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Snapchat has been experimenting with generative AI-powered augmented reality lenses in its app for the last couple years. Now, the company is allowing users to make their own with a new standalone app for making AR effects.

Snap is introducing a new version of its Lens Studio software that allows anyone to create AR lenses through text prompts and other simple editing tools, and publish them directly to Snapchat. Up to now, Lens Studio has only been available as a desktop app meant for developers and AR professionals. And while the new iOS app and web version aren’t nearly as powerful, it offers a wide range of face-altering and body-morphing effects thanks to generative AI.

“These are experimental new tools that make it easier than ever to create, publish, and play with Snapchat Lenses made by you,” the company explains in a blog post. “Now, you can generate your own AI effects, add your dancing Bitmoji to the fun, and express yourself with Lenses that reflect your mood or an inside joke–whether you’re on the go or near your computer. “

Snap gave me an early look at the Lens Studio iOS app, and I was pleasantly surprised by how much flexibility it offered. There are AI-powered tools for transforming your face, body and background via detailed text prompts (the app also offers suggestions of the kinds of prompts that work well, like “detailed zombie head with big eyes and nose, lots of details.”)

There’s a bit of a learning curve to figuring out what works well for each type of effect, and some of the generative AI prompts can take up to 20 minutes to render. But the app also offers dozens of templates that you can use as a starting point and remix with your own ideas. You can also make simpler face-altering filters that don’t rely as heavily AI but take advantage of popular Snapchat effects like face cutouts or Bitmoji animations. (A few examples of my creations are below, both used AI to create a background I overlaid other effects onto.)

Snap already has hundreds of thousands of lens creators, some of whom have been making effects for the app for years. But I can easily see this new, simpler version of Lens Studio opening the door for many more. There could also be some upside for creators hoping to take advantage of Snapchat’s monetization programs: the company confirmed that users who publish lenses from the new app will be eligible to participate in its Lens Creator Rewards program, which pays creators who make popular AR effects.

A more accessible version of Lens Studio could also help Snap compete with Meta for AR talent. (Meta shut down Spark AR, its platform that allowed creators to make AR for Instagram last year.) In addition to Snapchat’s in-app effects, the company is now on its second generation of standalone AR glasses. More recently, Snap has focused on big-name developers to make glasses-ready effects, but the company has previously leaned on Lens Creators to come up with interesting use cases for AR glasses. Those types of integrations will likely require much more than what’s currently available in the new pared-down version of Lens Studio, but making AR creation more accessible (with the help of AI) raises some interesting possibilities for what might one day be possible for the company.

Jim Lanzone, the CEO of Engadget’s parent company Yahoo, joined the board of directors at Snap on September 12, 2024. No one outside of Engadget’s editorial team has any say in our coverage of the company.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/snapchat-now-has-a-standalone-app-for-making-gen-ai-augmented-reality-effects-170036214.html?src=rss 

Uber just announced dedicated account profiles for senior citizens, bringing a streamlined app design and features aimed at older adults. This is part of the pre-existing “family profile” feature that also allows for teen accounts.

As for these senior accounts, the biggest draw is the design. The company promises “larger text, fewer steps and easy-to-follow screens.” To that end, there are fewer buttons and larger text throughout. This should make it easier for seniors, or anyone with minor eyesight issues, to book rides.

Loved ones and caregivers can book rides on behalf of the account holder. They can also help with stuff like adjusting payment methods and checking in during trips. Family members can track rides in real time or receive text updates upon arrival. In the case of an emergency, the app offers the ability for caregivers to contact the driver.

Frequent destinations, such as the doctor’s office, can be stored for easy access. There are even some unique payment options here, like the ability to accept Medicare Flex.

If older adults don’t have access to a family profile, they can still experience a streamlined version of the app via the platform’s Simple mode. This provides the same interface, with larger text and easier navigation.

Rival Lyft recently introduced a similar suite of features, called Lyft Silver. However, Lyft’s service will match older riders with cars that are easier to get in and out of, which is something Uber doesn’t seem to be offering at this moment. Senior accounts on Uber are rolling out now throughout the US, with global availability coming at a later date.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apps/uber-now-offers-a-streamlined-app-for-seniors-complete-with-flexible-payment-options-130013443.html?src=rss 

NVIDIA releases a brand new video card and AMD follows up with a cheaper one. That’s basically been the cycle of the GPU industry for the last decade, with NVIDIA typically leading the pack and AMD rushing to keep up. But with the recent Radeon RX 9070 and 9070 XT, AMD finally found a winning formula with GPUs that were both cheaper than NVIDIA’s and, in many cases, more powerful. The new Radeon RX 9060 XT, which is meant to take on NVIDIA’s RTX 5060 Ti in 1080p and 1440p gaming, mostly repeats that formula. Starting at $350 with 16GB of RAM (and $300 with a paltry 8GB), it’s launching for much less than the $429 RTX 5060 Ti while delivering a similar level of performance.

Once again, the key for AMD is offering much more RAM than NVIDIA for far less money. Sure, AMD is using slower GDDR6 RAM with 320 GB/s of memory bandwidth, compared to NVIDIAs’ 448 GB/s GDDR7. But in practice, actually having a larger memory pool is more useful when you’re dealing with massive textures and 3D models in modern games. So if you’re looking for the best gaming bang for the buck under $400, the 16GB Radeon RX 9060 XT is undoubtedly a winner.

What is the Radeon RX 9060 Ti?

The least powerful member of AMD’s Radeon RX 9000 family (so far), the RX 9060 XT is basically the card you’d get if you can’t stomach spending more than $500 on a GPU. Just remember that video cards tend to jump up in cost once they actually hit stores, depending on availability and the whims of retailers. The RX 9060 XT sports 32 RDNA 4 compute units, 32 RT accelerators and 64 AI accelerators. It can reach up to 3.1GHz speeds with its boost clock and consumes up to 180W of power. In comparison, the $549 MSRP RX 9070 has 56 compute units, while the $599 RX 9070 XT has eight more.

AMD is pitching this GPU as a replacement for the RX 7600 XT, which launched at $329 last year. That card also had 16GB of VRAM, but it had a slower 288 GB/s bandwidth. While the 7600 XT was more focused on entry-level 1440p gaming, the 9060 XT’s hardware improvements make it far more capable. AMD claims it’s 46 percent faster than the 7600 XT across more than 40 games, and in my testing that figure checks out.

For this review, I tested Gigabyte’s RX 9060 XT GPU, which has three cooling fans pointed at a typical copper heatsink. There’s no fancy vapor cooling chamber or any extravagant materials on the card, but at this price range I didn’t expect much.

What’s good about the Radeon RX 9060 Ti?

Across games and benchmarks, the 9060 XT clocked in just about where I expected: noticeably slower than the RX 9070, and either on-par or slightly slower than the NVIDIA RTX 5060 Ti. In 3DMark’s Steel Nomad benchmark, the 9060 XT scored 200 more points than that NVIDIA card, and it was also 90 points ahead in Timespy Extreme. But NVIDIA had a 1,000 point lead in the Speedway benchmark and it was more than 2,000 points ahead in the Luxmark HDR 4 test.

Despite those figures, I’m still impressed that the 9060 XT can stay in the same league as NVIDIA’s RTX 5060 Ti while costing a lot less. AMD’s ray tracing performance has also improved quite a bit from its previous generations, scoring 45 percent faster in the 3DMark Port Royal benchmark. NVIDIA still has the lead in ray tracing in games though, especially with the one-two punch of DLSS 4 AI upscaling and multi-frame generation. NVIDIA’s RTX 5000-series cards can produce up to three interpolate frames for every natively rendered frame, while AMD is still stuck with generating a single extra frame with its FSR 3 and 4 (Fidelity Super Resolution 4) upscaling.

None

3DMark TimeSpy Extreme

Geekbench 6 GPU

Cyberpunk (1440p RT Overdrive DLSS/FSR 3)

Blender

AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT

8,192

91,617

80fps

1,560

NVIDIA RTX 5060 Ti (16GB)

8,100

139,756

136 fps (4X frame gen)

4,220

AMD Radeon RX 9070

10,997

113,012

117 fps

N/A

AMD Radeon RX 7600

5,526

N/A

20 fps

1,013

The Radeon RX 9060 XT was able to run Cyberpunk 2077 in 1440p ray tracing “overdrive” mode at a respectable 80 fps, whereas NVIDIA’s RTX 5060 Ti hit 136 fps thanks to multi-frame generation. Still, there’s plenty of wiggle room to crank out more frames: Stepping down to 1080p got me 120 fps, and I saw 90 fps while using the less demanding ray tracing “ultra” preset in 1440p. In terms of raw performance, without any upscaling fanciness, the 9060 XT hit 114 fps in 1080p and 90 fps in 1440p.

The Radeon RX 9060 XT didn’t run very hot during my testing, but that makes sense since it’s purely focused on 1080p and 1440p gaming, During 3DMark’s Steel Nomad stress test, which repeats the benchmark 20 times in succession, the card only topped out at 54 Celsius. I’m used to seeing video cards reaching upwards of 70C under load, so the 9060 XT was a nice surprise. While idling, it sits at 42 Celsius. That’s higher than cards with vapor chamber cooling, but it’s about average for cards in this price range. I didn’t hear any annoying fan noise under load either, since it barely broke a sweat.

What’s bad about the Radeon RX 9060 XT?

There isn’t really much to complain about with the Radeon RX 9060 XT, so long as you’re not expecting too much from a sub-$400 GPU. Still, it would be nice to see support for AMD’s new FSR 4 AI upscaling spread out more quickly. When the RX 9070 XT launched, the feature was only available in a handful of games like Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, and now it’s supported over 60 games. That’s still about half of the games that NVIDIA’s DLSS 4 supports (which so far includes over 125 titles).

On the RX 9060 XT, the FSR 4 user experience still isn’t as simple as activating DLSS on NVIDIA cards. I had to enable it manually in AMD’s Adrenaline software, then flip it on in Call of Duty: Warzone to activate it. On the bright side, I saw an average of 254 fps while playing a match in 1440p with extreme graphics settings, FSR 4 and frame generation flipped on. With frame gen enabled, but no FSR 4, performance dipped to 174fps. And if I removed both of those features, it fell to 110 fps. Clearly, FSR 4 and frame gen helps quite a bit, I just wish it were in more games. 

Should you buy the Radeon RX 9060 XT?

Assuming retailers don’t go wild by overpricing the Radeon RX 9060 XT, it’s a solid option if you’re looking for an affordable GPU that’s dedicated to 1080p and 1440p gameplay. At $350, the 9060 XT is well below the RTX 5060 Ti’s $429 retail price, and certainly much cheaper than models being sold for more than $500.

To reach a lower $300 price point, AMD also unveiled an RX 9060 Ti with 8GB of RAM. But honestly, I’d recommend avoiding that entirely unless you only play ancient games in 1080p. It’s worth spending a bit more so you can play newer games with less headaches, and it’s practically a requirement if you want to play in 1440p.

Wrap-up

The Radeon RX 9060 XT is a reminder of a world where we didn’t have to pay more than $400 to get a capable GPU. We already know more than 80 percent of PC gamers play at 1440p or lower resolutions, according to Steam’s data. So for the vast majority of players out there — the ones who aren’t using monitors with crazy high refresh rates or 4K+ resolutions — it’s all the GPU you really need.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/pc/amd-radeon-rx-9060-xt-16gb-review-finally-a-powerful-350-gpu-130037952.html?src=rss