Tech – Page 66

Framework boosts its 13-inch laptop with new CPUs, lower prices, and better screens

framework, Tech / DJ Henderson / May 30, 2024

sprucing up —

Framework Laptop 13 gets its fourth major round of upgraded, modular parts.

Andrew Cunningham – May 30, 2024 5: 11 pm UTC

Enlarge / The Framework Laptop 13.

Framework

Framework will release a fourth round of iterative updates and upgrade options for its Framework Laptop 13, the company announced via a blog post yesterday. The upgrades include both motherboards and pre-built laptops that feature new Intel Meteor Lake Core Ultra processors with Intel Arc dedicated GPUs; lower prices for the AMD Ryzen 7000 and 13th-gen Intel editions of the laptop; and a new display with a slightly higher 2880×1920 resolution and a 120 Hz refresh rate.

The Core Ultra boards can come with one of three CPU options: an Ultra 5 125H with four P-cores, eight E-cores, and seven graphics cores; an Ultra 7 155H with six P-cores, eight E-cores, and eight graphics cores; or an Ultra 7 165H with the same number of cores but marginally higher clock speeds. Prices start at $899 for a pre-built or DIY model (before you add RAM, storage, an OS, or a USB-C charger), or $449 for a motherboard that can be used to upgrade an existing system.

All of the Core Ultra systems and boards ship in August as of this writing. Once this first batch sells out, a second batch will ship in Q3.

Those upgrading from an older Intel Framework board should take note: Like the Ryzen option, the Core Ultra CPUs also require an upgrade to DDR5 RAM since the processors don’t maintain compatibility with DDR4. Framework will charge you $40 for every 8GB of DDR5-5600 you buy, which is better than most PC OEMs but still above market rates—order your own RAM separately and you can save anywhere from $12 to $148, depending on the capacity.

The Core Ultra chips, like the Ryzen 7040-series chips, also include a neural processing unit (NPU) that can be used to accelerate some AI workloads. But both NPUs fall far short of the performance required for Recall and other locally accelerated AI features coming to Windows 11 24H2 later this year; Framework’s blog post doesn’t mention the NPU.

As for the new 13.5-inch, 2880×1920 display, it’s a decent resolution upgrade from the existing 2256×1504 display, and Framework says it will work a bit better with display scaling in Linux (Linux’s support for fractional scaling ratios like 125 percent or 150 percent is still generally labeled as “experimental,” though 200 percent display scaling usually works OK). It has a matte finish and a 120 Hz refresh rate, and it costs $130 more than the standard display or $269 when bought on its own to upgrade an existing laptop.

Enlarge / The new 13.5-inch Framework display has rounded corners, a side effect of the display panel being a repurposed version of something made for another (unspecified) company.

Framework

The one oddity of the new display is that it has rounded corners that don’t quite match the squared-off corners of the Framework Laptop’s display bezel. Framework says that’s because it “repurposed and customized a panel that was originally designed for another company,” though it hasn’t yet provided further specifics. All of Microsoft’s Surface devices released within the last few years have also used rounded corners, and I haven’t found that it affects functionality at all.

Other odds and ends include multicolor USB-C Expansion Cards that are color-matched to the colorful bezel options, an English International keyboard for Linux users with a “super” key in the place of the Windows logo, and a new 9.2-megapixel front-facing webcam module with low-noise microphones (Framework says this module doesn’t work at its native resolution but instead groups four pixels together into one to deliver better performance at 1080p).

Framework has also added new configuration options for the Ryzen 7040 version of the Laptop 13 that include the new display and has lowered prices on those AMD configs and on “our remaining inventory of 13th-gen Intel Core systems. AMD systems are about $50 cheaper than they were before, though the discount is only $30 if you’re buying a bare motherboard with the Ryzen 5 7640U installed.

If you’re interested in the Framework Laptop but are hesitating because of the software and firmware update issues we’ve reported on recently, Framework says it has made progress on some of the plans that CEO Nirav Patel outlined in an interview with Ars and in some statements since then. Both the Ryzen version of the Framework Laptop 13 and the Framework Laptop 16 got new drivers in early April, while BIOS updates for both Ryzen laptops, the 11th-gen Intel laptops, and the 12th-gen Intel laptops have all been formally released in the last few months. We’re monitoring these releases, and we’ll continue to cover them when there is new information to report.

Framework boosts its 13-inch laptop with new CPUs, lower prices, and better screens Read More »

Google Cloud explains how it accidentally deleted a customer account

Google, Tech / Shannon Garcia / May 30, 2024

Flubbing the input —

UniSuper’s 647,000 users faced two weeks of downtime because of a Google Cloud bug.

Ron Amadeo – May 30, 2024 5: 10 pm UTC

Earlier this month, Google Cloud experienced one of its biggest blunders ever when UniSuper, a $135 billion Australian pension fund, had its Google Cloud account wiped out due to some kind of mistake on Google’s end. At the time, UniSuper indicated it had lost everything it had stored with Google, even its backups, and that caused two weeks of downtime for its 647,000 members. There were joint statements from the Google Cloud CEO and UniSuper CEO on the matter, a lot of apologies, and presumably a lot of worried customers who wondered if their retirement fund had disappeared.

In the immediate aftermath, the explanation we got was that “the disruption arose from an unprecedented sequence of events whereby an inadvertent misconfiguration during provisioning of UniSuper’s Private Cloud services ultimately resulted in the deletion of UniSuper’s Private Cloud subscription.” Two weeks later, Google Cloud’s internal review of the problem is finished, and the company has a blog post up detailing what happened.

Google has a “TL;DR” at the top of the post, and it sounds like a Google employee got an input wrong.

During the initial deployment of a Google Cloud VMware Engine (GCVE) Private Cloud for the customer using an internal tool, there was an inadvertent misconfiguration of the GCVE service by Google operators due to leaving a parameter blank. This had the unintended and then unknown consequence of defaulting the customer’s GCVE Private Cloud to a fixed term, with automatic deletion at the end of that period. The incident trigger and the downstream system behavior have both been corrected to ensure that this cannot happen again.

The most shocking thing about Google’s blunder was the sudden and irreversible deletion of a customer account. Shouldn’t there be protections, notifications, and confirmations in place to never accidentally delete something? Google says there are, but those warnings are for a “customer-initiated deletion” and didn’t work when using the admin tool. Google says, “No customer notification was sent because the deletion was triggered as a result of a parameter being left blank by Google operators using the internal tool, and not due to a customer deletion request. Any customer-initiated deletion would have been preceded by a notification to the customer.”

During its many downtime updates, UniSuper indicated it did not have access to Google Cloud backups and had to dig into a third-party (presumably less up-to-date) store to get back up and running. In the frenzy of the recovery period, UniSuper said that “UniSuper had duplication in two geographies as a protection against outages and loss. However, when the deletion of UniSuper’s Private Cloud subscription occurred, it caused deletion across both of these geographies… UniSuper had backups in place with an additional service provider. These backups have minimized data loss, and significantly improved the ability of UniSuper and Google Cloud to complete the restoration.”

In its post-mortem, Google now says, “Data backups that were stored in Google Cloud Storage in the same region were not impacted by the deletion, and, along with third-party backup software, were instrumental in aiding the rapid restoration.” It’s hard to square these two statements, especially with the two-week recovery period. The goal of a backup is to be quickly restored; so either UniSuper’s backups didn’t get deleted and weren’t effective, leading to two weeks of downtime, or they would have been effective had they not been partially or completely wiped out.

Google stressed many times in the post that this issue affected a single customer, has never happened before, should never happen again, and is not a systemic problem with Google Cloud. Here’s the entire “remediation” section of the blog post:

Google Cloud has since taken several actions to ensure that this incident does not and can not occur again, including:

We deprecated the internal tool that triggered this sequence of events. This aspect is now fully automated and controlled by customers via the user interface, even when specific capacity management is required.

We scrubbed the system database and manually reviewed all GCVE Private Clouds to ensure that no other GCVE deployments are at risk.

We corrected the system behavior that sets GCVE Private Clouds for deletion for such deployment workflows.

Google says Cloud still has “safeguards in place with a combination of soft delete, advance notification, and human-in-the-loop, as appropriate,” and it confirmed these safeguards all still work.

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Google is killing off the messaging service inside Google Maps

Google, google maps, Tech / Mike M. / May 29, 2024

Going out of business —

Google Maps has had its own chat platform since 2018, but it’s shutting down in July.

Ron Amadeo – May 29, 2024 6: 05 pm UTC

Whether you want to call it “Google Business Messaging” or “Google Business Profile Chat,” the chat buttons in Google Maps and Search are going away.

Google
This is the 2018 version of Google Maps Messaging, which is when it was first built into the Google Maps app.

Google
Messages used to have a top-tier spot in the navigation panel.

Google
In the current UI, Messages lives in the “Updates” tab.

Ron Amadeo
You used to be able to reply to Google Maps Messages with Google Allo.

Google is killing off a messaging service! This one is the odd “Google Business Messaging” service—basically an instant messaging client that is built into Google Maps. If you looked up a participating business in Google Maps or Google Search on a phone, the main row of buttons in the place card would read something like “Call,” “Chat,” “Directions,” and “Website.” That “Chat” button is the service we’re talking about. It would launch a full messaging interface inside the Google Maps app, and businesses were expected to use it for customer service purposes. Google’s deeply dysfunctional messaging strategy might lead people to joke about a theoretical “Google Maps Messaging” service, but it already exists and has existed for years, and now it’s being shut down.

Search Engine Land’s Barry Schwartz was the first to spot the shutdown emails being sent out to participating businesses. Google has two different support articles up for a shutdown of both “Google Business Profile Chat” and “Google Business Messages,” which appear to just be the same thing with different names. On July 15, 2024, the ability to start a new chat will be disabled, and on July 31, 2024, both services will be shut down. Google is letting businesses download past chat conversations via Google Takeout.

Google’s Maps messaging service was Google Messaging Service No. 16 in our giant History of Google Messaging article. The feature has undergone many changes, so it’s a bit hard to follow. The Google Maps Messaging button launched in 2017, when it would have been called “Google My Business Chat.” This wasn’t quite its own service yet—the messaging button would either launch your SMS app or boot into another dead Google messaging product, Google Allo!

The original SMS option was the easy path for small businesses with a single store, but SMS is tied to a single physical phone. If you’re a bigger business and want to take on the task of doing customer service across multiple stores, at the scale of Google Maps, that’s going to be a multi-person job. The Google Allo back-end (which feels like it was the driving force behind creating this project in the first place) would let you triage messages to multiple people. Allo was one year into its 2.5-year lifespan when this feature launched, though, so things would have to change soon before Allo’s 2019 shutdown date.

Knowing that the announcement of Allo’s death was a month away, Google started making Maps into its own standalone messaging service in November 2018. Previously, it would always launch an outside app (either SMS or Allo), but with this 2018 update, Maps got its own instant messaging UI built right into the app. “Messages” became a top-level item in the navigation drawer (later this would move to “updates”), and a third-party app was no longer needed. On the business side of things, a new “Google My Business” app would be the new customer service interface for all these messages. Allo’s shutdown in 2019 disabled the ability to use SMS for small businesses, and everything needed to use this Google My Business app now. Maps was officially a new messaging service. Google also created the “Business Messages API,” so big businesses could plug Maps messaging into some kind of customer management app.

It does not sound like Google is going to replace business messaging with anything in the near future, so the Chat buttons in Google Maps and search will be going away. In the endless pantheon of Google Messaging solutions, the Google Developer page also mentions an “RCS Business Messaging” platform that will launch the Google Messaging app. This service does not seem to be built into any existing Google products, though, and isn’t mentioned as an alternative in Google’s shutdown announcement. Google only suggests that businesses “redirect customers to your alternative communication channels,” but those links won’t be getting premium placement in Google’s products.

Business messaging is a pretty well-established market, and the Big Tech companies with competent messaging strategies are involved somehow. On iOS, there’s Apple’s iMessage-based Messages for Business, which also has a chat button layout in Apple Maps. Meta has both WhatsApp Business Messaging and Facebook Messenger’s Meta Business Messaging. There are also standalone businesses like Twilio.

Listing image by Google / Ron Amadeo

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8BitDo M Edition mechanical keyboard is a modern take on IBM’s Model M

8bitdo, ibm, Keyboards, mechanical keyboards, Tech, Wireless keyboards / DJ Henderson / May 29, 2024

Bucks buckling springs —

Numpad sold separately.

Scharon Harding – May 29, 2024 5: 43 pm UTC

8BitDo’s IBM-like M Edition keyboard.

8BitDo
Design cues help pay tribute to the ’80s buckling spring keyboard.

8BitDo
It even has arrows on the Tab key, like the original Model M had.

8BitDo
A profile view.

8BitDo
Modern updates include these dedicated media keys.

8BitDo
The keyboard has integrated storage for the wireless dongle.

8BitDo

8BitDo is releasing an IBM-inspired look for its $100 wireless mechanical keyboard. Keyboard enthusiasts love regaling normies with tales of IBM’s buckling spring keyboards and the precedent they set for today’s mechanical keyboards. But 8BitDo’s Retro Mechanical Keyboard M Edition doesn’t adopt very much from IBM’s iconic designs.

8BitDo’s Retro mechanical keyboards come in different looks that each pay tribute to classic tech. The tributes are subtle enough to avoid copyright issues. Similar to 8BitDo’s ‘80s Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) and Commodore 64 designs, the M Edition doesn’t have any official IBM logos. However, the M Edition’s color scheme, chunkier build, and typeface selection, including on the Tab key with arrows and elsewhere, are nods to IBM’s Model M, which first succeeded the Model F in 1985.

Of course, the keyboard’s naming, and the IBM behemoth and floppy disks strategically placed in marketing images, are notes of that, too:

Enlarge / The IBM Easter eggs are apparent.

8BitDo

Despite its IBM-blue striped B and A buttons, the M Edition won’t be sufficient for retro keyboard fans seeking the distinct, buckling-spring experience of a true Model M.

As mentioned, the M Edition is basically a new color scheme for 8BitDo’s wireless mechanical keyboard offering. The peripheral connects to Windows 10 and Android 9.0 and newer devices via a USB-A cable, its wireless USB-A 2.4 Ghz dongle, or Bluetooth 5.0. 8BitDo claims it can endure up to 200 hours of use before needing a recharge. The M Edition also comes with the detachable A and B “Super Buttons” that connect to the keyboard via a 3.5 mm jack and are programmable without software.

A closer look at the Super Buttons.

8BitDo
The pair of buttons attach to a port on the keyboard’s top edge.

8BitDo

Differing from the Model M’s buckling spring switches, the M Edition has Kailh Box White V2 mechanical switches, which typically feel clicky and light to press. With crisp clicks and noticeable, but not slowing, feedback, they’re good for a modern mechanical switch for frequent typing.

But IBM’s ’80s keyboard didn’t use modern mechanical switches. It used buckling springs over a membrane sheet that made keys feel heavier to push than the keys on the preceding Model F keyboard (which used buckling springs over a capacitive PCB). 8BitDo’s switches are hot-swappable, though, making them easily replaceable.

The M Edition’s keycaps have an MDA-profile-like height, according to 8BitDo’s website. True Model M keycaps all had the same profile. The M Edition’s keycaps are doubleshot like the true Model M’s were, but the new keyboard uses cheaper ABS plastic instead of PBT.

While dimensions of 14.8×6.7×1.8 inches make the M Edition fairly dense for a tenkeyless keyboard, I would have loved to see 8BitDo commit to the vintage look with a thicker border north of the keys and more height toward the top.

But smaller keyboards that let owners reclaim desk space are the more common prebuilt mechanical keyboard releases these days, especially for gaming-peripherals brands like 8BitDo. A gaming focus also helps explain why there’s no numpad on the M Edition. 8BitDo is releasing a detachable numpad to go with the keyboard. It can connect via Bluetooth, dongle, or cable, but it will cost $45 extra.

Enlarge / The numpad has a button for switching to a regular calculator.

8BitDo

8BitDo’s new keyboard colorway may appeal to people craving a hint of IBM nostalgia that doesn’t make their workspace look like it’s completely stuck in the past. But considering the fandom and legacy of old-school IBM keyboards’ switches and looks, shades of gray and blue won’t feel retro enough for many IBM keyboard fans.

Enlarge / The real deal: an IBM Model M.

If you want a real Model M, there’s a market of found and restored models available online and in thrift stores and electronics stores. For a modern spin, like USB ports and Mac support, Unicomp also makes new Model M keyboards that are truer to the original IBM design, particularly in their use of buckling spring switches.

The M Edition comes out on July 15.

Listing image by 8BitDo

8BitDo M Edition mechanical keyboard is a modern take on IBM’s Model M Read More »

iFixit ends Samsung deal as oppressive repair shop requirements come to light

Tech / Mike M. / May 28, 2024

Samsung has no follow-through? Shocking —

iFixit says “flashy press releases don’t mean much without follow-through.”

Ron Amadeo – May 28, 2024 6: 14 pm UTC

IFixit and Samsung were once leading the charge in device repair, but iFixit says it’s ending its repair partnership with Samsung because it feels Samsung just isn’t participating in good faith. iFixit says the two companies “have not been able to deliver” on the promise of a viable repair ecosystem, so it would rather shut the project down than continue. The repair site says “flashy press releases and ambitious initiatives don’t mean much without follow-through.”

iFixit’s Scott Head explains: “As we tried to build this ecosystem we consistently faced obstacles that made us doubt Samsung’s commitment to making repair more accessible. We couldn’t get parts to local repair shops at prices and quantities that made business sense. The part prices were so costly that many consumers opted to replace their devices rather than repair them. And the design of Samsung’s Galaxy devices remained frustratingly glued together, forcing us to sell batteries and screens in pre-glued bundles that increased the cost.”

Samsung’s screen replacement parts usually require buying the display, battery, phone frame, and buttons, which is a big waste.

iFixit

A good example of Samsung’s parts bundling is this Galaxy S22 Ultra “screen” part for $233. The screen is the most common part to break, but rather than just sell a screen, Samsung makes you buy the screen, a new phone frame, a battery, and new side buttons and switches. As we said when this was announced, that’s like half of the total parts in an entire phone. This isn’t a perfect metric, but the Samsung/iFixit parts store only offers three parts for the S22 Ultra, while the Pixel 8 Pro store has 10 parts, and the iPhone 14 Pro Max store has 23 parts.

Even with Samsung’s part-bundling, though, iFixit’s complaint of high prices doesn’t seem reflected in the store pricing. The Pixel 8 Pro screen + fingerprint reader, without a case, battery, and buttons, is $230. An iPhone 14 Pro Max screen is $395. (There is a good chance Samsung is the manufacturer of all three of these displays.)

Samsung and iFixit have always had a rocky relationship. In 2017, the two companies were supposed to partner up for an “upcycling” program, where Samsung found new uses for old phones. The original plan included things like unlocking the bootloader of old devices, so Samsung’s OS could be completely replaced, and hosting an open source marketplace where users could submit ideas and software for repurposing old Galaxy devices. In what now seems like a familiar strategy, Samsung was more concerned about appearances than being actually useful, and iFixit said the upcycling program that launched in 2021 was “nearly unrecognizable” to what iFixit originally endorsed and lent its logo to in 2017.

In 2019, following the “embarrassing” delayed launch of the Galaxy Fold 1 due to durability reasons, Samsung attacked iFixit for doing a teardown of the flawed device. Samsung forced iFixit to take down an article explaining some of the flaws of the device. Samsung didn’t have any legal capability to do this, but it apparently threatened one of iFixit’s part suppliers if the article didn’t get pulled.

Samsung has also reportedly been on the attack against repair, even while it partners with iFixit. On the same day that iFixit announced it was dropping the partnership, 404 Media reported that Samsung requires independent repair shops to turn over customer data and “immediately disassemble” any device found to be using third-party parts. Imagine taking your phone to a shop for repair and finding out it was destroyed by the shop as a requirement from Samsung. The report also says Samsung’s contracts require that independent companies “daily” upload to a Samsung database (called G-SPN) the details of each and every repair “at the time of each repair.”

With the latest chapter of the partnership store dying after just two years, in June 2024, iFixit says some changes are coming to its website. It won’t remove any information, but it will start offering clearly labeled third-party parts in addition to whatever Samsung OEM parts it can source. It will no longer collaborate with Samsung for manuals and won’t need to follow Samsung’s quantity limit requirements.

iFixit ends Samsung deal as oppressive repair shop requirements come to light Read More »

“Unacceptable”: Spotify bricking Car Thing devices in Dec. without refunds

Spotify, Tech / DJ Henderson / May 25, 2024

Car Thing becoming nothing —

Spotify stopped making Car Things in July 2022 but kept selling them.

Scharon Harding – May 23, 2024 8: 32 pm UTC

Owners of Spotify’s soon-to-be-bricked Car Thing device are begging the company to open-source the gadgets to save some the landfill. Spotify hasn’t responded to pleas to salvage the hardware, which was originally intended to connect to car dashboards and auxiliary outlets to enable drivers to listen to and navigate Spotify.

Spotify announced today that it’s bricking all purchased Car Things on December 9 and not offering refunds or trade-in options. On a support page, Spotify says:

We’re discontinuing Car Thing as part of our ongoing efforts to streamline our product offerings. We understand it may be disappointing, but this decision allows us to focus on developing new features and enhancements that will ultimately provide a better experience to all Spotify users.

Spotify has no further guidance for device owners beyond asking them to reset the device to factory settings and “safely” get rid of the bricked gadget by “following local electronic waste guidelines.”

The company also said that it doesn’t plan to release a follow-up to the Car Thing.

Early demise

Car Thing came out to limited subscribers in October 2021 before releasing to the general public in February 2022.

In its Q2 2022 earnings report released in July, Spotify revealed that it stopped making Car Things. In a chat with TechCrunch, it cited “several factors, including product demand and supply chain issues.” A Spotify rep also told the publication that the devices would continue to “perform as intended,” but that was apparently a temporary situation.

Halted production was a warning sign that Car Thing was in peril. However, at that time, Spotify also cut the device’s price from $90 to $50, which could have encouraged people to buy a device that would be useless a few years later.

Car Thing’s usefulness was always dubious, though. The device has a 4-inch touchscreen and knob for easy navigation, as well as support for Apple CarPlay, Android Auto, and voice control. But it also required users to subscribe to Spotify Premium, which starts at $11 per month. Worse, Car Thing requires a phone using data or Wi-Fi connected via Bluetooth in order to work, making the Thing seem redundant.

In its Q1 2022 report, Spotify said that quitting Car Thing hurt gross margins and that it took a 31 million euro (about $31.4 million at the time) hit on the venture.

Open source pleas

Spotify’s announcement has sent some Car Thing owners to online forums to share their disappointment with Spotify and beg the company to open-source the device instead of dooming it for recycling centers at best. As of this writing, there are over 50 posts on the Spotify Community forums showing concern about the discontinuation, with many demanding a refund and/or calling for open-sourcing. There are similar discussions happening elsewhere online, like on Reddit, where users have used phrases like “entirely unnacceptable” to describe the news.

A Spotify Community member going by AaronMickDee, for example, said:

I’d rather not just dispose of the device. I think there is a community that would love the idea of having a device we can customize and use for other uses other than a song playback device.

Would Spotify be willing to maybe unlock the system and allow users to write/flash 3rd party firmware to the device?

A Spotify spokesperson declined to answer Ars’ questions about why Car Thing isn’t being open-sourced and concerns around e-waste and wasted money.

Instead, a company rep told Ars, in part: “The goal of our Car Thing exploration in the US was to learn more about how people listen in the car. In July 2022, we announced we’d stop further production and now it’s time to say goodbye to the devices entirely.” I followed up with Spotify’s rep to ask again about making the device open source but didn’t hear back.

At this point, encouraging customers to waste nearly $100 on a soon-obsolete device hasn’t resulted in any groundbreaking innovations or lessons around “how people listen in the car.” In their initial response, Spotify’s rep pointed me to a Spotify site that searches Spotify’s newsroom for “how to listen to Spotify in the car.” One of the top posts is from 2019 and states that “if your car has an AUX or USB socket, using a cable is probably one of the fastest ways to connect by using your phone.”

As for Spotify, using customer dollars for company-serving learning experiences isn’t the best business plan. And for regular users, it’s best to avoid investing in an unproven hardware venture from a software company.

As Redditor Wemie1420 put it:

Doesn’t feel great that there is literally no alternative other than trashing it. Feels like we’re being punished for supporting them. Dissuades me from buying anything Spotify puts out in the future. I feel like there would be some way to approach this without being like, ‘yeah we’re done. Just throw it out it’s a waste of money now.’

“Unacceptable”: Spotify bricking Car Thing devices in Dec. without refunds Read More »

Bing outage shows just how little competition Google search really has

AI, ai overview, Bing, Biz & IT, chatgpt, duckduckgo, ecosia, gby, Google, kagi, microsoft, mojeek, reddit, right dao, search, stract, Tech, yandex, yep / Shannon Garcia / May 25, 2024

Searching for new search —

Opinion: Actively searching without Google or Bing is harder than it looks.

Kevin Purdy – May 23, 2024 8: 01 pm UTC

Getty Images

Bing, Microsoft’s search engine platform, went down in the very early morning today. That meant that searches from Microsoft’s Edge browsers that had yet to change their default providers didn’t work. It also meant that services relying on Bing’s search API—Microsoft’s own Copilot, ChatGPT search, Yahoo, Ecosia, and DuckDuckGo—similarly failed.

Services were largely restored by the morning Eastern work hours, but the timing feels apt, concerning, or some combination of the two. Google, the consistently dominating search platform, just last week announced and debuted AI Overviews as a default addition to all searches. If you don’t want an AI response but still want to use Google, you can hunt down the new “Web” option in a menu, or you can, per Ernie Smith, tack “&udm=14” onto your search or use Smith’s own “Konami code” shortcut page.

If dismay about AI’s hallucinations, power draw, or pizza recipes concern you—along with perhaps broader Google issues involving privacy, tracking, news, SEO, or monopoly power—most of your other major options were brought down by a single API outage this morning. Moving past that kind of single point of vulnerability will take some work, both by the industry and by you, the person wondering if there’s a real alternative.

Search engine market share, as measured by StatCounter, April 2023–April 2024.

StatCounter

Upward of a billion dollars a year

The overwhelming majority of search tools offering an “alternative” to Google are using Google, Bing, or Yandex, the three major search engines that maintain massive global indexes. Yandex, being based in Russia, is a non-starter for many people around the world at the moment. Bing offers its services widely, most notably to DuckDuckGo, but its ad-based revenue model and privacy particulars have caused some friction there in the past. Before his company was able to block more of Microsoft’s own tracking scripts, DuckDuckGo CEO and founder Gabriel Weinberg explained in a Reddit reply why firms like his weren’t going the full DIY route:

… [W]e source most of our traditional links and images privately from Bing … Really only two companies (Google and Microsoft) have a high-quality global web link index (because I believe it costs upwards of a billion dollars a year to do), and so literally every other global search engine needs to bootstrap with one or both of them to provide a mainstream search product. The same is true for maps btw — only the biggest companies can similarly afford to put satellites up and send ground cars to take streetview pictures of every neighborhood.

Bing makes Microsoft money, if not quite profit yet. It’s in Microsoft’s interest to keep its search index stocked and API open, even if its focus is almost entirely on its own AI chatbot version of Bing. Yet if Microsoft decided to pull API access, or it became unreliable, Google’s default position gets even stronger. What would non-conformists have to choose from then?

Bing outage shows just how little competition Google search really has Read More »

Biggest Windows 11 update in 2 years nearly finalized, enters Release Preview

Tech, Windows 11, windows 11 24h2 / Mike M. / May 25, 2024

getting there —

24H2 update includes big changes, will be released “later this calendar year.”

Andrew Cunningham – May 23, 2024 7: 39 pm UTC

The Windows 11 24H2 update isn’t scheduled to be released until sometime this fall, but testers can get a near-final version of it early. Microsoft has released Windows 11 24H2 build 26100.712 to its Release Preview testing channel for Windows Insiders, a sign that the update is nearly complete and that the company has shifted into bug-fixing mode ahead of general availability.

Microsoft has generally stuck to smaller but more frequent feature updates during the Windows 11 era, but the annual fall updates still tend to be a bigger deal. They’re the ones that determine whether you’re still eligible for security updates, and they often (but not always) come with more significant under-the-hood changes than the normal feature drops.

Case in point: Windows 11 24H2 includes an updated compiler, kernel, and scheduler, all lower-level system changes made at least in part to better support Arm-based PCs. Existing Windows-on-Arm systems should also see a 10 or 20 percent performance boost when using x86 applications, thanks to improvements in the translation layer (which Microsoft is now calling Prism).

There are more user-visible changes, too. 24H2 includes Sudo for Windows, the ability to create TAR and 7-zip archives from the File Explorer, Wi-Fi 7 support, a new “energy saver” mode, and better support for Bluetooth Low Energy Audio. It also allows users to run the Copilot AI chatbot in a regular resizable window that can be pinned to the taskbar instead of always giving it a dedicated strip of screen space.

Other new Windows features are tied to the 24H2 update but will only be available on Copilot+ PCs, which have their own specific system requirements: 16 GB of memory, 256 GB of storage, and a neural processing unit (NPU) capable of at least 40 trillion operations per second (TOPS). As of right now, the only chips that fit the bill are Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X Plus and X Elite processors, though Intel and AMD systems with faster NPUs should be released later this year. Microsoft will maintain a separate list of processors that support the Copilot+ features.

The biggest 24H2 feature specific to Copilot+ PCs is Recall, which continually takes snapshots of everything you do with your PC so that you can look up your own activities later. This comes with obvious privacy and security risks, though Microsoft says that all of Recall’s data is encrypted on disk and processed entirely locally by the NPU rather than leveraging the cloud. Other Copilot+ features include Live Captions for captioning video files or video calls in real time and features for generating new images and enhancing existing images.

Collectively, all of these changes make 24H2 the most significant Windows 11 release since the 22H2 update came out a year and a half ago. 22H2 has served as the foundation for most new Windows features since then, including the Copilot chatbot, and 23H2 was mostly just a version number change released to reset the clock on Microsoft’s security update timeline.

Despite all of these changes and additions, the 24H2 update is still called Windows 11, still looks like Windows 11, and doesn’t change Windows 11’s official minimum system requirements. Unsupported installs will stop working on a few generations’ worth of older 64-bit x86 CPUs, though these chips are old and slow enough that they wouldn’t run Windows 11 particularly well in the first place.

For people who want to start fresh, ISO files of the release are available from Microsoft’s download page here (this is a slightly older build of the OS, 26100.560, but it should update to the current version with no issues after installation). You can update a current Windows 11 install from the Insider section in the Settings app. Microsoft says to expect the full release “later this calendar year.” Based on past precedent, it’s most likely to come out in the fall, but it will probably ship a bit early on the first wave of Copilot+ Arm PCs that will be available in mid-June.

Biggest Windows 11 update in 2 years nearly finalized, enters Release Preview Read More »

Google Search’s “udm=14” trick lets you kill AI search for good

Google, google ai, Tech / DJ Henderson / May 24, 2024

Kill AI search “for good” or until Google changes the parameter —

The power of URL parameters lets you unofficially turn off Google’s AI Overview.

Ron Amadeo – Updated May 24, 2024 5: 54 pm UTC

Enlarge / The now normal “AI” results versus the old school “Web” results.

Ron Amadeo / Google

If you’re tired of Google’s AI Overview extracting all value from the web while also telling people to eat glue or run with scissors, you can turn it off—sort of. Google has been telling people its AI box at the top of search results is the future, and you can’t turn it off, but that ignores how Google search works: A lot of options are powered by URL parameters. That means you can turn off AI search with this one simple trick! (Sorry.)

Our method for killing AI search is defaulting to the new “web” search filter, which Google recently launched as a way to search the web without Google’s alpha-quality AI junk. It’s actually pretty nice, showing only the traditional 10 blue links, giving you a clean (well, other than the ads), uncluttered results page that looks like it’s from 2011. Sadly, Google’s UI doesn’t have a way to make “web” search the default, and switching to it means digging through the “more” options drop-down after you do a search, so it’s a few clicks deep.

Check out the URL after you do a search, and you’ll see a mile-long URL full of esoteric tracking information and mode information. We’ll put each search result URL parameter on a new line so the URL is somewhat readable:

https://www.google.com/search

?sca_esv=2d1299fed1ffcbfc

&sca_upv=1

&sxsrf=ADLYWIKXaYE8rQyTMcGnzqLZRvjlreRhkw: 1716566104389

&q=how+do+I+turn+off+ai+overview

&uds=ADvngMiH6OrNXu9iaW3w… [truncated]

&udm=14

&prmd=vnisbmt

&sa=X

&ved=2ahUKEwixo4qH06aGAxW5MlkFHQupBdkQs6gLegQITBAB

&biw=1918

&bih=953

&dpr=1

Most of these only mean something to Google’s internal tracking system, but that “&udm=14” line is the one that will put you in a web search. Tack it on to the end of a normal search, and you’ll be booted into the clean 10 blue links interface. While Google might not let you set this as a default, if you have a way to automatically edit the Google search URL, you can create your own defaults. One way to edit the search URL is a proxy site like udm14.com, which is probably the biggest site out there popularizing this technique. A proxy site could, if it wanted to, read all your search result queries, though (your query is also in the URL), so whether you trust this site is up to you.

If you search from your browser’s address bar, that’s a good way to make “web” search the default without involving a third party. Chrome and Firefox have essentially the exact same UI for search settings. In Chrome, you get there by right-clicking the address bar and hitting “manage search engines.” Firefox might take a bit more work, since first you’ll need to enable custom search engines. First type “about:config” into the address bar and hit enter, then search for “browser.urlbar.update2.engineAliasRefresh,” and hit the “plus” button. Then go to Settings -> Search, scroll down to the search engine section, and hit “Add.”

On both browsers, you probably can’t edit the existing Google listing, so you’ll need to create a new search shortcut, call it Google Web, and use https://www.google.com/search?q=%s&udm=14 as the URL.

The third box in the search engine setting is either named “shortcut” or “alias,” depending on your browser, and it does not matter at all if you plan on making this your new default search engine. If you don’t want it to be the default, shortcut/alias will let you selectively launch this search from the address bar by starting your query with the shortcut text. The udm14.com instructions suggest “gw,” so then typing “gw should I eat rocks” will launch “web” search. Omitting “gw” will still launch Google’s AI idiot box, which will probably tell you that rocks are delicious. To use this search engine all the time, find it in the list again after creating it, click the menu button next to the listing, and hit “make default.” Then the shortcut is no longer needed—anything typed into the address bar/search box will go right to web search.

While you’re in here messing around with Google’s URL parameters, another one you might want to add is “&tbs=li:1”. This will automatically trigger “verbatim” search, which makes Google use your exact search inputs instead of fuzzy searching everything, ignoring some words, replacing words with synonyms, and generally doing whatever it can to water down your search input. If you’re a Google novice, the default fuzzy search is fine, but if you’re an expert that has honed your Google Fu skills since the good old days, the fuzzy search is just annoying. It’s just a default, so if you ever find yourself with zero results, hitting the “tools” button will still let you switch between “verbatim” and “all results.”

Defaulting to “web” search will let you use Google with only the 10 blue links, and while that feels like rolling the interface back to 2011, keep in mind you’re still not rolling back Google’s search results quality to 2011. You’re still going to be using a search engine that feels like it has completely surrendered to SEO spammers. So, while this Band-Aid solution is interesting, things are getting so bad that the real recommendation is probably to switch to something other than Google at this point. We all need to find another search engine that values the web and tries to search it. As opposed to Google, which increasingly seems like it’s trying to sacrifice the web at the altar of AI.

Listing image by Aurich Lawson

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Apple clarifies iOS 17.5 bug that exposed deleted photos

Apple, ios 17.5, iOS 17.5.1, photos, Tech / Kelly Newman / May 24, 2024

iOS 17.5 —

iOS 17.5.1 fixed the bug, but users still had questions.

Samuel Axon – May 24, 2024 4: 28 pm UTC

Enlarge / iPadOS 17.5.1 ready to install on an iPad Pro.

Samuel Axon

On May 20, Apple released iOS 17.5.1 to fix a bug users had found a few days prior in iOS 17.5 that resurfaced old photos that had been previously deleted. So far, the update seems to have resolved the issue, but users were left wondering exactly what had happened. Now Apple has clarified the issue somewhat, describing the nature of the bug to 9to5Mac.

Apple told the publication that the photos were not regurgitated from iCloud Photos after being deleted on the local device; rather, they were local to the device. Apple says they were neither left in the cloud after deletion nor synced to it after, and the company did not have access to the deleted photos.

The photos were retained on the local device storage due to a database corruption issue, and the bug resurfaced photos that were flagged for deletion but were not actually fully deleted locally.

That simple explanation doesn’t fully cover all the widely reported edge cases some users had brought up in forums and on Reddit, but Apple offered additional answers for those, too.

The company claimed that when users reported the photos resurfacing on a device other than the one they were originally deleted on, it was always because they had restored from a backup other than iCloud Photos or performed a direct transfer from one device to another.

One user on Reddit claimed (the post has now been deleted) that they had wiped an iPad, sold it to a friend, and the friend then saw photos resurface. Apple told 9to5Mac that is impossible if the user followed the expected procedure for wiping the device, which is to go to “Settings,” “General,” “Transfer and Reset,” and “Erase All Content and Settings.”

The bug was particularly nasty in terms of optics and user trust for Apple, but it would have been far worse if it was iCloud-related and involved deleted photos staying on or being uploaded to Apple’s servers. If what the company told 9to5Mac is true, that was not the case.

Still, it’s a good reminder that in many cases, a deleted file isn’t necessarily deleted, either due to a bug like this, the nature of the storage tech, or in some other cases on other platforms, a deliberate choice.

Apple clarifies iOS 17.5 bug that exposed deleted photos Read More »

Next up in Google’s dramatic overhaul of search: AI Overview ads

ai overview, Google, Tech / Kelly Newman / May 23, 2024

Are any consumers enjoying this? —

Google turned search into an AI product, and now it’s time to make money.

Ron Amadeo – May 23, 2024 5: 36 pm UTC

Ads in AI Overview. They’re below the fold in this example.

Google
Here’s the layout of Google’s example.

Google / Ron Amadeo

Google’s AI Overview is a complete transformation of what Google Search is, changing from a product that searches the web to show relevant links, to a place that scrapes the web of information and shows it directly to users. Google is not done making changes, though, and next for AI Overview is ads! We’re all so excited.

The Google Ads & Commerce blog shows what this will look like, with ads landing at the bottom of the AI Overview box. The overview box was already a massive, screen-filling box, and ads make it even longer, pushing what’s left of the web results even further down the page. Google’s demo shows the ads at the bottom of the overview box, and you have to scroll down to see them.

Google’s ad placement will surely be changed and tweaked a million times in the future, and Google mentions that “in early testing, we’ve heard that people find the ads appearing above and below the AI-generated overview helpful.” Leaving aside the unique perspective that ads are “helpful,” there’s your confirmation of the usual above-the-fold ad placement.

For now, AI Overviews are rolling out to everyone in the US, and Google says ads will start appearing in the overview box “soon.” Existing Google ad customers don’t have to do anything to get ads in the Overview box; just keep spending, and Google will take care of it.

Listing image by Sean Gallup | Getty Images

Next up in Google’s dramatic overhaul of search: AI Overview ads Read More »

Humane AI Pin is a disaster: Founders already want to sell the company

Tech / Kelly Newman / May 22, 2024

The definition of Dead-on-Arrival —

One month after launch of its “smartphone replacement,” Humane already seems doomed.

Ron Amadeo – May 22, 2024 6: 19 pm UTC

The wearable startup Humane, makers of the bizarre Humane AI Pin, is already looking for the exit. Bloomberg reports the company is seeking a sale after its first and only product launch was a big flop. Despite seemingly having nothing else in the pipeline and the AI Pin being dead on arrival, Bloomberg reports the company is “seeking a price of between $750 million and $1 billion in a sale.” Humane was founded by two ex-Apple employees, Imran Chaudhri and Bethany Bongiorno, in 2018 and has raised $230 million from some big-name investors like OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.

The Humane AI Pin immediately seemed like an idea that only made sense in a VC pitch room. The device is a wearable voice command box and camera that you magnetically clip onto a shirt, sort of like a Star Trek communicator. It wanted to replace your smartphone yet had no traditional display, and the company bragged in the launch video: “We don’t do apps.” That means you’re left with mostly voice commands for whatever the voice command system can process. You could press on the front and ask a question. The camera could also be involved in a “what’s this thing?” capacity.

While there was no onboard display, it did have a one-color 720p laser projection system that would project onto your hand. The UI looked just like a smartwatch, and you controlled it with the same hand you’re using as a projection screen. You could tilt your palm around to select something and tap your fingers together to confirm, all the while distorting and moving the “display” being projected onto your hand. The smartwatch-like UI raises the question: “Why not just wear a smartwatch instead?” Then you’d have real apps, a real display, a less-weird form factor, better input, and better voice commands, and it would probably cost less. Oh, yeah, about that price: The Humane AI Pin was $700 plus a $24-a-month subscription fee, while an Apple Watch Series 9 is $400.

Besides all those “on-paper” problems, the device was also universally panned once it landed in the hands of reviewers. The device comes in two halves, with a front processing unit and a back battery, and the side clipped together magnetically with your shirt in the middle. It turns out a shirt is not a great support substrate for the rather heavy device, and it drags down a lot of lighter clothes. Like all projector-based displays, the laser projector does not work well outside of a dark room. The voice response time is really slow, and the device is warm all the time, which is an odd sensation when it’s pressed against your chest. The battery life is between two and four hours. It can’t do a lot of basic things like set an alarm or timer. Review conclusions range from The Verge’s “not even close” to Marques Brownlee’s “the worst product I’ve ever reviewed.”

No one knows what sales were like for the company, but the AI Pin only started shipping in April. To already have the founders running for the exits a single month after launch sounds pretty dire. It’s hard to imagine a worse timeline of events and hard to imagine anyone paying $750 million for a company that seems to be swirling the drain. Don’t be surprised if history places Humane on the list of “biggest tech startup flops ever” alongside the likes of Juicero and Ouya.

Humane AI Pin is a disaster: Founders already want to sell the company Read More »