Google Play offering discounts inspired by ‘Ready Player One’

Get savings on movies, audiobooks, and more.

Steven Speilberg’s Ready Player One is officially in theaters, and in celebration of its highly-anticipated release, Google Play is running discounts on a number of audiobooks, e-books, and movies that should help to itch your 80s nostalgia craze.

When it comes to e-books and audiobooks, Google Play is running deals on titles like Starship Troopers, Ender’s Game, A Clockwork Orange, and many others. You can browse through the entire collection of sales here.

As for movies and TV shows, there’s even more to check out. Google’s discounted titles start at just $4.99, and they include Back to the Future, Jurassic Park, Alien, The Shining, etc. There are far too many movies to list here, so you can check out the entire sale on Google Play.

These savings are available now, and after you pick up a movie/book or two, be sure to drop a comment down below and let us know what you got!

See at Google Play

Google will predict Final Four winners based on in-game data

Google has been working closely with the NCAA during this year’s tournament, but now, during the Final Four, the company will be using predictive analytics to figure out who will win games. The wrinkle here is that the team will use data from the first half of the game to come up with their prediction during halftime. They’ll then create an ad right in the Alamodome, which will air before the beginning of the second half of the game.

The analytics that the Google Cloud team will be using to predict which team will win will be based on the interesting facts they’ve uncovered while analyzing NCAA data: “everything from who blocks more shots per minute (for the record: juniors) to whether teams with a certain type of animal mascot cause more March Madness upsets (hint: meow),” according to a blog post.

But the team wondered whether they could do more if they used machine learning and their analytics to figure out what might happen during a game, based on how the teams were performing before halftime. That’s why they’re trying this halftime experiment using Google Cloud Platform tech. You can learn more about exactly what they are trying to do over at their blog.

While this is certainly exciting for basketball fans, the Cloud Platform team is hoping that the techniques they use, and what they learn from the experience, will be broadly applicable. The team will break down what their results were after the Final Four.

Source: Google

Apple Shares Recommended Graphics Cards and Chassis in New eGPU Support Document for macOS High Sierra 10.13.4

macOS 10.13.4, released to the public yesterday afternoon, introduces official support for eGPUs (external graphics processors) on Thunderbolt 3 Macs. Alongside the release, Apple has published a detailed support document that outlines how eGPU support works and provides graphic card and chassis recommendations for use with your Mac.

One or more eGPUs can be used with the 2016 MacBook Pro and later, the 2017 iMac and later, and the iMac Pro, so long as macOS High Sierra 10.13.4 is installed. Apple has added eGPU support for graphic-intensive operations like using VR headsets, 3D gaming, and developing VR apps.

Apple’s support document outlines all supported eGPU configurations, with Apple recommending only AMD Radeon cards. There are no supported Nvidia cards.

It’s also worth noting that Apple has eliminated support for some cards that were supported during the beta, such as the AMD RX 560.

It’s important to use an eGPU with a recommended graphics card and Thunderbolt 3 chassis. And if you’re using a MacBook Pro, the eGPU’s Thunderbolt 3 chassis needs to provide sufficient power to run the graphics card while charging the computer.

Apple recommends AMD Polaris, Vega 56, and Vega 64 graphics cards, paired with a specific Thunderbolt 3 chassis. For the AMD Radeon RX 570, RX 580, and Radeon Pro WX 7100 cards (of which Apple recommends the Sapphire Pulse series and the AMD WX series), Apple recommends the following Thunderbolt 3 chassis:

• OWC Mercury Helios FX3
• PowerColor Devil Box
• Sapphire Gear Box
• Sonnet eGFX Breakaway Box 350W
• Sonnet eGFX Breakaway Box 550W3
• Sonnet eGFX Breakaway Box 650W3

For the AMD Radeon RX Vega 56 cards, Apple recommends the Sapphire Vega 56 and the XFX Vega 56 with the OWC Mercury Helios FX, PowerColor Devil Box, Sonnet eGFX Breakaway Box 550W3, or Sonnet eGFX Breakaway Box 650W3.

The Sonnet eGFX Breakaway Box 650W3 is the only chassis recommended for AMD Radeon RX Vega 64, Vega Frontier Edition Air, and Radeon Pro WX 9100 graphics cards, while the only recommended all-in-one eGPU product is the Sonnet Radeon RX 570 eGFX Breakaway Puck.

For the MacBook Pro, eGPUs and accompanying TB3 chassis must be able to provide sufficient power to run the graphics card while also charging the computer. In the case of the 15-inch model, that means the chassis needs to support at least 85W of charging power.

Apple says eGPU support has been designed to accelerate Metal, OpenGL, and OpenCL apps that benefit from more graphics power, and not all apps will support eGPU acceleration. Apple says eGPUs will work with most of the following types of apps:

• Pro applications designed to utilize multiple GPUs
• 3D games, when an external monitor is attached directly to the eGPU
• VR applications, when the VR headset is attached directly to the eGPU
• Pro applications and 3D games that accelerate the built-in display of an iMac or MacBook Pro. (This capability must be enabled by the application’s developer.)

Multiple eGPUs can be used together, but Apple recommends users connect eGPUs directly to the Mac instead of daisy-chaining them through another Thunderbolt device or hub.

macOS High Sierra 10.13.4 does not support eGPUs in Windows using Boot Camp, when the Mac is in macOS Recovery, or when system updates are being installed.

Related Roundup: macOS High Sierra
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