Tuesday, January 23, 2024

HP CEO just let slip a major issue with its printing strategy - and it's going to cost you

HP CEO Enrique Lores has acknowledged the company’s ambition to transform the printing experience into a subscription model.

The revelation, in a recent CNBC interview, came amid a class-action lawsuit against the company relating to its printer firmware updates, which were shipped as security fixes but were later found to introduce printer blocking when using third-party cartridges.

The interview also reveals the company’s direction, with Lores indicating that other products, including PCs, should also come with a subscription model.

HP really wants you to subscribe to ink, and more

Subscription models have been proven to drive revenue by keeping customers more loyal for longer. The CNBC interview saw Lores confirm that the company’s printers are not profitable as one-time purchases, and that HP makes an undisclosed loss on many models.

The profit comes later on from Instant Ink subscriptions. Lores even alluded to the fact that the company wishes to get rid of unprofitable customers who do not subscribe.

Lores also defended the company’s actions, emphasizing the importance of protecting the company’s IP embedded in HP’s inks and printers. He revealed that viruses can be shared between cartridge and printer, and then to the network and beyond when using dodgy replacements.

HP’s CEO’s statements seem to align with the company’s broader strategy and other similar statements we’ve heard in recent months. Lores’ thoughts echo those of CFO Marie Myers, who last year emphasized the company’s big subscription push.

While HP defends its actions as a necessity for protecting IP and ensuring customer safety, part of the legal action discusses the significantly higher cost associated with genuine HP ink compared with third-party counterparts.

If HP were to go down the subscription route for its other products, surely this would add further complexities and enrage even more customers later on down the line.

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source https://www.techradar.com/pro/hp-ceo-just-let-slip-a-major-issue-with-its-printing-strategy-and-its-going-to-cost-you
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Posted by at 12:25 AM

Andrew Scott oozes menacing charm in first trailer for Netflix crime thriller Ripley

If there's one type of TV show that Netflix is lacking, it's a terrific neo-noir crime thriller. Fortunately for the streaming giant, one such series is on the way very soon.

Starring Andrew Scott (Sherlock, All of Us Strangers), Ripley seems like it can fill this particular genre hole in Netflix's back catalog. Indeed, based on its first 60-second teaser, which was released today (January 22), its monochromatic palette, suspense-filled atmosphere, and tale of a 1960s New Yorker pulled into a life of deceit and murder seems ripe for the world's best streaming service's crime genre-adoring userbase. Oh, and it'll arrive on Netflix on April 4, so let the launch date countdown begin.

If you're sitting there thinking "The name Ripley sounds familiar", you're right, you have heard it before. That's because Ripley is based on Patricia Highsmith's best-selling Thomas Ripley book series, which inspired the 1999 Matt Damon-starring psychological thriller The Talented Mr. Ripley (the same title as Highsmith's first novel). With that Anthony Minghella-directed film celebrating its 25th anniversary this year, the forthcoming release of Netflix's Ripley project seems rather apt.

Ripley's release date and first trailer aren't the only things that Netflix has revealed. Indeed, the streaming titan has given us an official plot synopsis and confirmed who its talented supported cast is playing.

First up, Ripley's story brief: "Tom Ripley (Scott), a grifter scraping by in early 1960s New York, is hired by a wealthy man to travel to Italy to try to convince his vagabond son to return home. Tom's acceptance of the job is the first step into a complex life of deceit, fraud, and murder."

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As for its starry ensemble, there are plenty of recognizable names to pore over. Dakota Fanning (Once Upon A Time in Hollywood, The Equalizer 3) will portray Marge Sherwood, while Johnny Flynn (Emma, Lovesick) is set to play Dickie Greenleaf. The duo plays the most notable side characters in Highsmith's 'The Talented Mr. Ripley', so expect them to play big roles in Netflix's live-action adaptation.

Joining Scott and the aforementioned pair on the cast roster are Elliot Sumner (Stardust, No Time To Die), Maurizio Lombardi (Princess, The Nest), Margherita Buy (Made in Italy), and John Malkovich (In the Line of Fire, Being John Malkovich). Steven Zaillian (The Irishman, The Night Of) is on dual show running and directing duties.

Will Ripley make itself known on our best Netflix shows list post-release? Based on first impressions, I suspect so – Netflix subscribers really like crime-based movies, documentaries, and TV shows, regardless of whether they're met with critical acclaim or not. It's got an air of prestige TV about it, too, with its black-and-white visuals and foreboding tonality, which are sure to capture the imagination.

Even if crime/psychological thrillers aren't your thing, I think we can all agree that complex fictional characters fascinate us – just look at individuals like Breaking Bad's Walter White as proof of that. Expect Thomas Ripley to fall into that category when the eponymous figure makes his Netflix bow later this year.

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source https://www.techradar.com/streaming/netflix/andrew-scott-oozes-menacing-charm-in-first-trailer-for-netflix-crime-thriller-ripley
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Posted by at 12:25 AM

Monday, January 22, 2024

Quordle today – hints and answers for Monday, January 22 (game #728)

It's time for your daily dose of Quordle hints, plus the answers for both the main game and the Daily Sequence spin off. 

Quordle is the only one of the many Wordle clones that I'm still playing now, around 18 months after the daily-word-game craze hit the internet, and with good reason: it's fun, but also difficult.

What's more, its makers (now the online dictionary Merriam-Webster) are also keeping it fresh in the form of a variant called the Daily Sequence, which sees you complete four puzzles consecutively, rather than concurrently. 

But Quordle is tough, so if you already find yourself searching for today's Wordle answer, you'll probably need some hints for this game too. 

I'm a Quordle and Wordle fanatic who's been playing since December 2021, so I can definitely help you solve Quordle today and improve your game for tomorrow. Read on for my Quordle hints to game #728 and the answers to the main game and Daily Sequence. 

SPOILER WARNING: Information about Quordle today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

Quordle today (game #728) - hint #1 - Vowels

How many different vowels are in Quordle today?

• The number of different vowels in Quordle today is 3*.

* Note that by vowel we mean the five standard vowels (A, E, I, O, U), not Y (which is sometimes counted as a vowel too). 

Quordle today (game #728) - hint #2 - total vowels

What is the total number of vowels in Quordle today?

• The total number of vowels across today's Quordle answers is 7.

Quordle today (game #728) - hint #3 - repeated letters

Do any of today's Quordle answers contain repeated letters?

• The number of Quordle answers containing a repeated letter today is 3.

Quordle today (game #728) - hint #4 - total letters

How many different letters are used in Quordle today?

• The total number of different letters used in Quordle today is 12.

Quordle today (game #728) - hint #5 - uncommon letters

Do the letters Q, Z, X or J appear in Quordle today?

• No. None of Q, Z, X or J appear among today's Quordle answers.

Quordle today (game #728) - hint #6 - starting letters (1)

Do any of today's Quordle puzzles start with the same letter?

• The number of today's Quordle answers starting with the same letter is 2.

If you just want to know the answers at this stage, simply scroll down. If you're not ready yet then here's one more clue to make things a lot easier:

Quordle today (game #728) - hint #7 - starting letters (2)

What letters do today's Quordle answers start with?

• A

• T

• A

• S

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

Quordle today (game #728) - the answers

Quordle answers for game 728 on a yellow background

(Image credit: Merriam-Webster)

The answers to today's Quordle, game #728, are…

  • APPLE
  • TRAIN
  • ABBEY
  • SPELL

How did you do today? Send me an email and let me know.

Daily Sequence today (game #728) - the answers

Quordle daily sequence answers for game 728 on a yellow background

(Image credit: Merriam-Webster)

The answers to today's Quordle Daily Sequence, game #728, are…

  • VOILA
  • BLEND
  • YOUTH
  • CRAFT

Quordle answers: The past 20

  • Quordle #727, Sunday 21 January: PERCH, FIEND, THREW, MEDAL
  • Quordle #726, Saturday 20 January: SCOOP, RELAX, LAYER, TEETH
  • Quordle #725, Friday 19 January: SMELT, VENOM, SMALL, CHEEK
  • Quordle #724, Thursday 18 January: BAWDY, SCOUT, COCOA, SPECK
  • Quordle #723, Wednesday 17 January: TONAL, RAVEN, CURVE, DECAL
  • Quordle #722, Tuesday 16 January: STUNG, THETA, PAPAL, VAUNT
  • Quordle #721, Monday 15 January: QUAIL, NAVEL, FREER, SPLAT
  • Quordle #720, Sunday 14 January: WINCE, WOMEN, SMOKY, BADLY
  • Quordle #719, Saturday 13 January: SHRUB, ASCOT, COMMA, SHAWL
  • Quordle #718, Friday 12 January: VOWEL, EXILE, FUDGE, SMART
  • Quordle #717, Thursday 11 January: COUNT, HALVE, RARER, DALLY
  • Quordle #716, Wednesday 10 January: FLECK, CREAM, GUMMY, UPPER
  • Quordle #715, Tuesday 9 January: GHOUL, THINK, BLARE, TOPIC
  • Quordle #714, Monday 8 January: GOODY, MURAL, LORRY, ERROR
  • Quordle #713, Sunday 7 January: CARAT, TWANG, FLAME, THETA
  • Quordle #712, Saturday 6 January: HEFTY, GAZER, SWOON, DRAMA
  • Quordle #711, Friday 5 January: RACER, CHOIR, FLAME, ADAPT
  • Quordle #710, Thursday 4 January: MAJOR, CHOSE, IDEAL, JELLY
  • Quordle #709, Wednesday 3 January: MOUND, STUCK, HOARD, ANGRY
  • Quordle #708, Tuesday 2 January: MANOR, TORCH, FAUNA, AVAIL

Quordle FAQs: Everything you need to know

What is Quordle?

Where Wordle challenges you to guess a new five-letter word each day, Quordle presents you with four puzzles to solve. And rather than complete them in turn, you do so simultaneously. You get nine guesses, rather than the six for Wordle, but the rules are otherwise very similar. 

It's played online via the Quordle website and you can also get to it via the Merriam-Webster site, after the dictionary purchased Quordle last year. 

As with Wordle, the answers are the same for every player each day, meaning that you're competing against the rest of the world. And also as with Wordle, the puzzle resets at midnight so you have a fresh challenge each day.

The website also includes a practice mode - which I definitely recommend using before attempting the game proper! - and there are daily stats including a streak count. You also get Quordle Achievements - specific badges for winning a game in a certain number of turns, playing lots of times, or guessing particularly hard words.

Oh, and it's difficult. Really difficult.

What are the Quordle rules?

The rules of Quordle are almost identical to those of Wordle.

1. Letters that are in the answer and in the right place turn green.

2. Letters that are in the answer but in the wrong place turn yellow. 

3. Letters that are not in the answer turn gray…

4. …BUT the word you guess appears in all quadrants of the puzzle at the same time, so an A could turn green in one square, yellow in another and gray in the final two. 

5. Answers are never plural.

6. Letters can appear more than once. So if your guess includes two of one letter, they may both turn yellow, both turn green, or one could be yellow and the other green.

7. Each guess must be a valid word in Quordle's dictionary. You can't guess ABCDE, for instance.

8. You do not have to include correct letters in subsequent guesses and there is no equivalent of Wordle's Hard mode.

9. You have nine guesses to find the Quordle answers.

10. You must complete the daily Quordle before midnight in your timezone.

What is a good Quordle strategy?

Quordle needs to be approached in a different way to Wordle. With four puzzles to solve in nine guesses, you can't blindly throw letters at it and expect to win - you'll stand a far better chance if you think strategically.

That's the case in Wordle too, of course, but it's even more important in Quordle.

There are two key things to remember. 

1. Use several starting words

Firstly, you won't want just a single starting word, but almost certainly two or three starting words. 

The first of these should probably be one of the best Wordle starting words, because the same things that make them work well will apply here too. But after that, you should select another word or possibly two that use up lots more of the most common consonants and that include any remaining vowels.

For instance, I currently use STARE > DOILY > PUNCH. Between them, these three words use 15 of the 26 letters in the alphabet including all five vowels, Y, and nine of the most common consonants (S, T, R, D, L, P, N, C and H). There are plenty of other options - you might want to get an M, B, F or G in there instead of the H, maybe - but something like that should do the trick.

If all goes well, that will give you a good lead on what one or sometimes two of the answers might be. If not, well good luck!

2. Narrow things down

Secondly, if you're faced with a word where the answer might easily be one of several options - for instance -ATCH, where it could be MATCH, BATCH, LATCH, CATCH, WATCH, HATCH or PATCH - you'll definitely want to guess a word that would narrow down those options. 

In Wordle, you can instead try several of those in succession and hope one is right, assuming you have enough guesses left. It's risky, but will sometimes work. Plus, it's the only option in Hard mode. But in Quordle, this will almost certainly result in a failure - you simply don't have enough guesses.

In the scenario above, CLAMP would be a great guess, as it could point the way to four of the seven words in one go.



source https://www.techradar.com/computing/websites-apps/quordle-today-answers-clues-22-january-2024
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Posted by at 9:25 AM

"Customized chips will be in vogue beyond 2025": Intel could move away from regular CPU releases in a frantic bid to serve customers better and catch up with rivals — but will it be enough?

At last year’s Meteor Lake chip launch in New York, Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger hinted at the company's future direction, noting the company is on track to integrate five new nodes in four years, culminating in 2025. This includes the Intel 7, Intel 4, Intel 3, Intel 20A, and Intel 18A processes, used in a range of server processors.

However, going forward Intel hinted that its traditional release schedule may be discarded in favor of shipping products when ready in order to allow the company to catch up with rivals.

Intel says this will help its aim to offer customers more options by selling multiple generations of chips simultaneously, while serving the demand for customized products.

Chiplets with everything

The tech giant is focused on integrating emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence, and chiplets (which the company can put in a single package). Intel's chiplet technologies could erase the distinction between server and client products, allowing the company to assemble chips based on customer needs. This could enable Intel to rapidly produce custom chips for specific industries.

“As you go to chiplets, you’re not doing as large a die, and you have smaller die. In fact, when we go to 18A, a finish of our five nodes in four years, we’re almost concurrently tapping out the client and server parts. That’s something we’ve never done before,” Gelsinger said, according to HPCwire.

“We look at the Core Ultra packaging — we’re innovating on Foveros packaging [a wafer-level 3D stacking solution that delivers greater performance in a smaller footprint] but we’re going to be using that on the next generation server part in this chiplet architecture, there are so many ways to blur the lines between many of our designs,” Gelsinger concluded.

Intel stands out as the only fully integrated chip company, offering chips or manufacturing services to firms designing their own processors. This dual strategy could ensure Intel's survival, because while rivals Nvidia, ARM, AMD, Qualcomm, and Apple vie for market share, the company gets to manufacture their products.

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source https://www.techradar.com/pro/customized-chips-will-be-in-vogue-beyond-2025-intel-could-move-away-from-regular-cpu-releases-in-a-frantic-bid-to-serve-customers-better-and-catch-up-with-rivals-but-will-it-be-enough
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Posted by at 4:25 AM

This could be the design of the new 12.9-inch iPad Air for 2024

We think that the sixth-generation iPad Air is likely to break cover at some point this year, and another big hint backing that up has arrived with leaked schematics for the bigger 12.9-inch size that's rumored to be in the pipeline.

These schematics come from 91mobiles (via 9to5Mac), purportedly showing CAD renders of the iPad Air 6. The images have been obtained through "industry sources", so there's no guarantee that this will indeed be the final design.

The biggest incoming change is of course that jump in maximum display size, from 10.9 inches on the fifth-generation iPad Air 2022 up to 12.9 inches this time around – though the understanding seems to be that both sizes will be available on the next version.

There also seems to be a little bit of a redesign in terms of the camera on the back. The current iPad Air has a very simple camera bump around a single lens, but these schematics show a bump around both the lens and the flash.

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Updates on the way

As on previous models of the Apple iPad Air tablet, we've still got the Touch ID button on the edge of the device, and the usual USB-C port and the buttons for power and volume are also visible on these leaked CAD renderings.

While 91mobiles refers to the tablet being powered by the M2 chip from Apple, other sources have suggested that the very latest M3 chip is going to be used instead. Either way, this will be a powerful device when it eventually does arrive.

With the new 12.9-inch size, there will be even less to distinguish the iPad Air from the more expensive iPad Pro models, which are currently available in 11-inch and 12.9-inch versions. Those tablets are also expected to get a refresh at some point this year.

The year 2023 was notable for Apple because it was the first year since the launch of the original iPad that no new Apple tablets appeared. As we've written before, that's all likely to change in 2024, with updates expected for just about every model.

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source https://www.techradar.com/tablets/ipad-air/this-could-be-the-design-of-the-new-129-inch-ipad-air-for-2024
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Posted by at 3:25 AM
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