Month: July 2021

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  The Steam Deck, from Valve. [credit: Valve ]

Valve expects that its recently announced Steam Deck portable gaming console will be able to run "really the entire Steam library" on its 1280x800 LCD screen at frame rates of 30 fps or higher.

That's according to a recent IGN video interview in which Valve Hardware Engineer Yazan Aldehayyat said that "all the games that we wanted to be playable had really good [performance], a really good experience" in Steam Deck testing. Valve developer Pierre-Loup Griffais expanded on that statement by saying that "all the games that we wanted to be playable" means "really the entire Steam library."

"We haven't really found something we could throw at this device that it couldn't handle yet," he added.

Enlarge / Artist's impression of low-Earth-orbit satellites like those launched by SpaceX and OneWeb. (credit: NOIRLab / NSF / AURA / P. Marenfeld)

A UK government agency is worried that OneWeb, SpaceX's Starlink, and similar low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite-broadband systems could block each others' signals.

Ofcom, the UK's communications regulator, proposed new rules today in a report that details its interference concerns. Ofcom also said it intends to amend satellite licenses already issued to SpaceX and OneWeb to require coordination of frequency use. Without new requirements, the risk of interference could prevent competition by shutting new players out of the market, Ofcom said.

Non-geostationary satellite orbit (NGSO) systems are more complex than the traditional geostationary type because they use hundreds or thousands of satellites, Ofcom noted. "Satellite dishes need to track these satellites as they move across the sky, unlike existing satellite networks, where the dishes are fixed pointing at a single satellite which is stationary in the sky," the Ofcom report said. Because so many low-Earth-orbit satellites are being launched, "there is a risk of satellites from two different operators appearing to be in the same part of the sky," causing interference known as "in-line events" in which multiple operators' satellites are lined up in the sky, Ofcom wrote.

Enlarge / Apple executive Craig Federighi unveiled iOS 15 this summer. That version is coming later this year. (credit: Nathan Mattise / Ars Technica)

Apple has issued a new software update for iPhones, iPads, and Macs just a few days after the company launched macOS 10.15 and iOS/iPadOS 14.7.

The updates add no new features, but the iPhone update fixes one bug. From Apple's release notes:

iOS 14.7.1 fixes an issue where iPhone models with Touch ID cannot unlock a paired Apple Watch using the Unlock with iPhone feature. This update also provides important security updates and is recommended for all users.

As for macOS, there are no listed changes besides security updates. And Apple lists the same security update for iOS, iPadOS, and macOS. Here are the details from Apple's support hub:

Enlarge (credit: Tesla / Aurich Lawson)

Earlier in July, Tesla announced that it delivered 201,250 electric vehicles in the second quarter of 2021. On Monday, the US automaker filled in the rest of the gaps with its Q2 financial disclosure. Q2's deliveries were a record for Tesla, earning the company $1.1 billion in profit. Tesla ended Q2 2021 with $619 million in free cash flow and $16.2 billion in cash and cash equivalents.

Tesla said in its presentation to investors that its output and deliveries were significant factors in the profitable quarter. The company also said it successfully launched a subscription to its highly controversial FSD feature, where owners can pay $199 per month for the driving assist feature as opposed to a single payment of $10,000. And regulatory credits made a much smaller contribution to the bottom line in Q2 at just $354 million.

We reported Tesla's Q2 production results when they were announced several weeks ago, but to recap: the company built 2,340 Models S and X and delivered 1,890 of them, 18 percent of which were leased. The cheaper mass-market Model 3 sedan and Model Y crossover did the heavy lifting in Q2. Tesla built 204,081 of these models, delivering 199,360 of them. (Seven percent of Models 3 and Y were leased.)

Enlarge / The back of the iPhone 12 Pro. (credit: Samuel Axon)

A new investor note from JPMorgan Chase seen by AppleInsider and MacRumors claims that Apple's high-end iPhone models will soon use titanium alongside or instead of aluminum or stainless steel. It also provides new insights about what to expect from 2022's iPhone lineup.

Drawing from supply line sources, the note says the materials change is coming in 2022 and that Foxconn will be Apple's exclusive supplier for the titanium components. The Pro model phones from that year are likely to use a titanium alloy, which is stronger and more resistant to scratches than the stainless steel used in current iPhone models.

While the analyst report does not specify, it's very likely that we're talking about the metallic band around the edge of the iPhone, not the front and the back. The front is expected to still be glass, and given that Apple continues to introduce new MagSafe and wireless charging products and features, we expect the back to remain glass as well.