The Chicago Bears’ safety, who turns 29, will be heading to Paris next week to watch Biles compete in her third Olympic Games.
The Chicago Bears’ safety, who turns 29, will be heading to Paris next week to watch Biles compete in her third Olympic Games.
Adobe has widely released a new and potentially contentious feature: text-to-image generation for Photoshop powered by Firefly, first teased in April. As with LLMs like Dall-E and Mid Journey, you can use it to create an image from scratch by typing a description into Photoshop’s updated generative AI tool.
I tried it with the text “Dramatic low angle view of a steamship from the 1800s in a storm with large waves and lightning” in multiple styles (anime, watercolor, sketch, realistic) and got decent results. The usual AI art caveats apply though, particularly with weird details if you look closely. But it certainly created useable results and you have the benefit of already being inside Photoshop to fix any errors.
Previously, Photoshop’s Generative Fill feature only let you add, extend or remove specific parts of an image. Now, you can create images from scratch, then tweak them later. “This really speeds up time to creation,” Adobe’s Erin Boyce told Engadget in April. “The idea of getting something from your mind to the canvas has never been easier.”
The feature is powered by Firefly Image 3 model, something at the heart of a recent artist backlash against Adobe. Creators were incensed by language in Adobe’s recent ToS (terms of service), interpreting it to mean that Adobe could freely use their work to train the company’s generative AI models.
In its latest post, however, Adobe stated that it has a “commitment to creator friendly AI” which means “never training on customer content.” It promised to take a creator-friendly approach as part of its AI ethics principles of accountability, responsibility and transparency.
Along with image generation, Adobe introduced an “Enhance Detail” feature in Photoshop’s Generative Fill. For Illustrator, it introduced Generative Shape Fill to add detailed vectors in a designer’s unique style (above), Enhanced Text to Pattern (creating customized vector patterns in the artists style) and Style Reference. It also added a Mockup tool to create “high-quality visual prototypes of art on objects like product packaging,” enhanced selection capabilities and more.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/adobes-photoshop-can-now-generate-ai-images-via-prompts-like-dall-e-or-mid-journey-130018181.html?src=rss
The first reports of instability issues with the 13th-gen Intel desktop CPUs started popping up in late 2022, mere months after the models came out. Those issues persisted, and over time, users reported dealing with unexpected and sudden crashes on PCs equipped with the company’s 14th-gen CPUs, as well. Now, Intel has announced that it finally found the reason why its 13th and 14th-gen desktop processors have been causing crashes and giving out on users, and it promises to roll out a fix by next month.
In its announcement, Intel said that based on extensive analysis of the processors that had been returned to the company, it has determined that elevated operating voltage was causing the instability issues. Apparently, it’s because a microcode algorithm — microcodes, or machine codes, are sets of hardware-level instructions — has been sending incorrect voltage requests to the processor.
Intel has now promised to release a microcode patch to address the “root cause of exposure to elevated voltages.” The patch is still being validated to ensure that it can address all “scenarios of instability reported to Intel,” but the company is aiming to roll it out by mid-August.
As wccftech notes, while Intel’s CPUs have been causing issues with users for at least a year and a half, a post on X by Sebastian Castellanos in February put the problem in the spotlight. Castellanos wrote that there was a “worrying trend” of 13th and 14th-gen Intel CPUs having stability issues with Unreal Engine 4 and 5 games, such as Fortnite and Hogwarts Legacy. He also noticed that the issue seems to affect mostly higher-end models and linked to a discussion on Steam Community. The user that wrote the post on Steam wanted to issue a warning to those experiencing “out of video memory trying to allocate a rendering resource” errors that it was their CPU that was faulty. They also linked to several Reddit threads with people experiencing the same problem and who had determined that their issue lied with their Intel CPUs.
More recently, the indie studio Alderon Games published a post about “encountering significant problems with Intel CPU stability” while developing its multiplayer dinosaur survival game Path of Titans. Its founder, Matthew Cassells, said the studio found that the issue affected end customers, dedicated game servers, developers’ computers, game server providers and even benchmarking tools that use Intel’s 13th and 14th-gen CPUs. Cassells added that even the CPUs that initially work well deteriorate and eventually fail, based on the company’s observations. “The failure rate we have observed from our own testing is nearly 100 percent,” the studio’s post reads, “indicating it’s only a matter of time before affected CPUs fail.”
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/intel-has-finally-figured-out-its-long-standing-desktop-cpu-instability-issues-130042083.html?src=rss
The flag-bearer is usually chosen by fellow athletes and/or team captains.
The flag-bearer is usually chosen by fellow athletes and/or team captains.
The A-list couple shared the name of their new baby as the actor gave a speech ahead of the premiere of the third ‘Deadpool’ movie.
The A-list couple shared the name of their new baby as the actor gave a speech ahead of the premiere of the third ‘Deadpool’ movie.
For all its stacked selection of original content, like Fallout, The Boys and Rings of Power, Prime Video has historically pffered a cluttered, confusing and less-than-intuitive layout — especially compared to rivals like Netflix. That changes today as Amazon begins rolling out a new Prime Video UI that, in the company’s words, brings “clarity and simplicity back to streaming.”
The Prime Video redesign starts with a streamlined navigation bar that should make it easier to find your way around. To the left, the bar includes the general categories Home, Movies, TV Shows, Sports and Live TV. Immediately to the right, the nav bar continues with a dedicated tab for content bundled with your Prime membership, followed by sections for add-on subscriptions like Max, Paramount+, Crunchyroll and others. There’s a separate section to add new subscriptions — from Amazon’s more than 100 options — straight from the bar.
Meanwhile, a new “hero rotator” below the bar drills down to highlight content available within each selected bar section. It looks similar to rival services, which doesn’t sound like a big deal on paper but should be a welcome change for anyone who’s ever futzed around with the confusing old Prime Video UI.
Unsurprisingly, Amazon is adding personalized AI-generated recommendations (“Made for you”) when navigating the bar’s Movies and TV Shows sections. Using the company’s Bedrock AI model, the machine learning recommendations will offer content tips based on your watch history and preferences.
AI will also power new show and movie synopses. Amazon says the change will make browsing their blurbs faster, preventing you from having to scroll around to learn more about a given piece of content.
Finally, Amazon says the UI has new animations, snappier page transitions and zoom effects to make the experience more “frictionless.” On living room devices, video content will auto-play on the hero rotator as you browse around (much like Netflix and other competitors). If you head to the Live TV tab, recommended stations will also play on their own, continuing until you pick something to give your full attention.
The UI update begins rolling out on Tuesday. You can read more in Amazon’s announcement post.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/prime-video-gets-a-much-needed-ui-overhaul-with-a-new-content-bar-and-ai-recommendations-120019397.html?src=rss
The vice president has already won over the support of many Democrats, after President Joe Biden announced that he would step out of the presidential race.
The vice president has already won over the support of many Democrats, after President Joe Biden announced that he would step out of the presidential race.
iRobot unveiled its most advanced and expensive robot vacuum yet on Tuesday. The (deep breath) Roomba Combo 10 Max Robot + AutoWash Dock automatically washes and dries the mopping pad, something you had to do manually on all its previous combo vacs. But at $1,399, many customers will want to wait several generations for the feature to trickle down to models that don’t cost nearly the equivalent of a MacBook Pro.
Cleaning robots exist to automate tasks that are a pain for us, and the Roomba Combo 10 Max Robot expands on that. iRobot says the dock, which contains “premium antimicrobial materials,” can empty its dirt into an enclosed bag, refill the mopping solution tank and clean itself after each pad wash. You can manually run self-cleaning, and its companion app will remind you when it’s time for standard maintenance or a deeper cleaning.
The robot can store dirt and debris for up to 60 days before emptying, and the mopping pad and self-cleaning tank hold up to seven days of water. At least in theory, the Combo 10 Max leaves less work for the user than any other Roomba before it.
iRobot says the new Roomba can seamlessly transition from vacuuming carpet to mopping floors, automatically boosting its suction power when it detects carpets. It can then move back and forth with consistent pressure and deeper scrubbing when it senses that it’s time to mop.
The combo vacuum is designed to retract its entire mopping system when it reaches carpet, “lifting its mop pad to the top of the robot to keep even high-pile carpets fresh and dry.” Meanwhile, it can vacuum and mop simultaneously on hard floors.
While other Roomba models have been able to sense particularly messy areas, the Combo 10 Max adds a camera to “visually pinpoint dirt on the floor.” The company claims this allows it to recognize the dirtiest spots up to eight times more frequently, making multiple passes on those areas more efficiently.
Like other models, the robot cleaner can map your home, but iRobot says it can do so seven times faster than other models while automatically labeling each room type. Its software can even use past cleaning information to predict each room’s cleanliness, proceeding accordingly.
The robot works with Alexa, Siri and Google Assistant, and iRobot expects it to be Matter-enabled by the end of 2024. That should cover just about every type of smart home. Of course, it includes the company’s memorably branded Pet Owner Official Promise (P.O.O.P.). It provides a free device replacement if the robot accidentally plows through pet waste and ruins your day.
The Roomba Combo 10 Max is available for pre-order today on iRobot’s website in the US and Canada. (It’s also available to reserve in Europe and will launch there in “the coming months.”) However, as marvelous as the technological cleaning wonders sound, its $1,399 cost of admission prices it out of everything but the most well-heeled homes.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/irobots-newest-cleaning-machine-is-the-first-to-wash-and-dry-its-mopping-pad-for-you-110100150.html?src=rss
Condé Nast, the media giant that owns The New Yorker, Vogue and Wired, has sent a cease-and-desist letter to AI-powered search startup Perplexity, according to The Information. The letter, sent on Monday, demanded Perplexity stop using content from Condé Nast publications in its AI-generated responses and accused the startup of plagiarism. It comes a month after Forbes took similar action.
Condé Nast CEO Roger Lynch has warned “many” media companies could face financial ruin in the time it would take for litigation against generative AI companies to conclude. Lynch has called upon Congress to take “immediate action.”
— Mat Smith
EU officials say Meta may be violating consumer laws with paid ‘ad-free’ plan
The Engadget guide to the best smartwatches
Apple accused of underreporting suspected CSAM on its platforms
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Right in the middle of BBQ season, ThermoWorks, makers of the Thermapen, is upgrading its wireless meat probe. The RFX Meat uses radio technology rather than Bluetooth to transmit data. The company explains its “patent-pending sub-GHz RFX wireless technology” provides a more reliable connection with up to 2,132 feet of direct line of sight range. When placed inside a grill or smoker, it should work at up to 659 feet of range, ThermoWorks says. The $159 RFX Meat starter kit is available for pre-order. Shipping starts September 10, so, arguably, not quite in time for BBQ season.
Google won’t kill third-party cookies in Chrome after all, the company said on Monday in a blog. Instead, it’ll introduce a new experience in the browser that will allow users to make informed choices about their web browsing preferences. Killing cookies, Google said, would hurt online publishers and advertisers.
Over the past few years, multiple delays and regulatory hurdles have hit Google’s plans to eliminate third-party cookies. Initially, the company wanted to phase out these cookies by the end of 2022 but pushed the deadline to late 2024 and then to early 2025 because of various challenges and feedback from stakeholders, including advertisers, publishers and regulatory bodies, like the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA).
The company says it will now focus on giving users more control over their browsing data, including additional privacy controls, like IP Protection in Chrome’s Incognito mode, and ongoing improvements to Privacy Sandbox APIs.
Google’s Pixel 8a is the best Android phone for less than $500, and now it’s even cheaper than usual, making it the best Android phone for less than $450. Like past A-series devices (usually the best cheap Android phones in their time), it takes most of the headline features from last year’s flagship Pixel phone — the Pixel 8, in this case — and puts them in a slightly cheaper design. You still get a bright and vivid OLED display with a smooth 120Hz refresh rate and superb camera performance.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-morning-after-conde-nast-is-the-latest-media-company-to-accuse-ai-search-engine-perplexity-of-plagiarism-111559877.html?src=rss
Autumn Crittendon, mother of three, passed away in her Virginia home.
Autumn Crittendon, mother of three, passed away in her Virginia home.
