Month: March 2023

Enlarge (credit: Bloomberg / Contributor | Bloomberg)

Before it was updated last month, Discord’s privacy policy specifically promised to alert users “in advance” if the company ever started storing contents of video calls, voice calls, or channels. That’s why some users became alarmed when the latest updates—which go into effect March 27—seemed to quietly drop this promise. One Discord user asked Ars to investigate, wondering, “Does Discord plan to retain call recordings?”

According to a Discord spokesperson, the answer is no.

“There has not been a change in Discord's position on how we store or record the contents of video or voice channels,” a Discord spokesperson told Ars. “We recognize that when we recently issued adjusted language in our privacy policy, we inadvertently caused confusion among our users. To be clear, nothing has changed and we have reinserted the language back into our privacy policy, along with some additional clarifying information.”

CES introduced an OLED PC monitor with quantum dots. (credit: Scharon Harding)

For those who value performance, a big display, and upgrade flexibility, a desktop continues to deliver the best value. Not only can you outfit these larger computing rigs with a graphics card, but you can readily upgrade to newer, more powerful components down the road as your needs change. Pair a capable desktop with a gorgeous display and you've got a more spacious digital canvas for working , gaming, or staying entertained than any laptop can afford.

More serious gamers will want to check out the OMEN by HP desktop, which is discounted by $670, while casual home users can go for a model without a graphics card for less graphics-intensive productivity tasks. Both the Acer Aspire and the Dell Inspiron desktops are great options and come in at more reasonable prices because they lack the GPU. Enthusiast gamers and workstation users who demand the performance of the latest silicon will want to check out the Alienware Aurora R15 Gaming Desktop, which is discounted by $630. Now on sale for $3,600, this desktop packs in a 13th Gen Intel Core i9 processor alongside Nvidia's RTX 3090 graphics.

Best desktop deals

• Acer Aspire TC-1760 for $550 (was $620) at Amazon: Not the most powerful desktop on our list, Acer's Aspire desktop still comes with Intel's 12th Gen Core i5 processor and is a great option for college students and general PC use around the home. Discrete graphics is notably missing, as this model relies on Intel's UHD Graphics 730. The desktop also packs in 12GB DDR4 memory and a 512GB solid-state drive. Surprisingly, a DVD writer is still included in this model.
• HP Pavilion Gaming Desktop for $1,000 (was $1,315) at Amazon: Designed for work and play, this affordable gaming desktop is configured with AMD's Ryzen 7 5700G processor and Nvidia's GeForce RTX 2060 Super graphics. Serious gamers will likely dismiss the older GPU, but at close to 25 percent off, this is a terrific desktop for casual gamers and content creators. It comes with 16GB of RAM, 1TB of solid-state storage, and plenty of ports to connect your gear on the front.
• HP Envy Desktop for $1,230 (was $1,700) on Amazon: If you have a little bit of extra cash, we'd recommend HP's Envy Desktop over the Pavilion model on our list. At $230 more than the Pavilion, you're getting a much sleeker case design, more powerful silicon with Intel's 12th Gen Core i9 processor and Nvidia's RTX 3070 graphics, and similar memory and storage configurations. There's room for expansion and upgrades on the inside, and the tool-less, one-touch latch to open the side panel will give you access to this desktop's internals.
• Dell Inspiron 3910 Desktop for $723 (was $750) at Amazon: At a 10 percent discount, you're getting Intel's 12th Gen Core i5 processor on this Inspiron Desktop configuration, alongside integrated Intel UHD Graphics 730, 256GB of storage, and 16GB of DDR4 memory. Discrete graphics is notably absent, similar to the Acer model on our list, making this compact tower more suited for productivity than creative workflows.
• Dell XPS 8950 Desktop for $1,682 (was $2,349) at Amazon: This isn't the cheapest price for the XPS 8950 in recent days, but it's still 28 percent off of its retail price. With a 12th Gen Intel Core i7 processor and Nvidia RTX 3060 Ti graphics, you'll still get plenty of performance for creative work and gaming, provided you don't need a more powerful GPU for AAA titles. With accessible ports in the front and an accommodating tower, you'll be able to upgrade to a more capable GPU down the road if your needs change.
• OMEN by HP 45L Gaming Desktop for $1,630 (was $2,300) at HP: HP's OMEN gaming desktop is now discounted by $670 on the manufacturer's website. This desktop packs in an AMD Ryzen 7 5800X processor, discrete Nvidia RTX 3070 graphics, 16GB of HyperX DDR4 memory, and a 512GB WD Black PCIe NVMe M.2 solid-state drive alongside a 1TB 7200rpm HDD.
• Alienware Aurora R15 Gaming Desktop for $3,600 (was $4,230) at Dell: Dell's latest gaming desktop may be the priciest option on our list, but it's also the most powerful. This gaming powerhouse packs in Intel's 13th Gen Core i9-13900F processor with 24 cores and Nvidia's powerful GeForce RTX 4090 GPU. Other features include 32GB of DDR5 4800 MHz memory along with a 1TB NVM.e M.2 solid-state drive. Less expensive configurations are available as well, with prices starting at $1,400.

Ars Technica may earn compensation for sales from links on this post through affiliate programs.

Enlarge / The Pixel Watch. It's a perfect, round little pebble. (credit: Ron Amadeo)

Believe it or not, the Pixel Watch appears to be a hit! At least, that's according to new numbers from Canalys, which has Google capturing the No. 2 spot for worldwide wearable band marketshare in Q4 2022. Canalys' "wearable band" market category includes smartwatches, "basic watches," and "basic bands" from all the big tech companies.

The report has Google at 8 percent marketshare for Q4 2022, which is good enough to slot in right behind Apple's dominant 27.5 percent of shipments. Google was in fourth place this time last year, and Canalys credits the "16% smartwatch growth with the release of its Pixel Watch" as the reason for Google's rise to No. 2.

You might say, "Isn't the Pixel Watch Google's first smartwatch, and therefore the growth is from 0 units?" but no, Google also owns Fitbit, which means a bunch of product lines like the FitBit Sense, Versa, and Inspire are getting lumped into the "Google" bucket. Canalys says Google shipped 880,000 Pixel Watches during Q4, so the watch makes up 22 percent of Google's 4 million wearables shipments—the rest is still Fitbit.

Enlarge (credit: NurPhoto / Contributor | NurPhoto)

After losing a similar battle in Australia, Meta continues to resist efforts by a growing number of countries to require the social media company to pay for news linked on platforms like Facebook and Instagram. On Saturday, Meta announced that it would end news access for Canadian Facebook and Instagram users if the country’s Online News Act is passed, Reuters reported.

A Meta spokesperson told Ars that the online advertising giant contends that laws like Canada’s proposed legislation “misrepresents” the relationship between its platforms and news publishers. According to Meta spokesperson Lisa Laventure, the company’s stance in Canada is the same as its stance protesting the United States’ Journalism Competition and Preservation Act (JCPA).

“A legislative framework that compels us to pay for links or content that we do not post, and which are not the reason the vast majority of people use our platforms, is neither sustainable nor workable,” Laventure said.

Enlarge (credit: Wayne Eastep/Getty Images)

Women and older people are being failed by our crash test dummies, according to the US Government Accountability Office. The GAO has just published a new report on the topic and is concerned that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has not done enough to fill knowledge or research gaps that would make our vehicles safer for those more-vulnerable classes of occupants. Consequently, the GAO is recommending that NHTSA create a comprehensive plan to improve that crash test dummy data.

There's no question that cars today are safer than they were even two decades ago. In addition to the crash testing required by the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FVMSS), programs like NHTSA's New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety's Top Safety Picks publicize their test scores, which has forced manufacturers to improve occupant protection to get those all-important safety scores, and now cars have to be designed to deal with offset collisions, side impacts, and rollovers, as well as head-on crashes.

But the benefits of improved in-car safety have been mostly seen by men.