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Crypto exchanges refuse to freeze all Russian accounts as Ukraine requested
Major crypto exchanges including Coinbase and Binance are refusing a request by Ukraine to freeze all Russian accounts.
Microsoft fixes Anniversary Update's login freeze in Windows 10
Windows 10 users had many good reasons to install the Anniversary Update at the beginning of August, even if most changes were incremental. Less loved were the handful of serious bugs that came with it, from breaking webcams to systemwide crashes when users plugged in e-readers. But its worst offense was freezing when users logged in on devices that put their operating system on one logical drive and app data on another. Split users, your ship has come in: Microsoft patched the error in an auto-update on August 31st.
Watch these artists 3D print animation into reality
Why 3D print a computer animation? 'Art' is a good enough reason for us, and that's exactly what drove Dutch artists to put a hundred frames into a single mind-bending installation. Using an Ultimaker 2 3D printer and liberal amounts of glue and string, artists Job, Joris and Marieke squeezed all the cells from a short animation (below) into a single mise-en-scene. At a glance, you can see the fate of the teal-hued hero as he vaults off a cup and into a vase, with each detail (including a bouncing ball and shattered cup) faithfully reproduced in PVC. If you want to feel like you're inside a computer where time has lost all meaning, it'll be exhibited at Amersfoort's Kunsthal museum on March 29th.
PSA: Here's one possible fix for PS4 Rest Mode issues
If your PlayStation 4 is behaving badly after this week's 2.0 update, Reddit user Nestledrink has a potential fix that may get your ailing console back up and running. The fix is for users who are unable to wake their PlayStation 4s up from Rest Mode. You'll see your console constantly blinking an orange light if you're affected, and your system will be unresponsive if you attempt to power it on or press the PS button on a DualShock 4 controller. If this is the case, Nestledrink recommends powering down the console by pressing the power button for seven seconds, then engaging Safe Mode by holding the power button for another seven seconds afterward. From there, you can select the third option on the screen that appears in order to reinstall the latest firmware update, which should hopefully fix the problem. While the method isn't guaranteed to fix all PlayStation 4 issues, one Joystiq staffer was able to resuscitate their console by following the steps above, and confirms that their PS4 is now back in action. If your PS4 is still unresponsive, try contacting Sony support for further assistance. [Image: Sony]
Report: Pokemon X/Y glitch affecting Lumiose City saves
Some players have encountered a game-breaking bug in their copies of Pokemon X/Y. At least two videos of have hit YouTube already and the cause seems to be loading a file where the player has saved in Lumiose City. The game locks up when loading the file, so if you're currently playing you may want to avoid saving within Lumiose City. Lumiose City is the main metropolis of the Kalos region in Pokemon X/Y. In the center of the city stands the Prism Tower, which serves as its symbol and prime example the city's design was heavily inspired by Paris, France. We've contacted Nintendo to confirm the company is aware of the situation and working on a fix. We'll be sure to update this post with Nintendo's response when we get it.
PS3 users report 4.45 update locks up systems, may be tied to large HDDs (updated)
Planned to turn on your PS3 for some The Last of Us action tonight? According to a thread on the PlayStation Support forums, if you're prompted to install the latest firmware update version 4.45 then you may want to hold off for the moment. A number of owners are reporting their systems will no longer fully boot up after the update, although the problem may only affect users with hard drives installed that are 500GBs or larger. According to the changelog, it was supposed to allow users to select whether or not they want an in-game notification when a trophy is earned. If it is tied to user-replaced hard drives, then it wouldn't be the first time -- v3.41 resulted in a few corrupted PlayStation 3 drives a few years ago. Check the thread for more details, if we hear anything from Sony then we'll let you know when it's safe to press OK. Update: It appears the update has been pulled and users are no longer being prompted to download it, but we still haven't received any official response from Sony on the situation. Update 2: According to the PlayStation Europe Twitter account, Sony is aware of the problem, and has taken 4.45 offline to investigate the issue. There's a new thread in the forums for official info in FAQ form, however there isn't much else to say just yet.
Patch 5.1: Razorgore, other old world bosses made easier
Blackwing Lair has long been my one of my favorite raids of all time. Not only did it have some fun, interesting, and even emotional boss fights back in its day, the weapon and tier gear graphics are still some of the best to this day. Unfortunately, going back in there for transmogrification gear has been a bit of a pain. This is because Razorgore, the first boss, must be done by at least two players: One to mind control him, one to kill the adds. Patch 5.1 ends that. Not only can Razorgore be soloed (in theory), but a couple of other older dungeon bosses have been tweaked just a little.
Arcane Brilliance: Familiars, porcupines and Frostbolt healing, oh my!
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Arcane Brilliance for arcane, fire and frost mages. This week, we'll be discussing a few of the more recent additions and tweaks to our class on the Mists of Pandaria beta. Some of them are awesome. Some of them are silly. And some of them are porcupines. You see that thing up there in the picture? That tiny little legless flaming elemental from vanilla WoW? That's one of our three new familiars. That's right: familiars. I've actively campaigned for mage familiars in the past, even as far back as this crusty old post from 2008, in which I also wished for more portals, a Blink spell that actually worked, and a rumored new ability called Mirror Image, which I believed would prove to be a combination of a bacon double cheeseburger, the second coming of Christ, and a double rainbow out of a leprechaun's butt. So young! So naive. I always imagined my mage running around with a tiny furry minion, maybe mouse with glowing eyes, or an ominous crow, possibly animated by Don Bluth, that would do my bidding and tell me which cottage in the forest Princess Aurora was hiding in. I imagined a wizardly pet that would be always by my mage's side, part of the persona, perhaps conferring a passive buff or something. Well that isn't quite what we're getting here.
App Store holiday sales on now: GTA 3, id software, Dungeon Raid, lots more
The App Store freeze goes down today, so this is the last chance for many developers to put their apps on sale. And of course, many have taken advantage of that chance. Before we even start listing sales today, many of the sales previously listed, including EA and Gameloft's whole-catalog 99 cent sales, are still ongoing through the weekend. The anniversary release of Grand Theft Auto 3 is only $2.99. That's a bargain no matter which way you slice it -- pick it up. Japanese developer Cave is having a big 99 cents sale, with some of its bullet-hell shooters available for cheap. id Software is also going cheap, with Rage HD, Doom Classic, Doom II RPG, and more going on sale for just a buck. Hack-and-slash Aurum Blade (above) is free for the holidays. Monster RPG 2 is 99 cents. Comixology's great Comics app is having an in-store sale, with lots of comics for only a buck. Dungeon Raid is one of the best games of the year, and it's only $1.99 in a rare sale. Dragon Fantasy is an excellent 8-bit style RPG that's only a buck. Wayforward's excellent Shantae: Risky's Revenge platformer is only $1.99. Gamevil's Zenonia and Zenonia 2 are both completely free. iPad exclusive tower defense/strategy game Ant Raid is only a buck. Chillingo's Ravensword: The Fallen King is only 99 cents, and there's plenty of other Chillingo titles on sale for cheap as well. Disney's in on the sale, too, with Where's My Water, Jelly Car and lots of others for only 99 cents. Companions for iPad is only a buck. Galaxy Pirate Adventure got renamed as Galactic Phantasy, and it's only 99 cents right now. Word game Welder is just $1.99. And that's only the ones we've heard of -- there are probably lots more sales out there. In other words, if there's an app that you've been wanting to buy, you should probably check up on it today, because if it's not on sale now, it probably won't be this year. Good luck, enjoy all of your new apps!
Sony UK: no evidence of 'widespread glitches' among Japanese Vitas
Sony UK is downplaying the scope of reported freezing issues with the PlayStation Vita. Speaking to The Guardian, SCE UK head of public relations David Wilson said, "We're annoyed with these stories, because we can't find any evidence of widespread glitches." He went on to clarify that there has been no apology issued from Sony on the subject of glitches. "The stories even said that Sony has issued an apology for PS Vita glitches, which simply isn't true – there's an apology on our Japanese website for people who are having trouble getting through to our technical help line, but that's it." The page with the apology also links directly to a list of troubleshooting measures in case of a freeze. But don't take the overwhelmed tech support, and addressing "freezes" in a shortlist of frequently asked questions, as evidence that freezing is a common issue.
Developers eager to submit apps before App Store vacation
It's that time of year again: Snow is in the air, presents are underneath the tree, and Apple is about to shut down the developer's side of App Store for its yearly freeze. The New York Times has done some solid coverage on the shutdown this year, which will start this Thursday, and run for a week and a day after that. Apps will still be for sale, of course, but developers won't be able to release new apps or updated released apps. Every year, developers have to rush to not only, as the NYT says, get their apps out on the store and available before the freeze, but also to try and get their apps in the top 25 paid and free lists, which is where many post-holiday new iPhone and iPad owners start their app shopping. Electronic Arts, which the NYT quotes in its piece, has probably been the most public beneficiary of this App Store break -- a few years ago, the company dropped all of its apps on sale to 99 cents in the days before the freeze, which enabled it to grab most of the real estate in the "top apps" lists, and that big bump has even dictated company mobile policy until now. There's no doubt there is plenty of money to be earned on the App Store this holiday again (and we'll likely see some developers reporting big bumps next week), but I'd suggest that things are changing, soon, if not already. Back in the early days of the App Store, there weren't too many ways to find good apps besides those top 25 lists. But these days, there are a lot more resources, both for users to find the apps they want, and for developers to promote their own apps. So I don't know that we'll see as big an effect from the top 25 lists this year as past year. We'll still see big sales, I'm sure, but I think those will be more spread out than last year. And of course the App Store freeze has one more benefit for Apple: In addition to allowing the company to do maintenance and updates on the store and its infrastructure, it also allows the review and support staff to take a much-needed break for a few days. We'll have to wait and see how it works out for the company and 3rd-party developers this year.
Lion bug: Some iMacs locking up after playing video
Over the past few days, quite a few iMac owners have told us they're experiencing systemwide freezes after watching videos. Likewise, Apple's support forums are full of iMac owners experiencing the same issue. Although the bug is difficult to reproduce reliably, it's not confined to any one type of video. Flash-based YouTube videos appear as likely to cause the system to lock up as viewing movies from the local hard disk in either QuickTime or iTunes. During the system freeze users can still move the mouse pointer, but the system doesn't recognize any other form of user input. No error message comes up, and users who have checked their system logs aren't finding any evidence of kernel panics or other system-level errors. Thus far, the only solution to the freeze has been a hard shutdown by holding in the power button. iMac owners afflicted by this particularly nasty bug have speculated that the 10.7.1 update will be rushed out to address this and several other of Lion's version .0 growing pains. In the meantime, if you're an iMac owner and haven't upgraded to Lion yet, it may be prudent to hold off upgrading for now until we learn whether this problem has been addressed in the presumably forthcoming bugfix update.
Federal Excess: FedEx introduces liquid nitrogen-cooled biotech shipping, we can envision other uses
Just think about this the next time a FedEx van comes speeding past you -- that four-wheeled transporter could be carrying containers equipped with liquid nitrogen cooling that keeps its innards at a chilly -150 degrees Celsius. Don't worry, though, says FedEx, the use of dry vapor is actually safer than the currently used dry ice and classifies this new methodology as non-hazardous. While we may like to poke fun, it sounds like a pretty legitimate boon for healthcare and biotechnology shipments, which can now be maintained at a deeply frozen temperature for up to 10 days at a time. FedEx will provide the self-sufficient container and collect it upon delivery of the goods, while also monitoring its condition during transit. No word on whether or when DiGiorno will be signing up for the service. [Thanks, Pavel]
App Store price war continues, prices drop pre-freeze
I don't know what kind of criteria we need to hit to call the official start of an App Store price war, but quite a few companies have taken EA's lead from last week and dropped their app prices down in an attempt to get them on the top app charts before this week's store freeze by Apple. Pocket Gamer has a pretty good list of sales going -- most Namco apps are on sale, along with the Pac Man titles and Bit Trip Beat. Halfbrick Studios has also dropped prices on their games, bringing Age of Zombies and Fruit Ninja down to just 99 cents and adding new content to both. Samurai II: Vengeance was also dropped to 99 cents, as we tweeted on @TUAW earlier today. A number of apps are trying to compete by adding features -- Touch Arcade has a good list of those, including Imangi's Max Adventure and Capcom's Arcade title as well as Sega's Chu Chu Rocket. The weekend hasn't changed EA's grip on the App Store charts -- 6 of the top 10 are still EA's titles, and Apple is actually running banners on the App Store advertising EA's big sale (which has some smaller developers a little miffed). We'll have to see what happens as the week goes on. The store freeze is set to go down on Thursday through Tuesday, December 28, so any apps in the charts then will stay there over the holiday weekend.
App Store algorithms down and back up, probably tweaked
Regular users may not have noticed this, but I'm sure developers have -- the App Store's charts have been in a freeze for the past few days, leaving apps in exactly the same positions as they were last Thursday. That might not seem like too big a deal, but for many developers, the App Store charts are where they make or break a profit -- not only do the charts provide a good inkling of how popular an app is compared to others, but the top 10 on the charts provides a huge amount of exposure -- just getting in the top 10 often boosts app sales just by virtue of the extra eyeballs. For the past few days, though, the App Store charts haven't changed, and that usually means that Apple is messing with something, either tweaking the way the charts are calculated, or just plain changing the way that they work. Last year the company fixed an issue where developers could constantly update their apps to keep them on "Recently Released" charts, but this year we haven't quite figured out what changes have been made. At any rate, it seems likely Apple was simply getting things ready for what's sure to be a busy holiday season for the App Store. Hopefully developers who released their apps on Halloween didn't fall too far through the cracks while things were down.
Suspended animation shocker: lack of oxygen could be the key to surviving a deep freeze
Researchers in Seattle are coming closer to discovering the secrets of suspended animation. Experimenting with yeast and worms, Dr. Mark Roth has been able to determine that a significant decrease in oxygen before the deep freeze of an organism makes surviving the thaw much, much easier, and may account for several cases where people have appeared to be frozen to death but were later revived. Dr. Roth's aim, he says, is not to be able to freeze people for long periods (such as is the case in the classic film Encino Man), but to help medical professionals "buy time" and advance their understanding of the effects of freezing on the human body. Sure, but if it means we might get to meet up with Pauly Shore in like, a thousand years, why don't we just shoot for the stars on this one? Video is below.
Wii Strong Bad glitch making you Strong Mad? Try this un-awesome fix
So you're jauntily making your way through the first "episode" of Strong Bad's video game debut on your Wii and ... freeze. Sadly this can't be remedied by shouting "UNFROZEN!" at the screen in your best imitation of the luchador-masked star's mighty voice.Nope, according to some sleuthing by ThatVideoGameBlog, the freeze – which happens at the exact same point in the game for everyone, it seems – can only be avoided by following the advice on developer Telltale Games' message board. And what might that be? Oh, just setting your Wii to output in ye olde 4:3, 480i mode. Evidently, turning off widescreen and progressive scan output solves the problem. We'd much rather, oh, download a patch. Unfortunately, Telltale isn't telling tales of such a fix yet.[Via NWF]
WWI '08 Death Knight Demo: Frost spells and talents
The Frost tree was originally designated the tanking tree, and the Frost Presence will likely still be the presence of choice for tanking Death Knights. Interestingly enough, very few of the other spells and talents in the Frost tree -- with the exception of Icebound Fortitude -- really scream "tanking." However, some of them do scream "crowd control," which may amount to the same thing in the end -- just freeze, slow, or silence extra mobs until you have a chance to focus on tanking them. The "frozen" bonuses in some of the talents also suggest that Frost Death Knights may have a lot of good synergy with Frost Mages as well, assuming their frozen status afflictions are identical to each other. Below is a listing of some of the Frost spells and talents shown in the WWI Death Knight demo: Frost Spells: Icy Touch:Requires level 55Costs 1 Frost Rune Instant cast, 6 second cooldown20 yard rangeDescription: Deals 217 to 235 Frost damage modified by attack power and reduces the target's ranged, melee attack, and casting speed by 15% for 20 seconds.Chains of IceRequires level 56Costs 2 Frost RunesInstant cast, 16 second cooldown20 yard rangeDescription: Freezes the target in place for 3 seconds. the target regains 10% of their movement speed each second after breaking free of the chainFrost Presence Requires level 57Instant castDescription: The death knight takes on the presence of frost, increasing armor by 45% and threat generated by 25%.Mind FreezeRequires level 57 Requires Runic Power10 second cooldownDescription: Strike the target's mind with cold, dealing 100 frost damage modified by attack power and interrupting spellcasting while also preventing any spell in that school from being cast up to a maximum of 4 seconds. Obliterate Requires Level 61 Costs 1 Blood Rune, 1 Frost RuneDescription: A brutal instant attack that deals 100% of weapon damage plus 330 and 122 additional damage for each of your diseases on the target, but consumes the diseasesEmpower Rune WeaponRequires level 68 3 Minute cooldownInstant castDescription: Empower your rune weapon, immediately activating one of each rune typeIcebound Fortitude Requires level 72Requires Runic Power1 minute coooldownDescription: Consumes all available runic power, causing the Death Knight to become immune to stun effects and increasing armor by 50% for up to 12 seconds. Does not remove existing stun effects.Frost Talents:Frozen Rune WeaponRequires 10 talent pointsCosts 1 Frost RuneRequires melee weaponInstant castDescription: Imbue your rune weapon with frost, causing 29.9 to 92 additional frost damage, based on the speed of your weapon. Also has a chance to cause your target to be vulnerable to frost damage. Lasts 10 minutes.DeathchillRequires 20 talent points2 minute cooldownInstant castDescription: When activated, increases your critical strike chance with frost spells and abilities by 100% for the next 6 seconds. Howling BlastRequires 30 talent pointsCosts 1 Frost Rune30 second cooldownInstant cast20 yard rangeDescription: Blast the target with a frigid wind, dealing 278 to 302 frost damage to all enemies within 10 yards. Deals triple damage to frozen targetsMerciless CombatRequires 35 talent pointsCosts up to 3 talent pointsDescription: Your frost spells and abilities do an additional 20% damage per talent point when striking targets with less than 20% health.Frost StrikeRequires 40 talent points, Merciless CombatCosts 1 Frost RuneRequires melee weaponNext MeleeDescription: A strong attack that deals weapon damage as frost damage. Has a 10% chance to freeze the target.Hungering ColdRequires 50 talent pointsRequires runic power1 minute cooldownInstant castDescription: Unleashes all available runic power to eradicate all heat from around the Death Knight, freezing enemies within 10 yards and preventing them from performing any action for 2s per 10 runic power. Enemies are considered frozen, but any damage will break the ice.
Apple posts fix for freezing iMacs
Not a moment too soon, Apple has apparently delivered on its intentions to squash that annoying freezing bug that plagued some of its latest iMacs. Available now for Leopard (iMac Software Update 1.3) and Tiger (iMac Software Update 1.2), the update reportedly "provides important bug fixes and is recommended for 20- and 24-inch iMac models with 2.0, 2.4, or 2.8GHz processors." Unfortunately, we're given absolutely no elaboration beyond that, so for any of you out there still limping by on a freeze-happy machine, why not get your download on and let us know if your troubles do indeed vanish?[Via PCWorld]Read - iMac Software Update 1.3 for LeopardRead - iMac Software Update 1.2 for Tiger
Apple acknowledges iMac freeze problem
We've had several folks let us know about an apparent problem with the new iMacs, both in post comments and by email tips. There has been an Apple Discussions thread about the issue, which involves random freezes in the new iMac. It apparently causes the interface to completely lock up and requires the user to perform a hard restart to recover. Macworld is reporting that Apple has now admitted that there is a problem. An Apple spokesman told Macworld that they are "tracking down the root cause of this bug, and will issue a software update which corrects it as soon as we can - most likely later this month."
