Quick Shots-154

iPhone SE 3, iPad Air 5 tipped to appear at an Apple event on March 8

Apple has plenty of new products in the pipeline – as always – and according to one source it’s going to show off the iPhone SE 3, the iPad Air 5, and perhaps even a new Mac at an event to be held on Tuesday, March 8.

Bloomberg has the scoop, reporting that Apple is targeting a date “on or near” March 8 to unveil the shiny new gadgets. That’s as per “people with knowledge of the matter”, and Bloomberg typically gets its Apple-related predictions right.

There is the usual caveat than these plans may change further down the line, but at the moment it looks as though early March will see the next Apple event. It held an event in April last year, unveiling a new iPad Pro and a new iMac on that occasion.

From Techradar

Infinix seemingly pushes back Zero 5G India launch to February 14

Infinix has already made it abundantly clear that its new Zero 5G model is on the way, and that’s it will be battling for the title of “fastest 5G smartphone in-segment”. That’s what a previous set of teaser images alluded to and is the slogan found on a new announcement banner.

There is, however, a bit of a discrepancy between the two. The new banner has a “Launching on 14th Feb, 10 noon” text on it, whereas the old images advertised the February 8 date. Perhaps Infinix has decided to postpone the announcement event by a few days. Alternatively, we could still see the phone officially announced on February 8 and sales kick-off on February 14. That’s the problem with using ambiguous verbs all of the time – a prevalent industry practice. But, we digress.

From Gsmarena

Alleged vivo NEX 5 render leaks online alongside February announcement window

Rumors of a new vivo NEX device have been rather sporadic, but have also been picking up lately, with some chatter of the NEX 5 from last month. Last we heard, the NEX 5 is supposed to have an under-display camera, like the APEX 2020 concept, a large 7-inch or 6.78-inch, quad-curved display and 40W or 50W wireless charging. A new leaked render has now surfaced online for what is claimed to be the vivo NEX 5. To quote the leakster, it is a “first official look”.

Sweetening the leak further, the image also mentions February 2022, presumably as a launch window for the device. We are willing to give the leak the benefit of the doubt, though we should note that the NEX 5 was supposed to launch in the second half of 2021. So, take it with a grain of salt.

From Gsmarena

Leaked Intel Arc Alchemist pics show tantalizing GPU details

New images of an Intel Arc Alchemist engineering sample just leaked, giving us a lot of insight into the upcoming desktop GPUs.

This isn’t the first sample of Arc Alchemist that we’ve seen so far, but it might be the clearest one yet, showing the shroud, the fan setup, the ports, and even the full printed circuit board (PCB.)

Several images of the card have been unveiled by VideoCardz. The pictures show an engineering sample of the upcoming Arc Alchemist desktop GPU. On the surface, the card looks fairly simple and not unlike many AMD and Nvidia graphics cards. It has a black, rippled shroud and a dual-fan cooling solution.

A partial side view of the card gives a peek into the input/output situation on this GPU. The sample comes with three DisplayPorts and one HDMI port. It’s possible that the card might support the new DisplayPort 2.0 technology, as previous rumors pointed toward Intel working to enable it on their upcoming cards.

It’s nice enough to see the front of the Arc Alchemist GPU and learn more about its ports, but these leaked images take it one step further by showing us the full PCB without the backplate. This reveals eight memory modules, meaning that this model comes with either 16GB or 12GB memory. Having 16GB would imply that this is the flagship Arc Alchemist, but there is no way of telling for sure based on these images.

From Digital Trends

Rockstar Games confirms Grand Theft Auto 6 is in development

At the very end of the community update, Rockstar shared the following message:

With the unprecedented longevity of GTAV, we know many of you have been asking us about a new entry in the Grand Theft Auto series. With every new project we embark on, our goal is always to significantly move beyond what we have previously delivered — and we are pleased to confirm that active development for the next entry in the Grand Theft Auto series is well underway. We look forward to sharing more as soon as we are ready, so please stay tuned to the Rockstar Newswire for official details.

While the team didn’t actually mention Grand Theft Auto 6, there’s not really any other way to read this. It’s clear that GTA6 had been in development for years prior to this announcement. In fact, the studio even says active development is “well underway.”

From BGR

Google Chrome icon gets first update in 8 years & will now be customized for iOS, Mac, Windows

In 2011, the original 2008 logo was greatly flattened and no longer explicitly three-dimensional. Google modernized the logo three years later to further that trend, and is going all the way in 2022. 

The company has removed the shadows between the red, yellow, and green in the outer ring, while also “refining the proportions and brightening the colors.” While using “flat colors,” Google did add a “subtle gradient to the main icon to mitigate” how an “unpleasant color vibration” exists between green and red.

Google’s other big aim with this icon is to support “OS-specific customizations.” Designer Elvin on Twitter explains that Google “want[s] the icons to feel recognizably Chrome, but also well crafted for each OS.”

You might ask, “why bother with sth. so subtle?” We tailor Chrome’s experience to each OS, with features like Native Window Occlusion on Windows, day-one M1 support on macOS, Widgets on iOS/Android, and Material You on Android. We want our brand to convey the same level of care.

• For example, on Windows, the icons take on an obviously gradated look, appearing at home on Windows 10 & 11.
• On macOS, they look 3D. For Beta and Dev, we applied colorful ribbons to them.
• On ChromeOS, they use brighter colors without gradients to match the looks of the rest of system icons.

From 9to5Google

Google brings some Wear OS 3 UI directly to the settings of older watches 

Later this year, Google will update the latest watches with the newest version of its wearable operating system. Until then, Google is already redesigning some core parts of older watches with Wear OS 3’s new UI.

Previously, Google started bringing Wear OS 3’s new design language to non-Galaxy Watch 4 devices inside new and redesigned apps. This includes Google Maps, Messages, and YouTube Music.

The company is now bringing that new UI directly to system Settings. In recent days, users have begun to notice how navigating to Settings > Apps & notifications > App notifications > Show all and selecting an application reveals various Wear OS 3 design elements.

From 9to5Google

Intel claims its CPUs have fewer new security bugs than AMD

Your next work laptop may be safer off having an Intel CPU than one from its great rival AMD, a new report from the former claims.

The Intel 2021 Product Security Report says (perhaps unsurprisingly) that its hardware has been affected by fewer newly discovered bugs compared to AMD offerings.

Even the flaws found in its GPU unit mostly come from AMD graphics components, the chipmaker claimed – although AMD is yet to comment on any of these findings. 

From Techradar

Amazon’s Alexa is coming to thousands of Jaguar and Land Rover vehicles

Jaguar Land Rover announced a software update this week that offers deep Alexa integration for newer vehicle models (via Bloomberg).

The update is available to over 200,000 Jaguar and Land Rover vehicles outfitted with the company’s Pivi Pro 3.0 or later infotainment system via an over-the-air update. This comes after Amazon’s efforts early last year to open up some of Alexa’s AI to allow car manufacturers to better integrate Alexa into their vehicles.

From The Verge

MIT Creates Material Stronger Than Steel But as Light as Plastic

A team of chemical engineers at MIT have created a new material that they claim to be stronger than steel — but still as light as plastic.

If the science holds up, it could be a huge advancement in material sciences, potentially giving objects like car parts or cell phones an extraordinarily durable skin. The team is even going as far as to say that it can be easily mass produced.

“We don’t usually think of plastics as being something that you could use to support a building, but with this material, you can enable new things,” said Michael Strano, a professor of chemical engineering at MIT and senior author of a study about the research published in the journal Nature this week, in a statement.

“It has very unusual properties and we’re very excited about that,” he added.

From Futurism