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Vacuum cleaners have been around for a while now, and you're probably thinking there aren't any major design or performance breakthroughs left to be achieved. Well, you might be wrong, because Shark has unveiled a new range of vacuums that it claims solve one big problem with today's best vacuum cleaners.

The USP of the Shark PowerDetect vacuum range is that they work just as well going backwards as they do going forwards. Most vacuums are designed to do most of their suction work when you're pushing them, and the return stroke is mostly just to get them back into position for another push. 

For a truly hands-off experience, you can opt for a self-empty base (Image credit: Future)

The PowerDetect vacuums boast a patent-pending fin design and 'DirectionDetect technology' to change that, and offer the same cleaning power no matter which way they're being maneuvered. It could... well, probably not quite halve, but definitely make a decent dent in, the time you need to spend vacuuming. 

I had a chance to see one of Shark's PowerDetect models in action at IFA 2024, and was impressed with what I saw – I could hear the suction continuing unabated when the vacuum was being pulled in reverse. It was demoed alongside another Shark cordless vacuum without this new feature, and sounded noticeably different. The proof is in the cleaning, of course, and we're in the process of getting one of these new vacuums tested to see if it's as good as Shark is promising. 

The PowerDetect (left) being demoed alongside a Statos model, without the forward/backward suction feature (Image credit: Future)

The range comprises three models, to suit different households and cleaning jobs. There's the Shark PowerDetect Cordless Vacuum (IP1251UKT), the Shark PowerDetect Powered Lift-Away Upright Vacuum Cleaner (AZ3900UKT), and the Shark PowerDetect Corded Stick Vacuum Cleaner (HZ4000UKT). 

Of those, I'd expect most people will be most interested in the first one. Shark is the brand behind many of today's best cordless vacuums, and a pretty serious rival to Dyson these days. As well as the new forward-and-backwards suction tech, the PowerDetect Cordless combines most of the best features of the current best Shark vacuums.

Best of both worlds

It used to be that if you wanted maximum power, you'd opt for a Shark Stratos model, while for tech smarts you'd buy a Detect Pro. Shark says the PowerDetect does both. On the 'detection' front, this vacuum can sense whether it's on a hard floor or carpet, and how dirty it is, and reduce or increase suction in response. It can also tell when it's close to the edge of a room, where dust can accumulate, and will boost suction just on that side of the cleaning head for an extra hit of cleaning power, without unnecessarily draining the battery. 

You can bend the wand forwards, flamingo-leg-style, to enable you to reach right under furniture, without having to crouch down awkwardly. There's also a promised 70 minutes of battery life – matching the longest runtime you'll find anywhere. And if you want an even more hands-off experience, you can opt for the version with the auto-empty dock.

We don't have pricing or launch date information for the Shark PowerDetect range yet, but we'll bring that to you as soon as we get it.

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The MSI Claw, announced back at CES 2024, was a PC gaming handheld that had a lot of hype built up around it (myself included), and it didn't have the most auspicious launch earlier this year. Beset by performance issues that could rightly be laid at Intel's feet (Meteor Lake has been rather meh), I wouldn't blame anyone for looking at the MSI Claw 8 AI+ with a good bit of side eye and skepticism.

I also wouldn't blame folks if they gave me some as well, since I was definitely excited for the Claw's release, only to be just as disappointed as everyone else when the handheld finally shipped out. 

So, I won't ask you to take my excitement for the new MSI Claw 8 AI+ without a heap of salt, but having spent more than half an hour taking the Claw 8 AI+ for a spin at IFA 2024 this weekend, I'm going to ask that you bear with me. I've seen what these new Lunar Lake chips are capable of, and I really do think that Intel and MSI have ironed out what was wrong with the original Claw and are set to deliver a very impressive gaming handheld that will easily challenge the Steam Deck, Asus ROG Ally X, and Lenovo Legion Go in an increasingly competitive market.

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)

That's not to say there won't be issues with this handheld, sadly. Intel's graphics drivers for its Intel Arc GPUs simply lack the legacy support for older games that Nvidia and AMD graphics drivers do, and they always will, as many older studios aren't even around anymore to help Intel work out the bugs in DX10 games and earlier.

If what you're after is playing the classics from the mid-2000s and early 2010s, an AMD-powered handheld is going to do that better. But if what you're looking for is a chance to play the latest PC games on the go, the Claw 8 AI+ may be the gaming handheld to beat in 2025.

A huge part of that is Lunar Lake. Rebuilt from the ground up in a way that Meteor Lake really wasn't, Intel Lunar Lake promises significantly improved performance over previous Intel chips while using substantially less power in the process. This translates directly into better battery life for when you're on a flight, on the road, or just chilling on the couch and you don't want to be married to a wall outlet.

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)

In terms of gaming performance, I've seen the same Intel Core Ultra 7 chip that'll ship in the Claw 8 AI+ average nearly 70 fps in Cyberpunk 2077 on medium settings at 1080p and it looked fantastic, and it'll look even better on the smaller 8-inch screen which significantly ups the pixel density over a 14-inch ultrabook.

Plus, with an 80WHr battery packed inside, it'll almost certainly get some of the longest battery life of any gaming handheld on the market. Of course, we aren't talking more than an extra hour or two, but there's a huge difference between playing GTA IV for two hours on a flight and stretching things out to four hours (assuming the Claw 8 AI+ can effectively run this particular DX9 title).

The final specs for the Claw 8 AI+ aren't final yet, though it will come with an Intel Core Ultra 7 200-series chip in either 16GB or 32GB of memory. Whether a Core Ultra 5 or Core Ultra 9 configuration is in the cards isn't known yet, and as such, there's not much we can say about pricing at this time. But an MSI rep did tell me that MSI is targeting a January 2025 launch window, so we're bound to hear a lot more about the MSI Claw 8 AI+ in the weeks and months ahead.

MSI Claw 8 AI+: Design

The MSI Claw 8 AI+ has been redesigned somewhat from the original Claw, especially in terms of its aesthetics. Gone is the boring all-black chassis of the first-gen Claw, as there is now a matte silvery-copper panel around the controls that nicely accents the otherwise black plastic chassis.

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)

MSI wasn't able to provide a full spec sheet for the Claw 8 AI+, so I can't tell if there is anything new about the ports on the new Claw other than the addition of a second USB-C port. This will likely be a Thunderbolt 4 port, but I didn't have an opportunity to confirm that.

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)

The back of the Claw 8 AI+ looks pretty much the same as the original Claw, featuring two programmable macro buttons and an air intake for the cooling system.

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)

One very welcome change though is the revamped MSI Center, which is accessible from the touch of a button and features as close to a modern console interface as I've seen on any handheld other than the Steam Deck. It will even change the background to reflect the game that you're highlighting.

Windows 11 is still a terrible platform for PC gaming handhelds, so getting the MSI Center software right will be critical, and MSI is still tweaking the interface to improve it ahead of launch. Even as it is today, however, it's a much better experience than you'll find in other handhelds.

MSI Claw 8 AI+: Performance

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)

I didn't get to really push the Claw 8 AI+ to its limits during my time with the device since MSI is still fine-tuning the power profile for the chip, but I got a chance to play some Hi-Fi Rush and Sonic the Hedgehog to see how the device handled.

True, these are not the most demanding games around, but even in the early production state my Claw was in, the two games looked fantastic and played without issue, consistently getting very high frame rates. 

MSI Claw 8 AI+: Price & availability

The spec sheet for the MSI Claw 8 AI+ isn't finalized yet, so there's no way to price this system out, either from MSI or my own estimates based on the hardware profile.

As for availability, MSI is targeting a January 2025 launch for the Claw, but that's not an official release date, so it might slip a bit deeper into 2025. We'll hopefully know more about that soon as we get closer to the holiday season.

MSI Claw 8 AI+: Final thoughts

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)

It's too soon to tell how the MSI Claw 8 AI+ will perform, much less whether it will be a success, but there's no question that this is a very different experience than I've had with the first-generation model.

Everything I've seen from Lunar Lake makes me optimistic though, and the improvements that MSI has made to the Claw's design are also stand-out arguments in this second-generation Claw's favor.

We won't know for certain until we get an actual production unit in hand to benchmark and review, but given what I've seen so far, I can definitely say that I am very eager to see what this gaming handheld is capable of in a few months time.

Jessica Pishko says a group of sheriffs have become a flashpoint in the current politics of toxic masculinity, guns, white supremacy and rural resentment. Her book is The Highest Law in the Land.

Where you place your fan can affect both the temperature of your home and the numbers on your AC bill.

Solar panels can make a big difference in your energy bill and offer a sustainable energy option, but there are downsides to consider as well. Explore the pros and cons of solar panels to find out if they're a good choice for your home energy needs.

Governments and industries are pouring billions of dollars into so-called “regenerative agriculture.” But while scientists say some of these farming practices do reduce planet heating pollution, for others the science is less clear.

(Image credit: Julia Simon/NPR)

You can stream the animated film on Max.

Three Lions captain Harry Kane is in line to make his 100th appearance for his country.

The operators of the Quad7 botnet have been busy, adding new features and expanding their attack surface, according to multiple security researchers who have been keeping tabs on the malware’s recent evolution.

Quad7 was first spotted by a researcher alias Gi7w0rm, and experts from Sekoia, when it was only observed targeting TP-Link routers. However, during the following weeks, Quad7 (which was named so for targeting port 7777), expanded to ASUS routers, and now has been observed on Zyxel VPN endpoints, Ruckus wireless routers, and Axentra media servers.

To compromise these endpoints, a custom malware was written, the researchers further explained. For different types of devices, the botnet has different clusters. Each cluster is a variant of *login, it was explained, with Ruckus, for example, having the ‘rlogin’ cluster. Other clusters include xlogin, alogin, axlogin, and zylogin. Some clusters are relatively large, counting “thousands” of assimilated devices. Others are smaller, counting as little as two infections.

Mnemonic keys and seed phrases

The researchers don’t know the reason for such a small number on some of these clusters, and speculate that they still might be in an experimental phase, and that their numbers might mushroom once they’re ready to be deployed.

The goal of the campaign is also a mystery, but its most likely use case is for distributed brute-force attacks on VPNs, Telnet, SSH, and Microsoft 365 accounts.

Besides expanding, the botnet also improved in terms of communications and obfuscation. Apparently, it is a lot better when it comes to evading detection, as well as operational effectiveness.

The best way to defend against this type of botnets is to always keep the firmware and software of the devices up to date. If an endpoint is older and no longer supported by the OEM, replacing it with a newer model is the best way to go.

Via BleepingComputer

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Superhero movies can go one of two ways: these films can either be a faithful adaptations of beloved comic book canon texts or silly action flick flops. Looking at the new trailer for Max’s new comedy series The Franchise, the show will examine not the best superhero movies but the latter, poking fun at some of the badly-rated movies you see in the MCU and DC series. 

Created by Armando Iannucci (The Death of Stalin) and Academy Award winner Sam Mendes (American Beauty), The Franchise is set to arrive on Max, one of the best streaming services, on October 6. 

The story will follow the production crew behind fictional superhero movie Tecto: Eye of the Storm over the course of eight episodes. In the trailer, which you can watch below, we see the film crew fretting and fighting to pull the movie off, but its ability to succeed commercially is jeopardized when its behind-the-scenes drama shrouds the movie itself.  

Making up the members of the film crew is a star-studded cast of familiar faces across cinema and television, with Himesh Patel, Jessica Hynes, and Aya Cash from Prime Video’s hit superhero series The Boys as part of the dysfunctional film crew. The trailer also reveals several guest cameos you can expect across the series including ones from Daniel Bruhl (Captain America: Civil War) and Richard E. Grant (Can You Ever Forgive Me? and Saltburn), who’s expected to appear for one episode.

Opinion: Finally, superhero movies are being called out for what they are

I’ve never been one for movies within the MCU or DC franchise for a number of reasons, the main one being that there are just far too many for me to even wrap my head around. But also because it seems that these cinematic giants like the MCU aren’t focussed on putting out films that are actually good anymore, as they know they’ll attract millions of people at the box office even if the film is a bit crappy. 

Superhero movies, in my opinion, have lost their sense of novelty and the 'event factor' that surrounds cinema premieres. They’ve always been cash-grabbing opportunities, but it’s more obvious now than ever before and that’s what irritates me – as does the tabloid drama that surrounds them. Watching the trailer for The Franchise was like a deja vu moment, and it was reminiscent of movies like The Flash (2023), one which had a lot of potential but only garnered mass attention as a result of its production drama stories and Ezra Miller’s questionable behavior. 

Nonetheless, there’s something intriguing about the trailer for The Franchise that makes me want to lend it some of my time, despite my growing dislike for MCU and DC movies. Now that one of the biggest streaming services is coming forward with a show that will seemingly critique one of the most bankable and popular Hollywood franchises, I’m willing to partake in the discourse.  

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Immigrant rights groups say ICE has a pattern of keeping immigrants detained for months, and even years, after they have won their immigration cases, putting a toll on them and their families.

(Image credit: Ted S. Warren)

After years of rumors and leaks, the PlayStation 5 Pro has finally been officially revealed and, as expected, will be a huge hardware upgrade. This will lead to up to 45% faster rendering for gameplay, which will be leveraged by a number of supported titles.

According to a recent PlayStation Blog post, many games will take advantage of the PS5 Pro's power with many developers creating free software patches that allow recent releases to use its features. Games that offer enhanced PS5 Pro performance will be clearly labelled with a new 'PS5 Pro Enhanced' label. It seems safe to assume that this label will appear on the store pages or physical box of titles where it is applicable.

A selection of PS5 Pro Enhanced games have already been confirmed, including titles from both Sony and third-party developers. It is likely that even more compatible games will be confirmed soon but, at the time of writing, the list includes the following:

• Alan Wake 2
• Assassin’s Creed: Shadows
• Demon’s Souls
• Dragon’s Dogma 2
• Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth
• Gran Turismo 7
• Hogwarts Legacy
• Horizon Forbidden West
• Marvel’s Spider-Man 2
• Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart
• The Crew Motorfest
• The First Descendant
• The Last of Us Part 2 Remastered

The PS5 Pro will also offer PS5 Pro Game Boost, which will be compatible with some PS5 titles and more than 8,500 backwards compatible PS4 games. PS5 Pro Game Boost will stabilize or improve the performance of supported games, which could be an absolute gamechanger for more intensive older releases. Enhanced Image Quality will also be available for select PS4 games, improving their overall resolution.

The PS5 Pro is set to officially launch on November 7 and will cost $699.99 / £699.99 / around AU$1052.99. It will offer a 2TB SSD but will not include a disc drive. If you want to use any of your existing physical games, you will need purchase the separate Disc Drive for PS5 attachment, which is available now.

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Sony has confirmed the PS5 Pro release date and we won't have to wait long to get the most performant Sony games console.

The PlayStation 5 Pro release date is Thursday, November 7, 2024 in the US, UK, Japan, Canada, Mexico, Australia, New Zealand, and South Korea, according to the official PlayStation blog post. 

Pre-orders for the mid-generation console begin on September 26.

Also confirming the PS5 Pro price, Sony has said the new system will cost $699.99 / £699.99 and around AU$1052.99. 

This represents a price gap of $200 / £200 / AU$253.99 between the Pro and the now-base version of the PS5. The pricing also makes this PS5 Pro Sony's most expensive console ever.

As well as confirming the release date, Sony also gave us a first look at the new console. You can see some pictures of it below.

Image 1 of 2

(Image credit: Sony)Image 2 of 2

(Image credit: Sony)

 It looks like the PS5 Pro will continue the white aesthetic of this generation of Sony machines, and also might feature swappable panels like both the base PS5 and PS5 Slim. That said, its overall design definitely leans closer to the PS5 Slim than the base PS5 model. This means that it will also be compatible with the existing Disc Drive for PS5 attachment, which is good news at the console does not come with a disc drive out of the box.

While some will continue to debate the need for such a mid-gen upgrade, there's no doubt that any kind of new console is always one of the most exciting times in gaming and we're absolutely here for it.

For a recap on what Mark Cerny revealed, you can see the full Technical Presentation on YouTube below.

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Sony has officially revealed the PS5 Pro console, confirming its existence, as well as a host of features about the mid-gen refresh such as specs, design, and capabilities.

The console had been heavily rumored for a long time, and after a steady stream of rumors and leaks occurring in the last couple of months, it's almost a relief to finally have something official from the gaming behemoth itself.

The PS5 Pro looks to be substantially more powerful than the base model, and presenter Mark Cerny was incredibly confident about its ability to keep the journey of the PS5 generation moving forward.

We got a clear look at the design of the PS5 Pro during the presentation, and we've included some pictures of it below.

Image 1 of 4

(Image credit: Sony)Image 2 of 4

(Image credit: Sony)Image 3 of 4

(Image credit: Sony)Image 4 of 4

(Image credit: Sony)

Sony has also confirmed the PS5 Pro release date and price as well as the PS5 Pro specs.

In brief, the console will launch on November 7 this year at $699.99 / £699.99 (around AU$1,052.99), with pre-orders starting on September 26.

The headline specs are that the GPU is now significantly upgraded at "67% more Compute Units" and 28% faster memory. That makes for roughly 45% faster rendering on average. The SSD has also seen an upgrade, and there is now to be 2TB of internal storage. For more on the console's specs head over to our dedicated page linked above.

There's going to be plenty of information to come on the new console in the run-up to its launch and we're super excited to see what it can bring to the best PS5 games going forward.

For a full recap of the presentation, you can check out the full presentation below if you're looking for a full recap of the announcement.

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AI-enhanced infrastructure software firm Progress, the company behind MOVEit, has announced its acquisition of ShareFile, an online document-centric collaboration and file-sharing platform designed for specific businesses such as those in the financial and healthcare sectors.

As part of the deal, Progress will benefit from the platform’s AI-powered collaboration workflows, client portal and e-signature technology.

Progress also anticipates adding more than $240 million in annual revenue to its books from ShareFile’s 86,000 customers.

Progress snaps up ShareFile

Progress CEO Yogesh Gupta commented: "ShareFile fits strategically with Progress’ Digital Experience portfolio to enable organisations to deliver more effective client and team collaboration while simplifying the secure sharing of documents and other content.”

The deal, worth around $875 million, is expected to close by November 30, subject to the usual regulatory approvals and closing conditions.

Thomas Krause, CEO of Cloud Software Group, ShareFile’s parent company, added: “For ShareFile customers, we firmly believe they will benefit from Progress’ deep customer commitment, extensive product portfolio, expertise and its expansive user community.”

This won’t be the first time that ShareFile has changed hands, though. Between its inception in 2005 and 2011, the platform amassed 40 million users. It was at that point that Citrix took ownership of the company before it went on to become Cloud Software Group’s property in 2023.

What the new ownership will mean for customers is unclear, but Progress appears to be committed to continuing the brand. Gupta noted: “ShareFile customers will benefit from Progress’ strong customer focus, expansive product portfolio and expertise as well as an unparalleled track record of customer success.”

Elsewhere in the industry, WeTransfer is also undergoing a radical shift. Just weeks after the platform was acquired by Italian tech firm Bending Spoons, it was confirmed that hundreds would be laid off as more than 75% would go.

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Hello and welcome to our live coverage of today's PlayStation 5 Technical Presentation, otherwise known as the likely reveal of the PS5 Pro console.

Wherever you are in the world, we're only a matter of a few hours away from the presentation with PS5 lead architect Mark Cerny, where we'll likely see a shiny new hardware member of the PlayStation family revealed at 8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm BST.

I'm here to provide a rundown of what we can expect, what we're hoping for, all the best rumors and details that have surfaced so far, and more. Let's get into it!

We're only ten minutes out from the presentation starting! We'll be taking you through all the ins and outs of the video itself and what Sony shows, as well as reminding you of a few key rumors that have cropped along our journey to this point.

While we all have an idea as to why we're all gathered here today, Sony did rather let slip as recently as yesterday...

Sony seemed to accidentally jump the gun in regards to the official PS5 Pro announcement. Ahead of today's Mark Cerny-hosted PlayStation 5 Technical Presentation, its as-of-now unlisted video bore the title of 'PS5 Pro' which sort of gives the game away.

We'll give Sony the benefit of the doubt and assume this was a mistake - with that 'PS5 Pro' video title potentially meant for after the presentation has aired. Seems a little too convenient though...

On TechRadar Gaming, we've got our own desires and wishes. I've asked my colleagues to share what they hope to see in the presentation.

"For PS5 Pro, it's not just performance that's key. It's optimization. In a reverse of what typically happens with console generations, we're seeing more recent big-ticket PS5 games perform relatively worse than those of earlier in the console's lifecycle. Titles like Horizon Forbidden West, Rise of the Ronin, and Star Wars Outlaws all struggled to maintain a smooth 60fps in their performance modes at launch.

This is something that I feel needs to be addressed with the PS5 Pro. More reliable performance for those who prefer higher framerates is a must here, along with a beefier internal SSD for speedier load times (and hopefully a bulkier 2TB capacity). Though as we're already seeing 40fps modes in titles like Star Wars Outlaws, aimed at folks with VRR-capable displays, there's potential for this to be the new standard going forward for big-budget AAA games."

Rhys Wood, hardware editor

Another one of us is hoping that it doesn't drop the disc drive in particular...

"Although many leaks have suggested that the PS5 Pro won't come with a disc drive, I'm optimistic that this won't mean the end of physical games quite yet. If rumors are to be believed, the PS5 Pro will have a very similar design to the PS5 Slim - which already has its own Digital Edition without a disc drive. 

Hopefully, this visual similarity means that the PS5 Pro will also be fully compatible with the existing Disc Drive for PS5 attachment, which enables full disc drive functionality in a PS5 Slim Digital Edition. Having to splash out $79.99 / £99.99 on a separate attachment after what is already likely to be quite an expensive PS5 Pro purchase would be a bit of a blow, but it would certainly be worthwhile if, like me, you already have an extensive physical game collection. Fingers crossed..."

Dash Wood, hardware writer

Only 30 second to go! Let's see what Mark Cerny has got for us!

Here's Mark! And he's confirmed that it is the PS5 Pro!

Mark Cerny begins by going over some of the best successes of the now-base PlayStation 5 so far from a technical aspect. He's talking about how the the Tempest Audio enhances our experience along with the Haptics in the DualSense, as well as the core hardware components of the machine.

The US Department of Energy (DoE) has announced a program that will see $23 million of funding funneled into supercomputing research and investment.

The New Frontiers initiative will look to address a number of bottlenecks in current supercomputer performance at US institutions, such as bandwidth and power consumption.

The DoE hopes that new and emerging technologies, and the help of private companies, can improve the performance of current and future supercomputers.

Power equals performance

Supercomputers have been boasting impressive metrics for some time, with the Argonne National Laboratory’s Aurora system passing the one quintillion floating point operations per second (exaFLOP) mark earlier this year. However this peak performance is hampered by restriction in bandwidth between each supercomputing chip, as well as the power required to sustain exaFLOP performance.

Leading the New Frontier program will be HPC Systems Engineer, Christopher Zimmer, of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Speaking on the power consumption of supercomputing, Zimmer said, “With Dennard scaling long dead and the slowing of Moore's law, we're seeing technologies critical to HPC consuming more power that partially offset increases in application performance due to improvements in silicon process nodes and improved packaging techniques.”

There has been no disclosure on which organizations or technologies will see investment from the New Frontier program, emerging technologies set to enter production within the next 5 to 10 years, such as improved packaging and photonics interconnects, are likely to be key in addressing bottlenecks.

In a statement on the announcement of the New Frontier program, Ceren Susut, associate director of the DoE's Office of Science for Advanced Scientific Computing Research said, “There is a growing consensus that urgent action is needed to address the array of bottlenecks in advanced computing, including energy efficiency, advanced memory, interconnects, and programmability to maintain economic leadership and national security.”

Via The Register

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