AMD Ryzen Processors Facing Performance Issues On Windows 11

Windows 11 has finally been released to the public not too long ago. However, if you happen to own a PC running on an AMD Ryzen processor, it is advisable that you hold off from upgrading to the new platform for a while longer. The company has recently acknowledged issues that are affecting its chips when running the new operating system, with dips of up to 15 percent  in performance during certain instances.

According to AMD’s support page, both the company and Microsoft have found two main issues which, thankfully, are software-based rather than hardware related. This means that the problems can be remedied with a future update for Windows 11, so AMD Ryzen owners can still breathe a sigh of relief.

It turns out that Windows 11 may cause the L3 cache latency to triple, which causes a drop of three to five percent in performance when running most affected applications. This is more apparent when running games, especially those – as AMD puts it – that are “commonly used for eSports” – with performance seen to dip down around 10 to 15 percent.

The second is AMD’s “preferred core” technology, which Windows 11 is also reported to be having issues with. For the uninitiated, the tech shifts threads over to the fastest core on a processor in order to boost frequencies. AMD says that those on Ryzen CPUs with more than eight cores above 65W TDP will encounter performance drops on the new operating system, especially with CPU-reliant tasks.

AMD is assuring users that a software fix for both issues are currently under development, and are expected to be released sometime later in October. Suffice to say, it’s best to stick with Windows 10 until the solutions are made available if you’re running a Ryzen-equipped system.

iPhone Users Reporting Overheating And Battery Issues With Spotify On iOS 15

iPhone owners using the latest iOS 15 update have reported issues of overheating and battery draining when running Spotify. According to a support thread on the music streaming service’s official forum that was created last week, dozens of users have been reporting the same issue with one user even claiming that the music app drains through 30-40% of their iPhone’s battery every hour.

Initially, the forum’s admins responded by continuously giving generic advice, such as removing and reinstalling the app and suggesting users to try disabling Background App Refresh for Spotify on their iPhone – all of which were ineffective. Spotify finally acknowledged the battery drain complaints on Monday, and stated that the relevant team is working on the issue.

Besides that, there are also reports of similar issues occurring on older versions of iOS, including 14.7 and 14.8. Some users reported that the app would crash whenever their iPhones were locked, while others said that they have uninstalled Spotify altogether as a result of overheating issues.

As of now, there’s no confirmation on whether this is a problem with iOS or Spotify. One of the affected iPhone owners said they’ve tried using an older version of the streaming app and concluded that these issues only occur on newer releases, though they did not specify which versions exactly.

Spotify recommends that users always keep their app up-to-date for the latest patches, but gave no definitive timeline on when this issue will be resolved. Apple is said to be releasing iOS 15.0.1 soon, which would hopefully shed some light on the matter.

Google Adds Warning For “Unreliable Search Results” On Emerging Issues

Google recently updated its search engine with an additional feature. Now, when people perform a Google search on a breaking story or a topic that is “rapidly evolving”, the search engine will alert them through pop-ups to the potential unreliability of its results.

The new prompt encourages users to take note that the topic in question is developing, so the search results are rapidly changing as new information is made available. The prompt, which appears above the search results, says, “If this topic is new, it can sometimes take time for results to be added by reliable sources.” Basically, the prompt is cautioning users to take everything with a grain of salt and wait for more information to come to light.

Google said its software systems will decide when the warning needs to be triggered by detecting rapidly developing topics that have a limited range of sources. “We’ll now show a notice indicating that it may be best to check back later when more information from a wider range of sources might be available,” Danny Sullivan, Google’s public liaison for search, wrote in a blog post.

According to a report from TechCrunch on Thursday, Google began testing this feature a week ago. However, the company stated at the time that only a small percentage of search results were showing the warning. The features will be rolled out to U.S. users over the coming months, the company said on Friday.

In recent years, Google has employed several fact-checking measures to prevent the spread of misinformation and include critical context for topics that go viral on the web. With all the focus on issues related to misinformation, extremism, and toxicity on its platforms, Google has developed several fact-checking features such as warning labels to image searches and knowledge labels to help fight these problems. Critics have ramped up their criticism of COVID-19, as well as elections since Silicon Valley giants have tried to combat their opponents’ claims regarding COVID-19, as well as other issues.

Resident Evil Village Crack Reportedly Fixes Stuttering Issues

DRM has always been a touchy subject, especially so if its implementation affects gameplay. Resident Evil Village seems to be the latest game to serve as an example. Pirates have managed to crack the game, and it reportedly fixes a performance issue that some paying customers have been reporting.

DSOGaming reported that the PC version of Resident Evil Village has had stuttering issues. A common way to recreate it seems to be simply killing enemies which, as you’d imagine, is common enough. But over the weekend, a cracker managed to work its way through the game’s DRM. And the folks at DSOGaming found that the cracked version essentially solved the stuttering issue.

This points to the DRM in Resident Evil Village, a combination of Nenuvo and Capcom’s own anti-tamper software, causing performance issues. Though Denuvo prevents another hit to its already tarnished name here, as the crack only disables Capcom’s DRM.

But even if it’s not Denuvo’s fault this time, it’s another instance of anti-piracy measures hurting the paying customer instead of pirates. Resident Evil Village, and its players, are the latest victims. Judging from the amount of money Crytek paid to have Denuvo DRM in Crysis Remastered, it must’ve been an equally big sum for Capcom. And it’s unnecessary spending on the publisher’s part, since it put in its own DRM, which ultimately got cracked.

It’s probably worth mentioning that this article is not condoning piracy. But publishers should pay attention to this case study. If they spend less money on DRM, then that’s less money that they “need” to charge customers for. Or even if they charge us the same, that’s more money to pay their developers, use as budget for upcoming games, or line the pockets of executives and shareholders. The last one notwithstanding, those options all sounds better than paying for something that not only doesn’t work, but also has a chance of punishing the paying customer.

Windows 10 KB5001330 Update Reportedly Causing Framerate Issues And BSODs For Gamers

Microsoft’s latest Windows 10 Patch Tuesday update has reportedly been the bane of gamers. According to a post on Reddit, a gamer by the username of u/m4ddan says that they have been facing numerous issues while gaming, after he had installed the update.

The problems that they encountered after the patch supposedly includes stuttering, framerates wildly fluctuating, a non-functioning V-Sync, and sudden FPS drops whenever they shared their gameplay on Discord. At this point, the issue clearly isn’t an isolated incident and at the time of writing, the subreddit has more than 80 comments from users, all expressing discontent and anger over the same issues.

The good news is that uninstalling the update and reverting back to the previous version of Windows 10 eliminates the issue. That said, this isn’t the first time a Windows 10 update has caused grief for users, and there is a laundry list. As far back as 2018, updates to the OS have been known to cause its own digital assistant, Cortana, to freeze; Bluetooth connections to fail; unnecessary defragging of SSDs and an update last year that could damage the storage medium if users performed a Check Disk scan.

Then, if that wasn’t bad enough, the March update last month also contained a bug that causes systems to BSOD whenever a system tried to use a printer.

At the time of writing, Microsoft did not comment, neither did it specify when a fix to the update would be available.

Law Firm Currently Investigating Potential Lawsuit Over PS5 DualSense Drifting Issues

Chimicles Schwartz Kriner & Donaldson-Smith LLP (CSK&D), the firm that filed a lawsuit against Nintendo and its drifting Joy-Con controller, recently announced that the law firm is looking into a potential class-action lawsuit against Sony. More specifically, the lawsuit is aimed directly at a drifting issue involving the PlayStation 5’s (PS5) DualSense controller.

The firm is currently reaching out to affected PS5 customers who have or are currently experiencing said drifting issues via an online form on its page. Several complaints indicate that the DualSense controller either suffer from joystick drifting issues or just fail prematurely.

In regards to the former issue, some PS5 owners are reporting their DualSense controllers automatically registering movement, even when the joystick is not being controlled. Naturally, this can lead to some form of hindrance and interference in while gaming and as such, it’s unsurprising that these individuals would want to air out their grievances to Sony.

As mentioned earlier, this isn’t the first time CSK&D has handled a case involving faulty controllers. Back in 2019, the firm filed a lawsuit against Nintendo of America over drifting Joy-Con controllers. Ultimately, the court decided to put the case into arbitration, although, at the time of writing, CSK&D says that it is still looking for someone to help them settle the dispute.