TechWatch

SPEC updates its test suite

The Standard Performance Evaluation Corporation (SPEC) Graphics and Workstation Performance Group (GWPG) was formed in 1986 under the National Computer Graphics Association (NCGA). GWPG joined SPEC in 1996 joined SPEC in 1996, and today is ...

1,400 Ångströms or bust

  Do you know why airplanes that weigh more than the air they displace can fly? It’s because everyone on board believes it is possible. Every time someone on a flight reasons out that an ...

Chromebooks get into the game

Introducing the Chromebook cloud gaming lineup from (left to right) Lenovo, Acer, and Asus. (Source: Google) A few days ago, there was a good deal of chatter about the possibility of Lenovo soon releasing an ...

The RTX 4090, a successful debut of the Ada Lovelace series

The Ada Lovelace GPU die. (Source: Nvidia) The RTX 4090 is the most anticipated launch of a GPU since 2020, when AMD introduced RDNA 2.0, or 2018, when Nvidia launched the Turing family with a ...

Greyscalegorilla launches Tactile materials library

Beauty, they say, is in the eye of the beholder. But it’s easy to see the stunning materials in the new materials library called Tactile from Greyscalegorilla. Using what they refer to as the Tactile ...

Seeing loss of two licensees, Arm sues them

It’s been a rough year for Arm. The much-anticipated acquisition of Arm by Nvidia, a plan despised by everyone except SoftBank and Nvidia, got canceled. Arm’s long-standing CEO quit. Then the company laid off over ...

MovieLabs looks out to 2030

MovieLabs is a non-profit industry organization founded in 2006 by Disney, Paramount, Twentieth Century Fox, Sony Pictures, Universal, and Warner Bros. to do advanced research and development. The organization came together to prepare for the ...

Google invests $12 million in the unofficial VR app store SideQuest

Google Ventures shakes hands with an unofficial alternative to the Meta Store.

Not your father’s computer display

Over the years, we’ve seen an evolution in electronic computer displays in terms of shapes and sizes. From basic CRTs, to plasmas and LCDs, to LEDs, OLEDs, and more. From large, heavy devices to lightweight ...

Game over for Google’s streaming game service Stadia

Google abruptly shuts down Stadia. (Source: Google)   Google is shutting down Stadia, its cloud gaming service that it launched in 2019. The service will remain live for players until January 18, 2023. Google said ...

Avid promotes collaborative, distributed workflows at IBC

Avid CEO Jeff Rosica at IBC2022. (Source: IBC)   IBC2022 stands as a significant milestone in the history of digital content creation. It comes as the latest wave of Covid infections have subsided and as ...

Turning back time

Digital Domain used its Charlatan tool to replace the face of a stand-in (top) with a digitally de-aged face of quarterback Joe Montana (bottom). (Source: Digital Domain)   Most of us, if given the chance, ...