December Steam Survey: the Nvidia RTX 3060 leads Ampere's rise
Intel and Windows 11 also did well
Software
Noteworthy software updates, industry and its key players.
HandBrake debuts AV1 encoding integration
Handbrake 1.6.0 introduces support for several new video encoders including much anticipated AV1 encoding, as well as VP9 10-bit, H.264 levels 6, 6.1, 6.2, and more improvements.
AI-assisted code can be inherently insecure, study finds
Programmers must be educated about strong coding practices
Check out AtlasOS, a redesigned Windows 10 version for gamers and potato PCs
A stripped-down Windows 10 mod with questionable security choices
In brief: The market of "modified" Windows versions has been around for a while. AtlasOS strives to be the "best" version of Windows 10 for gamers – or for hardware platforms which are a bit out of date to properly run a modern OS.
How to Run Stable Diffusion on Your PC to Generate AI Images
Stable Diffusion is one the newest AI image generators and is completely open-source. Learn how to use it for image creation, upscaling, and more with our detailed guide.
Microsoft makes using formulas in Excel easier, adds new features
Windows, Mac and web versions receive various new features
It takes half an hour to boot into Windows 7 running on a 5 MHz CPU with 128MB of RAM
TL;DR: The race to 1GHz was very much a real thing at the turn of the century. It was quite entertaining as well, coming down to a photo finish between AMD and Intel (the former took the win by mere days). Fast forward to today and you won't be able to find a new desktop CPU with a clock speed under 1.6GHz or so. But, you can underclock an existing chip to run much slower and that's exactly what NTDEV did in his latest video.
Mozilla fixed an 18-year old CSS bug in the Firefox browser
All I want for Christmas is... a CSS bugfix
Windows 11 Notepad app appears to be getting browser-style tabs
Following in the footsteps of File Explorer
PSA: Reconsider your password manager options
After recent LastPass incidents, it might be time to consider other password manager options. Highly sought-after options include Bitwarden and KeePassXC, although there's a wider variety of choices that include the likes of Keeper, 1Password, Nordpass and Dashlane although not all of them are free.
LastPass breach: it's worse than initially thought
The August incident compromised some users' data, too
Winamp 5.9.1 uses less memory brings more optimizations
Newly relaunched Winamp has hit version 5.9.1 with several improvements such as memory footprint reduction, faster load time, increased buffer size for podcast downloads, and more.
Linux Mint 21.1 brings a new desktop look
Linux Mint 21.1, codename Vera, is based on Ubuntu 22.04 and debuts an updated Cinnamon desktop environment, a new Corner bar functionality, improved folder icons and several other advancements.
Google is developing an AI tool to better transcribe handwriting
Google demonstrates prescription transcribing, educational YouTube features, and multi-language audio for YouTube videos
Riffusion, AI-based music generation where Beethoven meets Radiohead
Stable Diffusion machine learning applied to fusion sonograms
Apple, Google, and Mozilla collaborate on Speedometer 3 browser benchmark
Cooperation should ensure fair and accurate benchmarks across Safari, Chrome, and Firefox
Microsoft fixes Windows 11 22H2 gaming performance issues, restarts rollout
The update should reappear in Windows Update over the next few days
inSSIDer analyzes your Wi-Fi to improve signal and performance
inSSIDer analyzes your Wi-Fi settings like channels, signal strength, and the impact of neighboring networks. The graphical results include suggestions for changes you can make to improve your Wi-Fi performance.
Firefox 108 comes with bug fixes as well as support for Windows 11 efficiency mode and WebMIDI
The last Firefox update of 2022 looks back at 40-year-old audio tech
Path Tracing vs. Ray Tracing, Explained
#TBT Every few years it seems like there's an amazing new technology with the promise of making games look ever more realistic. We've had shaders, tessellation, shadow mapping, ray tracing -- and now there's a new kid on the block: path tracing.
Google introduces vulnerability scanner for open-source projects
A community database-backed tool for detecting dependency vulnerabilities
Apple iOS 16.2, macOS 13.1, and concurrent updates include many security and feature updates
Apple introduces Freeform collaboration app, Apple Music karaoke, enhanced end-to-end iCloud encryption, and more
Good old PuTTY remains a solid and free SSH client for Windows
PuTTY is a free implementation of SSH and Telnet for Windows and Unix platforms. It lets you run a remote session from a Windows PC to a Unix computer, over a network, so you can work on the Unix machine as if you were sitting at its console.
Modders discover Portal RTX files can make Half-Life 2 and some other games look stunning
WTF?! Modders are having a field day with Nvidia's RTX Remix tool, and they haven't even gotten their hands on it yet. Apparently, you can take the files that enable RTX Remix in the recent Portal remake and drop them into the .exe folder of other games to give them a less-than-flawless visual upgrade with no further modification. Copyright lawyers are already rolling over in their graves and they aren't even dead yet.
Microsoft Office deal is down to $29 for a lifetime license
Over 90% off the regular price for Office, available for Windows and Mac