Gaming has been one of Chrome OS’ weak spots for years. Most Chromebooks have lower-power hardware paired with an OS built on web technology, so playing AAA titles found on Windows has simply not been an option. Cloud gaming, like Google’s own Stadia, offered a solution of sorts, but many players have been eager to see how Steam would fare, after Google announced Valve’s platform was in an early alpha phase.
News Editor Nathan Ingraham tested things out on one of the seven Chromebooks that can run Steam, an ASUS Chromebook CX9 with Intel’s 11th-generation Core i7. (Google says Steam required a device with at least a Core i5 processor and 8GB of RAM.) He explains that many games run like a dream; however, his attempts to play 2018’s God of War, originally released for the PS4 and ported to Windows in January this year, was apparently a “totally unplayable slideshow.” God of War’s spec requirements demand either NVIDIA’s GTX 960 or AMD’s R9 290X graphics cards — it wasn’t a huge shock.
While Google and Valve will improve the Steam experience from this early alpha, it’s fair to say Chrome OS will never be the place to play cutting-edge games. But, Steam’s library is vast, and there are thousands of titles — most playable offline, something Stadia can’t offer.
— Mat Smith
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New ‘Obi-Wan Kenobi’ trailer includes some Darth Vader assembly
The six-episode series debuts on Disney+ on May 27th.
Lucasfilm and Disney+ celebrated May the 4th by offering another look at the upcoming Obi-Wan Kenobi series. There’s not a ton of new footage, but it includes a peep at Darth Vader (Hayden Christensen) being pieced together, which is much more than the breathing cameo from the previous trailer.
Wordle brought ‘tens of millions’ of users to The New York Times
Many players stuck around, too.
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Samsung’s new phone storage standard is twice as fast
The company will start mass-producing Universal Flash Storage 4.0 in the third quarter.
Samsung has introduced the latest iteration of its Universal Flash Storage product, which it says is much, much faster than its predecessor. UFS was created to enable SSD speeds for cameras, phones and other devices, but this version — called UFS 4.0 — can reach 23.2Gbps per lane. That’s double the speed of UFS 3.1, the storage used in Samsung’s Galaxy S22.
Sonos’ rumored $250 soundbar is reportedly called the Ray
It may be smaller than the Beam, with some high-end features.
Sonos’ rumored budget soundbar was briefly posted online at Colombian store KTronix. The listing suggested g it will be called the Sonos Ray and be smaller than the already compact Beam Gen 2 at just 22 inches long (versus 25.6in), if slightly taller and thinner. A previous leak hinted Sonos might release it as soon as early June. And while the Colombian price (about $323) likely won’t reflect the exact pricing for the US, it does imply the rumored $250 sticker is at least close to the mark.
The best gifts to upgrade your grad’s tech setup
Due a refresh.
Graduation is traditionally a big time for gift-giving, so if you know someone heading out into the real world who could use an upgrade after four (or more!) long years of higher education, we’ve got a host of options — even if the giftee is in deep with tech already.
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