Hyundai is on a design roll these days. Everything that's coming out of the brand's South Korean design studios looks fresh and interesting, and that's very much the case with the new Santa Fe. Dropping next year, the 2024 Santa Fe looks nothing like the current car. In fact it looks more like a Land Rover, but still has a look all its own.

It has a selection of great tech, too, like dual wireless chargers, dual 12.3-inch displays and wireless Android Auto/Apple CarPlay. Plus, with three rows of seating, the Santa Fe hauls more folks and more cargo than ever before. Two engines will be on offer: a 2.5-liter, turbocharged four-cylinder making 277 horsepower and a 1.6-liter hybrid, with 232 ponies.

But what's it like to drive? And is that third row actually usable? We headed to South Korea to find out. Watch the video below for the full story.

Amazon has revealed more about its upcoming Fallout series on Prime Video. The company shared the first images from the show and gave Vanity Fair a sneak peek ahead of its April debut. Based on the game franchise, it stars Ella Purnell (Yellowjackets) as a naive newcomer to the post-apocalyptic surface world she’s spent her comfortable life hiding from underground.

The series takes place in the year 2296. That’s 219 years after nuclear war ravaged the Earth, driving deep-pocketed survivors into subterranean bunkers, leaving everyone else to fend for themselves above ground. Lucy is the daughter of “Overseer Hank” (Kyle MacLachlan, Twin Peaks), the mayor-like figure of Lucy’s Vault 33.

Vanity Fair says Vault Boy, the iconic game logo, appears as the mascot for Lucy’s underground dwelling. We’ll even hear about its origin story. “That was something that they came up with that’s just really smart,” Bethesda’s Todd Howard said, describing the series’ creative take on Vault Boy’s genesis.

Amazon / Bethesda

The Ghoul, familiar to fans of the games, will be played by the scene-stealing Walton Goggins (Justified, The Hateful Eight) in a role that sounds tailored to the wry character actor. “Walton’s equally adept at drama and comedy, which is so difficult,” creator Jonathan Nolan told Vanity Fair. “There is a chasm in time and distance between who this guy was and who he’s become, which for me creates an enormous dramatic question: What happened to this guy? So we’ll walk backwards into that.”

Nolan says The Ghoul represents all sides of Fallout’s world. “He’s got a lot of mileage on him, but he’s still got a swagger and kind of a charm to him,” Nolan said. The series’ take on the character strikes a balance between using prosthetics and makeup to show his disfigured face while still giving Goggins room to find the half-dead, half-immortal character’s humanity. “I need to be able to see Walton and his performance, he needs to look like a Ghoul from the game, and he needs to be kind of hot,” Nolan said.

The series was created by Westworld creators Nolan and Lisa Loy. They describe the story as hitting similar notes as the games, including its retrofuturistic stylings, biting social commentary and themes of gray morality. “We had a lot of conversations over the style of humor, the level of violence, the style of violence,” Bethesda’s Howard, an executive producer on the show, said. “Look, Fallout can be very dramatic, and dark, and postapocalyptic, but you need to weave in a little bit of a wink…. I think they threaded that needle really well on the TV show.”

Fallout premieres on April 12, 2024, on Amazon Prime Video.

The Embracer Group has been on an intense cost-cutting drive as part of a major restructuring over the last six months, as it has canceled games, laid off workers and shut down studios. The company confirmed that in the three months to September 30, it reduced its headcount by around 900 people, some five percent of the workforce. The cuts didn't end there, as it emerged on Tuesday that Embracer laid off around 50 workers from Chorus developer Fishlabs.

Free Radical Design, which was reformed a couple of years ago to work on a TimeSplitters revival, is in trouble too. The studio could be shut down as soon as December 11. That's according to an internal email from Embracer CEO Lars Wingefors that VGC obtained.

“As we move through the consultation process and face the potential closure of Free Radical Design on 11 December 2023, I want to express my gratitude for your commitment and the remarkable work you’ve done and still keep doing,” Wingefors is said to have told staff. “This is a challenging time for all of us but especially for you, and our focus is to support you as much as we can during this transition.”

The studio is based in Nottingham, England. Under UK law, a consultation period of at least 30 days has to take place before Plaion (the Embracer-owned publisher that runs the studio) can lay off any Free Radical workers. During the consultation period, Plaion is required to look at ways of avoiding layoffs. As such, there's a chance that Free Radical may stay open if a new owner takes over.

According to VGC, which initially reported earlier this month that the studio was at risk of closure, many Free Radical workers have updated their LinkedIn profiles to indicate that they're looking for work. Other studios are said to have offered interviews to Free Radical employees too.

Free Radical, the original developer of the TimeSplitters series, went bankrupt in 2008. Founders Steve Ellis and David Doak revived the studio two years ago under Plaion division Deep Silver to make a new TimeSplitters game. It's unclear what will happen with the current TimeSplitters project should Free Radical shut down.

Embracer has closed other studios in recent months, including Saints Row developer Volition. Others are said to be for sale, such as Gearbox, which Embracer bought in 2021 in a deal worth up to $1.4 billion.

Apple Music’s full year-end Replay experience has arrived. Although elements of the personalized recap are available year-round (including a continually updating playlist), the company spruces up its web interface this time of year for a sleeker presentation as you reflect on your 2023 listening habits. Apple Music also announced its Artist of the Year (Taylor Swift, who you may have heard of) and subscribers’ top choices in various categories.

If you listened to Apple Music this year, you can head to the service’s Replay 2023 website and log into your account to view a rundown of the music you enjoyed during the last 12 months. It lists your most-streamed artists, songs, albums, genres, playlists and stations.

It also includes a highlight video summarizing your habits, which you can share with friends and family or on social channels. If you reach any milestones, like listening to 25,000 minutes of music, it will reveal exactly when you hit them. Apple says Replay 2023 will also tell you if you rank among an artist’s top listeners.

Apple

Taylor Swift had a busy year, and her Apple Music streams unsurprisingly reflect that. The platform’s Artist of the Year had 65 songs reach its Global Daily Top 100, more than any other artist. The pop icon was also the most streamed artist on the platform in 2023, setting a record for the most listeners in a single year. Meanwhile, Morgan Wallen’s “Last Night” took the top spot in Apple Music’s Top Songs of 2023: Global list. It was the first country song to top that chart since “Old Town Road” four years ago. “Last Night” enjoyed the most days at number one on the service’s Global Daily Top 100 chart.

World music has grown in popularity on the platform. Nigerian breakout artist Rema had the most Shazam’d song of the year with the Afrobeats tune “Calm Down.” Meanwhile, “Idol” by J-Pop duo Yoasobi was the most popular karaoke song using Apple Music’s Sing feature, and it also hit number seven on the year-end top songs chart, joined by fellow J-Pop track “Subtitle” by Official Hige Dandism. Música Mexicana also did well, with four tracks on the top 20 global songs list. These include “Ella Baila Sola” by Peso Pluma and Eslabon Armado, “un x100to” by Grupo Frontera and Bad Bunny, “PRC” by Peso Pluma and Natanael Cano and “Bebe Dame” from Fuerza Regida and Grupo Frontera.

Year-end rewinds have become a popular feature for streaming services, as people enjoy the self-expression and comedy that can come from sharing their tastes on social media. If recent years are any indication, you can expect Spotify and YouTube to reveal theirs within the coming days.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) just kicked off its Las Vegas-based re:Invent conference with a stream of announcements, most of which involve the year’s most popular technology, AI. These news items, taken as a whole, give us a sneak peek at the company’s long-term goals for artificial intelligence platforms.

First of all, AWS unveiled its latest-generation of AI chips intended for model training and for running trained models. Trainium2, which is obviously for model training, has been designed to deliver up to 4x better performance and 2x energy efficiency when compared to its forebear. Amazon promises these chips will allow programmers to train models quickly and at a lower cost, due to a reduction in energy use. Anthropic, an Amazon-backed OpenAI competitor, has already announced plans to build models using Trainium2 chips.

Graviton4, on the other hand, is more for general use. These processors are based on Arm architecture, but consume less energy than Intel or AMD chips. Amazon promises an increase of 30 percent in general performance when using a trained AI model embedded within a Graviton4 processor. This should lower cloud-computing costs for organizations that regularly employ AI models and offer a slight uptick in speed for regular users just looking to make some fake photos of Harry Potter at a rave or whatever.

All told, Graviton4 should allow AWS customers to “process larger amounts of data, scale their workloads, improve time-to-results and lower their total cost of ownership.” It’s available today in preview with a wider release planned for the coming months.

Typically, when a company announces new in-house chips, that spells trouble for current third-party providers like NVIDIA. The company is a huge player in the enterprise AI space, thanks to companies using its GPUs for training and its Arm-based datacenter CPU Grace. Instead of eschewing the partnership in favor of proprietary chips, Amazon is further cementing the relationship by offering enterprise customers cloud access to NVIDIA’s latest H200 AI GPUs. It’ll also operate more than 16,000 Nvidia GH200 Grace Hopper Superchips expressly for NVIDIA’s research and development team. This is a similar approach to its chief AI rival, Microsoft, which also announced an enhanced partnership with NVIDIA at the same time it revealed its proprietary AI chip, Maia 100.

Amazon also announced a new business-focused AI chatbot called Q, a name that was likely inspired by the Star Trek demigod and not the Trump-adjacent conspiracy peddler. It’s described as a “new type of generative AI-powered personal assistant” and is specifically designed to help streamline work projects and customer service tasks. It can be tailored to suit any business and offers relevant answers to commonly-asked questions. Amazon Q can also generate content on its own and take actions based on customer requests. It’ll even customize interactions based on a user’s role within a company.

It’ll exist on communication apps like Slack and in text-editing applications commonly-used by software developers. To that end, Q can actually change source code and can connect to more than 40 enterprise systems, including Microsoft 365, Dropbox, Salesforce and Zendesk, among others. Amazon Q is currently available in preview, with a wider release coming soon. It’ll cost anywhere from $20 to $30 per user each month, depending on available features.

So what have we learned here? Amazon is betting big on AI, like everyone else. More specifically, it’s battling with old cloud rival Microsoft to be the go-to company for enterprise-based AI. It’s also using AI to continue its dominance in the cloud computing space, hoping to minimize any increase in market share for Microsoft and other players like Google and Alibaba.

Cyber Monday may be over, but there are still a few deals on the PlayStation 5 lingering on the internet today. You can save $50 on the console by itself, or about $60 if you pick up the PS5 with the latest Spider-Man game. Color options are slim, but you can still save upwards of $25 on PS5 controllers today, and there are a number of PS5 game deals still to be had as well. Here are the best PS5 games you can still get even now that Cyber Monday has come and gone.

Sony PS5 Slim console with Spider-Man 2

If you’re happy to go disc-free, Amazon has the month-old PS5 Slim console bundled with a digital code for Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, which Engadget found to be “bigger and better” than the 2018 original, for $499 ($60 off). Sony’s “Slim” PS5 console (officially called the PS5 Digital Edition) removes the system’s disc drive but lets you change your mind later. Unlike previous digital variants, the disc drive is a modular attachment you can add later as a separate $80 purchase.

Sony PS5 console with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III

You can also get the console with Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare III for the same price. This is the latest version of the gaming system with its removable disc drive already included and mounted. You also get a digital copy of the newest Call of Duty game, which includes remastered versions of all 16 maps from Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (2009).

Sony PS5 console (with disc drive)

A GameStop Cyber Monday deal has the PS5 console on sale for $450 ($50 off). This standard model includes a built-in disc drive that lets you choose between physical discs (without any extra purchases) or digital downloads of your favorite games.

Cyber Monday PS5 game deals

Unfortunately, most of the best deals we saw on PS5 games over the weekend are gone now. However, you can still get the dramatic action-RPG Final Fantasy XVI is still down to $35. The well-reviewed turn-based RPG Octopath Traveler II is still available for $30 and Assassin's Creed Mirage remains $20 off at $40. Sony has also started an "End of Year Deals" sale with a few OK discounts on first-party games, including the wholesome action game Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart and the open-world samurai game Ghost of Tsushima: Director's Cut for $30 each.

Your Cyber Monday Shopping Guide: See all of Yahoo’s Cyber Monday coverage, here. Follow Engadget for Cyber Monday tech deals. Learn about Cyber Monday trends on In The Know. Hear from Autoblog’s experts on the best Cyber Monday deals for your car, garage, and home, and find Cyber Monday sales to shop on AOL, handpicked just for you.

Ayaneo has been teasing its Macintosh-inspired PC for a few weeks. Now that the AM01 is available for pre-order, the company has revealed the prices and specs. While some had been hoping Ayaneo would use similar chipsets to those found in its powerful handheld gaming devices, it has opted to use older AMD APUs. On the plus side, the company has priced the various AM01 configurations pretty fairly.

The mini PC starts at $149 for a configuration with an AMD Ryzen 3 3200U, 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. That's an early bird price, and this version will later retail for $199. Configurations with a Ryzen 7 5700U APU start at an early bird price of $219 for a barebone unit and stretch up to $379 for a model with 32GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD. Ayaneo notes that the AM01 is expandable up to 64GB of dual-channel DDR4 RAM and 2TB of M.2 solid state storage. There's also a SATA 3.0 interface that supports a 2.5-inch SDD or HDD.

The Ryzen 7 5700U variants have Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2, compared with Wi-Fi 5 and Bluetooth 4.2 on Ryzen 3-powered units. Ayaneo keeps the AM01 cool with the help of a large fan and four copper heat pipes.

On the connectivity front, there's one USB-C 3.2 Gen1 port, three USB 3.2 Gen2 ports and one for USB 2. There's a 3.5mm headphone jack, while the machine runs on DC power. There are also gigabit Ethernet, DisplayPort 1.4 and HDMI 2.0 ports. Ayaneo says the AM01 can output video in 4k at 60fps and it's compatible with dual-screen setups.

All of this comes in a compact case that measures just over 5 inches (132mm) wide and tall and just over 2.5 inches (64.5mm) thick. Adding to the AM01's portability, it weighs slightly over a pound (486g).

You can personalize the mini PC with magnetic decorative elements. In other words, you'll be able to swap out the badge on the bottom left of the machine (the same spot where the Apple logo is on the Macintosh). Ayaneo will include a bunch of stickers too, so you can decorate the non-functional "screen."

The AM01 comes with Windows 11 Home Edition pre-installed, as long as you opt for a configuration with RAM and an SSD. Ayaneo says the Ryzen 7 APU can handle mainstream online games and "mild" AAA titles. Its AYA Space tool can handle tasks like bringing all of your games from different storefronts together in one place, limiting the framerate and adding a performance overlay.

Although it's generally worth exercising caution when it comes to products promoted on crowdfunding platforms, Ayaneo effectively uses Indiegogo as a storefront. It's not looking to crowdfund the AM01. In fact, the mini PC is pretty much ready to roll. The company says the AM01 is slated to ship in December, so the mini PC should start reaching customers over the next few weeks.

Meta has temporarily stopped selling the Elite Strap with Battery for the Quest 3, reportedly because of a firmware-related charging defect. The $130 accessory, which extends the standalone VR headset’s runtime by up to two hours while providing a counterweight for comfort, is currently unavailable from Meta and third-party retailers. Short of conducting a recall, the company told Road to VR, which first reported the story, that it’s currently manufacturing a new batch that fixes the firmware issues allegedly behind the defect. Meta told the publication it plans to replace the headsets on a case-by-case basis for buyers who contact customer support.

Owners have reported that the Elite Strap’s battery typically works at first but stops charging the headset earlier than expected. Informal polls, anecdotal social media comments and a separate report from Road to VR earlier this month suggest the issue may be at least somewhat common. Meta hasn’t stated whether the defect is universal, but chalking it up to firmware that requires newly manufactured units suggests it may be. I own a Quest 3 with the battery accessory and haven’t noticed any charging issues, but I also don’t remember if I’ve run its battery down enough to have noticed.

Engadget contacted a Meta spokesperson, and we’re still waiting for confirmation and any extra details about what to look for. We’ll update this article if we learn more.

Meta

Meta is reportedly manufacturing new units with updated firmware. The company told Road to VR it’s working to restock replacement units “as soon as possible.” Meta’s product page for the accessory says it’s out of stock, and its listing has been pulled entirely from the websites of retail partners Best Buy and Target. Amazon’s product page says “currently unavailable.”

In addition to that model, Meta makes a $70 Elite Strap without a battery focused solely on ergonomics. The company also had early troubles with its Elite Straps for the Quest 2, as both versions of the 2020 accessory were prone to cracking. Meta paused sales of that model and extended the accessory’s warranty after issuing a fix for subsequent batches.

Many companies give away free plugins in honor of the holiday season, but Universal Audio is taking things a step further. The audio giant is giving away free Volt 2 hardware interfaces with the purchase of a yearly subscription to its Spark plugin platform. These interfaces typically cost $170, so this is a pretty great deal for beginners, as the hardware plus the Spark software is pretty much everything you need.

Spark subscriptions are also on sale for the holidays, at $150 instead of $240, though this price point is fairly common. The end result? You pay $150 and you get a year of access to every available plugin on the service, plus the Volt 2. Not bad. The company’s subscription-based Spark platform allows access to dozens of popular UAD plugins, from iconic compressors like the 1176 to virtual instruments like the company’s Minimoog reproduction.

As for the Volt 2, this diminutive audio interface features a pair of TRS / XLR inputs on the front and associated gain control knobs. There’s a phantom power button for condenser mics and a proprietary Vintage Mode that runs the signal through a simple tube preamp emulation. These interfaces are powered via USB-C, though ship with a 5V jack for when you’re plugged into an iPad or another mobile device.

In our official review, we praised the Volt 2 audio interface for its low noise floor, simple controls and low latency, particularly when compared to rival Windows-based products. The biggest con was the price, which is normally the case for UAD products. Now that it’s down to $0 for this promotion, that worry has dissipated.

This isn’t the first time that UAD has leveraged the holiday season to give away free hardware. The company used to hand out free Satellite DSP accelerators to run its plugins with the purchase of higher-priced hardware items like the multi-channel 4-710d preamp and compressor.

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Gaming deals are always abundant during the holiday shopping period, and there are a few good ones left on the Nintendo Switch that you can grab as leftovers from Cyber Monday. It's next to impossible to find true discounts on Switch consoles, but Nintendo will often toss in some freebies when you buy one during this time of year. The OLED model is the one to get if you're more likely to play the Switch in handheld mode, but if you plan to mostly use the console in docked mode, there's no harm in opting for the standard Switch and saving $50.

There's a bundle that includes Mario Kart 8 Deluxe and three months of Switch Online access at no extra cost. You'll get a Switch, the game and a Switch Online membership for $300. That's handy for newcomers to the Nintendo ecosystem or those who want to race against a family member in Mario Kart. It's worth noting that you won't see the price of the bundle until you check out at Amazon.

It's hard to argue that this is a great deal, given that the console has been around for nearly seven years and Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is a port of an even older Wii U game. But it's among the best deals you'll find on a Switch right now, at least until Nintendo releases the console's successor (which is widely expected to happen in 2024). In addition, upgrading to the Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack plan or buying the Booster Course Pass for $25 will give you access to dozens of extra tracks in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe.

Those who don't mind spending a little more cash may prefer to pick up a Switch OLED instead. A bundle at Walmart and GameStop includes Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and three months of Switch Online access. This bundle costs $350. So, if you're hankering for some fighting game action on a larger, better display than you'll find on the regular Switch, this is the way to go.

As for Nintendo Switch game deals, the company's own e-shop has a sale running through December 3 that includes games like Super Mario Odyssey, Luigi's Mansion 3 and Kirby and the Forgotten Land for $40. There are also much cheaper games included, too, like Portal Companion Collection for just under $7.

Your Cyber Monday Shopping Guide: See all of Yahoo’s Cyber Monday coverage, here. Follow Engadget for Cyber Monday tech deals. Learn about Cyber Monday trends on In The Know. Hear from Autoblog’s experts on the best Cyber Monday deals for your car, garage, and home, and find Cyber Monday sales to shop on AOL, handpicked just for you.