Over the years, Intel's built a pretty strong lineup when it comes to its processors. The company also recently dove into the world of budget graphics cards with its Arc line, providing gamers with new and affordable options. Naturally, the Arc line can't and isn't meant to compete with the higher-end offerings out right now, but it's a good start.

AMC’s logos as seen in the trailer for the second season of Dark Winds. | Screenshot: Wes Davis / The Verge A handful of AMC Plus shows, including Fear the Walking Dead and Killing Eve, will have a temporary home on Max, Warner Bros. Discovery’s streaming service, starting September 1st and going through October 31st. Statements provided to multiple outlets by executives from both services’ parent companies make it clear the goal of the deal is to help AMC Plus while adding more content to Max, which is good because, with the strikes in Hollywood bringing productions to a halt and the challenges AMC is facing in the cable space, both companies probably need it. “This promotional arrangement with Warner Bros. Discovery is a terrific opportunity to serve up some of our most popular and critically acclaimed programming to millions of Max... Continue reading…

Photo by Paul Hennessy / Anadolu Agency via Getty Images A new crew recently arrived at the International Space Station (ISS), ready to begin a six-month stint of life in orbit. During its stay, Crew-7 will work on scientific research, including a new suite of experiments into the effects of spaceflight on the human body over time — information that could be crucial to future crewed missions to the Moon and beyond.The crew consists of NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli, European Space Agency astronaut Andreas Mogensen, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Satoshi Furukawa, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Konstantin Borisov.The launch had been scheduled for Friday, August 25th, but was delayed by around 24 hours for an extra safety review of the valves in the Dragon’s environmental control and... Continue reading…

Illustration by Laura Normand / The Verge Elon Musk’s Tesla almost ran a red light while livestreaming a demo of Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (FSD) beta software. Musk was also livestreaming the demo while in the driver’s seat, violating Tesla’s rules for its advanced driver-assist technology. Oh, and he kind of doxxes Mark Zuckerberg, too. The roughly 45-minute video was meant to demonstrate the prowess of v12 of Tesla’s advanced driver-assist technology, which has yet to be released to customers. And while the vehicle appears to be operating safely for the majority of the trip, it still ends up being a bizarre experience — which is typical of all things Musk.https://t.co/VzTxpktH1q— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 26, 2023At around the 19-minute mark, Musk is forced to take... Continue reading…

Illustration by Laura Normand / The Verge Amazon CEO Andy Jassy has a message to employees who don’t want to return to the office: “It’s not going to work out for you.” That’s according to a report from Insider, which says Jassy made that statement during a meeting earlier this month.While Amazon ordered its employees to return to the office for three days per week starting in May, many Amazon employees weren’t happy about the decision. Thousands of workers signed a petition against the mandate and staged a walkout in response.That clearly hasn’t changed Amazon’s position on the matter. In a recording of the meeting obtained by Insider, Jassy told workers, “It’s past the time to disagree and commit,” adding that “if you can’t disagree and commit... it’s probably not going to... Continue reading…

Image: The Verge The next version of Microsoft’s Edge web browser might end up with fewer features than before. The new Edge version 117, which is currently in beta and expected to turn stable on September 14th, according to Neowin and 9to5Google, has five features slated for removal. Those features include Math Solver, Picture Dictionary, Citations, Grammar Tools, and Kids Mode.Microsoft previously mentioned the “deprecation” of these features in its last beta channel release notes on August 25th. The company said the reason is to “improve end user experience and simplify the More tools menu.” Screenshot: Umar Shakir / The Verge The More Tools menu on a stable release of Microsoft Edge. As Microsoft tries to get more people... Continue reading…

Google Home automations just got a lot more powerful. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge Google Home is getting smarter. In a pair of blog posts published today, Google announced a bunch of new automation starters and actions rolling out in the Home app as well as some really cool features coming to the script editor for those enrolled in Public Preview. The new starters in the Home app include the ability to trigger routines when devices open or close, in response to temperature or humidity changes or occupancy sensing, if devices are plugged in, start charging, or dock or undock, or if the volume is muted or unmuted. Image: Google The new automations go a long way toward making Google Home an actual smart home platform. New actions include opening or closing devices (like shades), pausing or... Continue reading…

Poe is now available on the web, iOS, Android, and the Mac. | Image: The Verge Poe, the AI chatbot platform created by Quora, has added a slew of updates, including a Mac app, the ability to have multiple simultaneous conversations with the same AI bot, access to Meta’s Llama 2 model, and more. It’s also planning an enterprise tier so that companies can manage the platform for their employees, according to an email that was recently sent to Poe users.As my colleague David Pierce wrote in April, Poe’s ambition is to be the web browser for AI chatbots. Adam D’Angelo, the CEO of Poe’s parent company Quora, also sits on the board of OpenAI and thinks that the number of AI bots will keep increasing. Poe wants to be the one place where you can find them all. “I think there’s going to be this massive ecosystem similar... Continue reading…

Illustration: The Verge OpenAI finally released a version of ChatGPT that promises to protect business data as more companies consider using the platform but worry about privacy and security. In a blog post, OpenAI said ChatGPT Enterprise offers better security and privacy, unlimited high-speed access to GPT-4, more powerful data analysis so companies understand information much faster, and the ability to ask more complicated questions to ChatGPT.Privacy and security have been a concern for businesses who fear their data could be used to train ChatGPT and are worried that using the tool might accidentally expose sensitive customer information to AI models. OpenAI said users of ChatGPT Enterprise will have control and ownership over their data, which will not... Continue reading…

Do you want to learn how to lazy load images in WordPress?Lazy loading allows your website to only load images when a user scrolls down to a specific image, which reduces the website load time and improves website performance. Many popular image-heavy sites use lazy loading to boost website speed and performance.In this article, we will show you how to easily lazy load images in WordPress, step by step.Why Lazy Load Images in WordPress?Lazy loading WordPress images can speed up your website and offer a better user experience.No one likes slow websites. In fact, a performance study found that a 1-second delay in page load time leads to 7% fewer conversions, 11% fewer pageviews, and a 16% decrease in customer satisfaction.Search engines like Google don’t like slow-loading websites, either. This is why faster sites rank higher in the search results.Images take the most time to load on your website compared to other web elements. If you add a lot of images to your articles, then each image increases your page load time.One way to handle this situation is to use a CDN service like BunnyCDN. A CDN will let users download images from a web server closest to them and reduce website loading speeds.However, your images will still be loaded and affect the overall page load time. To get past this issue, you can delay image loading by implementing lazy load on your website.How does lazy loading for images work?Instead of loading all your images at once, lazy loading downloads only the images visible on the user’s screen. It replaces all other images with a placeholder image or blank space.As a user scrolls down the page, your website loads images that are visible in the browser’s viewing area.Lazy loading can be very beneficial to your WordPress blog:It reduces the initial web page loading time so that users will see your site faster.It conserves bandwidth by only delivering images that are viewed, which can save you money on WordPress hosting costs.The release of WordPress 5.5 added lazy loading as a default feature.However, if you want to customize how your images lazy load and also lazy load background images, then you will need to use a WordPress plugin.Let’s take a look at how to lazy load images in WordPress using two different plugins. You can use the quick links below to jump straight to the method you want to use:Lazy Load Images in WordPress With WP Rocket (Recommended)Lazy Load Images in WordPress With Optimole (Free)Bonus Tips to Optimize Your WordPress ImagesMethod 1: Lazy Load Images in WordPress With WP RocketWe recommend using the WP Rocket plugin to lazy load images in WordPress. It’s the best WordPress caching plugin on the market that lets you easily turn on image lazy loading.Aside from that, it’s a very powerful plugin that helps you optimize your website speed without knowing complex technical terms or configuring expert settings.Right out of the box, all of their default recommended caching settings will greatly speed up your WordPress website.The first thing you will need to do is install and activate the WP Rocket plugin. For more details, you can see our guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.To enable image lazy loading, all you have to do is check a few boxes. You can even enable lazy loading for videos, which will improve your website speed even more.All you need to do is go to Settings » WP Rocket in your WordPress dashboard and click on the ‘Media’ tab. Then, you can scroll to the ‘LazyLoad’ section and check the boxes next to ‘Enable for images’ and ‘Enable for iframes and videos’.For more details, see our guide on how to properly install and set up WP Rocket in WordPress.Note: If you are using Siteground as your WordPress hosting provider, then you can use the free SiteGround Optimizer plugin that has similar lazy loading features.Method 2: Lazy Load Images in WordPress With OptimoleThis method uses the free Optimole plugin. It’s one of the best WordPress image compression plugins that lets you easily enable image lazy loading.If you get over 5,000 visitors per month, then you will need the premium version of Optimole.First, you need to install and activate the Optimole plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.Upon activation, you will see a screen asking you to sign up for an API key. You can also find this screen by navigating to Optimole in the admin menu.You’ll need to make sure that the email address listed is correct and then click the ‘Create & connect your account’ button. Alternatively, if you are an existing user, then just click the ‘I already have an API key’ button.You may need to wait for a few seconds while the plugin connects to Optimole. After that, the plugin will automatically start to optimize your images so that your visitors will now see the best images for their devices.While that is happening, you can click on the ‘Settings’ tab to configure lazy load.Here, you need to make sure the ‘Scale images and & Lazy load’ setting is enabled. This will generate images based on your visitor’s screen size and improve loading speeds.Next, click on the ‘Advanced’ menu option and select ‘Lazyload’. On this screen, there are a few different settings that let you customize how your images will lazy load.First, you can adjust the ‘Exclude first number of images from lazyload’ setting. This will stop images at the top of your posts or pages from lazy loading, so images above the fold will always appear.You can set this to 0 if you want every image to lazy load.There are a few other advanced lazy load settings in Optimole that you can check. These settings are enabled by default.The first is the ‘Scale Images’ setting. This will scale images to the visitor’s screen size and make your page load faster.After that, you will see the ‘Enable lazyload for background images’ setting. This will lazy load your background images, which may be the largest images on your website.Another setting is lazy loading embedded videos and iframes. If you have a lot of embedded video content, then you will want to leave this setting on. It will load a placeholder image in place of the video. When the placeholder is clicked, the full video will load.You can continue to customize these settings and see what works best for your website and your images.Before you exit the plugin settings, make sure to click the ‘Save changes’ button at the bottom of the page.Bonus Tips to Optimize Your WordPress ImagesAlthough lazy loading will help to improve website loading speed, there are a few other ways to optimize your WordPress images for the best performance.For example, we recommend compressing your images before uploading them to your website using a tool like TinyPNG or JPEGmini. Alternatively, you can use an automated image compression plugin such as Optimole or EWWW Image Optimizer.It’s also important to choose the right WordPress image size and file format for your images. JPEGs are best for photos or images with many colors, PNGs are suitable for simple or transparent images, and GIFs are only for animated images.We hope this article helped you learn how to lazy load images in WordPress. You may also want to see our tutorial on how to easily optimize images for the web without losing quality and our expert picks of the best web design software.If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.The post How to Easily Lazy Load Images in WordPress (2 Ways) first appeared on WPBeginner.

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Amazon is once again flirting with a $35 minimum for non-Prime subscribers to qualify for free shipping. It’s currently testing the increased minimum order amount, which has been set at $25 since 2017. The price actually started at $25 before Amazon raised it to $35 in 2013, then raised it again to $49 in 2016, when it began lowering it to $35 and, later, $25. (Yes, it’s all very confusing.)Amazon’s ongoing roller-coaster ride of pricing naturally pushes people toward its $139 per-year Prime membership — where you don’t have to worry about minimum order amounts on items that qualify for free two-day shipping (or faster).CNBC’s reporting indicates that the minimum order hike hasn’t yet rolled out to all non-Prime accounts, and a quick... Continue reading…

When considering a new motherboard for an Intel desktop PC build, the socket and chipset are the most important parts as they determine what processors are supported. The most recent chips from Intel are 12th and 13th-generation Core processors, using the LGA 1700 socket and 600 or 700 chipsets, and we'll be recommending motherboards with these configurations. Depending on what you're planning to use the PC for, it's possible to pick up a motherboard for less than $150 or spend as much as $600. While we'd always recommend spending a little more on the motherboard to ensure you're getting enough features, there are plenty of options available.