Joel Hruska
Opinions and content posted by HotHardware contributors are their own.
Recent posts
It has been nearly a year since we visited ARM in Cambridge, UK, and the company recently held another tech day -- this time in Austin, Texas. During the three-day session, ARM covered a wide range of topics, with a primary focus on server ecosystems and next-generation mobile hardware. The company started off with an in-depth exploration...
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Ever since AMD announced it would build an ARM processor, there've been questions about how the company would balance its x86 and ARM obligations and product lines. Today, the company gave a major update to how it sees the future of these products. This year, AMD will debut its first Cortex-A57 based server (codenamed...
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A new website sponsored by Ubisoft as part of its advertising campaign for the upcoming hacking-themed game Watch Dogs isn't just a plug for the title -- it's a chilling example of exactly how easy it is for companies to mine your data. While I'm normally averse to giving any application or service access to my...
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NVIDIA holds the lion's share of the market in mobile graphics hardware, but it's not the only competitor. When Alienware asked if we'd be interested in looking at a notebook based on AMD's top-end R9 M290X in a single-GPU configuration, we agreed. This system is based on exactly the same hardware and chassis as the Alienware 18-inch model...
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The FCC has confirmed that it will hold a May 15 vote on a new set of policies governing net neutrality and ISP behavior -- but according to the Wall Street Journal, the commission's proposed regulation will effectively kill the idea of a level playing field. The Wall Street Journal reports that the proposed rules would prevent ISPs from blocking...
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Ever since terrestrial broadcasters shut down their stations and went off the air, the FCC has been mulling what to do with sections of spectrum and how that wireless space should be allocated between wireless broadcasters and other types of use. It's a complicated issue, in that much of the frequency in question is...
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Last month, Comcast and Netflix announced a controversial deal in which Netflix would pay Comcast directly for improved service. The reason this deal is controversial in many quarters is that it's seen as triple-dipping by Comcast -- the company is already paid by companies like Level 3, which provide Internet back-haul across the country,...
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As Seth covered earlier today, Bloomberg has accused the NSA of benefiting from the Heartbleed OpenSSL bug. The NSA denies this in fairly strong terms. I'd like to draw attention to a different facet of the topic -- first, by discussing the semantics of the NSA's denial and then the wider impact of how that denial is...
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One of the hot topics in the wake of Titanfall's launch has been whether or not DirectX 12 would make a difference to the game's sometimes jerky framerate and lower-than-expected 792p resolution. According to Titanfall developer Jon Shirling, the new Microsoft API isn't needed to improve the game's performance, and...
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One of the most profound questions BioShock Infinite's original story left open was the relationship between the floating city of 1912 and the undersea empire of Rapture that we explored in the original BioShock. BioShock Infinite's Burial at Sea DLC (Parts 1 & 2) answer that question -- but it's the second...
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At GDC a few weeks ago, NVIDIA teased a new set of drivers that it promised would offer huge scaling benefits for both single-GPU and SLI configurations. The new driver, 337.50 Beta, drops today -- so what kind of gains can users expect? If you own a high-end NVIDIA card, apparently quite a bit, especially if you game...
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Last week, we took a trip to San Diego to meet with Qualcomm and discuss the company's cutting edge 20nm radios and upcoming Snapdragon processors. Unlike the already-launched Snapdragon 801 and 805, these are fundamentally new chips with updated CPU cores as well as Qualcomm's new Adreno 400-class GPU. Qualcomm is announcing two new chips...
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Today, Qualcomm is announcing full support for a new wireless transmission method that could significantly boost performance on crowded networks. The new standard, MU-MIMO (Multiple User - Multiple Input and Multiple Output) has a clunky name -- but could make a significant difference to home network speeds and...
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When Nvidia unveiled its new GeForce 800M mobile family a few weeks ago, it talked about a new set of improvements and innovations coming to laptops with through the GeForce Experience program. In the future, applications would have the option to dramatically improve battery life by limiting in-game frame rates as...
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After AMD launched its Hawaii-based R9 290 and R9 290X last fall, it was only a matter of time before the company followed up with a new set of workstation cards. Today, it's rolling out the FirePro W9100 -- a new, R9 290X-based workstation GPU that slots in just above the older W9000. Matt Skynner, VP and GM of AMD's graphics business, introduced...
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Earlier this month, Microsoft acknowledged that it would debut DirectX 12 at GDC this year, with promises that it would offer many of the same features as AMD's Mantle. Fast on the heels of that announcement came news that the API would also be deployed on the Xbox One, presumably as part of a future update. Now, a...
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Nvidia may have just announced GameWorks support will be baked into Unreal Engine 4, but the Red Team is firing back with its own announcement today: Upcoming versions of Cryengine will support AMD's Mantle API. Just to be clear, this announcement refers to an upcoming engine that hasn't been used for a shipping title...
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I finished South Park: The Stick of Truth early this morning after navigating the wilds of Canada, alien starships, the Lost Forest, encounters with Crab People, and the myriad dangers, pitfalls, and ridiculous events that weave the fabric of life in the quiet mountain town of South Park, Colorado. The vast majority of licensed games wallow...
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Titanfall has been one of the most anticipated and important games of the Xbox One's short life, but a head-to-head comparison between the new console and high-end gaming PCs has illustrated that once again, the PCs come out on top. The problem, in this case, isn't that the Xbox One's visuals are poor -- the...
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The latest data from NPD is in and it shows a significant jump in Xbox One's relative sales position versus PS4. In January, reports indicated that the PS4 had been outsold by the PS4 nearly 2:1, but February closed that gap with the Xbox One moving an estimated 258,000 units against the PS4's 286,000 units...
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A new comprehensive writeup at The Intercept claims to reveal additional details of the NSA's plans to infiltrate and conquer the Internet -- as well as its desire to bring virtually all data, everywhere, within its reach. A year ago, this kind of claim would've sounded like hyperbolic conspiracy theory, but no...
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Expectations are high for the imminent launch of Titanfall. The game is a major test for Microsoft's Xbox One -- its one of the biggest exclusive projects, its beta was well-reviewed, and gamers have been looking for a game that would clarify just what the Xbox One is capable of when compared against the PlayStation...
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