Month: August 2024

New information from leaker ‘Billbil-kun’ could provide a first glimpse at the rumored PS5 Pro.

New information from reliable leaker ‘Billbil-kun’ could give us our first glimpse at how the long-awaited PlayStation 5 Pro could look.

In a new report posted to the French-language dealabs blog (which we have machine translated) ‘Billbil-kun’ claims to have seen the front of the final packaging for the upcoming system. They confirm that it will be called the ‘PS5 Pro’ and state that, while they are unable to post a photo “due to copyright reasons”, they can offer a basic sketch.

A mock-up of the PS5 Pro based on these leaks. (Image credit: Dashiell Wood / Sony)

I created the mock-up above based on this sketch and some of the written information included in the report, using an official image of the existing PS5 Slim as a starting point. ‘Billbil-kun’ alleges that the PS5 Pro will have a design that is “very similar” to the PS5 Slim, with a white exterior and two front USB-C ports along with the power button.

The biggest visible design difference between the PS5 Slim and the PS5 Pro, it seems, will be the presence of three black grooves on the side of the console. The leaker also believes that the upcoming console will be slightly thicker than the PS5 Slim. This kind of design would certainly make a lot of sense and seems quite reminiscent of the jump from the PS4 to the PS4 Pro.

‘Billbil-kun’ states that the packaging they have seen did not indicate the inclusion of a disc drive. This may suggest compatibility with the existing Disc Drive For PS5 Digital Edition attachment or the move to a digital-only console (though the latter is unlikely given the strong physical sales numbers of many of the best PS5 games). Ultimately, we will have to wait and see whether this is the case.

In terms of a release window, the leaker believes that an announcement could be made as soon as next month. This would certainly line up with a lot of the chatter that I heard from developers and partners at Gamescom 2024, who seem to have already been briefed on the existence of the console and expect some official news soon.

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Chinese manufacturer Tecno has unveiled a triple-foldable smartphone following confirmation of a Huawei tri-fold release in September.

Chinese manufacturer Tecno has revealed a triple-foldable smartphone concept just days after competitor Huawei confirmed that a tri-fold device is on the way.

As GSMArena reports, the Phantom Ultimate 2 concept sports a 6.48-inch outer screen with a 10-inch inner screen, an LTPO OLED panel with a resolution of 1620 x 2880, and an aspect ratio of 4:3.

Elsewhere, BGR reports that the Phantom Ultimate 2 is just 11mm thick when folded, which is 1.1mm thinner than the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6, though the video shows an increase in thickness around the camera bump, and it’s not clear how this measurement was taken.

The new phone also features OLED Touch and Display Driver Integration (TDDI), placing the display driver and touch sensor on the same chip.

(Image credit: TECNO Mobile)

Tecno unveiled the device concept with a short video demonstrating the two-hinged device in a number of scenarios, such as using one segment of the screen as a keyboard in a laptop-style configuration, or propping the displays up in ‘tent mode’ for real-time AI translation.

However, as a concept phone it’s not yet clear whether the Phantom Ultimate 2 will make it to production – the same has proved true for its predecessor, the Phantom Ultimate, which was revealed with a rolling screen in August 2023.

(Image credit: TECNO Mobile)

We should also note that since this is a concept phone we can’t get our hands on to test, we have no way of verifying if any of the purported features are complete or functional.

The race to third place

In fact, the timing of this new reveal says almost as much as the video itself. Tecno’s announcement comes as the race to release the world’s first tri-fold device begins to heat up.

On August 19, Huawei Consumer Business Group CEO Yu Chengdong (also known as Richard Yu) confirmed that a tri-fold Huawei device is coming out in September.

If Huawei sticks to this timeframe, the company has a good chance of being the first in the world to put a tri-fold device in consumers’ hands following months of rumors and prototypes being teased by multiple manufacturers.

In May, Creative Bloq reported that Chinese semiconductor manufacturer TCL CSOT had displayed its unnamed tri-fold prototype at the Society for Information Display’s Display Week event. And in July, Honor laid out a patent for a tri-fold design, though no development has been confirmed.

As for Samsung, rumors of a tri-fold Galaxy Z Fold have circulated all year despite a lack of details online.

While the Phantom Ultimate 2 remains a concept, it’s a clear indication that triple folding phones are on the minds of forward-looking designers. They’re on our minds too, so make sure to keep up with our smartphone news for the latest tri-fold updates.

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CrowdStrike reports encouraging results, but effects of global outage may harm future reports.

CrowdStrike has revealed strong results for its latest financial quarter, but has warned the next few months may not be as rosy as the company continues to deal with the fallout of its global outage earlier this year.

In its Q2 2025 results, the company reported revenue growth of 32% year over year, with a GAAP net income of $47 million compared to $8.47 million in the same period last year.

Total revenue this quarter was $963.9 million, and subscription revenue was $918.3 million – a 33% increase on the same period last year – but CrowdStrike has warned the next few earnings reports could be slightly trickier.

As it stands

The company was at the heart of a worldwide Windows outage earlier this year, which cost Fortune 500 companies (excluding Microsoft) an estimated $5.4 billion.

The outage occurred on July 19 2024, meaning it was in the final two weeks of the quarter, so these latest results don’t reflect the recent difficulties CrowdStrike has suffered, meaning the fallout will likely be delayed into coming financial cycles.

“Working with customers to recover from the July 19th incident, we emerge as an even more resilient and even more customer-obsessed CrowdStrike, continuing to aggressively invest in innovation”, noted George Kurts, Crowdstrike’s chief executive officer and co-founder.

“Our second quarter demonstrates the resilience of our business and platform”.

The company’s full-year revenue guidance does include an estimated $30 million subscription revenue impact in each of the remaining fiscal quarters as a result of the outage, as well as an estimated high single-digit millions to professional services revenue in the second half of the fiscal year.

CrowdStrike also faces other aspects of fallout from the incident, with a lawsuit from Delta Airlines looming after the outage cost the airline an estimated $350-500 million in revenue.

Microsoft recently revealed it will soon be hosting a major security event alongside CrowdStrike that will see it reveal more about the outage. The event will mark the first time the two companies have jointly spoken publicly about the outage, which took millions of devices offline and caused havoc for organizations across the globe.

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Charlie Vickers and Charles Edwards tease what to expect from Sauron and Celebrimbor’s dynamic in the show’s second season.

Charlie Vickers and Charles Edwards have opened up on what to expect from Sauron and Celebrimbor’s mentally taxing relationship in The Rings of Power season 2.

Speaking to TechRadar before the popular Prime Video show returned today (August 29), the pair revealed that the Dark Lord and master elven-smith’s dynamic won’t play out like many viewers expect. Indeed, Vickers and Edwards stressed that their relationship won’t be defined by Sauron, who’s now disguised as Annatar, simply manipulating Celebrimbor to forge more of the titular rings. Instead, their power dynamic will play out with a greater degree of unpredictability.

“It’s not just puppet and puppet master,” Edwards told me about the respective roles Celebrimbor and Sauron portray in their relationship. “They’re both brilliant minds who pursue this [creating the other rings] with honorable intention initially. But, they’re also vying for control, so there’s creative and domestic friction and, as we progress through season two, he [Sauron] starts to make me [Celebrimbor] question my very existence.”

Sauron (right) won’t spend all of season 2 pulling Celebrimbor’s (left) strings (Image credit: Ben Rothstein/Prime Video)

“I come with a proposal to ‘heal’ Middle-earth,” Vickers added. “And, with that, I tell Celebrimbor that he can be better than his grandfather [Fëanor]. So, it starts off with these great intentions, but then slowly becomes more of a power struggle, especially when I pitch the idea of making rings for me, which Celebrimbor pushes back on because men are so susceptible to corruption. That’s when the conflict starts to emerge and, as a consequence of the growing levels of disagreement, I need to enforce the law.”

Well, that doesn’t sound good! Understandably, teaming up with The Lord of the Rings‘ legendary villain isn’t what Celebrimbor consciously signed up for, but it’s clear he gets duped into making more of the magical artefacts in The Rings of Power from episode 4 onwards. Indeed, Edwards previously told me that he had a crash course in ring-making ahead of filming the hit show’s sophomore season, so I’m expecting to see the other 17 rings – seven for the Dwarf Lords, nine for the Kings of Men, and even the One Ring itself – to show up in the series’ latest chapter.

Sauron, disguised as Halbrand, reunited with Celebrimbor in season 2 episode 2 (Image credit: Ben Rothstein/Prime Video)

Unfortunately for Celebrimbor (and Middle-earth as a whole), the rings are crafted before anyone in Eregion realizes that Annatar has played them like a fiddle. When his true identity is revealed in the Amazon high fantasy show, then, you can expect a melodramatic powderkeg to go off – something that Vickers and Edwards can’t wait for audiences to see, especially once Celebrimbor grasps the enormity of the situation and how he was tricked into playing a massive part in it.

“Towards the end, it gets so meaty and so dark,” Edwards teases. “With every scene, there’s a new challenge and a new method of mental torture. It just grows and grows, and eventually boils over in the most dramatic and shocking way possible.”

“There are two battles going on once we hit that point [in the season],” Vickers said. “There’s the Siege of Eregion going on outside, but there’s also the siege of the mind as these two brilliant individuals lock horns. That’s what made filming those sequences so fun. One day, you’re walking along Eregion’s walls as things are exploding around you, and the next you’re locked in a room as you engage in this battle of wills. Those things happening concurrently is what makes the end of this season so special.”

It sounds like, then, that one of the best Prime Video shows is going all-out to cement itself as the one Amazon TV Original to rule them all. And that’s exactly what I said of The Rings of Power season 2’s three-episode premiere, which you’ll want to read first before you return to Middle-earth on one of the world’s best streaming services.

The Rings of Power season 2’s first three episodes are out now on Prime Video. New episodes arrive weekly until October 3.

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