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MacworldAt a glanceExpert's RatingProsVery fast RAID 0 performance2TB to 32TB capacityCross-platform SoftRAID Pro includedRugged carrying case.ConsSuper expensiveOur Verdict Its pricey, but OWCs Thunderblade four-slot, NVMe SSD Thunderbolt 3 enclosure delivers the performance goodswith up to 32TB of capacityto the pros that need it. Price When ReviewedThis value will show the geolocated pricing text for product undefinedBest Pricing TodayOWCs ThunderBlade delivers excellent read and write performance in a handsome, svelte package that is available in capacities up to a whopping 32TB. In fact its the third fastest external SSD weve tested, and the fastest Thunderbolt SSD in the charts. What it is not, is cheap. Expect to lay down thousands, not hundreds for the experience. For a product aimed at film and video pros, thats not generally an issue. For you and meThe ThunderBlade is a black, radiator-finned, 4-slot NVMe M.2 SSD enclosure measuring approximately 7.5-inches long, by 4.75-inches wide, by 1-inch tall. Its a rather hefty (and sexy by my lights) beast at 1-pound, 10-ounces. No inadvertently sliding off the table with this one.The Thunderbolt 3 ports and power connector on the back of the ThunderBlade.A 3-inch long slit on the front is home to the power/activity LED, while the rear of the unit offers up two Thunderbolt 3 ports as well as the DC input jack. The power brick (AC adapter) that fits into said input is 15 volts and 4.8 amps.As its envisioned as fast, rugged storage for video fieldwork, the ThunderBlade comes in a sturdy carrying case that fits both the drive and the power adapter. The case is made of thick, impact-resistant plastic that were sure will hold up.The ThunderBlade sitting in its rugged carrying case.The ThunderBlade ships with a three-year license for the Pro version of the companys cross-platform SoftRAID software. After three years, you lose the ability to create new arrays, but basic functionality remains intactyou dont lose use of the drive.You may of course also use macOSs or Windows own software solutions, but youre then tied to one or the other operating system. One reason I prefer hardware RAID is that its OS-independent. Many of the recovery tools I use are Linux-based.Note that the ThunderBlade is also available in an eight-slot version, logically monikered the ThunderBlade X8. Alas, youd think it would top out at 64TB, but its currently sitting at 16TB with a 32TB version out soon. We wish there were unpopulated versions of both the four-slot and eight-slot.OWC ThunderBlade: PriceHold onto your hats folks: the entry-level 2TB ThunderBlade we tested costs a cool $800. It gets steeper from there, with the 4TB version costing $1,180, the 8TB version is $1,800, the 16TB version is $2800, and the 32TB version setting you back a rather daunting $6,000.The ThunderBlade sitting on its side, upright.The pricing places the ThunderBlade firmly in AV professional territory, as there are certainly cheaper ways for end users to get this type of performance and capacity. At least up to 16TB. 8TB SSDs still carry a hefty premium at well over $1,000 each (four are in the 32TB version).OWCs own 1M2 and especially Adatas SE920 40Gbps USB 4 SSDs come to mind as more affordable options for end users.Still, OWC makes high-quality goods and the warranty is three years which is good for an external drive. But given the price, we do wish the SoftRAID Pro license was perpetual, not limited to three years.How fast is the ThunderBlade?Pretty darn fast would be the answer to this question. Even with the four smaller 480GB SSDs OWC shipped in our test unit, the ThunderBlade proved the third fastest external SSD Ive tested. Its bested only by the aforementioned Adata SE920 and OWCs 1M2both 40Gbps USB 4 drives.Testing on a Mac Studio with AmorphousDiskMark and Disk Speed test proceeded without incident, but there were one or two incidents with PCWorlds test bed that are described at the end of this section.We tested in RAID 0 and RAID 1+0, which you might consider for redundancy in the larger capacity configurations. We also tested the ThunderBlade in non-RAID as single drives but performance was as weak as it was with the recently reviewed OWC Express 4M2. About 840MBps reading, and 750MBps writing.IMHO, theres no reason to buy a ThunderBlade if you dont run it in RAID 0. NVMe SSDs are not the failure risks that hard drives are, and there are cheaper options for single drives.Nothing wrong with these sequential and random transfer numbers from AmorphousDiskMark. .Blackmagicdesigns Disk Speed Test rated the ThunderBlade as considerably slower than AmorphousDiskMark, with the latter being more in line with the Windows test tools shown after the Disk Speed Test graphic.Disk Speed Test didnt rate the ThunderBlade at highly as AmorphousDiskMarkCrystalDiskMark 8 on IDGs PCWorld Windows test bed thought very highly of the TunderBlades sequential transfer capabilities as you can see below. Though not as fast as the USB 4 drives, the ThunderBlade is pretty darn fast.Random performance under CrystalDiskMark 8 was good, but not as good as the USB 4 drives.Random performance under CrystalDiskMark 8 was good, but not as good as the USB 4 drives.The ThunderBlade was very fast in our 48GB transfer tests. Holding its own against the two extremely fast USB 4 SSDs.The ThunderBlade was very fast in our 48GB transfer tests. Holding its own with the two extremely fst USB 4 SSDs.The SSDs being only 480GB did rule out our 450GB (483 billion bytes) write to a single drive, but we expect it would be as slow as the 4M2s[link when possible) we recently reviewed. The ThunderBlade in RAID 0 is fantastic in this large file write, portending good things when you stream 4K or 8K video to it.The ThunderBlade as fantastic in this large file write, portending good things when you stream 4K or 8K video to it.As to those Window idiosyncrasies, in a couple of instances, a reboot was required before a SoftRAID volume or the separate drives would show up. And bizarrely, when I forgot to reformat to NTFS from APFS, SoftRAID still mounted the APFS volume and CrystalDiskMark 8 and AS SSD both ran fine. By what mechanism this was possible, I have no idea (no other suitable software installed) unless SoftRAID sports an APFS driver for Windows. If it does, it isnt perfect as our real-world 48GB test write froze at the 88 percent mark. Once reformatted to NTFS, everything was hunky-dory and the ThunderBlade performed as advertised.Should you buy the OWC Thunderblade 4?We like the styling, we love the rugged enclosure and carrying case, and the performance is excellent in RAID 0the only way the ThunderBlade should be utilized by my lights. That leaves financial wherewithal as your sole consideration when buying a ThunderBlade.

MacworldThe Apple TV+ service recently had its five-year anniversary, so on this episode of the Macworld Podcast, we talk about Apples foray into the entertainment streaming industry. What has the experience been, what can we expect in the future, and, of course, what are our favorite shows.This is episode 912 with Jason Cross, Michael Simon, and Roman Loyola.Watch episode 912 on YouTubeListen to episode 912 on Apple PodcastsListen to episode 912 on SpotifySubscribe to the Macworld PodcastYou can subscribe to the Macworld Podcastor leave us a review!right here in the Podcasts app. The Macworld Podcast is also available on Spotify and on the Macworld Podcast YouTube channel. Or you can point your favorite podcast-savvy RSS reader at: https://feeds.megaphone.fm/macworldTo find previous episodes, visit Macworlds podcast page or our home on MegaPhone.Apple

South Koreas sudden political upheaval has raised fresh concerns for its economy and global supply chains, with analysts warning of potential disruptions to its critical technology exports.As a major producer of memory chips, displays, and other critical tech components, South Korea plays an essential role in global supply chains for products ranging from smartphones to data centers.

Apple has faced an unequal battle in recent years as some lawmakers, the FBI, and regulators insist that the company create backdoors through which to access messages and other parts of its platform.Apple and others have always insisted that there is no such thing as a safe backdoor, and that if one person has access, then its only a matter of time until others gain access, too.Use encryption for all your communicationsNow, the FBI seems to agree.In a recent security warning, the FBI and the US Infrastructure Security Agency have warned people to use encrypted apps such as iMessage and FaceTime for communication in order to retain security resilienceagainst foreign hackers.They also warn people to avoid using Rich Communication Services (RCS) when sharing messages between iPhones and Android devices, as RCS does not yet provide end-to-end encryption. (It isallegedly coming eventually, according to RCS standards body, the GSMA). What this means is that Android and iPhone users should probably consider installingSignal for cross platform communications, which does provide cross-platform encryption.Apple also continues to invest in encryption technologies to protect its customers, and recently introduced upgraded protection against future high-level attacks that use quantum computersto break into your communications.An about face?Whats noteworthy about the FBI warning is that the agency has been battling Apple for years to convince it to put backdoors into its encryption ostensibly to enable law enforcement. Apple has resisted so far, arguing that once you leave any form of vulnerability in any platform you are automatically placing customers at risk.Knowledge of these back doors will inevitably slip outside the control of law enforcement into the hands of nation state attackers and eventually criminal groups, making everybody far less secure and placingpersonal, commercial, and national interest at risk. Not only does such weakened encryption directly threatenpersonal privacy, it also undermines national security.A former head of UK national security agency MI5 warned of thisalmost a decade ago, while Apple software Vice President Craig Federighi has similarly warned: Weakening security makes no sense when you consider that customers rely on our products to keep their personal information safe, run their businesses or even manage vital infrastructure like power grids and transportation systems.All the same, demands that Apple weaken platform security by diluting device encryption have remained. But with the attack environment now in a red zone, the FBI issued its warning about encryption.It comes after a CISA warning concerning ongoing attacks by China-based hackers.So, what is the FBI saying?Our suggestion, what we have told folks internally, is not new here: Encryption is your friend, whether its on text messaging or if you have the capacity to use encrypted voice communication,said Jeff Greene, executive assistant director for cybersecurity at the CISA. Even if the adversary is able to intercept the data, if it is encrypted, it will make it impossible [to use].The FBI also shared a recipe for security that should be on the desk of every IT purchaser. It recommends you use mobile devices that automatically receive timely OS updates, have encryption built in, and use multi-factor authentication for most collaboration tools. In other words, use a higher-end smartphone in preference to a low-end land-fill wannabe. Or, given that the best way to ensure security in your tech is toinvest in secure products, use an iPhone, which has built-in encryption and is designed with a security-first agenda.That focus on security likely reflects how Apple approaches the topic.The next big warAfter all, it was almost a decade ago that Apple CEO Tim Cook warned: I think some of the top people predict that the next big war is fought on cybersecurity. With hacking getting more and more sophisticated, the hacking community has gone from the hobbyist in the basement to huge, sophisticated companies that are essentially doing this, or groups of people or foreign agents inside and outside the United States. People are running huge enterprises off of hacking and stealing data. So yes, every software release we do, we get more and more secure,he said at the time.Now, at last, the FBI seems to agree that encryption makes us safer. We really should keep using it, andreject argumentsagainst doing so.You can follow me on social media! Join me onBlueSky, LinkedIn,Mastodon, andMeWe.

Google DeepMind has unveiled an AI model thats better at predicting the weather than the current best systems. The new model, dubbed GenCast, is published in Nature today.This is the second AI weather model that Google has launched in just the past few months. In July, it published details of NeuralGCM, a model that combined AI with physics-based methods like those used in existing forecasting tools. That model performed similarly to conventional methods but used less computing power.GenCast is different, as it relies on AI methods alone. It works sort of like ChatGPT, but instead of predicting the next most likely word in a sentence, it produces the next most likely weather condition. In training, it starts with random parameters, or weights, and compares that prediction with real weather data. Over the course of training, GenCasts parameters begin to align with the actual weather.The model was trained on 40 years of weather data (1979 to 2018) and then generated a forecast for 2019. In its predictions, it was more accurate than the current best forecast, the Ensemble Forecast, ENS, 97% of the time, and it was better at predicting wind conditions and extreme weather like the path of tropical cyclones. Better wind prediction capability increases the viability of wind power, because it helps operators calculate when they should turn their turbines on and off. And better estimates for extreme weather can help in planning for natural disasters.Google DeepMind isnt the only big tech firm that is applying AI to weather forecasting. Nvidia released FourCastNet in 2022. And in 2023 Huawei developed its Pangu-Weather model, which trained on 39 years of data. It produces deterministic forecaststhose providing a single number rather than a range, like a prediction that tomorrow will have a temperature of 30 F or 0.7 inches of rainfall.GenCast differs from Pangu-Weather in that it produces probabilistic forecastslikelihoods for various weather outcomes rather than precise predictions. For example, the forecast might be There is a 40% chance of the temperature hitting a low of 30 F or There is a 60% chance of 0.7 inches of rainfall tomorrow. This type of analysis helps officials understand the likelihood of different weather events and plan accordingly.These results dont mean the end of conventional meteorology as a field. The model is trained on past weather conditions, and applying them to the far future may lead to inaccurate predictions for a changing and increasingly erratic climate.GenCast is still reliant on a data set like ERA5, which is an hourly estimate of various atmospheric variables going back to 1940, says Aaron Hill, an assistant professor at the School of Meteorology at the University of Oklahoma, who was not involved in this research. The backbone of ERA5 is a physics-based model, he says.In addition, there are many variables in our atmosphere that we dont directly observe, so meteorologists use physics equations to figure out estimates. These estimates are combined with accessible observational data to feed into a model like GenCast, and new data will always be required. A model that was trained up to 2018 will do worse in 2024 than a model trained up to 2023 will do in 2024, says Ilan Price, researcher at DeepMind and one of the creators of GenCast.In the future, DeepMind plans to test models directly using data such as wind or humidity readings to see how feasible it is to make predictions on observation data alone.There are still many parts of forecasting that AI models still struggle with, like estimating conditions in the upper troposphere. And while the model may be good at predicting where a tropical cyclone may go, it underpredicts the intensity of cyclones, because theres not enough intensity data in the models training.The current hope is to have meteorologists working in tandem with GenCast. Theres actual meteorological experts that are looking at the forecast, making judgment calls, and looking at additional data if they dont trust a particular forecast, says Price.Hill agrees. Its the value of a human being able to put these pieces together that is significantly undervalued when we talk about AI prediction systems, he says. Human forecasters look at way more information, and they can distill that information to make really good forecasts.