Hasta La Gadget!

The Women’s Health Protection Act would bar states from imposing restrictions on abortion.

Alienware rocked the gaming world by launching thin gaming laptops equipped with some of the most powerful CPUs and GPUs available on the market. At 15.9mm (X15) and 20.9mm (X17) thin, these new Alienware laptops are visually even more attractive than their M15 and M17 predecessors.

Both have similar internal architectures and can be ordered with an Intel Core i7-11800H or Core i9-11900HX processor, two high-performance options for this market, with 45W and 65W Thermal Design Points (TDP).

The CPUs orchestrate the game logic and feed the graphics processing unit with a steady supply of data and commands. For the actual rendering, you can opt for NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060, 3070, or 3080 GPUs, three screaming-fast options, with the latter being the ultimate mobile GPU at this time.

These two high-powered sub-systems generate a lot of heat, and the new Alienware quad-fan cooling system is the central piece of this new laptop design. Alienware explains this cooling prowess by “five patent-pending” methods, including using new materials to transfer heat from the chips to the cooling system (aka, a very fancy thermal paste).

Once the heat is transferred, the quad fans will dissipate it as fast as possible. There is a good chance that using fewer fans allows Alienware to avoid extreme RPMs and noise but wait for independent reviews to confirm that.

Of course, there is also thermal throttling to keep everything under control and all kinds of intelligent software thermal management. I think that the new heat dissipation is what makes the difference here.

I’ll let you judge the (exquisite) design, but the last piece worth mentioning again is the CHERRY MX keyboard which was recently announced and made its way into the markets. It should be much more comfortable than classic laptop keyboards if you like deep key travel.

There are two display options split between FHD 360Hz gaming, which is great for action games, and 4K-UHD HDR400, which is fantastic for slower-paced games, movies, and creative work. In addition, 4K displays are often more color-accurate, so it is something to think about if you’re a designer.

Storage configurations go up to 4TB of SSD (dual-drives) and 32GB (X15) / 64GB (X17) of RAM, meaning that these gaming laptops are also powerful creative workstations as well.

Starting at $1999.99 (Alienware X15) and $2099.99 (Alienware X17), both systems are available for order right now.

Alienware X15 and X17 Gaming Laptops, With Uber-Cooling

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DC’s just dropped a surprise first look at Krypto’s appearance in League of Superpets, its new animated movie starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson as Superman’s beloved canine pal. But that’s not the only news: Krypto’s bringing some big stars with him to round out the team of, well, super pets.

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Playdate, app and game designer Panic’s first shot at hardware, finally has a firm price and ship date, as well as a bunch of surprise features cooked up since its announcement in 2019. The tiny handheld gaming console will cost $179, ship next month, and come with a 24-game “season” doled out over 12 weeks. But now it also has a cute speaker dock and low-code game creation platform.

We first heard about Playdate more than two years ago, were charmed by its clean look, funky crank control, and black and white display, and have been waiting for news ever since. Panic’s impeccable design credentials combined with Teenage Engineering’s creative hardware chops? It’s bound to be a joy to use, but there wasn’t much more than that to go on.

Now the company has revealed all the important details we were hoping for, and many more to boot.

Image Credits: Panic

Originally we were expecting 12 games to be delivered over 12 weeks, but in the intervening period it seems they’ve collected more titles than planned, and that initial “season” of games has expanded to 24. No one knows exactly what to expect from these games except that they’re exclusive to the Playdate and many use the crank mechanic in what appear to be fun and interesting ways: turning a turntable, opening a little door, doing tricks as a surfer, and so on.

The team hasn’t decided how future games will be distributed, though they seem to have some ideas. Another season? One-off releases? Certainly the presence of a new game by one-man indie hit parade Lucas Pope would sell like hotcakes.

Image Credits: Panic

But the debut of a new lo-fi game development platform called Pulp suggests a future where self-publishing may also be an option. This lovely little web-based tool lets anyone put together a game using presets for things like controls and actions, and may prove to be a sort of tiny Twine in time.

A dock accessory was announced as well, something to keep your Playdate front and center on your desk. The speaker-equipped dock, also a lemony yellow, acts as a magnetic charging cradle for the console, activating a sort of stationary mode with a clock and music player (Poolsuite.fm, apparently, with original relaxing tunes). It even has two holes in which to put your pens (and Panic made a special yellow pen just for the purpose as well).

Image Credits: Panic

The $179 price may cause some to balk — after all, it’s considerably more than a Nintendo 3DS and with the dock probably approaches the price of a Switch. But this isn’t meant to be a competitor with mainstream gaming — instead, it’s a sort of anti-establishment system that embraces weirdness and provides something equally unfamiliar and undeniably fun.

The team says that there will be a week’s warning before orders can be placed, and that they don’t plan to shut orders down if inventory runs out, but simply allow people to preorder and cancel at will until they receive their unit. We hope to get one ourselves to test and review, but since part of the charm of the whole thing is the timed release and social aspect of discovery and sharing, it’s more than likely we’ll be experiencing it along with everyone else.

Microsoft has a new update for its Outlook mobile app that targets users who prefer speaking rather than typing when it comes to getting things done. The update brings Cortana to the app in a big way, enabling users to ask questions about their agenda, schedule meetings, and other tasks, as well as using voice to search through their emails … Continue reading