Robot vacuums are one of the great modern conveniences. They can check one time-sapping chore off your daily to-do list and if you can find a self-emptying model for a decent price, that’s one fewer thing for you to worry about. As it happens, the Shark AV2501AE AI Robot Vacuum is a self-emptying option and it’s 46 percent off for the Amazon Big Spring Sale. That means it’s currently $350, which is $300 off the regular price and not too far away from its record low.
This is a variant of one of our top robot vacuum recommendations and Shark devices are by and large nearly as good as the ones Roomba makes.
A self-emptying robot vacuum is generally preferable to one without that feature, as you won't need to keep buying garbage bags for it. This one's base holds up to 60 days of muck, so you may only need to empty it every couple of months. It has a HEPA filtration system that Shark claims can capture and trap up to 99.97 percent of dust and allergens.
The AV2501AE will run for up to 120 minutes on a single charge. If that's not enough to cover your home, it will return to its base, recharge and then continue from where it left off. The vacuum uses a matrix grid approach and it makes multiple passes over debris and dirt to pick up as much of it as possible. The device uses LiDAR vision to map your home and steer clear of objects in its path. You'll be able to set up a cleaning schedule or start an ad hoc clean through the app or by Alexa or Google Assistant voice command.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/this-shark-self-emptying-robot-vacuum-is-300-off-for-the-amazon-big-spring-sale-143923650.html?src=rss
Almost every major PC maker has dabbled with the idea of a dual-screen laptop at some point. Way back in 2011, Acer released the Iconia 6120 sporting not one but two 14-inch displays. Then at CES 2017, Razer showed off Project Valerie which bumped the panel count to three before demoing something a bit less extravagant a year later in Project Linda. Fast forward to 2020, when Dell dazzled us with the Concept Duet. Even Apple gave the category a go on the old MacBook Pros with Touch Bars, only to reverse course and ditch them completely a couple of years ago.
Meanwhile, Lenovo has an entire family of devices dating back to the original Yoga Book and culminating most recently in the Yoga Book 9i, with the latter coming extremely close to turning the promise of dual-screen laptops into an actual appealing choice. But now after several generations of its own devices, ASUS has put everything together with the Zenbook Duo. It’s a super sleek machine with two screens that’s barely larger than a similarly sized clamshell. There’s also a detachable keyboard and a built-in kickstand for maximum adaptability. And starting at $1,500, the Zenbook Duo doesn’t command a massive premium for something with a ton of extra utility. So while it’s been quite a journey to get here, ASUS has finally made a dual-screen laptop that proves once and for all that two screens really are better than one.
Design
One of the most impressive things about the Zenbook Duo is that it doesn’t look like some kind of Frankendeivce. It’s just a regular-looking 14-inch laptop. Even after you open it, things still look normal with a physical keyboard and touchpad, not to mention a healthy selection of ports around the outside (two Thunderbolt 4, one USB 3.2 Type-A and a full-size HDMI 2.1 jack). A small part of me wishes ASUS had found room for some kind of SD card reader, but I understand if there just wasn’t space.
It’s only after you remove the keyboard that things get interesting because as soon as you do, the Duo’s second display springs to life. From here, you have a ton of options. Tapping three fingers on the lower panel summons a floating touchpad. Alternatively, eight fingers makes a virtual keyboard appear, which you can follow with a swipe up to reveal a traditional keyboard/trackpad combo. But the cool thing is that because these are all virtual stand-ins, it's easy to swap in a new layout (like for other languages), move the touchpad off to the side or call up a numpad if you need to do some data entry. There’s just so much more flexibility when half of a laptop’s interior isn’t taken up by a rigid set of physical keys.
Photo by Sam Rutherford/Engadget
But things keep getting better, because on the bottom of the Duo is a flap that folds out into a kickstand. This allows you to prop the system up and use both screens as proper displays, sort of like a portable dual-monitor setup but all in a single self-contained system. And because the detachable keyboard connects wirelessly over Bluetooth, you can place it in front (or wherever you want) just like a desktop. The one small drawback to this design is that if you rotate the Duo’s displays into portrait orientation side by side, the design of the kickstand means there’s no way to adjust how far it tilts. This heavily favors the stacked setup with one display above, which is fine because I think that arrangement is more useful in most situations.
Another pleasant surprise is that for a device with two screens, the Zenbook Duo isn’t much bigger or heavier than a typical clamshell. It weighs 3.6 pounds and measures 0.78 inches thick versus the 2.82 pounds and 0.59 inches for a standard Zenbook 14 OLED. And when compared to something like a Dell XPS 14 (3.7 pounds and 0.71 inches thick), both systems are practically the same size.
Photo by Sam Rutherford/Engadget
My one gripe is that ASUS’ dark gray paint job color doesn’t help the Duo stand out. It’s almost like someone who wears subdued colors to avoid drawing attention. But this design is fantastic and I wish ASUS would give this laptop (and the engineers who designed it) the flowers it deserves.
Displays and software
The centerpiece of the Duo is its pair of 14-inch displays, which are an absolute delight. Not only do the matching OLED panels offer strong brightness (around 500 nits), they also pump out rich and accurate colors (100 percent of DCI-P3). But the real magic is when you use both panels together.
Photo by Sam Rutherford/Engadget
Moving apps from one display to another is as simple as dragging and dropping or using the handy menus that appear at the top of the display. In addition, there’s a floating button in the bottom left for ASUS’ ScreenXpert software, which provides shortcuts for adjusting brightness (separately or as a pair), disabling specific panels or pulling up handy widgets for things like a control panel, a handwriting recognition tool, news and weather and more. If the goal was to get as much value out of the Duo’s two displays, I think ASUS’ software does a pretty good job.
The downside to all this is that despite ASUS’ best efforts, Windows 11 and many apps still aren’t fully optimized for systems like this. For example, when I played a round of Teamfight Tactics and wanted to pull up some game stats on the lower display, I ran into an issue where the virtual touchpad stopped working. It was only after I set the game to borderless window mode, closed the game and relaunched everything that it started working again. Granted, situations like this were rare, but it’s important to remember that when you’re using a cutting-edge device, there may be some bugs or awkward interactions.
Performance
Photo by Sam Rutherford/Engadget
The Zenbook Duo comes with an Intel Core Ultra 7 155H processor, 16GB of RAM and a 1TB NVMe SSD. While you can upgrade it with double the memory and a faster Ultra 9 chip, I found the base configuration to be plenty fast. On tests like Geekbench 6 and PCMark 10, the Zenbook Duo turned in results that were identical to those from similarly equipped clamshells, including ASUS’ own Zenbook 14 OLED. This is great because it means there’s not a ton of overhead due to the addition of a second screen and even when setup in desktop mode, dragging apps from one display to another felt snappy and responsive. The obvious drawback is that unlike some 14-inch systems such as the XPS 14, there’s no room for a discrete GPU, which makes the Zenbook Duo better suited to general productivity than more demanding tasks like video editing.
Battery life
You might think a system with two screens would be a battery hog, but the Zenbook Duo fared better than expected. With just one screen on, it lasted 13 hours and 12 minutes on our video rundown test, which is pretty much equivalent to (actually a touch longer than) the Zenbook 14 OLED (12:43). And with both screens going, the Duo’s time only dropped to 10:17, which is still more than enough to survive an entire workday.
Wrap-up
Photo by Sam Rutherford/Engadget
OK, so the Zenbook Duo delivers on the promises of dual-screen laptops. But one question I get a lot is who are devices like this actually for? The most obvious application is for people who carry a portable monitor around while traveling. But more generally, this thing is aimed at anyone who appreciates multiple monitors and wants a system that can recreate that experience in a more travel-friendly way, which is something the Zenbook Duo does with aplomb. The best part though is that it doesn’t make major sacrifices to do so, because thanks to its detachable keyboard, it can function just like any other clamshell when space is tight (like on an airplane).
When you have room to spread out, it transforms into a portable workstation with plenty of screen space for a project up top and bonus real estate for Slack, email, video calls or anything else you might need down below. It's got ample ports so you don’t need to carry a dongle around and thanks to its gorgeous OLED screens, your work (or play) always looks great. The Zenbook Duo can do everything a traditional laptop can and more. Yes, the software experience could be a bit more polished, though that’s not entirely on ASUS. We still need a new version of Windows to provide better OS support for dual-screen machines. But considering all the struggles and multiple generations it took to get here, the Zenbook Duo is a marvelous torchbearer for a new class of portable PCs.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/asus-zenbook-duo-review-specs-price-the-first-dual-screen-laptop-worth-buying-130016756.html?src=rss
Amazon's Big Spring Sale officially starts tomorrow, but many tech deals are already live. Take the Google Pixel Buds Pro — our choice for 2024's best wireless earbuds for Android — down to $139 from $200. The 30 percent discount doesn't bring the earbuds to their all-time low, but this is the cheapest we've seen the Google Pixel Buds Pro so far this year.
The Google Pixel Buds Pro scored an 87 in our review thanks to the addition of solid active noise cancellation (ANC), a punchy base, and reliable touch controls. This generation is the first to include ANC, which can be reason enough to consider an upgrade. The earbuds are a good choice for working out, too, as they offer IPX4 water resistance.
The Pixel Buds Pro also offer wireless charging and a quick-charge feature that juices the earbuds up to one hour of ANC listening in five minutes. Speaking of charging, Google's earbuds can hold 11 hours of charge and 31 in total with the case's boost.
However, there are a few aspects Google still needs to work on, such as spatial audio, which needs more support to function well. There's also the call quality, which is far from the clearest of all the earbuds on the market. But, at $61 off, these issues become less of a dealbreaker.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-google-pixel-buds-pro-drop-to-139-for-the-amazon-big-spring-sale-124850130.html?src=rss
Steam is introducing a new way for your clan to play games together. The platform has announced Steam Families, a collection of game-sharing (and monitoring) features for parents and children currently available in beta. It takes the place of Steam Family Sharing and Steam Family View, rolling in some of their existing features alongside updates.
Each member of a Steam Family will have a section called "family library" in their games list where they can access shareable games. Ownership remains with the purchaser, but each new title bought will appear in the list. You can play another member's games even when they're online (as long as they're playing another game). Plus, you can save your own progress and achievements.
You can invite up to five other family members to your Steam Family account, with each member assigned the role of parent or child. Only adults can manage the account or implement parental controls, such as setting playtime limits (and reviewing requests for more), seeing playtime reports and choosing which games a child can play. Plus, they can control access to the Steam Store and chats.
Steam Families also streamlines the process of children getting parental approval to buy games (thus, ideally for Steam, making them more frequent). Children can now request an adult on the plan to pay for their shopping cart, which a parent can manage via email or phone by pressing approve or decline.
Steam Family is currently in beta and requires each member to join to participate. You can find the option to join under Interface and then choose Steam Family Beta in the Client Beta Participation dropdown menu.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/steam-families-puts-game-sharing-and-parental-controls-in-one-place-123016424.html?src=rss
Replacing a smartphone every two years is partially why billions of phones go into landfills each year. If stacked flat atop one another, that many handsets would reach farther than the ISS. But we’ve become accustomed to that 24-month time frame because wireless carriers often push an upgrade on biennial contracts, and many smaller phone makers only offer software support for two years. But now, with longer software commitments from major manufacturers, along with growing right-to-repair legislation, many newer phones can stay in our pockets for closer to seven trips around the sun. Here’s how you can extend the lifespan of your smartphone and avoid shelling out hundreds before it’s absolutely necessary.
How to make your smartphone last longer
Engadget
Use a case
It’s a flashy move to carry a naked phone around, but the chances of a handset making it through a tumble go up dramatically when you employ extra protection. We recommend a number of them in our guide to iPhone cases and in our eco-friendly phone cases guide. In my family, we’ve been happy with Mous cases. Though we’ve never subjected our phones to the brutality seen in the company’s ads, I can say that these cases have seen my partner’s aging Samsung Galaxy and my elderly iPhone through some pretty gnarly spills, sparing them from scratches or worse.
Take care of the built-in battery (or use a power bank)
Since a phone’s battery is often the first thing to show signs of age, it’s worth it to follow recommendations for extending its lifespan. Lithium-ion batteries don’t perform well in heat and you should avoid charging them if it’s hotter than 95 degrees — doing so can degrade the battery quickly and even cause them to malfunction. They’ll tolerate cold weather better, but can get sluggish when things get too chilly.
If you’re storing a phone for a while, it’s best to do so with the battery at half charge, rather than full or empty. In fact, Li-ion cells last longer when they spend less time being either completely discharged or full — that’s why battery optimization features in iPhones and Pixel phones delay overnight charging to 100 percent until about an hour before you typically grab your mobile. And while it’s sometimes necessary to charge a battery quickly, a slower charging method when speed isn’t critical will put less stress on the ionic components and help extend the cell’s life.
But over time, any battery will eventually wear down. The cell powering my iPhone 11 can make it through a typical day, but if I’m traveling, relying heavily on navigation or using the phone as a hotspot, it’ll need a top-off before bedtime. That’s easy if I’m home, but out in the world, a battery pack is an essential. I have a slew of them on hand after testing for our best power banks guide and the two I grab most often are the Otterbox Fast Charge, because it looks cool and has a good capacity, and the Nimble Champ Pro, because it’s crazy fast.
If you really want to give your phone a new lease on life, a new internal battery could be the ticket. For Pixel phones, you can go through Google’s official channel for either a walk-in or mail-in repair, or you can pick the DIY route with iFixit’s Pixel repair kits and instructions. For iPhones, you can start with Apple’s official page, go through Best Buy or other third-parties, or try iFixit’s methods. Samsung also has an in-house option, or you can try Best Buy or iFixit. Depending where you go and the model of your phone, the price for a new battery and installation will likely run you between $45 and $150 — still far less than ditching your handset for something brand new.
Clean up your phone’s storage
Most advice on how to declutter your phone and make it run faster centers on one thing: freeing up space. Your phone’s OS will likely have suggestions for clearing up storage space, like automatically offloading unused apps or deleting year-old messages. You can also do things manually by deleting any apps you don’t use. Next, consider the photos and videos you’re storing locally and either opt to pay for cloud storage or transfer the files to a computer or an external backup device. You can also consider getting rid of any music and movies you may have downloaded for offline use, and deleting old messages and large attachments. A good rule is to keep your storage at around 80 percent capacity. Once you’ve deleted and transferred what you can, restart your phone to give it a chance to clear up its temporary memory.
Why you can (and should) extend the life of your smartphone
Photo by Sam Rutherford/Engadget
The e-waste stream grows each year and doesn't do great things for human or planetary health. Smartphone companies are offering better and more consistent trade-in deals, but even some electronic recycling has its faults. Simply hanging onto a device instead of opting for a new one is the most efficient way of cutting back on a phone's environmental impact — plus it'll save you money.
While every giant phone maker would like you to believe that upgrading annually is critical, it’s worth noting that new generations of phones often bear strong resemblance to the prior year’s model. We called both the latest iPhone and Google Pixel the most significant updates in years, but prior to that, upgrading didn’t make muchsense. The latest Samsung Galaxy phone has a slew of new AI tricks, but physically, it’s not much different than the one that came before it.
With only minor hardware upgrades, the more exciting new features come via over-the-air software updates. When Google released the Pixel 8 last October, the company promised security and software updates for a full seven years. Samsung came out with the Galaxy S24 in January of this year and committed the same support for its handsets. Apple hasn’t made the same pledge, but when the launch of iOS 17 last year cut support for the iPhone 8 and iPhone X, both models had enjoyed around six years of updates from launch.
What Apple did announce is that the batteries in all four models of the iPhone 15 last twice as long as the company originally claimed. Originally, battery capacity was listed at 80 percent of the original full charge after 500 cycles. Now, that same capacity rate applies to 1,000 cycles. The improvement, Apple says, comes courtesy of advanced battery tech and better power management from the operating system. It’s true battery technology has improved in capacity over the years, but longevity hasn’t gone up across the board, as a study by PhoneArena makes clear.
More advancements in battery life spans may be on the horizon particularly as the EV industry grows, which also relies on lithium-ion cells. For now, declining battery health is usually the most noticeable issue affecting older phones. This year, the European Parliament voted for rules surrounding battery-powered devices and included a mandate to allow consumers to “easily remove and replace” batteries. That won’t go into effect until 2027, and there will be plenty of interpretation as to what “easily” means. But EU mandates are what made Apple finally ditch Lightning ports on iPhones in favor of USB-C, so this could eventually be a step towards (once again) having smartphones with swappable batteries.
Even in the US, legislation will soon compel companies to make repair a better option. Right-to-repair bills were passed last year in New York, Minnesota and other states. California has the strongest rule, and it even garnered Apple’s support. Once the law goes into effect in July, it will require companies to provide repair tools and documentation, and to sell components for seven years after the last new model is made for any device costing more than $100. Of course, the law didn’t say anything about prohibiting “parts pairing,” in which a device only works properly when repaired with official parts by a manufacturer-authorized repair center.
Currently, a number of phones have decent repairability scores, according to the online repair community iFixit (the FairPhone 5 gets the highest marks). After California’s law goes into effect, more models may become user-repairable, considering few manufacturers are likely to ignore the state’s nearly 40 million customers. In the meantime, authorized repair is an option, as is self-repair for the more industrious.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/how-to-make-your-smartphone-last-longer-120014817.html?src=rss
NVIDIA’s H100 chips are used by nearly every AI company in the world to train large language models hooked into services like ChatGPT. It’s been great for business. Now, the company is ready to make those chips look terrible, announcing a next-generation platform called Blackwell.
Named for David Harold Blackwell, a mathematician who specialized in game theory and statistics, NVIDIA claims Blackwell is the world’s most powerful chip, reaching speeds of 20 petaflops compared to just 4 petaflops the H100 provided. Yeah, throw it in the trash. You need new chips.
And if you didn’t know how powerful NVIDIA is, its press release for this new platform includes quotes from the CEOs of OpenAI, Microsoft, Alphabet, Meta and Tesla — yes, all CEOs you probably know the names of.
Yeah, this is bad. Respawn, the EA-owned studio behind Apex Legends, has postponed the North American Finals tournament after hackers broke into matches and equipped players with cheats. Footage of the hacks on Twitch show players being able to see their opponent’s location through walls, while notable player (and one of the best) ImperialHal was gifted an aimbot to hit enemies more easily. Respawn says it would share more information soon, but as of time of writing, the studio hasn’t elaborated.
The Mevo Core has improved built-in mics and works with any MFT lens.
Logitech is expanding its Mevo lineup of livestreaming cameras. The company’s new Mevo Core shoots in 4K, a big upgrade from the 1080p Mevo Start camera kit I tested a few years back. However, the trade-off is pricing as the new model will set you back three times as much for a three-camera setup. $999. So yes, this is probably for the pro streamers.
To emphasize that, the Core ships as a body only, but Logitech will sell lens bundle kits through Amazon and B&H Photo Video. You will need to buy an additional lens just to make it work. And it’s only compatible with micro four-third lenses — so there’s a high chance you’ll have to buy one.
It’s like Google search on Safari all over again. Plus 15 years.
Apple is reportedly in talks with Google to integrate its Gemini AI in iPhones, according to Bloomberg. Gemini could be the cloud-based generative AI engine for Siri and other iPhone apps, while Apple’s models could be woven into the upcoming iOS 18 for on-device AI tasks.
There are regulatory concerns to consider—the Department of Justice has already sued Google over its search dominance, including the way it pays Apple and other companies to use its search engine. But given how Microsoft and OpenAI’s partnership turned the Bing search engine into something people were actually talking about, the team-up might be worth the risk.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-morning-after-nvidia-says-its-blackwell-gpus-are-the-worlds-most-powerful-chips-111500942.html?src=rss
GOG, the gaming storefront owned by CD Projekt, is getting into cloud gaming by teaming up with Amazon Luna. Since the Luna cloud service streams games from Amazon's cloud servers, you'll be able to access the titles you've purchased from the store across any compatible device you own, including PCs, Macs, Android and iOS mobile devices, as well as smart TVs and Fire tablets. That is, so long as those devices are installed with the Luna app and you're connected to the internet. You'll also be able to use any Luna-compatible devices and controllers, such as Xbox One's and PS4's, to play your games.
In its announcement, GOG says you'll be able to play any of the games you own on its platform, provided that they're also on Luna. The CD Projekt subsidiary has confirmed those titles include the Witcher series and Cyberpunk 2077, but you can check if your other games are accessible if you already have Amazon's cloud streaming service. Take note that if you find a game you want to play within the Luna client, you don't have to go to GOG to buy it first. If the title is available on both services, any game you purchase from Luna will also appear in your GOG library. Your downloads will remain DRM-free even if you buy from Luna, and you'll be able to enjoy GOG Galaxy features, such as cloud saves and achievements.
The collaboration isn't quite live yet, and the companies have yet to announce when it'll be available other than it's coming "soon." Access to it will be limited to regions where Luna is available, however, namely in the USA, Canada, UK, Germany, France, Italy, and Spain.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gog-gets-into-cloud-gaming-with-amazon-luna-partnership-084558767.html?src=rss
Logitech is expanding its Mevo lineup of live-streaming cameras for creators. The company’s new Mevo Core shoots in 4K, meaning, unlike the 1080p Mevo Start we reviewed two years ago, cropping and digital zooms won’t lead to overly grainy video. However, the tradeoff is pricing, as the new model will set you back three times as much for a three-camera setup.
The Mevo Core continues the lineup’s trajectory of wireless multicam live-streaming directly to platforms like YouTube, Twitch and Facebook. (Of course, you can also record content to upload later.) The $999 package ships as a body only, although Logitech says it will sell lens bundle kits through Amazon and B&H Photo Video. Either way, you’ll need at least one Micro Four Thirds (MFT) lens to get started, and the company says any powered or manual MFT lens will work on day one.
The camera has a large 4/3 CMOS sensor, which Logitech says diminishes noise and improves low-light performance and depth of field compared to the 1080p model. The Core shoots in 4K at 30fps for recording content to upload later; if you’re live-streaming, you can instead use 1080p at 30fps. This model supports WiFi 6E, which could help with network latency and stability if your router also supports it.
Logitech
The camera’s body is noticeably bigger than that of the Mevo Start. At 3.5 x 3.5 x 3.25 inches, it has a similar depth and height but is about twice the width. With its battery installed (and no lenses mounted), it weighs 1.5 lbs.
Logitech says its audio is upgraded, too. It has a built-in three-microphone array with noise cancellation. You can also connect an external mic (or other audio source), which we found essential in the Mevo Start. We’ll have to wait and see if the Core’s built-in mics fare much better.
The Mevo Core’s battery life is estimated at six hours. If you need more time, you can plug an external power source into its USB-C port. It also includes an HDMI port, a 3.5mm one (for analog audio), and a microSD card slot. Logitech says it can double as an (incredibly expensive) wired or wireless HD webcam.
Like previous models, the Mevo Core works with Logitech’s Mevo app (where you can adjust things like focus, zoom, and aperture) and Multicam app to set up multi-viewpoint recording or streaming.
The Logitech Mevo Core is available for $999 for a single (body-only) camera starting today. It’s available from Logitech, Amazon, and B&H Photo Video.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/logitechs-999-4k-livestreaming-camera-is-triple-the-price-of-its-1080p-model-070146814.html?src=rss
Amazon’s first Big Spring Sale in the US begins tomorrow, but we’re already starting to see some electronics deals trickle in. Admittedly, tech isn’t at the forefront of this event (unlike Prime Day, where we usually see a healthy number of tech discounts). Amazon stated in its announcement that the Big Spring Sale would feature deals on fashion, outdoor, cleaning and home organization products, with tech only getting a brief shout otherwise. But we at Engadget see this as an opportunity to surface all of the best tech deals you can get at Amazon nonetheless — whether they be explicitly tied to the Big Spring Sale or not. Here are the best Amazon spring deals on gadgets you can shop ahead of the main event.
Best Spring Sale deals on Apple devices
Best Spring Sale deals on headphones, earbuds and speakers
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/amazon-big-spring-sale-20-early-deals-from-apple-sonos-and-sony-you-can-shop-today-161534774.html?src=rss
In less than two years, NVIDIA’s H100 chips, which are used by nearly every AI company in the world to train large language models that power services like ChatGPT, made it one of the world’s most valuable companies. On Monday, NVIDIA announced a next-generation platform called Blackwell, whose chips are between seven and 30 times faster than the H100 and use 25 times less power.
“Blackwell GPUs are the engine to power this new Industrial Revolution,” said NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang at the company’s annual GTC event in San Jose attended by thousands of developers, and which some compared to a Taylor Swift concert. “Generative AI is the defining technology of our time. Working with the most dynamic companies in the world, we will realize the promise of AI for every industry,” Huang added in a press release.
NVIDIA’s Blackwell chips are named in honor of David Harold Blackwell, a mathematician who specialized in game theory and statistics. NVIDIA claims that Blackwell is the world’s most powerful chip. It offers a significant performance upgrade to AI companies with speeds of 20 petaflops compared to just 4 petaflops that the H100 provided. Much of this speed is made possible thanks the 208 billion transistors in Blackwell chips compared to 80 billion in the H100. To achieve this, NVIDIA connected two large chip dies that can talk to each other at speeds up to 10 terabytes per second.
In a sign of just how dependent our modern AI revolution is on NVIDIA’s chips, the company’s press release includes testimonials from seven CEOs who collectively lead companies worth trillions of dollars. They include OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis, Oracle chairman Larry Ellison, Dell CEO Michael Dell, and Tesla CEO Elon Musk.
“There is currently nothing better than NVIDIA hardware for AI,” Musk says in the statement. "Blackwell offers massive performance leaps, and will accelerate our ability to deliver leading-edge models. We’re excited to continue working with NVIDIA to enhance AI compute,” Altman says.
NVIDIA did not disclose how much Blackwell chips would cost. Its H100 chips currently run between 25,000 and $40,000 per chip, according to CNBC, and entire systems powered by these chips can cost as much as $200,000.
Despite their costs, NVIDIA’s chips are in high demand. Last year, delivery wait times were as high as 11 months. And having access to NVIDIA’s AI chips is increasingly seen as a status symbol for tech companies looking to attract AI talent. Earlier this year, Zuckerberg touted the company’s efforts to build “a massive amount of infrastructure” to power Meta’s AI efforts. “At the end of this year,” Zuckerberg wrote, “we will have ~350k Nvidia H100s — and overall ~600k H100s H100 equivalents of compute if you include other GPUs.”
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/nvidias-gpus-powered-the-ai-revolution-its-new-blackwell-chips-are-up-to-30-times-faster-001059577.html?src=rss
