Current Promotions: Save Almost $200 on M5 iPad Pro, Up to $155 Off Apple Watch Ultra 3, Along with Price Cuts on Ocean Band and Trail Loop

### Apple’s M5 iPad Pro Models Reach Record Low Prices

In a recent report from 9to5Toys, it has been revealed that Apple’s M5 iPad Pro models are being offered at remarkable discounts, with prices slashed by nearly $200 from the original price. The standout offers feature the 11-inch M5 iPad Pro 1TB model, now priced at $1,399.99, and the 11-inch 256GB model, which is now at a record low of $799.99. These reductions signify the best offers available to date, creating an ideal opportunity for interested buyers.

### Apple Watch Ultra 3 Price Cuts

Furthermore, Best Buy has introduced discounts on the Apple Watch Ultra 3 models, providing savings of $155 off the original price. While new models have received minimal discounts, refurbished versions can be found at this lower price, offering a budget-friendly alternative for customers in search of premium smartwatches.

### M5 MacBook Pro Models Discounted

Apple’s M5 MacBook Pro models are also experiencing notable price cuts, with $300 off on specific 32GB configurations. These units, which feature the cutting-edge M5 chip, are competitively priced when compared to the forthcoming M5 Pro and M5 Max models. The current promotions offer a fantastic opportunity for individuals looking for robust laptops without the elevated price associated with the latest releases.

### Conclusion

With the continuous sales across Apple’s range of products, including the M5 iPad Pro, Apple Watch Ultra 3, and M5 MacBook Pro, consumers are presented with a rare chance to acquire high-performance gadgets at significantly lower prices. As new models are expected to be launched shortly, these discounts offer a timely opportunity for buyers to enhance their technology without overspending.

Leaked Email Discloses Ring’s Intentions to Employ Surveillance Capability for User Oversight

### The Debate Surrounding Ring’s Search Party Functionality

When Amazon unveiled the enhancement of its Ring Search Party functionality, intended to assist in finding lost pets, the reaction was far from the anticipated wave of enthusiasm. Rather, it incited considerable public dissent, with many perceiving it as a concerning move toward expanded surveillance abilities. This response was intensified by worries over privacy and the possibility that the feature could be utilized for identifying individuals rather than just animals.

#### The Dystopian Consequences

The launch of the lost dog functionality was showcased through a Super Bowl commercial, seeking to portray a touching picture of communal assistance. However, detractors swiftly made connections between the drive to locate lost dogs and the pre-existing facial recognition technology found in Ring’s video doorbells. This led to apprehensions that the Search Party functionality might transform into a means of observing human behavior, heightening concerns about privacy infringements and the ramifications of augmented surveillance.

Public opinion shifted dramatically against the initiative, causing Ring to reassess its plans for a collaboration with law enforcement via Flock Safety. The backlash illuminated an increasing discomfort with how technology firms, especially those entangled in surveillance, are viewed in the present environment.

#### Leaked Correspondence Confirms Surveillance Intentions

The situation escalated when a leaked correspondence from Ring’s founder, Jamie Siminoff, emerged, validating fears that the firm aimed to broaden the Search Party functionality beyond merely finding pets. The correspondence, which Ring has confirmed as genuine, delineated a vision where the technology could potentially “eradicate crime in neighborhoods.” This remark provoked additional anxieties about the ramifications of such surveillance capabilities and the moral considerations that accompany them.

Siminoff’s assertions hinted at a future where the technology could be leveraged to scrutinize human actions under the pretense of community security, triggering worries of a dystopian scenario where privacy is profoundly compromised.

#### Public Relations Consequences

Following the backlash and the disclosure of the leaked correspondence, Siminoff has initiated an “apology campaign” to confront the escalating concerns and rebuild public confidence. The scenario mirrors a larger dialogue about the position of technology in society, particularly concerning surveillance and privacy rights.

As organizations like Amazon persist in innovating and broadening their technological reach, the equilibrium between security and privacy remains a divisive topic. The Ring Search Party functionality exemplifies the possible ramifications of surveillance technology and the societal reaction to perceived overstepping.

### Conclusion

The debate surrounding Ring’s Search Party functionality highlights the fragile balance between technological progress and ethical considerations. As society navigates the implications of surveillance technology, it is vital for companies to pursue transparent practices and reflect on the potential impacts of their innovations on personal privacy and civil liberties.

Apple TV Teams Up with IMAX to Stream Live Formula 1 Races in Cinemas

**Apple TV Joins Forces with IMAX to Bring Formula 1 Racing to Cinemas**

For enthusiasts of Formula 1 in the United States, an Apple TV subscription is vital to view the races this season. However, Apple is broadening its broadcasting rights beyond conventional home viewing. In a recent collaboration with IMAX, Apple TV will present select Formula 1 races live in theaters, enhancing the experience for fans.

**Live IMAX Showings of Selected Races**

Five Grand Prix races from the 2026 season will be shown at IMAX theaters nationwide. The races feature notable events such as Silverstone, Miami, Monaco, Monza, and Austin. The inaugural live screening is scheduled for May 3, commencing with the Miami Grand Prix. Apple and IMAX have confirmed that these races will be accessible at over 50 IMAX venues across the country.

**Building on Past Achievements**

Last year, Apple made headlines in the IMAX arena with the fictional film “F1: The Movie,” starring Brad Pitt. This year, the company seeks to replicate that achievement by providing live broadcasts of real Formula 1 races in theaters. According to Oliver Schusser, Apple Services VP, this project is intended to bring the thrill of Formula 1 to a wider audience in an immersive setting.

**Expanding Cinematic Offerings**

This announcement supports IMAX’s strategy to broaden its portfolio beyond conventional films. The company is increasingly concentrating on live sports and music events as part of its expansion strategy.

**Access in Commercial Venues**

In addition to theater showings, Apple recently revealed a partnership with EverPass Media to enable access to Formula 1 broadcasts in restaurants, bars, and clubs throughout the United States. This collaboration will also encompass other sports, including MLS and MLB Friday Night Baseball.

**Streaming Exclusively on Apple TV**

Beginning March 7, Formula 1 will be available for exclusive streaming on Apple TV. Fans can discover all the details on how to view the races through Apple’s platform.

This partnership between Apple TV and IMAX signifies a pivotal advancement in how sports content is consumed, providing fans with new and exhilarating ways to engage with their favorite events.

Meta’s Imminent Smartwatch Probably Won’t Measure Up Against Apple Watch

**Meta’s Upcoming Smartwatch: A Companion to Smart Glasses**

A recent article suggests that Meta is planning to introduce a smartwatch later this year, though it is not expected to directly rival the Apple Watch. Instead, this device may act as an accessory to Meta’s forthcoming smart glasses.

The notion of a Meta smartwatch was initially alluded to in 2021 via a leaked image discovered in the Ray-Ban Stories app. While early plans encountered delays and were allegedly shelved, later reports have indicated that the initiative has been revitalized, with a possible launch imminent.

As per a paywalled article from *The Information*, Meta aims for a release towards the end of this year. The smartwatch is anticipated to enhance the functionality of the company’s upcoming smart glasses, which may include a display. CNET speculates that the watch will mainly operate as a supplementary device, improving the features of the smart glasses.

Meta’s Chief Technology Officer, Andrew Bosworth, has previously noted that the neural band introduced with the Ray-Ban Display glasses could ultimately sync with a smartwatch. This aligns with the vision of a neural-enhanced watch launching alongside the next-gen Ray-Ban Display glasses, especially as rivals like Apple and Google prepare to penetrate similar markets.

From a strategic perspective, it seems that Meta is prioritizing smart glasses as its main conduit for delivering AI functionalities. The incorporation of a fitness tracker within an accompanying neural band appears to be a sensible development.

Although the Meta smartwatch may not significantly threaten the Apple Watch, the competitive environment could change dramatically with the eventual introduction of Apple Glasses. As the wearable technology market keeps evolving, the interaction between these devices will be vital in influencing consumer choices and technological progress.

Enhance Your PC with a Mini Monitor Using the ESP32 Desktop Monitor Project – CNX Software

TENSTAR T Display ESP32

While searching AliExpress for new products, I found the TENSTAR T-Display ESP32-D0WD with a 1.14-inch IPS color IPS LCD and 16MB of QSPI flash that’s used by some as a tiny secondary mirrored monitor for their PC. The board appears to be a low-cost alternative to the original LilyGo T-Display, and also integrates a USB-to-TTL converter (CH9102F), a battery charging circuit, a toggle switch, and two user-programmable buttons, which makes it suitable for projects like the NerdMiner and small-scale dashboards for home automation. The hardware does not seem special, yet they sold over 10,000 pieces of the board. After looking into it, the ESP32 Desktop Monitor project is probably the “culprit” for the high sales number, as it transforms the board into a regular monitor, albeit with a tiny 1.14-inch LCD. More on that after the specifications. TENSTAR T-Display Specifications: SoC – Espressif Systems ESP32-D0WDQ6-V3 MCU cores – Dual-core Xtensa LX6 32-bit […]

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Black Sesame Technologies Wudang C1200 Automotive SoCs with up to 10x Cortex-A78AE Cores – CNX Software

Black Sesame Technology C1200 family

I found two interesting automotive SoCs in the Linux 6.19 changelog: Renesas R-Car X5H 16-/32-core Cortex-A720AE SoC and Black Sesame Technologies’ “Wudang” C1200 8-/10-core Cortex-A78AE processor family. While announced in 2024, there’s still no product page for the Renesas chip. So today, I’ll focus on the Wudang C1200 family. They are designed to be automotive-grade “cross-domain computing platforms” capable of handling multiple functions such as in-cabin sensing systems (e.g., driver attention monitoring), infotainment, auto-parking systems, safety information, autonomous driving, and more. Wudang C1296 10-core SoC Wudang C1296 specifications: CPU 10x Arm Cortex-A78AE automotive-grade cores Dual-Core Lockstep (DCLS) supported, ASIL-D compliance Up to 32K DMIPS (or 16K DMIPS in DCLS) GPU –  Automotive-grade Arm Mali-G78AE GPU; DCLS supported, ASIL-D compliance NPU – DynamAl NN Engine Hybrid precision 4-bit/8-bit MAC array Overall 80% utilization of convolution layers MAC Array Sparse support for storage and acceleration INT8/INT16, FP16 GEMM and nonlinear functions acceleration […]

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TOPST D3-G SBC Utilizes Telechips TCT8050 “Dolphin3” Cortex-A72/A53/R5 Automotive-Grade SoC – CNX Software

TOPST D3-G SBC

TOPST D3-G is a single board computer (SBC) powered by a Telechips TCT8050 “Dolphin3/3M” 9-core automotive-grade SoC with four Cortex-A72 cores, four Cortex-A53 cores, and one real-time Cortex-R5 core. The board features 4GB or 8GB LPDDR4 RAM, 32GB eMMC flash and a microSD card for storage, a Gigabit Ethernet port, a DisplayPort 1.2 connector capable of driving four display through MST, two MIPI CSI connectors, a PCIe Gen3x 1 slot, a few USB ports, a 40-pin GPIO header compatible with Raspberry Pi HAT+, and three CAN Bus interfaces. TOPST D3-G specifications: SoC  – Telechips TCC8050 (Dolphin3) CPU(45,180 DMIPS​) Quad-core Arm Cortex-A72 @ 1.69 GHz, 31,840 DMIPS​ Quad-core Arm Cortex-A53 @1.45 GHz, 13,340 DMIPS​​ Real-time MCU core – Arm Cortex-R5 @ 600 MHz GPU – Imagination Technologies PowerVR 9XTP (GT9524) delivering up to 168 GFLOPS; Supported APIs: OpenGL ES 1.1 / 2.0 / 3.2, Vulkan 1.2, OpenCL 2.0 / 3.0 System […]

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Beelink ME Pro 2-Bay Intel N95/N150 NAS & Mini PC with 5GbE Networking, Supports up to 3x M.2 NVMe SSDs – CNX Software

Beelink Me Pro

Beelink ME Pro is a compact 2-bay hybrid NAS and Windows 11 mini PC built around Intel N95 (Alder Lake-N) or N150 (Twin Lake) SoC, and equipped with two 3.5-/2.5-inch SATA bays and three M.2 2280 NVMe slots for storage. It also features a “DIY drawer” design that lets users swap the motherboard for upgrades. The system also features up to 16 GB of LPDDR5 memory, 5 GbE and 2.5 GbE networking, Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.4, and various I/Os, including USB-C (10 Gbps), USB-A, HDMI 2.0, and a 3.5 mm audio jack. An internal blower-based cooling system, an aluminum chassis with thermal pads, and anti-vibration drive mounts help with improved thermals and noise control. Target applications include home NAS, media server, Proxmox/TrueNAS host, small office file server, lightweight virtualization, backup appliance, and compact desktop PC. Beelink ME Pro specifications: SoC(one or the other) Intel Processor N95 quad-core “Alder Lake-N” processor […]

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PicoClaw: Ultra-Lightweight Personal AI Assistant Operates on Just 10MB of RAM – CNX Software

PicoClaw lightweight personal AI Assistant embedded systems

PicoClaw is an ultra-lightweight personal AI Assistant designed to work on less than 10 MB RAM and suitable for resource-constrained embedded boards such as the Sipeed LicheeRV Nano SBC going for around $15 and powered by a SOPHGO SG2002 RISC-V SoC with 256MB on-chip DDR3. I keep reading news about the OpenClaw personal AI assistant, after first finding out about it when the Cubie A7S SBC was launched. OpenClaw (previously ClawdBot) clears your inbox, sends emails, manages your calendar, and checks you in for flights from WhatsApp, Telegram, or any chat app. It’s been shown to run a range of hardware platforms, but it can be resource-intensive, and HKUDS created the nanobot ultra-lightweight personal AI assistant with about ~4,000 lines of Python code, or roughly 99% smaller than Clawdbot’s 430k+ lines. PicoClaw further builds on the nanobot project, and has been “refactored from the ground up in Go through a […]

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VU GPSDR: Affordable GPS-Disciplined SDR Expansion Board for Vivid Unit RK3399 Touchscreen SBC – CNX Software

UUGEAR VU-GPSDR

UUGear’s VU GPSDR is a low-cost GPS-disciplined SDR expansion board designed specifically for the Vivid Unit, a palm-sized Rockchip RK3399-based touchscreen SBC we covered back in 2024. The VU GPSDR is built around the RTL2832U ADC and Rafael Micro R860 tuner, but what makes it different from SDRs like the PhaseLatch Mini and DeepRad SDR  is the integration of a u-blox NEO-M8N GPS module. This module provides a GPS-disciplined 24 MHz clock reference to the Si5351 local oscillator, which ensures high frequency stability and timing accuracy that is typically only found in much more expensive SDR hardware. VU GPSDR specifications: Supported Platform – UUGear Vivid Unit via Vivid Unit Extender Gen 1/2 (See details below) MCU – STM8S003F for board-level controls RF Tuner – Rafael Micro R860 ADC – Realtek RTL2832U Frequency Range – 500 kHz to 1.766 GHz Bandwidth – Up to 3.2 MHz (2.4 MHz recommended for stability) HF […]

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