Technology

There have been plenty of leaks surrounding the Intel Core Lunar Lake series and its capabilities, but a new CPU-Z benchmark result for the Intel Core Ultra 5 245K Arrow Lake desktop processor has leaked, and they’re quite impressive so far.

According to popular Chinese hardware leaker ECSM_Official, the Intel Core Ultra 5 245K scored 850.6 points in the single-core performance and a multi-core score of 10,907.1 points. This puts the Core Ultra 5 245K between the Intel Core i9-13980HX’s 842 points and the Intel Core i5-14600K/KF’s 852 points in terms of single-core performance, or about 99.8% of the performance of the Raptor Lake Refresh chip.

The processor shines in multi-core testing, however, as it beats the 14600K/KF’s 9,868 multi-core score by roughly 10.5%, putting it at 90% of the performance of the higher-end Intel Core i7-14700K, which scored 12,117 points. The 245K doesn’t feature hyperthreading either, so its 14 threads delivering performance similar to chips with 20 and 28 threads is even more impressive.

Though Arrow Lake is in its final stages, there are still plenty of tweaks and changes that can be made right until the processors start rolling off the line. Not to mention that performance leaks could always be outliers due to an incredibly small sample size. So, take these results with a grain of salt until the product launches and is fully tested.

Is hyperthreading really that great?

According to Intel, hyperthreading was dropped to improve the efficiency of its Arrow Lake chips. Judging from the leaked benchmark results, this was the ideal decision. The 245K has a maximum power of 159 watts, compared to the 14600K’s 181 watts, and yet the former nearly matched the latter in a single-core test and bested it in a multi-core test.

Leaker ECSM_Official also noted that the tested 245K processor had not been fully optimized, with a frequency lower by 100 to 200 MHz from the standard. If this is true, then it’s clear that the Intel Core Ultra 5 245K will most likely score even higher benchmark scores once it officially launches.

Hyperthreading is the name of Intel’s tech that allows more than one thread to run on each core in a CPU, meaning that more work can be done in parallel (AMD and ARM have similar tech as well). The idea is that with hyperthreading enabled, a PC is able to process more information in less time and can run more background tasks without any disruption.

However, the fact that removing hyperthreading from the most recent Arrow Lake chips can up the processor performance so drastically calls into question just how useful the tech really is. Most likely the amount of overhead required to implement the tech essentially negates any benefits from it.

It’ll be interesting to see the Arrow Lake in full capacity once it’s released, and whether or not Intel will reconsider including hyperthreading in its future processors.

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Watch The Golden Bachelorette online

They say that good things come to those who wait, and as the first ever Golden Bachelorette, enchanting 61-year-old Joan Vassos has the pick of a very promising litter. The Golden Bachelorette season 1 airs on ABC in the U.S. — and viewers abroad can watch it from anywhere with a VPN.

Her 24 suitors run the gamut from rancher David to girl dad Keith, from chiropractor Bob to retired bank CEO Michael, but one thing they all appear to have in common is not just a twinkle in their eye, but straight up swagger.

60 is the new 40, according to sales manager Jordan, and if you're not immediately convinced, just take a look at these guys. "Hopeful romantic" Jonathan, a shipping consultant, is the kind of guy who'd give everyone from "The Bachelor" and "The Bachelorette" sleepless nights, while certified adrenaline junkie and salon owner Pascal looks like trouble.

Read on as we explain how to watch The Golden Bachelorette season 1 online and from anywhere.

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Watch The Golden Bachelorette online in the US

The Golden Bachelorette premieres on Wednesday, September 18 at 8 p.m. ET/PT on ABC. 

No cable? Sling TV offers ABC in selected locations. Other options include Fubo, YouTube TV and Hulu with Live TV.

Sling TV is among the best value cable replacements, costing from just $40/month and half price for your first month.

Episodes are also available to stream the next day on Hulu (30-day FREE trial).

How to watch The Golden Bachelorette from anywhere

If you’re traveling abroad when The Golden Bachelorette airs, you’ll be unable to watch the show like you normally would due to annoying regional restrictions. Luckily, there’s an easy solution. 

Downloading a VPN will allow you to stream online, no matter where you are. It's a simple bit of software that changes your IP address, meaning that you can access on-demand content or live TV just as if you were at home.

Use a VPN to watch The Golden Bachelorette from anywhere.

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How to watch The Golden Bachelorette online in Canada

Canadians can watch The Golden Bachelorette at the same time as Americans on CityTV — that's at 8 p.m. ET/PT on Wednesdays.

US viewer currently traveling in Canada? Download a VPN to watch your usual streaming service from abroad.

Can I watch The Golden Bachelorette online in the UK?

Hayu was previously the home of all things The Bachelor and The Bachelorette in the U.K., but the whole franchise was pulled from the streamer earlier in the year, and there's no word on when or if The Golden Bachelorette will hop across the pond. 

Don't forget: U.S. and Canadian nationals visiting the U.K. can still access their usual streaming services with the help of NordVPN.

Can I watch The Golden Bachelorette S1 in Australia?

The franchise used to be hosted by Hayu, but is now up in the air, with no word on when or if The Golden Bachelorette season 1 will head Down Under.

For now, anybody currently abroad in Australia from the U.S. or Canada can use one of the best VPN services to access their usual streaming service. We recommend NordVPN thanks to its speed, reliability and trusted security features. 

Can I watch The Golden Bachelorette for free?

Canadian viewers can watch The Golden Bachelorette season 1 for free with the Citytv 7-day free trial (via Amazon Prime Video). Meanwhile, US fans can watch episodes the day after they air with the Hulu 30-day free trial.

The Golden Bachelorette contestants

• Bill Hernandez, 68 from Portland, Oregon
• Bob Kilroy, 66 from Marina del Rey, California
• Charles Chapple, 60 from Wichita, Kansas
• Charles King, 62 from Rancho Palos Verdes, California
• Charles Ling, 66 from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
• Christopher Stallworth, 64 from West Babylon, New York
• Dan Roemer, 64 from Naples, Florida
• David Huff, 68 from Austin, Texas
• Gary Levingston, 65 from Palm Desert, California
• Gil Ramirez, 60 from Mission Viejo, California
• Gregg Lassen, 64 from Longboat Key, Florida
• Guy Gansert, 66 from Reno, Nevada
• Jack Lencioni, 68 from Schererville, Indiana
• Jonathan Rone, 61 from Oakland, Iowa
• Jordan Heller, 61 from Riverwoods, Illinois
• Keith Gordon, 62 from Columbus, Indiana
• Ken O'Brien, 60 from Peabody, Massachusetts
• Kim Buike, 69 from Seattle, Washington
• Mark Anderson, 57 from Leesville, Louisiana
• Michael Stevens, 65 from Denver, North Carolina
• Pablo Gonzalez-Juana, 63 from Cambridge, Maryland
• Pascal Ibgui, 69 from Glencoe, Illinois
• Ralph Johnson, 66 from Irvine, California
• Thomas, 62 from New York City, New York

It’s not every day that an art exhibit is secretly a laptop launch, but that’s exactly what just happened: at a swanky studio venue in London, I bore witness to Asus showcasing a fresh Zenbook laptop line built from an entirely new and unique material.

‘Ceraluminum’ took Asus four years to conceive and design in its 5,000-strong R&D department (no, they weren’t all just working on this), and while I was initially skeptical, I can now say that I’m a true believer. Described by Asus Chief of Design Mitch Yang as “a fusion of aluminum and ceramic, designed to integrate the best qualities of both materials,” the substance is created by bonding aluminum with a mystery ceramic ingredient, producing a strong plated material with a pottery-like matte surface.

Even the big-screen Zenbook S 16 is still phenomenally thin and light thanks to ceraluminum. (Image credit: Future)

Asus kept repeating that the new material is ‘inspired by nature,’ and while I’m not really sure what that means, I can attest to its impressive physical properties. It’s fantastically lightweight, enabling some incredibly thin and light new Zenbook models, and it repels fingerprints like nobody’s business. 

Seriously, I couldn’t see the slightest blemish on these laptops, even after handling them for several minutes. It’s also stronger and more resilient than conventional milled aluminum; Asus had a ceraluminum disc spinning endlessly under a turntable needle to show exactly how scratch-resistant it is.

Can the ‘forever laptop’ become a reality?

Yang described the material as ‘everlasting,’ making it clear that the new Zenbooks made using ceraluminum should prove more enduring than the competition. It’s not hard to see why; these devices, especially the new Zenbook Duo on show, feel like the future of laptops.

It’s perhaps a little at odds with the general ethos of the tech industry as a whole, which I’m convinced is ‘new is always better.’ We’re constantly being encouraged to upgrade and toss aside our outdated (read: two years old) hardware in favor of something newer and more exciting.

Thankfully, Asus has prepared for this eventuality, too: even if you do choose to replace your ceraluminum Zenbook, the material is 100% recyclable. As Yang stated: “We are trying to encourage a more sustainable approach to tech ownership… we are trying to create a balance between sustainability and enjoyment.” When I spoke to him in a private interview after the panel discussion, he was visibly filled with almost childlike joy at the product he helped create, running his hand over the lid of his new laptop and admitting: “It’s just nice to touch.”

Other than the new ceraluminum outer casing, the new slate of Zenbooks has undergone some subtle (but nice) design changes. (Image credit: Future)

He’s not wrong, either; it’s a bit strange at first to pick up a one-kilogram laptop that feels like an ancient Roman tablet under your fingertips, but the matte surface is oddly pleasing. It’s not as cold as metal and feels far higher quality than plastic. It’s not painted or coated; it doesn’t need to be. Combined with the straight-lined inlaid silver patterning on the lids, there’s no denying that the new Zenbook line looks fantastic.

As for whether they’ll truly last forever, well, that’s sort of out of Asus’s hands. The components that power these laptops are what really determine their longevity. However, with powerful new Intel Lunar Lake and AMD Ryzen AI 300 chips (though notably no Snapdragon X Elite models) at the heart of these laptops, they should last for a good while yet - at least, until the next big CPU industry upheaval.

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AWS has revealed a growing trend whereby customers are looking to reduce their reliance on cloud and revert back to on-prem options.

The news came during a hearing with the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), which is investigating anticompetitive practices within Britain’s cloud market.

Amazon occupies around one-third of the cloud market globally, the equivalent of Microsoft and Google combined.

Are customers fed up of cloud’s unrealistic promises?

AWS admitted customers are moving their workloads back to on-prem infrastructure in a move known as cloud repatriation. The trend highlights the flexibility and range of cloud storage options available to customers, as well as the varied use cases and associated benefits.

Amazon’s cloud division said customers may be doing this for any number of reasons, including: “to reallocate their own internal finances, adjust their access to technology and increase the ownership of their resources, data and security.”

One of the key drivers could be cost – cloud once promised to be a cost-effective way to access data anywhere, but on-prem and hybrid infrastructure is beginning to blur the boundaries.

However, while AWS acknowledged evolving competition from on-prem infrastructure providers, the company doesn’t seem to be overly bothered about the trend. AWS believes that companies are migrating on a workload-by-workload basis, and many are exploring hybrid and multicloud setups where they don’t entirely abandon AWS.

That being said, strong competition is causing AWS to reevaluate its business practices, and ongoing global investigations into anticompetitive behavior across the entire cloud sector means that cloud hosting companies and responding to pressures from these organizations and customers to offer greater flexibility and cost efficiency.

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After several prominent bankruptcies among big solar companies, it might take more than better economic conditions to calm things down.

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Microsoft has announced plans to integrate Python into excel as part of its latest Copilot AI push.

The move, part of the company’s broader expansion of its Microsoft 365 Copilot suite, is designed to boost productivity to giving workers access to advanced tools that can be controlled through natural language input.

Python integration will allow workers to perform complex tasks, like data analysis, forecasting, risk assessment and machine learning, without the need to write code.

Excel gets AI-powered Python

Microsoft hopes that by enabling users to carry out these more advanced tasks from within its spreadsheet software, Excel can become a better tool for modern data science.

A demo video shared in the announcement confirmed workers can overwrite the Python code to tweak as necessary.

Jared Spataro, Corporate VP of AI at Work for Microsoft, commented: “It’s like adding a skilled data analyst to the team.”

The tool, Copilot in Excel with Python, is currently in public preview.

The welcome addition forms part of a much broader strategy that Microsoft is currently rolling out, which it calls ‘Wave 2’. Redmond says this is in response to the positive feedback of its AI-powered tools in Teams.

Wave 2 will include further enhancements across the entire suit, including dynamic storytelling in PowerPoint and inbox management aids in Outlook.

The Python-powered Excel enhancements are part of a partnership with data science, ML and AI company Anaconda.

Anaconda’s Chief AI & Innovation Officer, Peter Wang, commented: “We are thrilled to announce the general availability of Python in Excel, a major breakthrough that will transform the workflow of millions of Excel users around the world.”

Microsoft Excel Head of Product Catherine Pidgeon added: “With the general availability of Python in Excel, we are ushering in a new era of data analysis.”

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Bose is replacing its $499 Smart Soundbar 600 with a speaker it simply calls Smart Soundbar. Along with a new A.I. Dialogue Mode, you can now pair the company's Ultra Open Earbuds with the soundbar to use as personal surround speakers.

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Tech giant Microsoft revealed that its board of directors approved a new $60 billion stock-buyback program. The repurchase program has no expiration date and may be terminated at any time, according to the company’s statement.

The board also outlined a quaterly dividend of $0.83 per share, which reflects a 10% rise over the previous quarter. Shares for the company gained 31% in the last 12 months, bringing its market value to $3.2 trillion.

A partnership with OpenAI and investments into cloud technologies has ushered in a new era for the corporation, seemingly one met with optimism and confidence. The company is reported to have $75.5 billion in cash and equivalents as of June 30th, with free cash flow of $23.3 billion in the fiscal fourth quarter, “up 18% year-over-year reflecting higher capital expenditures to support our cloud and AI offerings.”

More investments to come

AI infrastructure is set to secure more investments in the near future, with the company already reporting a 77% rise in capital spending largely due to AI related endeavors.

Tech giants are facing huge pressure to produce returns from the recent AI, with Microsoft being one of the few companies to do so. Microsoft surpassed the $3 trillion market value mark, and is the second company to ever reach this level.

AI is certainly emerging as a driving force behind Microsoft's success, especially after the company integrated generative AI into a lot of core products, including its dedicated chatbot, Copilot. The projections are incredibly promising for the company, which could be set to take the title of the world's most valuable company from its current #2 spot.

Via Bloomberg

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