Technology - Google News |
- Nvidia RTX 20 Series: Why You Should Jump Off The Hype Train
- Microsoft Xbox Gamescom 2018 livestream: Sea of Thieves: Forsaken Shores adds volcano area Devil's Roar
- Google Fit is getting redesigned with new health-tracking rings
| Nvidia RTX 20 Series: Why You Should Jump Off The Hype Train Posted: 21 Aug 2018 07:50 AM PDT  The dust has settled from the GeForce Gaming event in Germany, where Jensen and company revealed Nvidia's next-generation RTX 20 Series graphics cards. There was a 90 minute deep dive on ray tracing, the expected amount of hype, new and somewhat nebulous metrics for measuring performance and some steep price tags. When you step away from the spectacle, what the event lacked was a compelling reason to upgrade. Before you pull the trigger on pre-ordering the RTX 2080 Ti or RTX 2080, though, please listen to some advice: don't. Don't pay inflated prices for marginal performance gains over the 10 Series. In fact, don't buy this new generation of GPUs from Nvidia at all, because there's something better coming. Nvidia Geforce RTX 2080 Ti Founder's EditionNvidia Ray Tracing Isn't Everything Nvidia's entire presentation was built around the wonder of ray tracing. Don't get me wrong, when Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang proclaimed "games will never be the same" he wasn't lying. Ray tracing renders light in real-time as it interacts with surfaces, objects, skin, literally everything. In most games now, light is simulated. Ray tracing addresses billions of light sources in real-time which takes enormous computational muscle, but makes light and everything it touches incredibly realistic. This makes each scene more believable and immersive than ever. Yes, it is a generational leap. But ray tracing isn't everything. Nvidia, however, hopes you won't believe that. The reality of the RTX 20 Series that releases next month is this: it's a shameless money-grab designed to get early adopters on the ray tracing hype train for the 20 or so games that will ship with the feature. It's a stopgap to next year's 7nm cards which will offer substantial performance gains and power efficiency improvements. And as for the price tag, Nvidia can charge whatever it desires due to lack of competition in the high-end space. Seriously, glance at the clock speeds for the 20 Series. Check out the CUDA core increase over the 10 Series. Realize that the memory configuration is the same as the 10 Series. Take a hard look at what the performance increase will be. Most in the tech media are putting it at maybe 10% to 15% over the 10 Series when it comes to the majority of games out there. But you'll pay 40% to 50% higher prices for this generation's replacements based on MSRP. And you know we won't be paying MSRP. . . Ray tracing is bleeding edge right now, but do you want to spend an exorbitant amount of money to enjoy a handful of games optimized with it? RTX 2080 Ti specs compared to GTX 1080 TiNvidia Ask yourself why Nvidia showed approximately zero gaming benchmarks without ray tracing. There were no performance comparisons between, say, the GTX 1080 Ti and the RTX 2080 Ti for the most popular games already out there. Or to sum that up, this meme shared by Videocardz: Basically this.Videocardz via Twitter When the GTX 1080 launched, Nvidia repeatedly reminded us how its performance dwarfed the GTX 980 in everything from AAA gaming to VR. When the GTX 1070 arrived, Nvidia boasted that it matched or beat the Titan X. That's a compelling upgrade argument. Don't Pre-Order. Wait For 2019 Right now, though, Nvidia is asking people to pre-order their top-tier and flagship RTX cards for a minimum of $799 (painfully higher if you're in Europe or Australia) on the back of, basically, ray tracing and untested real-world performance. Think about that before dropping the money. You could argue that the RTX 20 Series is a compelling for owners of the GTX 900 series, but I strongly disagree. You can upgrade from a GTX 980 to a GTX 1080 for only $449 and enjoy about a 40% performance uplift, versus spending nearly double that for an RTX 2080. Double the money for a maximum 20% performance increase isn't a strong bang-for-buck scenario. If that's sound logic to you, pull the trigger on Pascal before Nvidia retires it and Turing is the only option. A non-final render of Intel's Arctic Sound dedicated gaming GPU.Intel If you really want an RTX 20 series card, there's a strong chance that Nvidia will release 7nm versions in 2019 (RTX uses the 12nm process) with substantial performance gains, improved power efficiency and likely double the GDDR6 memory capacity. Why? Because that's likely the point when AMD will have some kind of competitor at the high end, and Nvidia will want to leapfrog them. It's also when we'll know many more details about Intel's upcoming Arctic Sound gaming GPUs slated for 2020. Right now, though, Nvidia has no competition in this space. It can sell its new generation solely on the back of ray tracing hype and charge whatever it wants. There's no pressure, and I guarantee a genuinely jaw-dropping iteration of the RTX series is waiting in the wings. Don't misunderstand me. The GeForce RTX cards are probably great products. They're just overpriced, unproven products. Wait for the reviews. |
| Posted: 21 Aug 2018 08:14 AM PDT Microsoft didn't host a physical press conference at this year's Gamescom in Cologne, Germany, but it offered a livestream announcement in the form of a special episode of Inside Xbox. Here's what they announced:
 Battlefield V is getting an Xbox One X bundle. Screenshot by CNETWe're not expecting to see any major new hardware from the company, so don't get excited about an Xbox Two. Instead, Microsoft said it will show off the "latest on Forza Horizon 4, Sea of Thieves and State of Decay 2," as well as "exclusive interviews and never-before-seen content for many other games." We'll update this story with the news as it happens. Nvidia already kicked off Gamescom week with the announcement of its new GTX 2080 video card. Keep your eyes on our Gamescom hub page for more news from the show floor. And for more, see our sister site GameSpot's coverage of the show. |
| Google Fit is getting redesigned with new health-tracking rings Posted: 21 Aug 2018 06:00 AM PDT  Today, Google is rolling out a complete redesign of the Google Fit app for Android and the Fit section of the Wear OS app on iPhone. The new design focus is on closing rings, much like Apple (and everybody else). Google says that its rings are informed by health recommendations from the American Heart Association (AHA) and the World Health Organization (WHO). Every day, users will be encouraged to complete two goals: one based on "move minutes" and another based on a new thing called "heart points." Those metrics are an attempt to "abstract away the complication" of fitness tracking, says Margaret Hollendoner, senior product manager for Google Fit. "Move minutes" is meant to be a better metric than simple steps because it can capture several different activities since walking "might not be a great option" for some people. "Heart points" is a little more abstract, but it's designed to encourage people to engage in activities that will still get their heart rate up but don't necessarily require a trip to the gym. "It's as simple as picking up the pace when you're walking," Hollendoner says. With both metrics, Fit will attempt to use as many sensors as are available to it and estimate the rest. If you use a Wear OS watch, it can track your heart rate directly and also automatically detect when you start exercising. Fit won't require a Wear OS watch, but it definitely works better with one. It can also work with health data from other devices that are compatible with Fit. As with all tech companies, Google is careful not to cross the line into making actual health claims with Google Fit. Instead, it is saying that it worked with the AHA and WHO to set up Fit so that it can help users track their progress toward achieving the physical activity guidelines the groups recommend. Those goals are roughly 150 minutes of "moderate" activity per week and 75 minutes of "vigorous" activity. So the move minutes track daily progress to moderate activity. Heart points track toward the vigorous activity goal, but the "points" abstraction means that Fit can award more points for heavy exercise while also still rewarding less strenuous activity. (Fit will still show users more traditional metrics like step counts and estimated calories burned.) In any case, the Fit app will start every user with goals it thinks are appropriate and move them up as they achieve more. Hollendoner says the system will offer suggestions within the app. For example, it might suggest that you only need another 20 minutes of exercise to hit a weekly goal, even if you missed your rings earlier in the week. In other words: Fit will try to help you alter your behavior, but it might make you feel a little less bad when you take a rest day. Patrick Wayte, SVP for the center for health tech at AHA, says his organization's contribution to the new system was more of an "active collaboration" or an "alignment exercise" than a full-on partnership with Google. The AHA's recommendations will appear directly inside Fit if users go looking to see exactly what these Heart Points are all about. "This gives us an opportunity to get people oriented around the science," Wayte says. He hopes that Fit's coaching for users will "increasingly align them to the guidelines" the AHA recommends for physical activity. Beyond the new metrics, the Fit app has generally been cleaned up, modernized, and simplified. When either the Heart points or Move rings are completed in the app, they'll turn into an octagon. (Hollendoner calls it a "jewel shape.") The Wear OS app will be updated as well, including those new rings. A journal tab can show maps of previous runs and bike rides, track heart rates over time, and more. Users will have a setup process, but Google will take on more of the work to help them set goals over time. A floating "plus" button allows users to set up custom exercise routines. Google has a lot of work ahead of it now as it fights to gain relevancy in a health tech conversation completely dominated by the Apple Watch and Fitbit. On its own, the new version of Fit seems nice but certainly not enough to pull mindshare away. That will probably require new WearOS smartwatches, and we should be seeing some of those come out later this year. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
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