Last January, AMD beat out Intel by launching its Ryzen 7040 chips, the first x86 processors to integrate a neural processing unit (NPU) for AI workloads. Intel's long-delayed Core Ultra "Meteor Lake" chips, its first to integrate an NPU, are set to arrive on December 14th. But it seems AMD can't help but remind Intel it's lagging behind: Today, AMD is announcing the Ryzen 8040 series chips, its next batch of AI-equipped laptop hardware, and it's also giving us a peak into its future AI roadmap.
The Ryzen 8040 chips, spearheaded by the 8-core Ryzen 9 8945HS, are up to 1.4 times faster than its predecessors when its comes to Llama 2 and AI vision model performance, according to AMD. They're also reportedly up to 1.8 times faster than Intel's high-end 13900H chip when it comes to gaming, and 1.4 times faster for content creation. Of course, the real test will be comparing them to Intel's new Core Ultra chips, which weren't available for AMD to benchmark.
AMD
AMD's NPU will be available on all of the Ryzen 8040 chips except for the two low-end models, the six-core Ryzen 5 8540U and the quad-core Ryzen 3 8440U. The company says the Ryzen 7040's NPU, AMD XDNA, is capable of reaching 10 TOPS (tera operations per second), while the 8040's NPU can hit 16 TOPS. Looking further into 2024, AMD also teased its next NPU architecture, codenamed "Strix Point," which will offer "more than 3x generative AI NPU performance." Basically, don't expect AMD to slow down its AI ambitions anytime soon.
It's worth remembering that both AMD and Intel are lagging behind Qualcomm when it comes to bringing NPUs to Windows PCs. Its SQ3 powered the ill-fated Surface Pro 9 5G. That was just a minor win for the Snapdragon maker, though: the Windows-on-Arm experience is still a mess, especially when it comes to running older apps that require x86 emulation.
The far more compelling competitor for Intel and AMD is Apple, which has been integrating Neural Engines in its hardware since the A11 Bionic debuted in 2017, and has made them a core component in the Apple Silicon chips for Macs. Apple's Neural Engine speeds up AI tasks, just like AMD and Intel's NPUs, and it helps tackle things like Face ID and photo processing. On PCs, NPUs enable features like Windows 11's Studio Effects in video chats, which can blur your background or help maintain eye contact.
Just like Intel, AMD is also pushing developers to build NPU features into their apps. Today, it's also unveiling the Ryzen AI Software platform, which will allow developers to take pre-trained AI models and optimize them to run on Ryzen AI hardware. AMD's platform will also help those models run on Intel's NPUs, similar to how Intel's AI development tools will ultimately help Ryzen systems. We're still in the early days of seeing how devs will take advantage of NPUs, but hopefully AMD and Intel's competitive streak will help deliver genuinely helpful AI-powered apps soon.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/amds-ryzen-8040-chips-remind-intel-its-falling-behind-in-ai-pcs-200043544.html?src=rss
Acer just announced a new gaming laptop, the Nitro V 16. This computer has some serious bells and whistles, with the key takeaway being the inclusion of the just-announced AMD Ryzen 8040 Series processor. The processor has plenty of oomph for modern gaming applications, with the addition of AI technology to enable enhanced ray-traced visuals.
You can spec out the laptop how you see fit, with GPU options up to the respectable NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060. This GPU features DLSS 3.5 tech and its own AI-powered ray-tracing, called Ray Reconstruction. You have your pick of two display options, with availability of WQXGA or WUXGA screens. Both options boast 165 Hz refresh rates and 3ms response times. Acer promises that the displays offer “fluid visuals with minimal ghosting and screen tearing.”
As for other specs, you can beef up the laptop with up to 32GB of DRR55600 RAM and 2TB of PCIe Gen 4 SSD storage. Acer also touts a new cooling system that features a pair of high-powered fans that make it “well-equipped to take on heavy gameplay.” To that end, you can monitor performance and temperature via the company’s proprietary NitroSense utility app.
There are three microphones outfitted with AI-enhanced noise reduction tech, for online tomfoolery, and the speakers incorporate DTS:X Ultra sound optimization algorithms for immersive audio. Finally, you get a USB-4 Type C port, two USB 3 ports, an HDMI port, a microSD card reader and WiFi 6E compatibility.
If the name of the processor seems a bit confusing, that's because AMD recently changed up its naming conventions. Here's a simple breakdown. The "8" relates to 2024 and the second number refers to the product line or relevant market segment, so that doesn't mean much to consumers. The third number, however, is all about performance. The "4" indicates that the chip uses the advanced Zen 4 architecture. Finally, the fourth number illustrates what type of Zen 3 architecture the chip uses. The "0" denotes a lower-tier Zen 3 experience when compared to Zen 3+, which would be marked as "5".
The Windows 11 gaming laptop will be available in March, with a starting price of $1,000 for the base model. It also comes with one month of Xbox Game Pass, so you can run it through its paces.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/acers-nitro-v16-gaming-laptop-is-powered-by-new-amd-ryzen-8040-processors-200031118.html?src=rss
Ahead of the International Day of Persons with Disabilities last Sunday, Apple released a short film that showcased its Personal Voice accessibility feature, which debuted earlier this year in iOS 17. Personal Voice allows users to create digital versions of their voice to use on calls, supported apps and Apple’s own Live Speech tool.
For those who are at risk of permanently losing their voice due to conditions like Parkinson’s disease, multiple sclerosis, ALS and vocal cord paralysis, not sounding like yourself can be yet another form of identity loss. Being able to create a copy of your voice while you’re still able might help alleviate the feeling that you’ll never feel like yourself again, or that your loved ones won’t know what you sound like.
All iOS 17, iPadOS 17 and macOS Sonoma users can create a personal voice in case you need it in the future — whether temporarily or for long-term use. I found the process (on my iPhone 14 Pro) pretty straightforward and was surprisingly satisfied with my voice. Here’s how you can set up your own Personal Voice, as long as you’ve upgraded to iOS 17, iPadOS 17 or macOS Sonoma (on Macs with Apple Silicon).
Before you start the process, make sure you have a window of about 30 minutes. You’ll be asked to record 150 sentences, and depending on how quickly you speak, it could take some time. You should also find a quiet place with minimal background sound and get comfortable. It’s also worth having a cup of water nearby and making sure your phone has at least 30 percent of battery.
How to set up Personal Voice on iPhone
When you’re ready, go to the Personal Voice menu by opening Settings and finding Accessibility > Personal Voice (under Speech). Select Create A Personal Voice, and Apple will give you a summary of what to expect. Hit Continue, and you’ll see instructions like “Find a quiet place” and “Take your time.”
Importantly, one of the tips is to “Speak naturally.” Apple encourages users to “read aloud at a consistent volume, as if you’re having a conversation.” After you tap Continue on this page, there is one final step where your phone uses its microphone to analyze the level of background noise, before you can finally start reading prompts.
The layout for the recording process is fairly intuitive. Hit the big red record button at the bottom, and read out the words in the middle of the page. Below the record button, you can choose from “Continuous Recording” or “Stop at each phrase.”
Screenshot
In the latter mode, you’ll have to tap a button each time you’ve recorded a phrase, while Continuous is a more hands-free experience that relies on the phone to know when you’re done talking. For those with speech impairments or who read slowly, the continuous mode could feel too stressful. Though it happened just once for me, the fact that the iPhone tried to skip ahead to the next phrase before I was ready was enough for me to feel like I needed to be quick with my reactions.
Personal Voice on iOS 17: First impressions
Still, for the most part the system was accurate at recognizing when I was done talking, and offered enough of a pause that I could tap the redo button before moving to the next sentence. The prompts mostly consisted of historical and geographical information, with the occasional expressive exclamation thrown in. There’s a fairly diverse selection of phrases, ranging from simple questions like “Can you ask them if they’re using that chair?” to forceful statements like “Come back inside right now!” or “Ouch! That is really hot!”
I found myself trying to be more exaggerated when reading those particular sentences, since I didn’t want my resulting personal voice to be too robotic. But it was exactly when I was doing that when I realized the problem inherent to the process. No matter how well I performed or acted, there would always be an element of artifice in the recordings. Even when I did my best to pretend like something was really hot and hurt me, it still wasn’t a genuine reaction. And there’s definitely a difference between how I sound when narrating sentences and having a chat with my friends.
That’s not a ding on Apple or Personal Voice, but simply an observation to say that there is a limit to how well my verbal self can be replicated. When you’re done with all 150 sentences, Apple explains that the process “may need to complete overnight.” It recommends that you charge and lock your iPhone, and your Personal Voice “will be generated only while iPhone is charging and locked” and that you’ll be alerted when it’s ready to use. It’s worth noting that in this time, Apple is training neural networks fully on the device to generate text-to-speech models and not in the cloud.
Screenshot
In my testing, after 20 minutes of putting down my iPhone, only 4 percent of progress was made. Twenty more minutes later, the Personal Voice was only 6 percent done. So this is definitely something you’ll need to allocate hours, if not a whole night, for. If you’re not ready to abandon your device for that long, you can still use your phone — just know that it will delay the process.
When your Personal Voice is ready, you’ll get a notification and can then head to settings to try it out. On the same page where you started the creation process, you’ll see options to share your voice across devices, as well as to allow apps to request to use it. The former stores a copy of your voice in iCloud for use in your other devices. Your data will be end-to-end encrypted in the transfer, and the recordings you made will only be stored on the phone you used to create it, but you can export your clips in case you want to keep a copy elsewhere.
How to listen to and use Personal Voice
You can name your Personal Voice and create another if you prefer (you can generate up to three). To listen to the voice you’ve created, go back to the Speech part of the accessibility settings, and select Live Speech. Turn it on, choose your new creation under Voices and triple click your power button. Type something into the box and hit Send. You can decide if you like what you hear and whether you need to make a new Personal Voice.
At first, I didn’t think mine sounded expressive enough, when I tried things like “How is the weather today?” But after a few days, I started entering phrases like “Terrence is a monster” and it definitely felt a little more like me. Still robotic, but it felt like there was just enough Cherlynn in the voice that my manager would know it was me calling him names.
With concerns around deepfakes and AI-generated content at an all-time high this year, perhaps a bit of artifice in a computer-generated voice isn’t such a bad thing. I certainly wouldn’t want someone to grab my phone and record my digital voice saying things I would never utter in real life. Finding a way to give people a sense of self and improve accessibility while working with all the limits and caveats that currently exist around identity and technology is a delicate balance, and one that I’m heartened to see Apple at least attempt with Personal Voice.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/how-to-use-personal-voice-on-iphone-with-ios-17-193002021.html?src=rss
Apple’s latest tvOS beta suggests the iTunes Movies and TV Shows apps on Apple TV are on their way out. 9to5Macreports the set-top box’s former home of streaming purchases and rentals is no longer in the tvOS 17.2 release candidate (RC), now available to developers. (Unless Apple finds unexpected bugs, RC firmware usually ends up identical to the public version.) Apple’s folding of the iTunes apps into the TV app was first reported in October.
9to5Mac says the home screen icons for iTunes Movies and iTunes TV Shows are still present in the tvOS 17.2 firmware, but they point to the TV app, where the old functionality will live. The publication posted a photo of a redirect screen, which reads, “iTunes Movies and Your Purchases Have Moved. You can buy or rent movies and find your purchases in the Apple TV App.” Below it are options to “Go to the Store” or “Go to Your Purchases.”
The change doesn’t remove any core functionality since the TV app replicates the iTunes Movies and TV Shows apps’ ability to buy, rent and manage purchases. The move is likely about streamlining — shedding the last remnants of the aging iTunes brand — while perhaps nudging more users into Apple TV+ subscriptions.
The update also adds a few features to the TV app on Apple’s set-top box. These include the ability to filter by genre in the purchased section, the availability of box sets in store listings and a new sidebar design for easier navigation.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apples-latest-tvos-beta-kills-the-itunes-movies-and-tv-shows-apps-192056618.html?src=rss
The headphone industry isn’t known for its rapid evolution. There are developments like spatial sound and steady advances in Bluetooth audio fidelity, but for the most part, the industry counts advances in decades rather than years. That makes the arrival of the Aurvana Ace headphones — the first wireless buds with MEMS drivers — quite the rare event. I recently wrote about what exactly MEMS technology is and why it matters, but Creative is the first consumer brand to sell a product that uses it.
Creative unveiled two models, the Aurvana Ace ($130) and the Aurvana Ace 2 ($150) in tandem. Both feature MEMS drivers, the main difference is that the Ace model supports high-resolution aptX Adaptive while the Ace 2 has top-of-the-line aptX Lossless (sometimes marketed as “CD quality”). The Ace 2 is the model we’ll be referring to from here on.
In fairness to Creative, just the inclusion of MEMS drivers alone would be a unique selling point, but the aforementioned aptX support adds another layer of HiFi credentials to the mix. Then there’s adaptive ANC and other details like wireless charging that give the Ace 2 a strong spec-sheet for the price. Some obvious omissions include small quality of life features like pausing playback if you remove a bud and audio personalization. Those could have been two easy wins that would make both models fairly hard to beat for the price in terms of features if nothing else.
Photo by James Trew / Engadget
When I tested the first ever xMEMS-powered in-ear monitors, the Singularity Oni, the extra detail in the high end was instantly obvious, especially in genres like metal and drum & bass. The lower frequencies were more of a challenge, with xMEMS, the company behind the drivers in both the Oni and the Aurvana, conceding that a hybrid setup with a conventional bass driver might be the preferred option until its own speakers can handle more bass. That’s exactly what we have here in the Aurvana Ace 2.
The key difference between the Aurvana Ace 2 and the Oni though is more important than a good low end thump (if that’s even possible). MEMS-based headphones need a small amount of “bias” power to work, this doesn’t impact battery life, but Singularity used a dedicated DAC with a specific xMEMS “mode.” Creative uses a specific amp “chip” that demonstrates, for the first time, consumer MEMS headphones in a wireless configuration. The popularity of true wireless (TWS) headphones these days means that if MEMS is to catch on, it has to be compatible.
The good news is that even without the expensive iFi DAC that the Singularity Oni IEMs required to work, the Aurvana Ace 2 bring extra clarity in the higher frequencies than rival products at this price. That’s to say, even with improved bass, the MEMS drivers clearly favor the mid- to high-end frequencies. The result is a sound that strikes a good balance between detail and body.
Listening to “Master of Puppets” the iconic chords had better presence and “crunch” than on a $250 pair of on-ear headphones I tried. Likewise, the aggressive snares in System of a Down’s “Chop Suey!” pop right through just as you’d hope. When I listened to the same song on the $200 Grell Audio TWS/1 with personalized audio activated the sounds were actually comparable. Just Creative’s sounded like that out of the box, but the Grell buds have slightly better dynamic range over all and more emphasis on the vocals.
For more electronic genres the Aurvana Ace’s hybrid setup really comes into play. Listening to Dead Prez’s “Hip-Hop”really shows off the bass capabilities, with more oomph here than both the Grell and a pair of $160 House of Marley Redemption 2 ANC — but it never felt overdone or fuzzy/loose.
Photo by James Trew / Engadget
Despite besting other headphones on specific like-for-like comparisons, as a whole the nuances and differences between the headphones is harder to quantify. The only set I tested that sounded consistently better, to me, was the Denon Perl Pro (formerly known as the NuraTrue Pro) but at $349 those are also the most expensive.
It would be remiss of me not to point out that there were also many songs and tests where differences between the various sets of earbuds were much harder to discern. With two iPhones, one Spotify account and a lot of swapping between headphones during the same song it’s possible to tease out small preferences between different sets, but the form factor, consumer preference and price point dictate that, to some extent, they all broadly overlap sonically.
The promise of MEMS drivers isn’t just about fidelity though. The claim is that the lack of moving parts and their semiconductor-like fabrication process ensures a higher level of consistency with less need for calibration and tuning. The end result being a more reliable production process which should mean lower cost. In turn this could translate into better value for money or at least a potentially more durable product. If the companies choose to pass that saving on of course.
For now, we’ll have to wait and see if other companies explore using MEMS drivers in their own products or whether it might remain an alternative option alongside technology like planar magnetic drivers and electrostatic headphones as specialist options for enthusiasts. One thing’s for sure: Creative’s Aurvana Ace series offers a great audio experience alongside premium features like wireless charging and aptX Lossless for a reasonable price — what’s not to like about that?
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-first-affordable-headphones-with-mems-drivers-review-161536317.html?src=rss
Foreign governments likely spy on your smart phone usage, and now Senator Ron Wyden's office is pushing for Apple and Google to reveal how exactly it works. Push notifications, the dings you get from apps calling your attention back to your phone, may be handed over from a company to government services if asked. But it appears the Department of Justice won't let companies come clean about the practice.
Push notifications don't actually come straight from the app. Instead, they pass through the smart phone provider, like Apple for iPhones or Google for Androids, to deliver the notifications to your screen. This has created murky room for government surveillance. "Because Apple and Google deliver push notification data, they can be secretly compelled by governments to hand over this information," Wyden wrote in the letter on Wednesday.
Apple claims it was suppressed from coming clean about this process, which is why Wyden's letter specifically targets the Department of Justice. "In this case, the federal government prohibited us from sharing any information and now that this method has become public we are updating our transparency reporting to detail these kinds of request,” Apple said in a statement to Engadget. Apple's next transparency report will include requests for push notification tokens, according to the company. Specifically, Wyden asks the DOJ to let Apple and Google tell customers and the general public about the demand for these app notification records. "We were the first major company to publish a public transparency report sharing the number and types of government requests for user data we receive, including the requests referred to by Senator Wyden. We share the Senator’s commitment to keeping users informed about these requests," Google said in a statement.
It's even more complicated because apps can't do much about it. Even if there's an individual pledge for security, if an app delivers push notifications, it must use the Apple or Google system to do so. In theory, this means your private messaging could be shared with a foreign government if you're getting push notifications from the app. That includes any metadata about the notification, too, like account information.
The revelation about push notifications come at a time when privacy and security have become a selling point. Companies advertise how they'll keep your information safe, but as more loopholes come to light, it's becoming harder to suss out what's actually trustworthy.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apple-and-google-are-probably-spying-on-your-push-notifications-154543184.html?src=rss
OpenAI's spot atop the generative AI heap may be coming to an end as Google officially introduced its most capable large language model to date on Wednesday, dubbed Gemini 1.0. It's the first of “a new generation of AI models, inspired by the way people understand and interact with the world,” CEO Sundar Pichai wrote in a Google blog post.
“Ever since programming AI for computer games as a teenager, and throughout my years as a neuroscience researcher trying to understand the workings of the brain, I’ve always believed that if we could build smarter machines, we could harness them to benefit humanity in incredible ways,” Pichai continued.
The result of extensive collaboration between Google’s DeepMind and Research divisions, Gemini has all the bells and whistles cutting-edge genAIs have to offer. "Its capabilities are state-of-the-art in nearly every domain," Pichai declared.
The system has been developed from the ground up as an integrated multimodal AI. Many foundational models can be essentially though of groups of smaller models all stacked in a trench coat, with each individual model trained to perform its specific function as a part of the larger whole. That’s all well and good for shallow functions like describing images but not so much for complex reasoning tasks.
Google, conversely, pre-trained and fine-tuned Gemini, “from the start on different modalities” allowing it to “seamlessly understand and reason about all kinds of inputs from the ground up, far better than existing multimodal models,” Pichai said. Being able to take in all these forms of data at once should help Gemini provide better responses on more challenging subjects, like physics.
Gemini can code as well. It’s reportedly proficient in popular programming languages including Python, Java, C++ and Go. Google has even leveraged a specialized version of Gemini to create AlphaCode 2, a successor to last year's competition-winning generativeAI. According to the company, AlphaCode 2 solved twice as many challenge questions as its predecessor did, which would put its performance above an estimated 85 percent of the previous competition’s participants.
While Google did not immediately share the number of parameters that Gemini can utilize, the company did tout the model’s operational flexibility and ability to work in form factors from large data centers to local mobile devices. To accomplish this transformational feat, Gemini is being made available in three sizes: Nano, Pro and Ultra.
Nano, unsurprisingly, is the smallest of the trio and designed primarily for on-device tasks. Pro is the next step up, a more versatile offering than Nano, and will soon be getting integrated into many of Google’s existing products, including Bard.
Starting Wednesday, Bard will begin using a especially-tuned version of Pro that Google promises will offer “more advanced reasoning, planning, understanding and more.” The improved Bard chatbot will be available in the same 170 countries and territories that regular Bard currently is, and the company reportedly plans to expand the new version's availability as we move through 2024. Next year, with the arrival of Gemini Ultra, Google will also introduce Bard Advanced, an even beefier AI with added features.
Pro’s capabilities will also be accessible via API calls through Google AI Studio or Google Cloud Vertex AI. Search (specifically SGE), Ads, Chrome and Duet AI will also see Gemini functionality integrated into their features in the coming months.
Gemini Ultra won’t be available until at least 2024, as it reportedly requires additional red-team testing before being cleared for release to “select customers, developers, partners and safety and responsibility experts” for testing and feedback.” But when it does arrive, Ultra promises to be an incredibly powerful for further AI development.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/googles-answer-to-gpt-4-is-gemini-the-most-capable-model-weve-ever-built-150039571.html?src=rss
Undoubtedly, 2023 has been the year of generative AI, and Google is marking its end with even more AI developments. The company has announced the creation of its most powerful TPU (formally known as Tensor Processing Units) yet, Cloud TPU v5p, and an AI Hypercomputer from Google Cloud. "The growth in [generative] AI models — with a tenfold increase in parameters annually over the past five years — brings heightened requirements for training, tuning, and inference," Amin Vahdat, Google's Engineering Fellow and Vice President for the Machine Leaning, Systems, and Cloud AI team, said in a release.
The Cloud TPU v5p is an AI accelerator, training and serving models. Google designed Cloud TPUs to work with models that are large, have long training periods, are mostly made of matrix computations and have no custom operations inside its main training loop, such as TensorFlow or JAX. Each TPU v5p pod brings 8,960 chips when using Google's highest-bandwidth inter-chip interconnect.
The Cloud TPU v5p follows previous iterations like the v5e and v4. According to Google, the TPU v5p has two times greater FLOPs and is four times more scalable when considering FLOPS per pod than the TPU v4. It can also train LLM models 2.8 times faster and embed dense models 1.9 times faster than the TPU v4.
Then there's the new AI Hypercomputer, which includes an integrated system with open software, performance-optimized hardware, machine learning frameworks, and flexible consumption models. The idea is that this amalgamation will improve productivity and efficiency compared to if each piece was looked at separately. The AI Hypercomputer's performance-optimized hardware utilizes Google's Jupiter data center network technology.
In a change of pace, Google provides open software to developers with "extensive support" for machine learning frameworks such as JAX, PyTorch and TensorFlow. This announcement comes on the heels of Meta and IBM's launch of the AI Alliance, which prioritizes open sourcing (and Google is notably not involved in). The AI Hypercomputer also introduces two models, Flex Start Mode and Calendar Mode.
Google shared the news alongside the introduction of Gemini, a new AI model that the company calls its "largest and most capable," and its rollout to Bard and the Pixel 8 Pro. It will come in three sizes: Gemini Pro, Gemini Ultra and Gemini Nano.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-announces-new-ai-processing-chips-and-a-cloud-hypercomputer-150031454.html?src=rss
Google is bringing Gemini, the new large language model it just introduced, to Android, beginning with the Pixel 8 Pro. The company’s flagship smartphone will run Gemini Nano, a version of the model built specifically to run locally on smaller devices, Google announced in a blog post. The Pixel 8 Pro is powered by the Google Tensor G3 chip designed to speed up AI performance.
This lets the Pixel 8 Pro add several smarts to existing features. The phone’s Recorder app, for instance, has a Summarize feature that currently needs a network connection to give you a summary of recorded conversations, interviews, and presentations. But thanks to Gemini Nano, the phone will now be able to provide a summary without needing a connection at all.
Gemini smarts will also power Gboard’s Smart Reply feature. Gboard will suggest high-quality responses to messages and be aware of context in conversations. The feature is currently available as a developer preview and needs to be enabled in settings. However, it only works with WhatsApp currently and will come to more apps next year.
“Gemini Nano running on Pixel 8 Pro offers several advantages by design, helping prevent sensitive data from leaving the phone, as well as offering the ability to use features without a network connection,” wrote Brian Rakowski, Google Pixel’s vice president of product management.
As part of today’s AI push, Google is upgrading Bard, the company’s ChatGPT rival, with Gemini as well, so you should see significant improvements when using the Pixel’s Assistant with Bard experience. Google is also rolling out a handful of AI-powered productivity and customization updates on other Pixel devices, including the Pixel Tablet and the Pixel Watch, although it isn’t immediately clear what they are.
Google
Gemini Nano is the smallest version of Google's large language model, while Gemini Pro is a larger model that will power not just Bard but other Google services like Search, Ads and Chrome, among others. Gemini Ultra, Google's beefiest model, will arrive in 2024 and will be used to further AI development.
Although today’s updates are focused on the Pixel 8 Pro, Google spoke today about AI Core, an Android 14 service that allows developers to access AI features like Nano. Google says AI Core is designed run on “new ML hardware like the latest Google Tensor TPU and NPUs in flagship Qualcomm Technologies, Samsung S.LSI and MediaTek silicon.” The company adds that “additional devices and silicon partners will be announced in the coming months.”
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/googles-gemini-ai-is-coming-to-android-150025984.html?src=rss
Algoriddim’s djay Pro software has always had close ties to Apple and often been at the forefront of new DJ tech, especially on Mac, iOS or iPadOS. Today marks the launch of djay Pro version 5 and it includes a variety of novel features, many of which leverage the company’s AI and a new partnership with the interactive team at AudioShake.
There are several buzzy trademarked names to remember this time around including next-generation Neural Mix, Crossfader Fusion and Fluid Beatgrid. These are the major points of interest in djay Pro 5, with only a passing mention of improved stem separation on mobile, UI refreshes for the library and a new simplified Starter Mode that may cater to new users on the platform. The updates include some intriguing AI-automated features that put the system in control of more complex maneuvers. Best of all, existing users get it all for free as part of their subscription.
AudioShake and Algroiddim have been working on their audio separation tech (like many other companies) and are calling this refreshed version Next-generation Neural Mix. We’re told to expect crisp, clear separation of elements from vocals, harmonies and drums. The tools have also been optimized for mobile devices, as long as they run a supported OS.
Fluid Beatbrid is perhaps one of the easiest to understand and seems to be an underlying part of the crossfader updates. Anyone who’s used beatgrids knows they’re rarely perfect on first analysis and often take a bit of work to lock in, especially on tracks that need it. Songs with live instrumentation that tend to shift tempo naturally, EDM with varying tempo shifts during breakdowns and even just older dance tracks that tend to meander slightly throughout playback have been pain points. Fluid Beatgrid is supposed to use AI to accommodate for those shifts and find the right points to mark.
Crossfader Fusion is where stems, automation and those beatgrids all come into play. There are now a variety of settings for the crossfader beyond the usual curves. One of the highlighted modes is the Neural Mix (Harmonic Sustain) setting. This utilizes stem separation and automated level adjustments as you go from one track to the next.
For those who enjoy cutting and scratching, there are crossfade settings that use automated curves and spatial effects so, for example, outgoing track vocals can be dropping out as you cut into the next track automatically. The incoming track’s vocals can be highlighted for scratching and as your mix completes the transition, things are blended together further with AI.
There's even an example provided that shows how you can mix across vastly different BPMs, where the incoming song matches up with a slower outgoing track, but its original tempo is slowly integrated during the transition leaving you with the new faster tempo.
Existing users should be alerted to the update, but newcomers can find djay Pro version 5 starting today at the App Store. While there will continue to be a free version, the optional Pro subscription costs $7 per month or $50 per year and gives you access to all the features across Mac, iOS and iPhone. Support for the app includes devices running MacOS 10.15 or later and iOS 15 / iPadOS 15 or later.
And as a side note, we’re told that djay Pro for Windows users were leveled up in September and will get Fluid Beatgrid in an update for that platform as soon as next week. Newer features like Crossfader Fusion are expected in the near future.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai-joins-you-in-the-dj-booth-with-algoriddims-djay-pro-5-150007224.html?src=rss