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A New York federal judge is set to hear pivotal questions in the case of Mahmoud Khalil, a leader of large Gaza solidarity protests at Columbia University who now faces deportation after his arrest by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.

(Image credit: Spencer Platt)

• The Last of Us creator Neil Druckmann has revealed that Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet will be about "faith and religion"
• The team spent years developing "this new religion" that takes place on one planet
• Druckmann said the player will crash land on this planet and need to figure out how to escape, saying, "I want you to be lost in a place that you're really confused about what happened here"

Naughty Dog co-president Neil Druckmann has revealed new details about the studio's new game Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet.

In an almost one-hour-long Sony 'Creator to Creator' discussion, Druckmann, alongside 28 Years Later director Alex Garland, sat down to discuss their mutual inspirations and their respective process in how they each tackle their creative process.

On the topic of Naughty Dog's next major title Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet, Druckmann revealed that it will take place "2000 years in an alternate future that deviates in the late 80s". The game director then joked that the game will receive less hate than the divisive The Last of Us: Part 2, since it's about "faith and religion".

"I joke about this with the team," Druckmann said, "With The Last of Us 2, we made certain creative decisions that got us a lot of hate. A lot of people love it, but a lot of people hate that game," to which Garland said, "Who gives a sh*t."

"Exactly. But the joke is like, you know what, let's do something that people won't care as much about. Let's make a game about faith and religion," Druckmann said.

Speaking more on the game's narrative, Druckmann added, "So there is not only in this alternate history timeline, we've made this - where the where the timeline deviates - this new religion becomes pretty prominent and then we spend years just building out this religion like from the original prophet all the way [to] how it gets like changed and sometimes bastardised and evolves over all these years."

Druckmann continued, revealing that this religion takes place on one planet until, one day, all communication suddenly stops. The playable character and bounty hunter, Jordan A Mun, who is chasing her bounty, eventually crash lands on this planet alone and is left to figure out how to escape.

On top of tackling faith and religion, Druckmann said that he wanted to also focus on isolation.

"So many of the previous games we've done there's always like an ally with you," he said. "I really want you to be lost in a place that you're really confused about what happened here, [about] who are the people here, what was their history, and in order to get off this planet like, again no one has been heard from this planet for 600 years, so if you ever have hoped to have a chance to get off you have to figure out what happened here."

Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet doesn't have a release date just yet, but we can expect the game to get a PS5 launch.

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Arab countries reject Gaza displacement as ethnic cleansing, but Israeli officials say they are working on plans to make it happen, and polls suggest most Israelis are open to the idea.

(Image credit: Bashar Taleb)

Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig tells an audience at SXSW that regulators must hold AI builders accountable.

• PwC study finds more than half of investors predict global economic growth
• They want businesses to invest more in upskilling - especially around AI
• Environmental factors still influence decisions

The business world has high expectations for generative AI tools in the year ahead, with hopes specifically that efficiency and business growth will see positive impacts, new research has claimed.

PwC’s recent survey of investors and analysts revealed around three-quarters (74%) believe the tech will boost productivity, outpacing the global average of 66%, which means that three in five now anticipate increased profitability.

More broadly, investors appear to be optimistic about the broader economic outlook, with more than half (53%) anticipating global economic growth over the next 12 months.

AI is driving economic growth after all

The figures mirror another recent PwC study of company CEOs, 61% of whom expect to see global economic growth this year.

Artificial intelligence’s impacts aren’t just limited to financial benefits, though; scaling the business (61%), measuring ROI (42%), shaping stakeholder perception (43%) and enhancing workforce impact (43%) were also noted as the tech’s biggest opportunities.

“GenAI has been a game changer for businesses worldwide, but investors now expect it to deliver real, measurable value," noted PwC UK Asset & Wealth Management Leader Albertha Charles.

Looking ahead, investors are more keen for companies to upskill their workforce (77%) than deploy artificial intelligence at scale (72%), highlighting the crucial role human workers are to play in the AI revolution.

Charles added: “As AI adoption accelerates, investors will be watching closely to see how leaders balance technology with upskilling their workforce to unlock meaningful gains in profit and productivity.”

Despite the optimism, investors are still keeping an eye on macroeconomic volatility (39%), geopolitical conflict (35%) and cyber risks (34%). Three-quarters (74%) also noted that they’d be looking to increase investment in companies who are working with suppliers and communities to build sustainable supply chains, highlighting the environmental weighting on decision-making.

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The carrier announced Tuesday that it will begin charging certain passengers to check their luggage on flights, a significant shift at the company long prized by consumers for its perks.

(Image credit: David Zalubowski)

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• Design company AndoAndoAndo released a turntable-inspired wrist watch
• The design takes inspiration from the classic Technics SL-1200
• Shipping rolls out in April, but the collection is limited to only 30 pieces

Design company AndoAndoAndo is taking the Hamilton Brothers' funky bop Music Makes the World Go Round quite seriously in its upcoming release of wrist watches, which are an ode one of the world's best turntables. The company’s latest creative venture takes the legendary DJ turntable, the Technics SL-1200, and reimagines it as an automatic wrist watch for music and vinyl fans alike – making it the tiniest turntable I’ve ever seen (albeit one that can't actually spin a tune), and it’s kind of adorable.

Powered by Miyota 9039 Premium automatic movement, the watch is a tiny replica of the legendary DJ turntable which uses a tiny vinyl record as the clock face. Its attention to detail is admirable, going the distance to avoid including numbers in its design and instead using a distinct pattern of dots to indicate the hours, minutes, and seconds. And again, no it can’t spin actual vinyl records nor play music of any kind, but that would be very impressive wouldn’t it?

The larger red disc with the letter 'A' points to the current hour. The smaller red disc indicates seconds past which, when the text returns to its original position, marks the beginning of a new minute. (Image credit: AndoAndoAndo)

It’s a unique take on a classic deck (and a chance to wear your analog-loving heart on your wrist), however it may take some getting used to when it comes to deciphering the actual time – and its designer, Yu Ando, seemingly agrees. When referring to the watch’s minute hand in the product description online, Ando writes: "Yes it's not straight, it's not pointing (to) the minute marker straight, but so you can interpret it in your own way". OK – I still want one.

The minute hand is designed to replicate the turntable’s tonearm, hence its slightly bent shape, and sitting on top of the vinyl record are two spinning discs; a large one with the letter ‘A’ that points to the current hour, and a smaller one that shows the seconds past, which can be difficult to read – although Ando has stated that when the text on the disc is level and back to its original position, that indicates that the zero second has begun.

The watch is available to preorder now, and is available in three different finishes; red, black, and silver, or gold and black both for $438 (which is around £350 or AU$697), or a slightly pricier all-gold version at $455. Shipping will be processed in April, but according to the AndoAndoAndo website there’ll only be 30 pieces made for this edition – so it’s a very limited run indeed.

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• Asus has launched three new monitors using its new built-in air ionizer technology
• Asus claims it removes up to 90% of airborne dust in indoor environments
• One of the monitors is a WQHD ultrawide, which uses a VA panel for better contrast

Asus is shaking things up with its monitors, not only by focusing on high refresh rates and good response times but also by introducing an innovative feature that aims to improve indoor air quality - and it may be something that other monitors should copy.

As highlighted by Notebookcheck, Asus has launched three new monitors under the VU series: the VU249HFI-W (24-inch), VU279HFI-W (27-inch), and the VU34WCIP-W (34-inch WQHD ultrawide), all of which maintain a 100Hz refresh rate and 1ms MPRT response time - but these aren't just any ordinary monitors - they take advantage of Asus' new built-in air ionizer design.

Asus claims this removes up to 90% of airborne dust, leading to fresher air which could be highly beneficial for office spaces and gaming setups. This is possible thanks to 'Innovative Nano-Ion Technology' that does not require a filter, and instead uses negative ions to eliminate dust, pollen, and allergens - essentially, these monitors will draw air in from their rear to refine your room's air quality.

Both the VU249HFI-W and the VU279HFI-W use IPS panels, which are bright and designed for greater color accuracy - however, the VU34WCIP-W will use a VA panel, which is better for higher contrast ratios and response times (it's still 1ms MPRT in this case) including VRR (Variable Refresh Rate) to ensure that the refresh rate matches the frame rate of gaming or video content.

The specifications of these new monitors may not be the best when compared to other high-end displays from Asus, but it’s still good enough to cater to productivity, gaming, and video content uses. It’s also a good way for Asus to test its new technology on a monitor without all the bells and whistles (at a low cost), with hopes that it becomes a newfound success that inspires other manufacturers to follow suit.

(Image credit: Asus) Now, just use this technology on gaming monitors, and I'll be happy

It might be easy to dismiss Asus' efforts here as simply a gimmick, especially if you're more excited about improvements in terms of display quality - but I'd argue this is a great innovation.

I'm fully aware that there is a chance it won't be widely adopted by Asus for its other monitors or by other manufacturers - but this could help reduce the dust buildup I'm sure we all hate with our desktop setups. If this saves me from having to regularly clean my desktop (and the desk itself), then I’d be very interested in using one of these monitors in the future.

Price and availability are currently dependent on your region, but the standout choice for me, the VU34WCIP-W model, is currently available at various US retailers for $359 (around £280 / AU$570).

Ultrawide monitors with 3440x1440 resolutions have always been my go-to for productivity and gaming - and don't get me wrong, I'd never choose this over my Alienware AW3423DWF QD-OLED or the PG49WCD super ultrawide monitor Asus sent me for testing, but it has me hoping this can somehow be used for gaming monitors. Let's just hope the air-purifying quality is good enough (and therefore proves popular enough with consumers) to make that a reality.

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New features include a nighttime wind-down mode and the ability to block access during designated hours

Honor Pad V9 review: One-minute review

It’s hard not to view the Honor Pad V9 through the lens of its potential as a rival to the new base-model iPad (2025) – it came out just days before (for roughly the same price), has comparable specs, and half of the best Android tablets on the market are trying to take on Apple’s market-dominating juggernauts, anyway.

The more I used the Honor Pad for this review, the more I recognized its strengths – it takes the basic iPad principle, strips away the unnecessary extras, and adds in some useful productivity tools.

Take, for example, performance: instead of burdening its tablet with more processing power than you’d ever practically be able to use, Honor has given the Pad V9 a more restrained mid-range processor. But it’s compensated with twice the storage of the basic iPad, and more RAM. From my testing, using the device felt as smooth and snappy as anyone would need it to.

Software is another important thing to note. In the tablet space, Android used to struggle compared to iOS, but a lot has changed in the last few years, with plenty of similar productivity and multi-screen features between the two operating systems. What's more, instead of burdening the slate with a million first-party apps that you may or may not ever use, Honor has only added a few useful apps to the default Pad V9 package. Some of these proved pivotal to my experience, too.

Specifically, there's a suite of pre-installed Microsoft Office-like apps that each offer some useful functions, like the ability to convert your docs into PDFs (or other file formats), compile documents from various apps, and also mark up PDFs. Where was this technology when I was doing my degree?

The Pad V9 is a dab hand at entertainment, too: it has eight speakers, unlike the iPad’s two, and I found it great for streaming music or creating a surround-sound effect when streaming movies and TV shows. The display, while only using LCD tech, supports a 144Hz refresh rate and 2.8K resolution, which should sate spec-heads.

Most of my gripes with the Honor Pad V9 are pretty minor, and ones you can level at the vast majority of Android tablets: there’s no 3.5mm headphone jack, you can’t expand the storage, and there are some irritating software quirks – I’m talking specifically about the weird design of the quick settings menu, which is unduly cramped.

Like its Apple rival, I can see the Pad V9 being useful to students, or people who need a lightweight business companion and think a laptop is too bulky. It’s not as fully featured as it needs to be to be classed as a creativity powerhouse, and it’s a bit too advanced for those who want a simple on-the-go movie tool. That said, a few extras over the new base-model iPad mean it manages to beat Apple’s tablet at its own game (on paper, at least – we're currently in the process of reviewing the latter).

Honor Pad V9 review: price and availability

(Image credit: Future)

• Costs £399.99, but only on sale in limited regions
• Bundled with some accessories, depending on region

You can pick up the Honor Pad V9 for £399.99 (roughly $515, AU$820) in the UK. At the time of writing, it’s only on sale in a handful of European countries, as well as in Saudi Arabia and the UAE, though Honor does sell some tech in the US and Australia.

The device you get varies by country. In the UK, there’s only one variant on sale, which has 8GB RAM and 256GB storage, and you get a flip cover and stylus included in the box. Other countries have different combinations of storage, memory, and bundled accessories. So, in the interests of fairness, I’ve treated the tablet as independent of its accessories when weighing up its value.

At the time of writing, Honor's website (in the UK, at least) doesn't actually list any accessories to buy individually. So make sure you don't lose or break the ones you get in the box, because replacements may be hard to find.

The price roughly puts the slate in the mid-range of Android tablets, a fact reflected in its positioning in Honor’s line-up: it beats the Honor Pad 9 and Honor Pad X9, but doesn’t match the Honor MagicPad 2. For context, Apple’s new base-model iPad starts at $349 / £329/AU$599 for 128GB storage.

Its price marks the Honor Pad V9 as pretty good value for money when you consider its specs and features. It doesn’t quite veer right into ‘drop what you're doing and buy it now!’ territory, but if you find a deal that reduces its price tag by a healthy margin, I'd say it's a must-buy.

The Honor Pad V9 was announced at the global tech expo MWC 2025 in February 2025, and went on sale shortly afterwards.

• Value: 4 / 5

Honor Pad V9 review: specs

Here are the Honor Pad V9's specs at a glance:

Honor Pad V9 review: design

(Image credit: Future)

• Lightweight and easy to carry or hold
• USB-C port but no 3.5mm jack
• Camera bump creates some wobble

Honor hasn't shaken up the tablet world with the V9's design, but it echoes the premium cleanliness of iPads (and most other Android tablets on the market right now).

The dimensions of the Honor Pad V9 are 259.1 x 176.1 x 6.1mm – yes, it’s nice and thin, so it won’t take up much space in a backpack. It weighs 475g, so it’s pretty light, and I found it easy to hold for long periods of time (at least, the length of time it takes to watch a movie in bed).

You can pick up the tablet in gray or white, and as you can see in the images included throughout this review, my sample was a gray model.

(Image credit: Future)

When holding the tablet in landscape, the power button is on the left edge while the volume rocker is on the top-left corner. There’s a USB-C port on the right edge but no headphone jack to speak of. Holding the slate in this orientation means that the front-facing camera is in the top bar of the bezel, which I find to be the best positioning for video calls.

On the back are two circular mounds. One, which barely sticks up from the surface of the slate, houses the flash, while the second holds the camera lens. It doesn’t stick too far up, but it does mean the slate has a little wobble when put flat on a table.

As far as I can tell, the Honor Pad V9 doesn’t have an IP rating against dust or water ingress, so keep it protected.

You can get some extra use out of the Pad V9 with some accessories; the slate supports a keyboard folio and a stylus, the latter of which comes with its own features. As mentioned, though, I didn’t receive either, so didn’t test them, and can only see them on sale in some regions. In other regions, they come bundled with the tablet in various combinations – it’s a bit confusing, in all honesty. If you can’t pick up the keyboard or stylus in your region, it’s very possible that third-party equivalents will go on sale before too long.

• Design: 4 / 5

Honor Pad V9 review: display

(Image credit: Future)

• Large 11.5-inch display
• 1840 x 2800 resolution and 144Hz refresh rate
• Range of eye comfort overlays

The Honor Pad V9 is pretty big, as mid-range Android tablets go – don’t go taking that ‘9’ in the title to be its screen size. Instead, the display measures 11.5 inches diagonally.

The display has a 2800 x 1840 pixel count, which is billed by Honor as a 2.8K resolution, and it supports a refresh rate of up to 144Hz (though you'll struggle to find an app or game that supports such a high figure). I couldn’t find a figure on the max brightness but suffice it to say, it’s really bright.

The screen uses LCD tech so it’s not got the same contrast or sharpness that your phone (or a more premium tablet) may have, but this kind of display is easier to see in direct sunlight if you’re working, say, in a well-lit cafe or coffee shop. And Honor is clearly pulling out all the stops to ensure it’s still valid as a streaming device.

(Image credit: Future)

The brand touts that the screen supports DCI-P3 color gamut and 10-bit color (basically, it can show a wide range of colors, making videos look realistic) and it’s also certified by IMAX Enhanced. This basically means that it reaches a set of standards in the visual and audio departments to accurately play IMAX content – this is mostly available on Disney Plus, according to IMAX’s website, though Bravia Core, iQIYI, and Rakuten TV also have some such content.

Like most rivals, Honor offers a few screen modes to benefit eye comfort or battery life. These include eBook mode (which makes the display grayscale), eye comfort (which reduces the prevalence of blue colors), and Dark mode (you've probably used this before, and it's a decent battery-saving option).

• Display: 4.5 / 5

Honor Pad V9 review: software

(Image credit: Future)

• Android 15 with MagicOS 9.0 laid over the top
• Range of useful pre-baked working apps
• A few user interface quirks to be ironed out

The default software for the Honor Pad V9 is MagicOS 9.0 – that’s Honor’s own skin, which is based on Android 15, and while it’s largely a graphical overhaul of Android, it brings a few useful extras.

One of these is Honor Docs, a pre-installed suite of document processing apps that look near-identical to the Microsoft Office equivalents (and may actually be them). There are extra tools, too, like the ability to convert various documents to PDF and the aggregation of documents across your tablet into one place, no matter their file format.

If you’re buying the Pad V9 for productivity reasons, I can see these tools being a core part of your user experience, and it was pretty handy to have them pre-installed on the tablet. They'll be especially useful for students, or people who already own Honor tech, as docs will be shared between devices.

(Image credit: Future)

Android software used to be poorly implemented on tablets, but in 2025, that’s not the case, with useful features that make the most of the large display size. It's still not perfect, though.

Case in point, the quick-settings menu on the Pad V9, which is summoned when you swipe down from the top-right edge of the screen, is unnecessarily cramped and clustered. It makes it rather hard to use, and I don’t see a reason why it has to be shoved so far to the side. Hopefully, an update can fix this. You can see it in the image above, and I don't understand why it can't be a bit wider to use more of the empty screen space.

All tech companies tout ‘AI features’ nowadays, and Honor has a few too, like the ability to create meeting minutes from your notes, summarize documents, or automatically add typesetting. They’re pretty light-touch, but that’s how I like it, and Honor hasn’t staked the entire use case of its tablet on a few AI features.

• Software: 4 / 5

Honor Pad V9 review: performance and cameras

(Image credit: Future)

• MediaTek Dimensity 8350 Elite offers middling processing power
• 8GB RAM and 256GB storage (depending on region)
• Impressive octo-speaker offering

Powering the Honor Pad V9 is a MediaTek chipset called the Dimensity 8350 Elite. Despite the name, this is a mid-range chipset that we’ve seen in a few Oppo phones and tablets before.

Multi-core benchmark results attest to this: over multiple tests, I got an average score of 4409, while the best chipsets on phones and tablets right now reach up to 6000. That goes to show that this is a tablet designed more for streaming and working than intensive processing.

Most games I tested on the tablet ran just fine, but noticeably not as snappily or quick as tablets or phones running top chipsets. When graphical options were available, I didn’t push to the top graphics due to fear of how the slate would respond, and the same was true of framerate. So, the Pad V9 will be fine for gamers, but there are better options out there.

(Image credit: Future)

The slate has various memory configurations depending on where you live. In the UK, it’s on sale in a sole 256GB storage and 8GB RAM model, but the version I tested had 12GB RAM, and certain regions have models ranging from 128GB to 512GB storage. There’s no memory card slot, so you’ll have to stick to the storage of whichever variant you pick up.

I mentioned earlier that the tablet is IMAX Enhanced; that extends to the speakers too, with a whopping eight of them around the slate (on other tablets, you’re lucky to get four). They make movies and TV shows sound a little bit better, with audio spread out to the left and right as well as up and down (depending on the video you watch). However, the max volume isn’t exactly deafening – streaming a movie in bed was fine, but when I tried to put on some Netflix while I was cooking, I sometimes struggled to hear what was being said over the various cooking noises.

On the camera front, you’re looking at a 13MP rear camera and an 8MP front-facer. They’re fit for scanning documents, conducting video calls, and facial recognition, but you’re not exactly going to take artistic snaps with sensors like these. There was noticeable noise in darker areas of pictures (even fairly well-lit ones), and I couldn’t see a difference in images taken in portrait mode versus the standard mode.

• Performance: 3.5 / 5

Honor Pad V9 review: battery

(Image credit: Future)

• 10,100mAh battery will see you through multiple days of use
• 33W charging is slow for a battery of this size

The Honor Pad V9 packs a 10,100mAh battery, which is a sliver bigger than the ones seen on some comparably priced rivals.

Practically, this gets you about two days of heavy use before the tablet needs to be charged. In my testing period, which saw me replicate my usual tablet use (some word processing here, a movie night there, and a fair amount of music streaming), I reached about five days of charge before the slate needed powering up.

If there’s a slight disappointment with the Pad V9's battery, it’s the charging speed, which caps at 35W – on the global release of the slate, at least, though the Chinese version gets 66W. You’re looking at a charging time of several hours to fill that big battery, so remember to plug it in early if it needs a charge!

I found it easiest to charge the tablet up in dribs and drabs, so I could ensure it always had some charge, but never needed to part with it for an entire working day.

• Battery: 4/5

Should you buy the Honor Pad V9? Buy it if…

You're a student
If I'd bought the Honor Pad V9 when I was a student, I'd have saved hours of wrangling various apps and trying to use various features that the tablet can handle out the gate.View Deal

You like streaming movies and TV
Its display is good, but its speakers are great: the Honor Pad V9 is dependable for streaming entertainment.View Deal

You want an iPad, but running Android
Are you an Android fan who wants an iPad-like tablet? The Honor Pad V9 is one of your best picks, and it roughly matches its Apple rivals in price.View Deal

Don’t buy it if…

You need lots of storage space
While the Honor's 256GB built-in memory is extensive, that's all you'll get without relying on cloud space or external hard drives.View Deal

You like wired audio
There's no 3.5mm headphone jack on this tablet, so audiophiles will have to rely on USB-C converters, which can be annoying if you also want to charge the slate.View Deal

Also consider

Not convinced by the Honor Pad V9? Here are a few other options to consider:

iPad 11 (2025)
The natural rival, Apple's newest iPad will win fans simply by being an iOS device. But it's more expensive (when considering like-for-like storage), doesn't offer the same speaker quality, and will make you pay more for accessories. We've currently got the device in for review, so we'll have a full verdict on its quality soon.

Oppo Pad 3 Pro
For only a little bit more, you can get Oppo's new tablet, which boasts a more powerful chipset, a higher-res display, and faster charging.

Read our full Oppo Pad 3 Pro review

How I tested the Honor Pad V9

I tested the Honor Pad V9 by using it in lieu of my normal tablet (an iPad Pro from years ago) for several weeks, for all the tasks I normally use my iPad for.

This included typing up and editing documents, watching movies, playing games, and checking out the news. The model I tested had 12GB RAM and 256GB storage, and I used it without first-party accessories.

I've been reviewing products for TechRadar since early 2019, covering everything from tablets and smartphones to headphones, fitness trackers, and electric scooters.

Why you can trust TechRadar

☑️ 100s of smartphones reviewed
☑️ 15 years of product testing
☑️ Over 16,000 products reviewed in total
☑️ Nearly 200,000 hours testing tech

First reviewed March 2025

Diplomatic teams from Ukraine and the United States are holding talks in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, on Tuesday in steps toward ending a full-scale war started by Russia in 2022.

(Image credit: Saul Loeb)

• Two US healthcare firms confirmed suffering a cyberattack
• More than 300,000 victims have had sensitive data stolen
• Rhysida claimed responsibility for the attack and added the data to its leak site

Ransomware operators Rhysida are claiming responsibility for cyberattacks on two US healthcare organizations.

On its data leak site, they listed Sunflower Medical Group, and Community Care Alliance (CCA). The former is a healthcare provider in the Kansas City metropolitan area offering services such as primary care, urgent care, pediatrics, and more. The latter is a unified human service agency offering more than 50 programs.

Combined, it seems that more than 300,000 people have had their sensitive data compromised as a result of these attacks.

No abuse yet

In a public announcement posted on its website, Sunflower said that the attackers broke into the systems on December 15, but were only spotted and ousted a month later, around January 7.

During that time, they stole people’s names, addresses, dates of birth, Social Security numbers, driver’s license numbers, medical information, and health insurance information. In a filing with the Maine Attorney General’s Office, Sunflower said 220,968 people were affected.

CCA, on the other hand, was struck in July last year, and claims that the miscreants took people’s names, addresses, dates of birth, driver's license numbers, and SSNs, as well as diagnoses and conditions, lab results, medications, patient ID numbers, health insurance information, provider names, and other data. Its filing with the Maine Attorney General’s Office puts the number of affected people at 114,945.

As for Rhysida, the ransomware operators claim to have 7.6 TB worth of Sunflower’s data, including a 3TB SQL database, The Register reports. Since the data is still listed on the site, it means either that the negotiations are ongoing, or that they’ve broken down.

In any case, Rhysida is yet to leak everything on the dark web, and at press time, there was no indication of abuse in the wild. Both organizations said they tightened up on security following the incident.

Via The Register

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Sennheiser HD 505: two-minute review

The new Sennheiser HD 505is a refresh of one of the cornerstones of its model ranges: entry-level, open-backed, hard-wired over-ear headphones. This new design uses a variation on a proven transducer, and makes pragmatic choices where materials are concerned to produce a headphone that’s light, comfortable and built to last.

The Sennheiser HD 505 are fine-sounding headphones in many ways, too. The open-backed element of the design of these headphones allows them to sound open and expansive, and they’re organized and authoritative too.

Their tonal balance is just somehow correct, their frequency response is judicious and they have the sort of dynamic headroom that allows the changes in volume or intensity in your favorite recordings to be completely apparent.

They’re far from the last word in bass heft or punch, though – so despite the amount of low-frequency detail they reveal and the naturalistic way they have with rhythms and tempos, there’s no doubt some listeners will want more, bass-wise, than the HD 505 are prepared to give.

Those listeners are invited to check out other options among the best wired headphones – and notably the company’s own HD 600, which have been around long enough to be available at regular discounts that bring them very close to the price of the HD 505.

The rest of us, though, can just go ahead and marvel at how open, revealing and, yes, entertaining the HD 505 sound.

(Image credit: Future) Sennheiser HD 505 review: Price and release date

• Release date: February 10th 2025
• Price: $249 / £229 / AU$449

Obviously the HD 505 have had no time to become any more affordable, so they find themselves competing with the likes of Beyerdynamic (with its DT 900 Pro X) and Grado (with its SR325x). They also, rather unfortunately, find themselves competing with their HD 600 siblings, which have had plenty of time to come down from their £399 launch price to something much closer to HD 505 money…

Sennheiser HD 505 review: Specs

(Image credit: Future) Sennheiser HD 505 review: Features

• 38mm dynamic drivers
• 1.8m cable with 3.5mm/6.3mm termination
• 120Ω nominal impedance

Given that this is a fairly affordable pair of wired over-ear headphones, you shouldn’t really expect a whole host of features – and, sure enough, the HD 505 focus on the essentials. That doesn’t mean that those features aren’t entirely fit for purpose, though.

Sennheiser has drawn on the relatively long-serving 500-series transducer in an effort to maintain sonic transparency, but added a little low-end heft and substance. And the result, so it says, is that the 38mm dynamic driver design is now good for a frequency response of 12Hz - 39kHz – which in layman’s terms is ‘extremely deep’ to ‘very high indeed’.

A nominal impedance of 120Ω isn’t the most promising number you ever heard, but nevertheless the HD 505 won’t be difficult for all but the most weedy smartphone or laptop to drive.

And really, there’s only the cable left to discuss where ‘features’ are concerned. The left earcup is hard-wired with a 2.5mm jack that connects via a ‘twist and lock’ method that ensure it won't be yanked out.

At the other end of the 1.8m cable there’s a 3.5mm termination with a screw-on 6.3mm adapter supplied. It would have been nice to see a balanced cable as an option too, but I guess you can’t have everything…

• Features score: 4.5 / 5

(Image credit: Future) Sennheiser HD 505 review: Sound quality

• Detailed, dynamic and direct sound
• Spacious, organized presentation
• Will not satisfy bass-fanciers

The pluses, it’s fair to say, comfortably outweigh the minuses where the sound of the HD 505 is concerned. So while the deficiencies are not insignificant, it seems only polite with all the many things these Sennheiser cans get right.

Thanks in no small part to their open-backed configuration, the HD 505 are an expansive, wide-open listen – and they can control a soundstage just as confidently as they lay it out in the first place. Even in a recording with lots going on (Fela Kuti’s Colonial Mentality, for instance), the soundstage is properly defined and easy to follow.

Every element of the recording has a pocket of space to itself in which it can spread out and express itself, and the spaces in between are given the weighting and emphasis they deserve too.

They’re a fairly dynamic listen, too, able to put a lot of distance between the most contemplative and the most intense passages of a recording without sounding in any way stressed. They’re just as skilful when it comes to handling the dynamic aspects of harmonic variation, too – the moments of unaccompanied bass guitar during the Fela Kuti tune have their fluctuations described in eloquent fashion.

Tonality is pleasantly neutral, which allows the sound of a recording to take precedence over the sound of the headphones. Detail levels are high at every point of the frequency range – the top end is bright but substantial, and enjoys just as much variation as the swift, properly controlled bottom end.

In between, voices are given the space and the positivity to reveal the minutiae of their character and technique – a listen to Doechii’s Alligator Bites Never Heal lets you know the HD 505 are very adept indeed when it comes to allowing vocalists to properly express themselves.

The frequency range is handled with confidence, too – nothing is underrepresented, nothing is overstated, and the sweep from bottom to top and back again is smooth. But it’s at the bottom of the frequency range that the Sennheiser reveal themselves to be slightly less than the finished article.

The control of bass sounds is straight-edged and direct, so the headphones have no problem describing rhythms in a natural and unforced manner. Detail levels here, and tonal variation, are just as satisfying as they are elsewhere in the frequency range.

But there’s a definite lack of substance and weight to the bottom end, a bony and flimsy quality that is going to disappoint listeners who are used to (and probably expect) something approaching ‘punch’ from their new headphones. Certainly the Doechii album is done no favours whatsoever by this flyweight attitude.

• Sound quality score: 4 / 5

(Image credit: Future) Sennheiser HD 505 review: Design

• Covered memory foam at the contact points
• Steel mesh earcup coverings
• Concealed headband adjustment mechanism

There’s nothing especially luxurious about the Sennheiser HD 505 – they’re mostly made of plastic – but they’re built and finished to the sort of high standard the brand established ages ago.

Without the cable, they weigh just 237g, and allied to some nicely judged clamping force they prove a comfortable proposition even for longer listens. The amount of memory foam that makes up the inside of the headband (where it’s covered in synthetic leather) and the earpads (which are covered with synthetic velour) doesn’t do any harm in this respect, either.

The headband adjustment mechanism is concealed inside the headband itself, and operates with a sort of clicky positivity. The rear of the earcups is covered with a quantity of metal mesh, and carries some understated branding – but as design flourishes go, that’s going to have to do.

The details in the majority of the world are in a nice copper color – in China, there's a model with gold-colored details that certainly provides more bling.

• Design score: 4.5 / 5

(Image credit: Future) Sennheiser HD 505 review: Value

• Informative, entertaining but slightly lightweight sound
• Properly built and finished, although far from tactile
• Light and comfortable

In truth, the HD 505 aren’t much to look at, and they’re not exactly tactile either. This doesn’t mean that they’re not properly built, you understand, or that they won’t last for the long haul – and there’s always the cachet of that brand name to add to your the pride of ownership.

Add in the trim weight of the headphones and, even more so, the deftly accomplished sound they make, and there’s unarguable value for your money on offer here.

However, as I mentioned further up, you can get the Sennheiser HD 600, which are the 'step-up' versions of these headphones, for very close to the same price as these in the real world. So it's hard to say the HD 505 are the bargain of the century when the HD 600 might actually qualify for that moniker.

• Value score: 4 / 5

(Image credit: Future) Should I buy the Sennheiser HD 505? Buy them if…

You admire an open, rapid and informative sound
If this sort of money buys a more spacious sound, allied to such impressive detail levels and outright drive in a pair of headphones, I’ve yet to hear them.View Deal

You want a comfortable listen
A light (but appropriate) amount of clamping force, a relatively light weight, and well-padded headband and earcups all mean that the HD 505 are good for longer listening sessions.View Deal

Don't buy them if…

You like a bit of bass
To be fair, the HD 505 create varied, textured bass and properly control it in every circumstance. What they don’t do is punch with any sort of conviction.View Deal

You’re blessed with larger-than-average ears
A circumaural ear coupling is all well and good, but the HD 505 is on the tight side if you’ve even biggish ears…View Deal

You're in a shared space
Just because the HD 505 aren’t the leakiest open-backed headphone around, that doesn’t mean they should be worn in the office.View Deal

Sennheiser HD 505 review: Also consider

Sennheiser HD 600
You should keep an eye out for one of those occasions when the Sennheiser HD 600 dip down very close to HD 505 money – because it happens more often than you might think. They're excellent headphones for that price.View Deal

Grado SR325X
The Grado SR325X are a bit of an acquired taste where looks are concerned, but there’s no denying they’ve got it where it counts – and in a pretty big way. They're the same price as the Sennheiser HD 505, but have more of an on-ear fit, so if that's your preference, they're a great choice.View Deal

Beyerdynamic DT 900 Pro X
Notably cheaper than the HD 505 – if a rather more judicious, pseudo-studio emphasis sounds like your sort of thing, the Beyerdynamic DT 900 Pro X will work very nicely.View Deal

How I tested Sennheiser HD 505

• Connected to a FiiO M15S, to an Apple MacBook Pro and to a Naim Uniti Star
• With a lot of different types of music, from a number of different formats
• Alone, of course, because to do otherwise would be rude

‘Quiet time’ is necessary to listen to the Sennheiser HD 505, if for no other reason than they let a distracting amount of sound leak out of the back of their earcups, as all open-back cans do.

So I sat at my desk with them attached to my laptop and to my digital audio player (via its unbalanced output, tragically) and sat rather more comfortably with the headphones attached to a network streamer that also preamplified a turntable and a CD player.

So lots of different formats were available, as were lots of different types of music – and a week of this (on and off) was long enough to learn all there is to know about these headphones.

Read more about how we test

First reviewed: March 2025

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