instance, if you’re building a multimedia robot called Keecker, you can create a custom “Hey Keecker” hot word. Snips then uses deep learning to accurately detect when someone is trying to talk to your voice assistant.
The second part is automatic speech recognition. A voice assistant transcribes your voice into a text query. Popular home assistants usually send a small audio file with your voice and use servers to transcribe your query.
Snips can transcribe your voice into text on the device itself. It works on anything that is more powerful than a Raspberry Pi. For now, Snips is limited to English and French. You’ll have to use a third-party automatic speech recognition API for other languages.
Then, Snips needs to understand your query. The company has developed natural language capabilities. But there are hundreds, or even thousands of different ways to ask a simple question about the weather for instance.
That’s why Snips is launching a data generation service today. I saw a demo yesterday, and the interface looks like Automator on macOS or Workflow on iOS. You define some variables, such as “date” and “location”, you define if they are mandatory for the query and you enter a few examples.
But instead of manually entering hundreds of variations of the same query, you can pay $100 to $800 to let Snips do the work for you. The startup manually checks your request then posts it on Amazon Mechanical Turk and other crowdsourcing marketplaces. Finally, Snips cleans up your data set and sends it back to you.
You can either download it and reuse it in another chatbot or voice assistant, or you can use it with Snips’ own voice assistant. You can also make your capability public. Other Snips users can add this capability to their own assistant by browsing a repository of pre-trained capabilities.

Source: TechCrunch

Bitcoin just passed $8,000

Stop me if you’ve heard this before…

This morning bitcoin shot past ** INSERT PRICE MILESTONE **, and is now hovering around ** INSERT CURRENT PRICE ** — up nearly ** INSERT % ** percent from yesterday.
Just kidding. We don’t actually use that template, but if you’ve been following bitcoin over the last 6 months it probably sounds very familiar.
In all seriousness, bitcoin has been on a wild run. Yesterday the price shot past $8,000 for the first time, and per usual when it breaks through a milestone is now trading solidly above it at $8,250.
Here’s a quick recap of what’s been happening in bitcoin world the last few weeks.
On November 2nd the price of Bitcoin passed $7,000 for the first time, fueled by demand before the Segwit2x hard fork that was supposed to happen a few days ago. Anyone that held a bitcoin prior to the fork would receive an equal amount of the forked coin, which some saw as being akin to free money.
When the hard fork was canceled on November 10th the price plummeted down to $5,800 as people moved their money back into alternative cryptocurrencies. This sudden plummet also coincided with some very strange movement in the price of bitcoin cash (BCH) which saw the price and hash rate spike for about 24 hours, temporarily making it the second most valuable coin and the coin with the most hash rate (even surpassing bitcoin).

Bitcoin’s price over the last month – from coinmarketcap.com

Anyways, now that the drama has passed the price is on a steady climb again and well past $8,000. So what’s causing this?
While I made this argument when it passed $5,000 in early October, I still think that institutional interest is the main cause of this extended rally.
Over 100 cryptocurrency-focused hedge funds have been created in the least year, which are acting as a conduit for large amounts of fiat being converted to bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. Even old-school hedge funds and investment institutions are getting in on the action, to the extend that there are services that allow them to safely do so.
And these services are coming. Just last week Coinbase announced a service to securely store $10M or more of cryptocurrency for institutional investors. Additionally, CME group will launch the first ever regulated bitcoin futures product on December 10th. Both of these offerings will make it easier for large diversified investment vehicles to enter the market.
So what’s next? No one knows, but at this point it looks like $10k before the end of the year is possible. Of course it’s just as likely for the price to plummet, as many say we are due for a correction.

Source: TechCrunch

Watch Tesla’s new Roadster show off its record-breaking speed

Tesla has delivered the ultimate fan car – a revamped version of its original Roadster, with crazy fast acceleration of 0 to 60 mph in just 1.9 seconds, 0 to 100 mph times of only 4.2 seconds, a top speed north of 250 mph and 621 miles of estimated range on a single charge.

There’s nothing quite like seeing the car peel out in person, which I got a chance to do at the Tesla Semi unveiling yesterday, but the video above provides at least some idea of how fast this thing can go. IRL, it’s actually so fast and so ground-hugging that it kind of muddies your brain a bit to look at it operating in a world where physics still exists.
I’m sure we’ll get a lot more looks at the Roadster in action leading up to its launch, which is currently set for 2020. And if you want to be one of the first owners posting videos to YouTube, you can reserve a Founder’s Series edition now, with just $5,000 due immediately, and then the remaining $245,000 due in 10 days.

Source: TechCrunch

Fintech startup Glint de-cloaks to offer a multi-currency account and card that supports spending gold

London-based Glint has been pretty stealthy about what it planned to offer, despite several funding rounds and a vague description that it wanted to a create new “global currency” based on gold. Well, today the fintech startup is finally de-cloaking with a staggered launch of its multi-currency account, app and card that does indeed let you store your money in gold and convert it back to fiat currency at the point of payment.

Initially, Glint, which is regulated by the FCA under an e-money institution license, is supporting Sterling and gold, with more currencies to come. Exchange rates between currencies are promised to be “the real exchange rate,” and the Glint card itself is a Mastercard and therefore widely accepted.
However, while some users may join for the low exchange rate and the Glint wallet’s multi-currency support, the startup’s differentiation is of course the way it does in effect turn gold into a widely accepted global currency, albeit it by proxy.
Available for iOS only, the way the app works is as follows: once you have successfully signed up, including passing the mandatory anti-money laundering checks, you are asked to top up your account. You can then choose to either leave your money in Sterling or convert it into gold (and in future any of the other supported currencies). Then when you pay for things with the Glint debit card you tell the app which ‘wallet’ (a particular fiat currency or gold) you want to spend from, and Glint does the conversion on the fly, including effectively selling the required gold to cover the cost of the purchase.
In terms of how your gold is stored, Glint says that physical gold holdings are legally allocated to each individual user and held in a London Bullion Market Association Accredited Brink’s bank vault in Switzerland. For the privilege, I’m told the startup charges an annual storage fee, which is taken monthly in arrears.
Much like the argument behind Bitcoin, the wider premise is that by storing your cash in gold, you avoid the volatility of fiat currencies and manipulation from central banks. Unlike Bitcoin, however, gold as a storage of value is pretty stable and, of course, older than even fiat money.
Meanwhile, as I’ve noted before, Glint’s founders both know a thing or two about gold.
CEO Jason Cozens co-founded GoldMadeSimple.com, a website that helps clients buy and sell physical gold and have it stored securely or delivered. He also previously founded two other companies: Visuality — where he is said to have pioneered Virtual Reality, e-commerce and online marketing, selling to ERP software company McGuffie Brunton — and Bite, a digital marketing agency.
Glint COO Ben Davies is said to have over 17 years’ experience within international financial and commodity markets. He was the former head of trading at RBS Greenwich, and co-founded Hinde Capital in 2007, an alternative investment management company specialising in precious metals.
To date, Glint has raised £6.1 million. Backers include most recently NEC Capital Solutions (through its venture fund co-operated with Venture Labo Investment) and Tokyo Commodity Exchange, in addition to Bray Capital and a number of angel investors from the banking and asset management industry.

Source: TechCrunch

100 cryptocurrencies described in four words or less

Name            | Sym.  | Description                              
----------------|-------|------------------------------------------
Bitcoin         | BTC   | Digital gold                             
Ethereum        | ETH   | Programmable contracts and money         
Bitcoin Cash    | BCH   | Bitcoin clone                            
Ripple          | XRP   | Enterprise payment settlement network    
Litecoin        | LTC   | Faster Bitcoin                           
Dash            | DASH  | Privacy-focused Bitcoin clone            
NEO             | NEO   | Chinese-market Ethereum                  
NEM             | XEM   | Batteries-included digital assets        
Monero          | XMR   | Private digital cash                     
Ethereum Classic| ETC   | Ethereum clone                           
IOTA            | MIOTA | Internet-of-things payments              
Qtum            | QTUM  | Ethereum contracts on Bitcoin            
OmiseGO         | OMG   | Banking, remittance, and exchange        
Zcash           | ZEC   | Private digital cash                     
BitConnect      | BCC   | Madoff-like investment fund              
Lisk            | LSK   | Decentralized applications in JavaScript 
Cardano         | ADA   | Layered currency and contracts           
Tether          | USDT  | Price = 1 USD                            
Stellar Lumens  | XLM   | Digital IOUs                             
EOS             | EOS   | Decentralized applications on WebAssembly
Hshare          | HSR   | Blockchain switchboard                   
Waves           | WAVES | Decentralized exchange and crowdfunding  
Stratis         | STRAT | Decentralized applications in C#         
Komodo          | KMD   | Decentralized ICOs                       
Ark             | ARK   | Blockchain switchboard                   
Electroneum     | ETN   | Monero clone                             
Bytecoin        | BCN   | Privacy-focused cryptocurrency           
Steem           | STEEM | Reddit with money voting                 
Ardor           | ARDR  | Blockchain for spawning blockchains      
Binance Coin    | BNB   | Pay Binance exchange fees                
Augur           | REP   | Decentralized prediction market          
Populous        | PPT   | Invoice trading futures                  
Decred          | DCR   | Bitcoin with alternative governance      
TenX            | PAY   | Cryptocurrency credit card               
MaidSafeCoin    | MAID  | Rent disk space                          
BitcoinDark     | BTCD  | Zcoin close                              
BitShares       | BTS   | Decentralized exchange                   
Golem           | GNT   | Rent other people's computers            
PIVX            | PIVX  | Inflationary Dash clone                  
Gas             | GAS   | Pay fees on Neo                          
TRON            | TRX   | In-app-purchases                         
Vertcoin        | VTC   | Bitcoin clone                            
MonaCoin        | MONA  | Japanese Dogecoin                        
Factom          | FCT   | Decentralized record keeping             
Basic Attention | BAT   | Decentralized ad network                 
SALT            | SALT  | Cryptocurrency-backed loans              
Kyber Network   | KNC   | Decentralized exchange                   
Dogecoin        | DOGE  | Serious meme bitcoin clone               
DigixDAO        | DGD   | Organisation manages tokenized gold      
Veritaseum      | VERI  | Vaporware                                
Walton          | WTC   | IoT Blockchain                           
SingularDTV     | SNGLS | Decentralized Netflix                    
Bytom           | BTM   | Physical assets as tokens                
Byteball Bytes  | GBYTE | Decentralized database and currency      
GameCredits     | GAME  | Video game currency                      
Metaverse ETP   | ETP   | Chinese Ethereum plus identity           
GXShares        | GXS   | Decentralized Chinese Equifax            
Syscoin         | SYS   | Decentralized marketplace                
Siacoin         | SC    | Rent disk space                          
Status          | SNT   | Decentralized application browser        
0x              | ZRX   | Decentralized exchange                   
Verge           | XVG   | Privacy Dogecoin                         
Lykke           | LKK   | Digital asset exchange                   
Civic           | CVC   | Identity and Authentication App          
Blocknet        | BLOCK | Decentralized exchange                   
Metal           | MTL   | Payments with rewards program            
Iconomi         | ICN   | Digital asset investment funds           
Aeternity       | AE    | Decentralized apps (prototype)           
DigiByte        | DGB   | Faster Bitcoin                           
Bancor          | BNT   | Token Index Funds                        
Ripio Credit    | RCN   | Co-signed Cryptocurrency Loans           
ATMChain        | ATM   | Advertising network                      
Gnosis          | GNO   | Decentralized prediction market          
VeChain         | VEN   | Supply chain item IDs                    
Pura            | PURA  | Cryptocurrency                           
Particl         | PART  | Privacy marketplace and chat             
KuCoin Shares   | KCS   | Profit-sharing exchange fees             
Bitquence       | BQX   | Mint for cryptocurrency investments      
FunFair         | FUN   | Decentralized casino                     
ChainLink       | LINK  | External data for contracts              
Power Ledger    | POWR  | Airbnb for electricity                   
Nxt             | NXT   | Cryptocurrency and marketplace           
Monaco          | MCO   | Cryptocurrency credit card               
Cryptonex       | CNX   | Zerocoin clone                           
MCAP            | MCAP  | Mining investment fund                   
Storj           | STORJ | Rent disk space                          
ZenCash         | ZEN   | Privacy-focused Bitcoin clone            
Nexus           | NXS   | Bitcoin clone                            
Neblio          | NEBL  | Decentralized application platform       
Zeusshield      | ZSC   | Decentralized insurance                  
Streamr DATAcoin| DATA  | Real-time data marketplace               
ZCoin           | XZC   | Private digital cash                     
NAV Coin        | NAV   | Bitcoin with private transactions        
AdEx            | ADX   | Advertising exchange                     
Open Trading    | OTN   | Decentralized exchange                   
SmartCash       | SMART | Zcoin clone with rewards                 
Bitdeal         | BDL   | Bitcoin clone                            
Loopring        | LRC   | Decentralized exchange                   
Edgeless        | EDG   | Decentralized casino                     
FairCoin        | FAIR  | Bitcoin that rewards savers

Coin ranking from coinmarketcap.com.

Inspired by Greg Wilson.

Source: TechCrunch

Canadian grocery chain orders 25 Tesla electric Semi trucks

Tesla’s Semi is off to a promising start, despite there being no official pricing information available yet: In addition to a Walmart pilot, Canadian grocery giant Loblaw is purchasing 25 of the heavy duty all-electric transport trucks (via Canadian Press), with a $5,000 deposit for each upfront even though pricing is TBD for the vehicle, which is supposed to start shipping in 2019.

Loblaw has a target of running a fully electric vehicle fleet to support its stores, as part of a goal of reducing its emissions impact by 2030. The plan is to eventually have as many as 350 zero-emission vehicles in operation by that time, and taking those diesel cars off the road could help it reduce its carbon footprint by the equivalent of taking around 20,000 consumer cars with internal combustion engines off the road.
Tesla has said that its cost of operation for the Semi will help shippers save money on a per mile basis right away, and that’s likely meant to help lessen the impact of sticker shock when it finally does reveal the upfront price. But as I mentioned with the Walmart pilot, which will involve a trial of 15 Semi trucks across the U.S. and Canada, there’s additional value in helping these major shippers meet their green targets.
This Loblaw backing is another sign that Tesla’s crazy truck dreams likely aren’t all that crazy after all, and could be perfectly timed to take advantage of a business climate where major retailers with significant logistics operations are looking for ways to minimize their carbon footprint, while also hoping to achieve cost benefits over the lifetime of their fleet.

Source:  TechCrunch

This is Tesla’s big new all-electric truck – the Tesla Semi

Tesla has unveiled its all-electric semi truck, aptly dubbed the ‘Tesla Semi,’ as promised, and the resulting Class 8 transport vehicle is indeed a sight to behold. It boasts a considerable charge capacity, and has a very aesthetically distinct look, as you can see, which will obviously help it stand out from other commercial freight vehicles on the road. The Tesla Semi will go 0 to 60 mph in just 5 seconds, which is incredibly fast compared to a diesel truck. It can go 0 to 60 mph towing 80,000 lbs, its max tow load, in just 20 seconds. It can go 65 mph up a 5 percent grade, which is way better than the 45 mph max that a diesel competitor can do. And for range, it can go 500 miles at highway speed, and less than 80 percent trips are at 250 miles. It also has a better drag coefficient than a super car thanks to its extremely aerodynamic design.
The real secret weapon of the truck, however, isn’t that it can turn into a giant fighting robot (this feature hasn’t been activated yet, if it does exist, and Tesla won’t admit that it does). Instead, it’s that the truck offers a transmission that requires no shifting of gears (as is normal for fully electric vehicles) with regenerative braking that provides “basically infinite” brake life per Tesla.

Tesla also says that the Semi outperforms its diesel rivals in terms of responsiveness and handling, and can cover more miles than a diesel semi truck in the same timespan, with safer operation in and around regular traffic. It also uses a number of Model 3 components to maximize production efficiencies, including individual Model 3 motors for each wheel, and even Model 3 inset door handles.
Another standout for Tesla’s Semi lies in its design – the company points out that that cabin is tailor-made for drivers, with starts that are designed to make it easier to get in and out, and the ability to stand fully when inside the cab. The driver is also centered in the cab relative to the road, a unique twist on vehicle design in general, but a logical one for a car class that almost never has a passenger. There’s a removable jump seat for a passenger, too, offset and behind the main driver position.
Tesla has also added not one, but two of its favorite in-cabin vehicle features to the Semi: Touchscreens. These are positioned on either side of the driver and offer navigation information, blind spot monitoring, and trip data logging applications. There’s also a suite of fleet management and routing tools, which Tesla says would ordinarily require third-party add-on hardware to incorporate into a car.

Electric trucks aren’t the exclusive purview of Musk and Tesla, of course. There’s the somewhat trollishly named Nikola, which is working on a hybrid hydrogen powered electric powertrain, which its building with Bosch. Also, Daimler has revealed its own concept for a Mitsubishi E-FUSO fully electric Vision One truck with 220 miles of range, but with no specified release window.
 What’s the big deal about an electric semi truck? It’s a fair question, especially given the range of traditional Diesel engine heavy-duty trucks. These can have ranges of up to nearly 900 miles on a single tank. But the long-term advantages of electric trucks could make a lot of sense, both from a relatively obvious ecological perspective, which is obvious, and from the perspective of cost-effectiveness.
 It also charges up at solar-powered Megachargers, and can get 400 miles of range on a single 30 minute charge, which can be done while you’re loading and unloading by detaching the cab. Tesla plans to have these Megachargers placed worldwide to ensure that people can move from one destination to anther easily and charge without issue at both destination and origin. Electric trucks could be longer-lived and less expensive to maintain over the long term, and the cost to refuel them over their lifetimes should be far less than the cost to operate a truck that uses an internal combustion engine. Tesla says the Semi requires “significantly less maintenance” than a diesel truck, in particular because it lacks the high-strain moving parts of internal combustion engine vehicles, including the engine, transmission, after-treatment system and differentials. The Tesla Semi also offers advanced safety features, with a special battery design that reinforces the battery units themselves and also helps lower the center of gravity of the truck overall thanks to their positioning in the chassis. The windshield is also built of glass designed to resist impacts, and the truck is made to avoid jackknifing, a common problem for this class of truck, by automatically detecting any stability that could lead to this issue and torquing each wheel accordingly, whose also activating the brakes as needed. Surround view cameras try to eliminate blind sots, and also help to support object detection, providing alerts to the driver automatically when they identify potential hazards. Tesla has also built Enhanced Autopilot features into its Semi, which is not surprising given the work it’s done pioneering and refining these drier assistance features on its lineup of consumer cars. On the Semi, Tesla’s Autopilot offers automated emergency braking, lane keeping and lane departure warnings to help encourage safe highway driving.
This is definitely a futuristic version of the modern transport truck, with a lot of bells and whistles that indeed look like they could make the lives of both freight shipping companies and drivers much more comfortable and convenient overall. The focus on drivers, in particular, is interesting as it appears as though Tesla is hoping to gain support for its trucking from ground-up endorsement, as well as by appealing to the long-term financial reasoning of the shipping companies themselves.

Source: TechCrunch

What to expect from Tesla’s big electric truck reveal

Tesla is set to take the lid off its electric truck tomorrow for the first time, after months of teasing the big rig. Tesla CEO Elon Musk is still doing some teasing of his own, posting to his Instagram account a short video clip of the truck all draped in shadow — but we’re still going to learn a lot tomorrow. Here’s a quick breakdown of what we know, what we think we know and what gaps we hope Tesla will fill at its big unveiling.

A truck

Easy ones first — we’re going to see a huge truck at 8 PM PT tomorrow, and it’ll look recognizably truck-like. We know this much because Tesla has told us so directly, and we’ve seen the teaser images that are going around, which include a barely concealed silhouette that’s definitely a truck with a trailer.
We’ve also potentially seen the full thing unobscured, too. A Reddit post revealed a spy shot taken by a passerby that shows what looks like it could very well be the Tesla semi truck. It bears more than a passing resemblance to the truck cloaked in shadow from the official Tesla images, and it was taken at a spot that’s supposedly been used for Tesla vehicle testing in the past.

But what kind of truck?

So we know we’ll see a truck, and we know it’ll be a big one. Musk has previously said that the truck would be able to suit the needs of large-freight shippers, and that they’ll be unveiling a “working prototype” of a vehicle intended to be produced at scale potentially within around two years.
Musk talked earlier about how Tesla has worked directly with potential customers for the truck, talking to freight-shipping companies throughout the vehicle-design process to ensure that it meets their needs and is an attractive option to them in all regards once it becomes available to purchase.

Range and capacity

The key ingredients for the truck from a commercial viability perspective will be how much it can tow, and how far. As a Class 8 truck, it’ll have a total max weight load of around 80,000 lbs., and to get a decent range out of something that heavy you’ll need a lot of battery capacity.
An earlier report claimed that the Tesla truck would have between 200 and 300 miles of all-electric range, which would require a huge battery pack — which will likely mean at least a 500 or 600 kW capacity for onboard storage, and likely more.
If Tesla can hit that range, with that load capacity, they can offer a product that’s good for short and shorter medium-haul routes, which are key for frequent trips for logistics companies between major hubs and large retail stores, for instance. Even with a higher upfront cost for the truck, they can offer better lifetime value in terms of mechanical systems maintenance and cost of powering the vehicle, which should help with the overall value proposition.

Autonomy

The Tesla semi truck sounds like it could pack some pretty significant surprises, if Musk isn’t just hyping for hype’s sake with his comments around the launch event. One thing that has previously been rumored, and that there exists a bit of a bread crumb trail for, is the inclusion of autonomous driving features in the truck.
A report from August revealed that Tesla has had discussions with the Nevada and the California DMVs around potential autonomous testing of a truck. Even the inclusion of Tesla’s Autopilot system might be a selling point, depending on how it’s presented, but others are also chasing trucking as a relatively low-hanging fruit in terms of implementing autonomous driving technology in the relative short term.
This would be a definite whiz-bang feature reveal for Tesla to trot out at the reveal, even if it’s already been rumored, and a future-focused component.

Extras

There could be plenty more revealed tomorrow, and in fact Musk has made some interesting remarks to that effect, too. He said at the Tesla annual shareholder meeting earlier this year (when the event was still planned for September) that he “really recommend[ed] showing up,” since “maybe there’s a little more than we’re saying here.” Could that be a rumored Tesla streaming music service? Or maybe the truck really is an all-electric Optimus Prime. Either way, tune in right here on TC to find out tomorrow starting at 8 PM PT.

Source: TechCrunch

China’s third-largest bike sharing service, which raised $90M, is reportedly closing down

Bike-sharing, the year’s hottest startup trend in China and beyond, looks like it is about to see the biggest casualty of its cut-throat competition.

Bluegogo, which had raised $90 million from investors and operates around 700,000 bikes across China, seems headed for the deadpool after Technode, our Chinese partner site, reported that the company has lost a slew of top executives and is now preventing users from withdrawing their 100 RMB ($15) deposit due to financial issues.
Things are so bad, Technode said, that the company is in the process of dissolving and all salary payments to employees have been delayed until February 2018. Staff have reportedly already waited months without being paid, and the website is no longer online.
In yet another bad sign: the CEO is said to be ‘somewhere overseas.’
are in talks over a potential merger, but it does have a major China presence and it did make an effort to expand to San Francisco. That global plan collapsed, however, due to issues with local regulation.
Mobike and Ofo, meanwhile, are in the process of ambitions expansion plans aimed at taking their services to more than 200 cities across North America, China and Europe. This tale is a reminder of their dominance at home and what it takes to even just compete at this point.

Source: TechCrunch

Mysterious ‘green line of death’ appears on some iPhone X displays

It wouldn’t be the launch of a first-generation Apple product without a few hiccups — who can forget Antennagate and Bendgate? — and the iPhone X is no different. A handful of users report that a mysterious and inextinguishable green line has appeared on their device’s display.

The above images, from Twitter users mix0mat0sis, Nate Heagy and Christian Roman, represent a few of the examples of the “green line of death” as the latter called it. No one seems to know what causes it or how prevalent it actually is. I’ve asked Apple for comment.
We can at least speculate on one part of that. iPhone Xs have a new diamond sub-pixel pattern in their displays, and as such all green sub-pixels appear in lines, while red and blue alternate. You can see that in this image taken as part of DisplayMate’s tests:

It seems likely that an electrical fault in a few phones is causing voltage to flow to all the green sub-pixels in a line. That it stretches all the way from top to bottom suggests it’s something at the edge of the display that’s sending an incorrect voltage down a few lines of pixels (if it were just one line of sub-pixels, it would appear much thinner). The line tends to be close to the right or left side of the phone, but that’s harder to diagnose.
This kind of issue always pops up in ambitious devices that use several new kinds of tech at scale. It happened to Samsung last year, except the line was pink. Even if only 0.001 percent of the displays they put together were faulty, a frequency that’s nearly impossible to test for, a few users will still end up with a bum phone.
One such user already reports that their phone was replaced at the Apple store, so it seems unlikely that this is a software issue. Is your phone showing this line? Take a picture and let us know. Then take it in to be replaced.

Source: TechCrunch

Roomi raises $11 million to find you a roommate

Looking for a roommate on Craigslist can be cumbersome. And it can be difficult to determine what the person will be like in real life.

A startup called Roomi thinks it has a better solution for finding people to live with. Its app and website help you search for apartment listings with background-checked profiles from the tenants. It also pulls data from social media, like photos and employment information.
New York-based Roomi says it has signed up a million people since it launched in 2015. Its average customer is a young professional, aged 26.
Roomi is announcing that it’s raised $11 million to accelerate its business.The round is led by London-based Atami Capital, with participation from DCM, Great Oaks Venture Capital and others. Strategic investors including Scott and Cyan Banister are also participating. This brings the total funding raised to date to $17 million.
Founder and CEO Ajay Yadav said the goal of Roomi is to “help young people find flexible affordable shared housing options.” He believes that Roomi stands out from the competition because it “focuses a lot on the trust factor.”
Yadav said he came up with the idea to “moderate the marketplace” after he became frustrated searching for his own apartment.
Roomi is in over 21 cities, but it says its top markets are New York, LA and San Francisco. Yadav said he hopes the investment from Atami Capital will help Roomi expand to London next.
The funding will also be used to “double down on the product.”

Source: TechCrunch

Driverless shuttle in Las Vegas gets in fender bender within an hour

A driverless shuttle set free in downtown Las Vegas was involved in a minor accident less than an hour after it hit the streets, reported the local NBC affiliate KSNV. Not really the kind of publicity you want, or that self-driving cars need.

The shuttle, an egglike 8-seater Navya, is operated by the AAA and Keolis. It was a test deployment along half a mile of the Fremont East “Innovation District,” so this thing wasn’t cruising the strip. Probably a good thing.
Now, it must be said that technically the robo-car was not at fault. It was struck by a semi that was backing up, and really just grazed — none of the passengers was hurt.
Like any functioning autonomous vehicle, the shuttle can avoid obstacles and stop in a hurry if needed. What it apparently can’t do is move a couple feet out of the way when it looks like a 20-ton truck is going to back into it.
A passenger interviewed by KSNV shared her frustration:

The shuttle just stayed still and we were like, ‘oh my gosh, it’s gonna hit us, it’s gonna hit us!’ and then.. it hit us! And the shuttle didn’t have the ability to move back, either. Like, the shuttle just stayed still.

Surely this situation is not so rare that the shuttle’s designers did not allow for it? Moving the car out of the way of an oncoming vehicle seems like a pretty elementary safety measure.
A City of Las Vegas representative issued a statement that the shuttle “did what it was supposed to do, in that its sensors registered the truck and the shuttle stopped to avoid the accident.” It also claims, lamely, that “Had the truck had the same sensing equipment that the shuttle has the accident would have been avoided.”
Not if it failed to react properly, as arguably was the case with the shuttle. Testing will continue, but I have to say I wouldn’t get on this thing until they demonstrate that it can do more than just stop.

Source: TechCrunch

Alibaba smashes its Single’s Day record once again as sales cross $25 billion

Alibaba has set another Single’s Day record after the e-commerce giant sold over $25 billion of product on the Chinese biggest online shopping date.

The full number comes in at 163.8 billion RMB, that’s roughly $25.3 billion, in GMV — that’s “gross merchandise volume” which is used to measure a dollar value for all sales on a platform. In Alibaba’s case, that predominantly means its Taobao marketplace and Tmall brand store although it does offer sales via its international services and it ships worldwide. All told, Alibaba handled 1.48 Billion transactions during the 24-hour period.
That represents an impressive 39 percent increase on last year’s sales total of RMB 120.7 billion ($17.79 billion), and it comes nicely on the heels of another blockbuster quarter in which Alibaba’s revenue surged by 61 percent thanks to its core business in China.
For comparison, Alibaba’s Single’s Day haul puts America’s largest shopping days in the corner. Retailers pulled in a record $3 billion on Black Friday and then $3.45 billion on Cyber Monday, both of which were records.
Related: Rival JD.com revealed its 11/11 GMV for the first time after processing 127.1 billion RMB ($19.14 billion)

The year’s numbers also signal a return to growth for Single’s Day (11/11) sales, an important area that investors will look at and Alibaba needs to show progress on.
While the jump isn’t as much as the 60 percent Alibaba saw yearly from from 2013 to 2015, it is up on last year’s 32 percent which is impressive given the scale that the event has reached today and the growth that Alibaba’s business has seen since then.
The holiday began as a promotion for TMall started by current CEO Daniel Zhang, who was then in charge of the business unit, as a way to make single people feel less lonely, but it has since blossomed into the world’s largest single shopping date by some margin.
GMV is off the charts, but it is important to note that this is not revenue for Alibaba. The company makes money from e-commerce in two main ways. It charges a commission and ‘store fee’ to brands that are accepted to Tmall; Taobao doesn’t charge fees to merchants, it instead makes money by charging them for ads that boost their product/store visibility.

It’s important to note sales in RMB and USD due to varying exchange rates

This year’s 11/11 got off to a fast start with around $7 billion of goods sold in the first 30 minutes of the day alone. Alibaba went on to surpass last year’s $18 billion total after just twelve hours of sales.
Another important metric is mobile. Not only does a higher number mean that Alibaba is reaching new/newish internet users, but mobile users tend to be more engaged which is obviously an important goal.
This year, Alibaba said 90 percent of sales were made on mobile which is up on 82 percent for 2016 and 69 percent in 2015.
Among the many stats released by Alibaba, the following stand out:

• Order total numbers hit 812 million, up 23 percent
• Alibaba Cloud, which handled the infrastructure, managed 325,000 orders at peak
• Alipay processed 1.5 billion payment transactions, up 41 percent
• Over 140,000 brands — including 60,000 international — took part on Tmall where they offered 15 million product listings
• 167 merchants generated over 100 million RMB ($15.1 million) in sales each
• 17 merchants surpassed 500 million RMB ($75.4 million) each
• Six merchants surpassed 1 billion RMB ($150.9 million) each

Source: TechCrunch

Alphabet and Goldman Sachs are suing adtech startup Outcome Health for alleged fraud

Investors are suing Outcome Health, a startup selling ad space on screens in doctors’ offices, for alleged fraud and breach of contract eight months after pouring $500 million into the company.

First reported in The Wall Street Journal, investors Goldman Sachs, which invested $100 million into the company, Alphabet’s investment arm CapitalG, Norwest Venture Partners and Laurene Powell Jobs’ Emerson Collective Investments, which each invested $50 million, are seeking to freeze $225 million in those investments, according to the lawsuit, alleging Outcome Health misled investors by “knowingly providing false data and financial reports before the firms invested $487.5 million beginning in March,” according to the Journal report.
The $225 million was set aside in a subsidiary to pay investors dividends on the investment.
These same investors now want their money back, claiming in the lawsuit Outcome Health “now hold securities that may be worthless.”
In October, TechCrunch reported on allegations Outcome Health had possibly misled advertisers by allegedly charging them for ad placements on more video screens than the company had installed.
At the time, Outcome Health denied those allegations and the Journal reported it had “found nothing to demonstrate top executives’ involvement in the alleged misleading of advertisers.”
Outcome now tells TechCrunch, “The equity investors led by Goldman Sachs are misusing the court system to advance their own short-term, self-interest of winning an advantage over debt-holders — all to the detriment of the business, its employees and customers.”
However, Outcome told the Journal it had put three employees on paid leave last month, following the report. It had also hired the law firm of former U.S. attorney Dan Webb to look into the allegations.
Investors also became alarmed at the allegations and, according to the Journal, pressed Outcome’s CEO Rishi Shah to provide backup of his claims, only to discover “manipulations consistent with those reported by The Wall Street Journal,” according to the suit.
The lawsuit also alleges Shah was working to move the funds out of the subsidiary, though investors say in the suit they have been unable to verify this activity.
“We want to use the capital we would be entitled to take out personally instead for the benefit of the business, to further capitalize Outcome Health based on our confidence and commitment to the company and its mission,” Outcome Health told TechCrunch in a statement. “We have been completely transparent with  employees, customers and investors, and always operated with complete integrity.”
It should be noted that even if the courts should rule in favor of these investors, it may be difficult for them to pull their money out. Outcome Health reportedly currently owes somewhere in the neighborhood of $300 million to creditors who would require the startup to pay them back before anyone else.
We’ve reached out to the aforementioned investors individually and are waiting to hear back about this case. We will be sure to update you if and when they do.

Source: TechCrunch

Tencent could play a role redesigning Snapchat following $2B investment

Tencent, the Chinese internet giant valued at $470 billion, may have a hand in rebooting the Snapchat app to make it more competitive with Instagram and Facebook.

Off the back of some very poor financials announced this week, parent company Snap said it is retooling the messaging app “to make it easier to use.”
Now Tencent, which upped its stake in Snap with the purchase of 12 percent of the company — forking out around $2 billion in the process — may be on hand to help. It said is positioned to enable Snap to dig into its experience of growing WeChat, China’s dominant messaging app which boasts 800 million monthly users worldwide, and potentially tap into other business lines, including its games business which includes Clash Of Clans maker Supercell.
“The investment enables Tencent to explore cooperation opportunities with the company on mobile games publishing and newsfeed as well as to share its financial returns from the growth of its businesses and monetization in the future,” a Tencent spokesperson told Reuters in a statement.
Tencent first invested in Snap in 2013 although the size of its stake in the company is not public information. As backers go, the company brings considerable clout and know-how in the messaging space. Most impressive is the manner in which it turned WeChat from a messaging app into a social ‘Swiss army knife’ that users in China turn to for a range of services including payment, e-commerce, local services, investments, banking and more.
Tencent also has a long-standing interest in U.S. tech companies, and it hasn’t been shy backing a number with investments. Its U.S. portfolio includes chat app Kik, Tesla and games firm Activision, while it has invested in global messaging apps like Hike in India and South Korea’s Kakao.
This experience is likely to be welcomed by Snap as it looks for what trends will come next in messaging and alternative ways it can engage users to compete with Instagram.

Source: TechCrunch

EV startup Nio reportedly raises $1B from Tencent and others

Electric cars are set to become an increasingly lucrative investment target, if they continuing enjoying the strong support of global initiatives to lower emissions and put clearer vehicles on roads. So expect more funding like the reported $1 billion that Niobium’s (formerly NextEV) has raised from a host of investors led by Tencent, per Reuters.

The Chinese carmaker has already set a launch window for its first all-electric car, a seven-seater SUV which is going to be available in the middle of next month. Nio is hoping tho then also bring an autonomous EV to U.S. shores by 2020, and it raised $600 million in a round that closed just this past March.
The Shanghai based company added some new investors during this round, according to Reuters, including U.S. hedge fund Lone Pine Capital, and the round values the young automaker at around $5 billion. Niobium’s is working with Chinese automaker Chongqing Changan Automobile on a joint venture focused on development and sales of EVs, too. Source: TechCrunch

Google to launch an AirDrop competitor, file manager, and cleanup utility called Files Go

Google is preparing to soon launch a new mobile app called Files Go that will allow Android users to better manage the files on their phone, transfer those files easily – even when offline – as well as free up storage space on their devices as needed. The app will become available to users worldwide in early December.

Files Go was first spotted by 9to5Google on the Play Store, where it was available in an early access program for testing purposes. The test was full, but the site was able to get a sneak peek at the app’s features by reading the description and viewing screenshots.
It appears that Files Go is basically part file manager, part file transfer utility, and part clean up wizard. The main interface shows an overview of how much storage space is being used by files and offers tools to clean the app cache, or browse through other areas where files may have accumulated – like those received from a chat application, for example.
Another screen offers a list of file types, like Images, Videos, and Audio, as well as a section for “Received” files.
  As you dive into the various sections, you can then filter the files by source for easier discovery, access, or deletion. For instance, you can choose to display only files from the camera, those that are screenshots, those from a chat application, and so on.
Of course, Google already offers a clean up utility as part of its Google Photos application, but Files Go has a broader focus that’s not just limited to photos and video.
In addition, one of the more notable features in Files Go is a file transfer utility that works over Bluetooth, meaning users could share files with others, even if offline. This appears to be an Android-flavored version of Apple’s AirDrop, which also uses Bluetooth to share things like photos, videos, documents and contacts with nearby Apple devices.
However, Files Go’s screenshot indicates that both users will have to have the app open to send and receive files at the time of transfer.
Some reports about the new app speculated that Files Go is being developed for emerging markets only, noting its offline capabilities and the “Go” branding – the latter which also seems to reference Android Go, Google’s lightweight version of Android for cheaper phones.
We understand, however, that Files Go will be made globally available at launch in the beginning of December.
Reached for comment, a Google spokesperson confirmed the app’s existence in the following statement:

“We are always doing experiments on ways to help users get the most from their smartphones. We have nothing specific to announce at this time.”

Source: TechCrunch

Intersection raises $150 million for the global expansion of its free Wi-Fi

As it looks to expand the global footprint of its internet-enabled digital advertising and informational kiosks, New York-based Intersection has raised $150 million in a new round of financing.

The company has installed hundreds of its obelisk-like Link devices in both London and New York, where it has supplanted the the telephone booths and payphone stands that have served alternatively as icons and urban eyesores for generations of metropolitan commuters.

Now, it’s looking to expand with a major hiring push and new installations across cities including Philadelphia, Chicago, Charlotte, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, New York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, New Jersey, San Francisco, Seattle, and London.

The new financing was led by Graham Holdings Company, the publicly traded conglomerate run by the former owners of the Washington Post, which now holds interests in education services companies(Kaplan), television stations, online news, and healthcare. Additional investors ArrowMark Partners and NewSpring Capital.

In a statement, the company said it would use the money to accelerate the digitization of its existing billboards and outdoor advertising spaces and accelerate the development of its technological capabilities.

Previous investor Sidewalk Labs, a division of Google’s parent company, Alphabet, did not participate in the latest round, according to a person familiar with the transaction.

Intersection is one component of Sidewalk Labs’ strategy to bring internet connectivity and data collection to cities around the globe. The company believes that the advertising-supported internet services, government communications and local news, and monitoring and tracking services its kiosks provide will be a boon to city living around the world.

It’s a play to be an integral part of the smart cities movements that aim to enhance quality of life in urban environments with tools to monitor and manage how those cities run.

“We believe in the transformative power of technology to elevate the urban experience – delivering benefits like free internet connectivity, real-time information, localized content, and civic services – as Link has done on the streets of New York City and London,” said Ari Buchalter, CEO of Intersection.

Founded in 2015 through the merger of Titan Outdoor and Control Group by a consortium of investors including Sidewalk Labs, Intersection has been the architect of providing free wireless internet to large swathes of New York through the LinkNYC initiative.

The rollout has not been without controversy, as BuzzFeed reported that the initial devices included beacons, which could potentially track users and push out local advertising to them. The beacons were removed from the kiosks that the company installed in New York.

So far, the Link network includes LinkNYC, InLinkUK, and LinkPHL in Philadelphia. There’re also kiosks in New York’s subways and on the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transit Authority’s network of trains.

“Intersection is the clear leader in deploying real-world smart city solutions at scale,” said Tim O’Shaughnessy, chief executive of Graham Holdings in a statement. “We believe there is tremendous opportunity for the company to leverage their experience from massive deployments like LinkNYC, extensive municipal and advertising relationships, and unique capabilities in data, engineering, user experience, and design to create tremendous value for cities, consumers, and brands.”

As part of the investment O’Shaughnessy, Jake Mass, a senior vice president at Graham Holdings and the co-founder and general partner of NewSpring Capital, Marc Lederman, will take seats on the company’s board of directors. Allen & Co. advised Intersection on the investment.

Source: TechCrunch
 

Intel and AMD partner on graphics and CPU combo to challenge Nvidia

Intel is working with AMD to produce a chip for notebook computers that pairs an Intel CPU with an AMD graphics processor, with a small, lightweight design that can nonetheless handle heavy graphics requirements for top-tier video games.

This team-up may seem like kind of a no-brainer, but AMD and Intel actually haven’t collaborated since the 80s, according to analyst Patrick Moorhead speaking to the Wall Street Journal. Instead, AMD and Intel have been pretty fierce rivals, vying for the PC processor market, though Intel has pretty much always been on top in that race.
Intel’s primary challenger seems to be Nvidia these days, however, as the graphics card maker has accelerated its AI and machine learning business, while also continuing to delivery industry-leading graphics cards for consumer and enterprise computers.
AMD has pressed Nvidia on its GPU business lately, introducing products designed to fit similar functions, and this new Intel product which eliminates the requirement for a beefy standalone graphics card will give it some additional space to grow, while making it possible for PC makers to build designs that don’t require the space and heat sink requirements of a full-fledged graphics card.
Basically, it seems like Intel is willing to partner with one of its oldest rivals in order to help stave off one of its top current ones in the bargain. The good news is, consumers should benefit.

Source TechCrunch

The Jolt is a $500 electric bike for the masses

Electric bikes range in price but the best ones come in just north of $1,000. Now, however, you can own a foldable electric bike with a 50 mile range for less than $500.

The Jolt ebike, created by a guy named John Madden, is selling now at an early bird price of $499. That’s a quarter of the final price and a great deal on an ebike.
The bike is about the same size as your standard aluminum folding bike but it includes a large LG battery built into the frame. You can use the bike in pedal assist mode for a 50 mile range and it has a 30 mile range if you don’t want to pedal at all.
The bike ships fully assembled and includes everything you need to go ebiking through the countryside, including an LCD readout of speed and range. It can go a maximum of 20 miles per hour.
The crowdfunding campaign has already hit $87,000 and the bikes should ship next April, just in time for a spring-time jaunt.

iPhone X teardown finds major changes inside the gleaming exterior

The iPhone 8 may have been filled with the expected kit, but we’ve all been looking forward to finding out what fun Apple’s engineers had putting together the all-new iPhone X — and it doesn’t disappoint. iFixit’s excellent-as-always teardown finds a wealth of strange new components inside the biggest redesign of the device in years.

Right off the bat there’s an interesting and first-time choice to split the battery into two parts — it’s mainly just to better use the space that’s left over after budgeting for the volume of the other parts. It still comes out as a single piece, just a little more L-shaped than the usual rectangle.
Users will be glad to hear that the Lightning port has been reinforced; it’s given a little more space and structure inside the body of the phone, which should prevent it from wearing out so quickly.
The front-facing camera array, essentially a miniaturized first-generation Kinect, doesn’t have many surprises, but it’s nice to see that it comes out relatively easily and in one piece.
It’s the logic board that really impresses, though. When taken out of its little spot, it looks like it’s actually smaller than the iPhone 8’s. How could that be, if it has even more capabilities? Turns out this particular logic board is double-sided.
Putting a few pieces on the back of a board is nothing new, but this takes it to a different level. It’s really two very thin and very densely packed logic boards, connected with a spacer PCB and with little tunnels through which data can travel.
By doing this, the logic board in the iPhone X manages to take up 30 percent less space, while fitting in 35 percent more components. It’s an admirable feat of miniaturization — but the flip side, so to speak, is that it puts a great deal of electronic eggs in one basket. If something goes wrong with one bit, you’ll have to replace what’s likely the most complex mobile logic board ever made.
The good news is that the most common failure of iPhones — a cracked screen — is relatively straightforward to fix. That notch holding the Face ID hardware is separate from the screen, so you can replace the glass without replacing the baby Kinect. The battery is likewise relatively easy to replace. Take care of the back panel, though: if it shatters, you’ll pretty much be stuck with it unless you really want to shell out.

Source: TechCrunch

Xbox One X review: This is the ultimate Xbox

This is the Xbox One X. It’s the fastest and smallest Xbox and the first to offer games in 4K. At $499 the higher resolution comes at a steep price. After a week with the console and hours of gaming, I can firmly state the Xbox One X is the best Xbox to date. This Xbox has everything.

Think about it. The Xbox One X is the culmination of the Xbox project and, right now, at this moment in history, the system is not missing a critical feature or capability. I’m happy to report it performs as advertised, too. It’s fast, smooth and capable of playing games from the past and the present with the best possible graphics.
Even though the Xbox One X provides the best possible Xbox experience, it may not be a system for everyone.

From 480p to 4k

The Xbox One X is the third version of the third generation of the Xbox. The original came out in 2001 with the Xbox 360 hitting stores in 2005. The current generation started in 2013 with the Xbox One. The Xbox One X shares a lot of similarities with the first Xbox One yet lacks a feature of the original: Kinect. Microsoft once bet the future of the living room on motion and voice controls. Here we are, some four years later, and the Kinect is dead, and the controller stands tall.
With certain games, graphics pop and colors shimmer in a way that was not possible on past consoles. The jump in quality is significant with the One X. The increase in quality feels more like the jump from the 480p Xbox to the 720p Xbox 360 rather than the jump from the 360 to 1080p Xbox One.
Simply put, gaming at 4K is brilliant. Gaming at 4K with a faster refresh rate is even better, and this Xbox throws down. Games optimized for the higher resolution and quicker refresh rate look better and play smoother. Likewise, games that are not optimized still benefit from the One X’s extra power with faster load times and improved graphics. I guess. Sometimes I felt older Xbox One games were performing better on the One X than the One S but that could have just been because I was using an Xbox that wasn’t pulling from a full hard drive.
New games like Gears of War 4 look stunning in 4K and at 60 frames per second. I found the graphics nearly as good as anything available on a PC. Even during the most intense firefights, the gameplay was beautifully smooth. This wasn’t always the case. Sometimes with past systems there was a bit of slowdown when the action sped up. I played latest Gears last month and yet I played through a good chunk again — for TechCrunch’s readers, of course — and for the first time in a Gears game, felt like the system had enough headroom to provide the smoothest possible experience.
I literally said “wow” during the opening fight scene on Gears of War 4. I had played the game since it was released last month, so it felt like the right place to start. The game is already gorgeous, and even on a One S, the gameplay is smooth. However, on the Xbox One X, the gameplay is smoothed out to a silky experience.

This is how good Gears of War 4 looks while you’re playing it. Seriously.

It gets messy

All the graphical improvements can be complicated.
For Gears of War 4, players have several options. In the game’s setting menu, players can select between Visuals or Performance modes. Select Visuals and the game plays in 4k at 30 fps (the pretty mode). The Performance option bumps the framerate to a 60 fps target and keeps the resolution at 1080p (the smooth mode). But this switch is only for the campaign mode. The Horde mode plays at 60 fps in 4k with adaptive resolution scaling to maintain the high frame rate.
And these options are the settings for just Gears of War 4. Each game offers different settings and modes and some do not offer any at all.
That’s just the start of the confusion. Other games have been updated to support HDR that provides a broader swath of colors and contrast. HDR lets bright parts of the picture look more vivid and dark parts look darker while serving up more colors in between. Only some games output HDR and 4K and some games support HDR or 4K. It’s a confusing mess, and the consumer will suffer.
Games like Gears of War 4 were updated to support both 4K and HDR. Others like Halo 5: Guardians or Killer Instinct only support 4K and not HDR. As a consumer, I find the situation insulting and a drawback to buying the console at launch. Eventually, most games will support at least 4K but until then, gamers will need to suffer through Microsoft’s growing pains of convincing developers to release games in 4K.

Microsoft is smart to point out that the extra power inside the Xbox One X improves the graphics even on a 1080p display. If patched for the hardware, these games look marginally better on older displays.
Sometimes the differences are inconsequential for a person with a 1080p display and a One X. Most users would be hard pressed to notice the difference outside of a few games. On the home screen, the One S performs as well as the One X thanks to the new UI Microsoft rolled out last month.
It’s important to note that the Xbox One X does not automatically make a game 4K. And of course the system has to be hooked up to a 4K TV. Moreover, some 4K TVs offer HDR for better color and faster refresh modes for smoother graphics. It gets complicated. There are many variables, and these variables can be expensive.
Right now, 4K titles available on disc have to download a patch to output at a higher resolution. There are also 4K titles available through the online Store. In both cases it’s a chore to discover games available at a higher resolution. Right now, at launch, the best place to find 4K games is with this comprehensive list on the Xbox’s site.
Users can search for 4K games through the online Store, but some of the results are not 4K games. To check if a game is available in 4K users must click through and consult the Capabilities box on the game’s product page. It’s a tedious process and Microsoft would be smart to add a label to the title’s box art that’s displayed when browsing the catalog.
Sony had a similar issue when the PS4 Pro launch, and it seems like Microsoft is handling it slightly better. The online listing is easier to parse and displayed more prominently. When it comes to retail availability right now, it’s just as hard to find a 4K Xbox game as it was a PS4 4K game. Eventually Xbox games will sport a label on the back of the title displaying its graphical capability but the stores I visited are still working through back stock and have yet to get titles with the new labels. I checked two Best Buy Stores and Forza 7 was the only game labeled as 4K capable. The selection will improve over time but it might be hard around the holidays for mom and dad to identify 4K games to buy for your new 4K gaming system.

Amazing performance, questionable value

Microsoft proudly proclaims the Xbox One X as the most powerful console ever. And by all accounts, that’s true. It packs more computing power than the PS4 Pro, which until now, held that title.
Listen, the Xbox One X is the best Xbox a gamer can buy. Hands down. It’s smoother, quicker and smaller than the Xbox One S. If the One X replaced the One S at the same price, it would be easy to recommend. With the One X priced at $499, for most people, the $279 Xbox One S is the smarter way to spend money. It offers, in most cases, a similar gaming experience and, in a few cases, slightly less pretty graphics – which you definitely won’t miss if you aren’t running a 4K-capable display, or viewing your set from the proper distance.
There is an appeal to gaming in 4K though I question the current value to gaming in 4K. Are the Xbox One X graphics better than on the Xbox One S? Yes, but sometimes the differences are marginal and often meaningless to the gameplay.
Purchasing the Xbox One X right now is an investment. 4K TVs are quickly becoming the standard and now that Microsoft and Sony offer 4K systems, eventually developers will start designing games with 4K as the standard. There will be a time when 1080p is an afterthought and that’s when the Xbox One X will be justified. And by then, the Xbox One X’s price will probably be lower and 4K games will be easier to find.
When the Xbox 360 came out, it was a runaway hit. The difference between the Xbox and the Xbox 360 are massive. Then the $500 Xbox One came out and the difference was less dramatic over the Xbox 360. The $500 Xbox One X is an even less meaningful jump in quality over its predecessor and gamers will have a hard time justifying purchasing a One X over a One S. To me, it’s not worth it. At least not right now. If you’re the person who needs the best Xbox possible, the One X is the system for you.

Souurce: TechCrunch