Author: Duncan Pike

Sony’s newly-announced PlayStation Now subscription service is cool and all, but what does it mean for South African gamers? Is it worth getting over (or as well as) Xbox Game Pass? Allow us to help you get there. If you missed the announcement, Sony revealed changes coming to the currently offered PlayStation Plus and PlayStation Now services. From June 2022, PS Plus is expanding, offering three differently priced tiers. PS Now will be incorporated into PS Plus and ceases as a standalone service after June. Current PS Now subscribers will be migrated over to PS Plus Premium while staying at…

With the ROG Strix Scar 17 (2022), Asus has managed to make high-end performance gaming cheaper somehow. We’re not saying it’s cheap. R55,000 is not cheap in anyone’s books. But it might be cheaper than you’d expect for this much performance. If you’re looking for great gaming performance in a laptop that can act as a desktop replacement but you don’t possess a blank cheque, the ROG Strix Scar 17 (2022) makes a compelling argument for why you should consider it. The Scar adds character Right out of the box, you’ll notice this kind of bends the definition of ‘portable’.…

Finally, some good NFT news. A non-fungible token has sold for R1.9 million in an auction to raise money for a museum that documents the anti-apartheid struggle of South Africa. The NFT was created from the original arrest warrant issued in 1961 against Nelson Mandela, the anti-apartheid activist that went on to become SA’s first democratically elected black president in 1994. The money raised will go towards keeping the lights on at the Liliesleaf Museum Heritage site. The museum has been struggling to stay afloat during the COVID-19 pandemic, and eventually had to close its doors indefinitely in September last…

WhatsApp testing larger file sharing feature The folks at WhatsApp continue to play catch-up to Telegram features. This time it has to do with the maximum file size one can send on the platform. According to WABetaInfo, who are usually spot on, WhatsApp is working on allowing users to send media files up to 2GB in size. The feature is still in very early beta and is only available to users in South America on WhatsApp beta version 2.22.8.5, 2.22.8.6, and 2.22.8.7.If this update makes it to the stable version on WhatsApp – the one we all use – it…

Do you know what the best kind of customer is? An existing customer. Apple knows this all too well. This is why it’ll always find ways to make more of them. A recent Bloomberg report reckons that Apple is working on a hardware subscription model intended to bring even more people into Apple’s ecosystem. Apple would charge a monthly fee and in return, subscribers get a new iPhone, or other Apple product, for the subscription period. So, basically what Mobile Service Providers already do, minus the SIM card. This is aimed at the people who really want to give Apple…

The Republic of Gamers division at Asus, as the name suggests, has a keen focus on a specific market. Can you guess which one? The subbrand is well-known for making fairly decent —  if at times over-priced — gaming gear. Their newest creation, the ROG Strix Scope RX TKL Wireless Deluxe keyboard has a lengthy name. And an even longer list of features. We’ve spent the better part of the last month using the Strix Scope RX TKL pretty much all day, every day. Now it’s time to tell you if it’s worth your hard-earned money. Form over function Keyboards,…

When a global company like Samsung, Microsoft, or Nvidia has its data stolen, images of clandestine operatives hammering away at keyboards in a darkened room come to mind. Individuals capable of such actions must be well-trained and possibly even state-funded. As a mad Titan once said, “Reality is often disappointing.” It turns out the mastermind behind the recent Microsoft data breach, might just be a UK teenager living with his mother. Hacking Microsoft as an extramural activity  According to a Bloomberg report, security researchers investigating the recent string of high-profile hacks said they managed to trace the attacks, in part,…

It seems like Sonos is looking to branch out a little, judging from recent job listings discovered by Protocol. The positions available strongly suggest that Sonos wants to expand its audio offerings to the home theatre space. The positions, listed on the company’s job portal, include ‘Head of Partnerships, Home Theatre” and “UX Lead- Next Generation Home Theater Experience” as well as a position for a “Principal Platform Product Manager”. That last one isn’t as specific as the other two but it does list “working knowledge of home theatre technologies and protocols” and “experience in home theatre or home entertainment…

Apple services go rotten for a few hours If you thought there might be something wrong with one or more Apple services or features over the long weekend, you would’ve been right. Turns out quite a few of the tech company’s services went down for as much as three hours on Monday, 21 March 2022 at around 19h00 SAST. Some of those services were iMessage, the App Store, Apple Aracade, iTunes, podcasts, and Apple TV+. Apple confirmed all of this on its System Status page. Most of the issues were quickly resolved and the page now shows ‘Resolved outage’ next…

The South African branch of TransUnion, the American consumer credit reporting agency, has been hacked.  According to ITWeb, the group managed to breach the security of TransUnion and are demanding $15 million, or roughly R223 million, in Bitcoin within the next week. If not, the perpetrators are threatening to exploit or release the 4TB of confidential information of some 54 million South Africans. That includes, but is not limited to, contact info, ID numbers, banking details, and credit scores. TransUnion has confirmed the attack and in a statement to ITWeb, said, “We have received an extortion demand and it will…