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Luxury automaker Mercedes-Benz foreshadows the debut of its E-Class series of vehicles' newest member with a dark peek at the 2017 Mercedes-Benz E-Class Cabriolet. The open top four-seater will join the sedan, coupe and (in European markets) wagon variants, completing the updates to the series when it debuts at the 2017 Geneva Auto Show in just two weeks. Like the model that precedes it, the new Cabriolet should feature a power retractable hardtop look. It's a heck of a lot like the 2018 E-Class Coupe -- which only just debuted back in December -- when that top is raised. I also expect the Coupe's 3.0-liter V6 engine to make an appearance under the hood with its 329 horsepower and 354 pound-feet of torque in tow. The automaker's new suite of cabin tech and semi-autonomous driver aid technologies should complete the new package. The new E-Cab will share the stage in Switzerland with six other premieres from the Mercedes-Maybach and Mercedes-AMG sub-brands. The performance-oriented AMG will debut a new "alternative drive" concept car -- I'm hoping for something sexy and electric to complement the German automaker's new EQ electrification initiative -- alongside a trio of special edition models, including the AMG GT C Roadster "Edition 50," the C63 S Cabriolet "Ocean Blue Edition" and C43 Coupe "Night Edition." Rounding out the bunch is the premiere of the new Mercedes-AMG E63 S Wagon. Meanwhile, the rugged G-Class has its poshness cranked up to 11 with an appearance by the Mercedes-Maybach G650 Landaulet. This variation augments the SUV with Maybach's high-level of cabin luxury as well as a power-operated fabric top. Don't expect to see this one sold in the US anytime soon. Stay tuned to all of Roadshow's coverage of the 2017 Geneva Auto Show for more details, photos and video as they emerge.

It isn't often that a company as tight-lipped as Samsung confirms a future phone down to its very name, but extreme times call for extreme measures. Having had to toss out its entire Note 7 production in the wake of two combustible battery flaws, Samsung has apparently decided to reveal some details. Note phones are all about that stylus. Sarah Tew/CNET So here's what we know about the Note 8 for sure. 1. It's happening. Samsung mobile chief DJ Koh confirmed this to CNET. Both that the phone is coming as part of the Note's yearly release cycle, and that it will indeed be called the Note 8. 2. The Note 8 will use Samsung's new eight-point battery test, which the company instituted as part of a revised testing measure after discovering holes in its battery testing that led to the Note 7 failures. In fact, the upcoming Galaxy S8 phone will use it too, along with every other Samsung phone going forward. 3. The Galaxy Note 8 shouldn't be confused with the Galaxy S8, a separate phone that's expected to debut in March or April. What else? There haven't been a lot of other leaks so far. We're still expecting the Note 8 to come in August if it continues to follow Samsung's typical release cycle. Last year's Note 7 came a little earlier than usual (early August rather than late August), but the phone has been announced before Apple's yearly iPhone (early September) ever since the Note series began. In recent years it's shown up in stores before the iPhone, too. Even after skipping the Note 6, the Note 8 will still be Samsung's eighth Note phone. Josh Miller/CNET Note phones represent Samsung's power user series. They're large-screen devices equipped with a digital stylus called the S Pen. The Note 7 was the first handset other than the experimental Edge series to feature a curved screen. Now that the Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus are expected to also have large screens and curved sides by default, it's anyone's guess how the Note 8 will stand out from the S8 and S8 Plus, apart from that S Pen. We do know that Samsung Note usually has specs that are a half-step above that year's Galaxy S device. It often gets new software features, too -- a sentiment echoed by Koh when he spoke to CNET: "I will bring back a better, safer and very innovative Note 8," Koh said. But with the S8 phones right around the corner and the Note 8 still months away, there's still plenty of time for rumors and leaks to form a picture of the future phone that could restore the Note family's charred reputation.

Apple's futuristic new headquarters will open in April. The first employees will move into the 175-acre Apple Park campus while building work continues across the large parkland site. It'll take six months for Apple's 12,000 staff to move from the existing Cupertino HQ into the new campus nearby in the Santa Clara valley, which has at its heart a ring-shaped, 2.8 million-square-foot main building clad in curved glass. Also in the campus is the 1,000-seat Steve Jobs theatre, entered through a 20-foot-tall glass tube measuring 165 feet in diameter. Jobs described the building as "like a spaceship landing" when he first proposed the development to the Cupertino city council in 2011. Despite Apple's infamous secrecy, the site will be open to the public, with a visitor centre, cafe and Apple Store.

Microsoft's having a good generation with Windows 10 and Xbox One, according to Xbox Head Phil Spencer. He had a quick chat with his follower XBX4LFE on Twitter, who said Xbox is not performing pretty well and is basically not good enough to compete with PS4, as many users don't own a Windows 10 PC or don't care about the Redmond giant improving in the personal computer space. "Strange comments. Xbox is having a good gen, our best yet. XB1S strong since launch. Can always improve but proud of where we are," Spencer answered, confirming he's confident with the offer Microsoft is giving to all the gamers and not just to the PC users who are all of a sudden gaining games once upon a time console exclusives. This time, it's easy to understand both the positions. Xbox 2017 lineup might be pretty good, with State of Decay 2, Sea of Thieves, Crackdown 3, all coming this year - together with Halo Wars 2 which has already released. But actually we don't have many clues about those specific titles and more importantly there seems to be a lack of good AAA single player blockbusters, a space where the upcoming and yet to be announced Forza Motorsport 7 game doesn't seem to fit.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) recently revealed beautiful but frightening images of a huge area of ice breaking off from the Pine Island Glacier in Antarctica. "The Larsen Ice Shelf is situated along the northeastern coast of the Antarctic Peninsula, one of the fastest-warming places on the planet," they say. "In the past three decades, two large sections of the ice shelf have collapsed. A third section seems like it may be on a similar trajectory, with a new iceberg poised to break away soon." Pine Island is one of the main glaciers responsible for moving ice from the interior of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet to the ocean. This as the US National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) also released a statement confirming that the sea ice around Antarctica has shrunk to the smallest annual extent on record. Ice floating around the frozen continent usually melts to its smallest for the year around the end of February, at the peak of the southern hemisphere summer, before expanding again as the autumn chill sets in. SEE PICS: Climate change is causing Antarctic snows to shrink This year, however, the sea ice extent contracted to 2.287 million square kilometres on 13 February, pointing to the lowest it has even been recorded in the 38-year satellite record. The new record-low is but a fraction smaller than a previous low of 2.290 million square kilometres, which was recorded on 27 February 1997, but confirms the intensifying on global warming. Take a look: According to Ian Howat, a glaciologist at Ohio State University, this ice-calving event was about 10 times smaller than in July 2015, when a 30-kilometre-long rift developed below the ice surface, then broke through and calved an iceberg spanning 583 square kilometres. “I think this event is the calving equivalent of an ‘aftershock’ following the much bigger event,” Howat says. “Apparently, there are weaknesses in the ice shelf—just inland of the rift that caused the 2015 calving—that are resulting in these smaller breaks.” NASA says they've detected several more rifts on the Pine Island glacier not far from where it meets the sea, and they expect they will contribute to future break-offs before long. "[It] fits into the larger picture of basal crevasses in the center of the ice shelf being eroded by warm ocean water, causing the ice shelf to break from the inside out," Howat says. Take a look at how the landscape of Antarctica has changed since February 2014:

Free drone simulators Before you take your new drone out for its maiden flight, it’s a good idea to use a simulator to get a feel for its handling to avoid embarrassing and potentially expensive crashes. You could pay hundreds of pounds for a realistic drone sim, but the strong community spirit of drone pilots means there’s also a growing collection of superb free simulators to help you master your props. There are two main types of drone simulator: those designed to help you practise first-person view (FPV) racing, and those for refining handling of camera drones to help you achieve better video and photos. The best sims offer a variety of courses, variable weather conditions, and realistic physics so you’re fully prepared and know how your drone will respond in different situations. Real licensed drone models are also a boon, as is scope for future development. All of the free drone simulators here let you use your own RC transmitter, which you’ll need to connect using a device like the PCTx (a quick Google search should reveal whether there are any alternative ways to link your specific controller to your PC). Most simulators support game controllers as well, and some even let you fly with a keyboard and mouse, though you’d need three hands to control a quadcopter with any success. 1. DRL Drone Racing Simulator Blast through the neon mazes used by the real Drone Racing League in dizzying first-person The official simulator of the professional Drone Racing League, DRL Drone Racing Simulator is the most polished of the free drone simulators here. It’s currently in beta, but the League was confident enough to use it for pre-qualifying for the 2017 world championships. DRL Drone Racing Simulator features courses from the real competition, and is scored in the same way, with points earned from a combination of checkpoints and completion times. Real-life DRL racing drones are fully customizable, and so are their simulated counterparts. Outdoor maps are fairly realistic, but the simulator really comes into its own indoors, where LED-clad drones hurtle through a Bladerunner-style tangle of neon. DRL Drone Racing Simulator is compatible with both console and RC controllers. There’s a menu option for keyboard controls, but in our tests the sim failed to detect any hardware; something of a moot point, because the fine-control necessary for navigating the complex courses at high speed would be almost impossible with key-hammering. 2. Hotprops A stylish sim for amateur drone racers who want full control over their quadcopter's handling Hotprops is also in active beta, available to download and enjoy with no restrictions. Like DRL Drone Racing Simulator, the goal of this great-looking sim is to reproduce the experience of FPV drone-racing as accurately as possible, with advanced physics courtesy of the Unity game engine. Hotprops offers fully adjustable parameters to replicate the behavior of your own drone as closely as possible. The settings offer a very impressive degree of granularity, and the impact of each slider and radio button is clearly explained. Hotprops’ developers are constantly adding, removing and adjusting features in response to testing and user feedback. As a result, there can be considerable wait-times while the sim is updated automatically at launch – sometimes up to half an hour. There’s more loading mid-sim too; even if you don’t intend to pit your skills against friends or strangers in the game’s multiplayer mode, you’ll need an internet connection to download tracks before you can fly them. The simulation itself is superb, with realistic flight physics and smooth, good-looking graphics. There’s a great choice of maps to test your skills, and they’re fun and varied enough to enjoy as a racing game in their own right (albeit one that requires an RC controller). We don’t yet know whether the Hotprops release candidate will be free-to-play or carry a subscription fee, but the active beta is very promising. One to keep an eye on. 3. Real Drone Simulator Real licensed drones and real fun, with lots of extra features promised for the final release Real Drone Simulator is in pre-alpha (an early testable release), so it’s still a little rough around the edges and doesn’t yet have a full complement of tracks and features. It’s very promising though, and the developers are planning to keep it free to play, with optional donations to support the project. Real Drone Simulator offers two types of environment to practise your skills: ‘virtual reality’ (realistic but computer-generated) and real-world (based on Google Earth). Each level has a difficulty profile, area size and wind strength, so you know what to expect before starting your props. The physics and handling are realistic, and adjust to the weather conditions, but Real Drone Simulator is designed for fun, first and foremost. The final release will gamify the experience with a career mode that lets you earn virtual currency to upgrade your drone, and race it against other pilots locally or online. You can control your quadcopter with a transmitter connected via USB, with a gamepad, or with a keyboard and mouse if you’re just playing for fun and have an extra arm. Real Drone Simulator’s developer (the Real-Team) has some other ambitious plans up its sleeve, including the addition of photography and aerial filming missions, and international championships in the style of DRL: the sim already contains some licensed racing drones, and the Real-Team intend to contact all the major drone manufacturers when they hit beta to request permission to license their craft. 4. Heli-X Flight Simulator A serious simulator for aerial photographers, though mostly designed for RC helicopters As its name suggests, Heli-X Flight Simulator is primarily an RC helicopter sim, but the free version also includes one quadcopter – the DJI Phantom. This prosumer drone is designed for aerial photography and filmmaking, and Heli-X is designed to help you refine your handling before you send £500 of hardware skyward. Heli-X offers a great selection of training modes to test your dexterity, though there’s little mileage if you’re looking for a simulator that doubles as a game; the tasks are challenging, but there are no rewards beyond the satisfaction of beating your own high-scores. The free version only offers two airports and one training course, though this can be po[CENSORED]ted with various obstacles. The handling settings are highly customizable, but the defaults have been set by a professional pilot to provide a realistic experience, so there’s little to be gained from tweaking them in you’re training to operate a real Phantom.

President Jacob Zuma has presided over a moving ceremony to “restore the dignity” of the more than 600 mainly black soldiers who died during the sinking of the SS Mendi during World War One and whose contribution had been ignored by pre-democracy governments. Addressing the commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the tragedy, which took place on February 20 1917, Zuma said that the 616 men who died that day had now been recognised along with their white comrades who fell in the Great War and in other conflicts. The Mendi, carrying members of the 5th Battalion of the SA Native Labour Corps, was rammed by the larger SS Daro in the English Channel. The soldiers had left England for France where they were to act as support troops in the war against Germany. “Today we restore the dignity and humanity of the black soldiers” who had left to fight the Germans, but were not allowed to carry weapons and were used as labour instead of combat troops, said Zuma. Zuma said the men who died on the Mendi were “ahead of their time” and “internationalists” who had joined the war in the hope that their lives at home would be improved by their colonial masters after its conclusion. They had also believed in and fostered South African unity. However, they were never honoured by a succession of apartheid governments. “They were never decorated or awarded any medal at the end of the war. That is the painful history we come from, a history of brutal and blatant racism and colonialism,” Zuma said. Zuma said his administration had ensured that those who died on the Mendi and their comrades who died the year before at Delville Wood were honoured here and where they fell. “We salute their contribution in the struggle for a better world,” he said. Zuma said the highest honour for bravery bestowed in South Africa was the Order of Mendi. “Through this award we will continue to honour these men and their sacrifices throughout our lives and from generation to generation,” Zuma said. At the start of this speech, Zuma paid tribute to the three SA Navy sailors and three public works staff members who died in a gas leak at Naval Base Durban on Friday. As part of the day’s proceedings, Zuma awarded medals for long service and bravery to members of the various wings of the armed forces. Military aircraft – including C130 transporters and helicopters – carried out a mass flyby, while military units in ceremonial uniforms stood to attention in formation around the stadium. Earlier the in the day, Zuma laid a wreath in memory of the men of the Mendi at Durban’s maritime museum. Over the weekend, thousands of members of the public attended the military exhibition put on by the SA National Defence Force at the fan park set up on the old Durban drive-in site. Armed Forces Day was proclaimed by Zuma and is commemorated on February 21 every year.

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Chinese manufacturer Geely, which owns Volvo, is also interested in purchasing Proton but may be offered a deal to take only Lotus. Those terms could suit PSA, which has less interest in the Lotus brand. Proton is looking to get a foreign partner involved in the business after being bailed out by the Chinese government six months ago following a long period of poor financial results. It is thought PSA's plans for Proton include building a new plant to raise its output in the South East Asian market, which would aid PSA's Push to Pass strategy. Reports suggest PSA is aiming to raise Proton's production capacity up to 2 million units from the current 150,000. Proton is itself owned by DRB-Hicom, a large Malaysian conglomerate, and last year revealed it would consider offering Lotus to the market in its attempts to save the ailing Proton brand. At that time PSA, Renault and Suzuki were reported to have all voiced interest in purchasing Proton, but the purchase of Lotus was still uncertain. This isn’t the first time the future of Lotus and its parent company have been cast into doubt - six years ago, Proton faced similar financial issues. However, the purchase of both brands by DRB-Hicom enabled Lotus to commit to a more secure future. This future includes an all-new Lotus Elise that will go on sale in 2020. Comment about the model’s development coincided with news that Lotus has made a profit for the first time in two decades.

Project Scorpio might be receiving a brand new dashboard and user interface, according to a report from Windows Central. The report is based on information gathered from Eric Fiscus, software design engineer at Microsoft, LinkedIn profile, where he offers some insights about what he is currently working on. According to Fiscus, "I'm currently prototyping Xbox Scorpio Motion Design language, which is targeting Holiday 2017. What are we going to do with 6 teraflops of graphical processing power? Find out next year on Christmas morning." This seemingly hinting at a substantial difference between Project Scorpio and Xbox One of some sorts. Xbox One has received plenty changes when it comes to the user interface and has definitely improved in comparison with the original release in 2013. However, it'd be nice to see Microsoft going for something different when it releases by the end of the year, possibly carrying Xbox One over altogether as it's part of the same ecosystem and I don't think it'd be left behind.

Introduction Linux is built for tinkering and experimentation, which means it’s always morphing and changing. New distros are popping up all the time, because all it takes is a little bit of determination, time and effort to create a custom operating system. Not all of them hit the mark – there are stacks of Linux distros that have seen little to no action, and we’re almost certain that some have been released and never installed by anyone other than their creator. Other alternative distros, though, fare rather better. Look at the success of Linux Mint, which spun off from Ubuntu to become (at times) arguably more po[CENSORED]r than its own parent. Indeed, Ubuntu itself grew from Debian, and its niche offshoots (distros like Ubuntu Studio) have seen good movement. If there’s a market out there for your distro, there’s traction to be had. So let’s look at our pick of the five distros moving up swiftly through the ranks as of early 2017. Some of these might become the best Linux distros out there, some might turn out to be awful – but it won’t cost you a penny to try them out. 1. Antergos Built on top of Arch and similarly catering to bleeding-edge users with package updates the moment they’re deemed stable, Antergos is a rising star thanks to its default configuration options – which its developers describe as ‘sane’, perhaps throwing shade at a few of the more esoteric distros out there. It does indeed provide a fully configured, ready-to-go Arch system, and the process is made even easier thanks to the custom installer, Cnchi, which allows you to select your desired Linux desktop as you go. It also downloads and installs essentials for media playing and the like – very handy. The project has come a long way since its early days, when it was a single-desktop distro known as Cinnarch, named for its amalgamation of the Arch environment and the easy-to-use Cinnamon desktop. With its stringent multi-language support (it’s po[CENSORED]r in Spain, so covers the likes of Galician and Catalan as well as other European languages), Antergos is sure to enjoy success going forward. 2. Deepin Mashing together elements of Ubuntu, macOS and Windows 10, deepin (the lower-case ‘d’ is apparently important, since it officially changed from an upper case letter at some point during 2015) is a Chinese-developed Linux OS concentrating on simplicity, elegance and ease of use. It certainly sports one of the sharper desktops around, a home-grown affair powered by Qt with Mutter looking after window management, and its installer is absolute child’s play to get through. Deepin – we’ll have to capitalise it at the start of a sentence, we’re afraid, devs – does have a bit of an identity crisis on its hands, though. It’s been through at least four name changes in its lifetime, and we’re not entirely sure why. And depending on where exactly you look, you may even find this release labelled as ‘DepthOS’, muddying the waters even further. Hopefully, if the company can make up its mind, settle on a brand and keep working at its sharp feature set and clean appearance, deepin might gain even more love in the future. 3. MX Linux A collaboration between the communities behind the AntiX and Mepis projects has resulted in a Debian-based distro which shares its ancestor’s primary properties. This means it’s a middleweight distro which offers up easy configuration, reasonable resource consumption and a gorgeous, easily configured desktop. Inherited from AntiX is its happiness to run entirely from a USB stick, making MX Linux a good choice if you’re just trialling Linux, or if you want a removable, pocket-able desktop that doesn’t care about the hardware it’s run on. You’ll also find probably the most distinguished implementation of Xcfe we’ve seen, with more flexibility and good looks than you’d expect from a desktop environment usually slanted towards the lightweight end of the market. Oddly, despite Mepis development seemingly stalling in 2014, MX Linux hasn’t meant the end of super-low-end distro AntiX, which is still seeing regular releases. That’s a good secondary option if you’re really short of RAM or CPU power, but keep an eye on MX Linux if you’re slightly better off. 4. Subgraph Privacy distros are not a new idea, and there are plenty of established examples floating around the web. So why try a relatively new one? A distro in its infancy doesn’t necessarily inspire trust. But hear us out – there’s a reason Subgraph is rising with such speed. First of all, it’s equipped with a kernel hardened by Grsecurity, which is regarded as one of the best strengthened Linux cores around, and which guards specifically against memory corruption, one of the key methods of malware incursion. Applications like the browser or email are automatically sandboxed for an extra layer of protection. The Tor network is used to obfuscate internet traffic, with a different network route used for each whitelisted application. It is simply not possible to run Subgraph without an encrypted filesystem. So it’s pretty tough stuff, but Subgraph’s key feature is that it appears to the end-user to be pretty much a simple, standard Gnome 3.22 environment. Not to everyone’s tastes, perhaps, but easy enough for a new user to get to grips with – if you have a family member or user who’s constantly getting in security scrapes, Subgraph could be the ideal solution. 5. Debian We can hear you shouting from here. “But TechRadar,” you bellow, “Debian is massive! How can you call it ‘rising’?” Here’s how: it is definitely a rising distro. While Ubuntu did a great job bringing Linux to the masses, many users brought on board by its orange-and-brown glitz and glamour have moved away thanks to a few controversial changes. The natural post-Ubuntu route, given the huge amount of shared DNA, is its parent OS, Debian. There may not be a better time to make the leap than now, with the latest of Debian’s ‘when it’s ready’ releases about to drop. Version 9, subtitled ‘Stretch’, is frozen and ready for release once its list of bugs is ironed out. Given Debian’s huge range of application options, its massive list of possible desktops, and the stability and almost universal compatibility of its package manager, plain old Debian is one of the strongest Linux choices going.

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With the arrival of the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa, 2017 will go down in history as one of the most important years in the development and growth of African art. The 9 000m2, R500 million development, designed by starchitect Thomas Heatherwick, will be the biggest museum to open on the continent in the past 100 years. This week, the museum announced a multimillion-rand partnership with photographer Roger Ballen. It involves a significant financial donation, which will go towards the creation of the Roger Ballen Foundation Centre for Photography, and a complete collection of every photograph Ballen has taken. Ballen, who broke into the mainstream during his collaborative period with pop rappers Die Antwoord, spoke to #Trending this week. “The planning of the museum has been going on for a long time and I was quite impressed with what they were doing. I don’t think the public actually comprehends the scale of what’s going on there. It’s a world-class museum, built by world-class architects and the best artists. I wanted to be involved with something that is about to have a big effect on someone’s understanding of art. To have a museum with the infrastructure, combined with my expertise, could help achieve their goals and my goals about the various aspects of art photography on the continent. “The endowment is set up so that the museum can better promote aesthetic photography in South Africa – people who have a conception of what photography can do as an art form, not merely as a documentary. There are millions of pictures taken on the planet, so how do you decide what’s contemporary, historic or documentary? We want to educate the public about the new nature of photography.

Melbourne – US First Lady Melania Trump, usually a demure and soft-spoken presence at her husband's side, broke with form on Saturday, reciting the Lord's Prayer before issuing a scathing rebuke of his enemies and her critics at a campaign-style stop in Florida. Preceding her husband on the dais at a rally in the city of Melbourne, the first lady started her remarks with the words "let us pray," before beginning her recitation of the Christian prayer. "Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven," Mrs Trump read from the lectern, wrapping up the roughly half-minute-long prayer with an "Amen". ‘My husband is creating a country of safety’ She then launched into an uncharacteristically strident defence of her husband - and her own brief tenure as first lady. "The America we envision is one that works for all Americans and where all Americans can work and succeed," she said. "A nation committed to a greater civility and unity between people from all sides of the political divide. I will always stay true to myself and be truthful to you, no matter what the opposition is saying about me," said the first lady. "I will act in the best interests of all of you. I'm committed to creating and supporting initiatives dear to my heart which will have impact on women, and children all around the world," she said. "My husband is creating a country of great safety, and prosperity," the first lady said before introducing President Donald Trump, ceding the podium to cheers and applause. Melania Trump has been a rare presence with her husband since the inauguration. ‘A campaign rally for America’ To the dismay of some critics, she has decided to continue living at their palatial residence in Trump Tower in New York until their 10-year-old son Barron finishes the school year. Purists and traditionalists have been disappointed that the first lady has not kept with precedent and immediately joined her husband in the White House residence. President Donald Trump hits the campaign stump for a rally in Melbourne, a city on Florida's famed Space Coast, seeking to reconnect with his tribe of largely white, male middle-class voters. He delivered a speech lasting about 45 minutes in what was billed by the White House as "a campaign rally for America". After pressure from US lawmakers, Melania Trump announced this week that the White House will finally reopen to the public in early March, nearly seven weeks after her husband Donald became president. White House tours are highly po[CENSORED]r with visitors to Washington, a perk arranged by members of Congress for their constituents and foreign embassies for their nationals. Some members of Congress had begun complaining about the long delay in restarting tours that had been suspended since Trump's inauguration January 20, and some critics have blamed the delays on Melania extended absence. However, criticism of the first lady has been mild compared to the blistering attacks lodged against her embattled husband, who is engaged in open warfare with the media and facing a major political contretemps over allegations of possible ties between his senior aides and officials in Russia.

As he usually does, Phil Spencer has lately had a chat with his followers on Twitter, especially discussing what's going on with Microsoft's E3 2017 showcase and PC/Xbox One gaming. In the first place, he said he's sorry because of the not so great timing the event is set to air in Europe (11:00pm CET), but added he feels great about the content we're going to see. "I'm confident in what we'll show. Going later in the day on Sunday will be a nice change, sorry Europe viewers for the late hour," Xbox Head told fans on Twitter. It's the first time Microsoft is going to show up with an E3 event on Sunday, as it usually debuts on Mondays. Sunday is also set to be Bethesda's pre-E3 2017 show. Talking about PC games possibly coming to Xbox One, he said he believes there's more on its way. "I do" see that ore PC titles are coming to the console, referring to Astroneer, Fallout Shelter, Ark. "The easier we make it for devs to target Win + Xbox == more opportunity for them."

Google Chrome Every PC comes with a perfectly decent web browser, unless it’s really old: if you’re using Internet Explorer, just skip the rest of our words and hit the download link right now. Chrome is Google’s alternative to your default web browser, and it offers a number of things that your current browser probably doesn’t. Why you need it Speed, security, speed, simplicity, speed, flexibility. Did we mention speed? Chrome is incredibly, ridiculously fast, and if you don’t install all the plugins in the world – known here as Chrome Extensions – it won’t make your PC feel slow and sluggish no matter how many tabs you open. We tend to browse with just a few well-chosen extensions, such as privacy protectors and video blockers to stop auto-play videos from annoying us at work. It can use a lot of RAM, but that’s because it keeps each tab as a separate process. That means if one website hangs, it won’t crash the entire browser. Another key reason to go for Chrome is that you can sync your bookmarks, auto-fill items and even your open tabs between devices – not just PCs but Macs, iPhones, iPads and Android devices too. That’s a boon if you’re always juggling gadgets or need to access the same things at home and at work.

Cape Town - The best kind of camping is the simple kind. A wood fire surrounded by a couple of tents, a night sky full of stars and an immense silence. In South Africa’s national parks and nature reserves, our diverse campsites have got spectacular views of mountains, oceans, bushveld and thick forests. Then, hopefully there are a few wild animals to keep you company while you turn your wors on the grid. Our country is blessed with plenty of remarkable campsites that tick most or all of these boxes. After spending several years exploring the country’s national parks and nature reserves, here are some which you should visit at least once. To get away from the crowd Kokerboomkloof in the Richtersveld National Park - www.sanparks.org Kokerboomkloof in the Richtersveld National Park is hidden away in a desert valley surrounded by granite boulders the size of intergalactic meteors. Several quiver trees stand on the desert plain nearby like extraterrestrial statues. This is the wildest campsite in the most remote national park in the country, so it’s got some of the best stargazing. There are only showers and toilets at each of the 8 campsite but anything more would detract from the intense sense of wilderness. Because it’s set in a rocky valley away from the Orange River, it can get very hot in summer, so it’s best visited during winter. Kwas se Baai in the Namaqua National Park - www.sanparks.org On the Atlantic Ocean coastline further south is Kwas se Baai, one of ten seaside campsites spread across 35 kilometres of shoreline of Namaqua National Park. The chilly ocean – chilled by Antarctic waters of the Benguela Current - is usually wild and frothy, but on windless days, it’s as flat as a pannekoek. There is oodles of space across the strandveld…so you’ll see very few other people. A sandy track can only be negotiated with a serious 4x4. The only facilities are longdrop toilets. No showers, no fresh water, so you’ll need to be fully self-sufficient. And if you need a bath, jump in the ocean for serious refreshment, and catch some a fish or two for the braai while you're at it. Cape Vidal campsite in iSimangaliso Wetland Park can get very busy during holiday season but somehow it still seems peaceful. It’s ensconced in the thick forests on the sub-tropical shoreline of northern KwaZulu-Natal, and the crashing ocean is an omnipresent soundtrack. Out of holidays, it’s one of the best seaside spots in the country. Situated within South Africa’s first World Heritage Site, you’ll share the forest and beaches with vervet monkey, chacma baboons, purple-crested turacos and the odd leatherback turtle which you may even encounter on the long beaches during the summer nesting season. And watch out for leopards which can be seen wandering the forest roads in the early mornings. Algeria Campsite in the Cederberg alongside the Rondegat River is close to the main gravel road that winds up the Uitkyk Pass, so its easy to get to from Cape Town. Like Mahai, the views of the mountains above are reason enough to spend the weekend camping here. Large trees provide ample shade during the searing summers, and the river is dammed with a small weir, providing a safe, shallow pool in which to swim. While Nossob is fenced, the smaller Mazhou campsite in Mapungbwe National Park on the border of Botswana has only a few strands of flimsy electrified wire to stop an elephant bull from wandering past your tent. There’s plenty of shade from the riverine trees. Keep an eye out for Pel’s Fishing owls in the high branches. Lions are less common than in Kruger, but they are still there, along with the spotted hyenas who will approach your braai begging for a piece of meat. Because there are only ten campsites, Mazhou has an authentic feel.

Chevrolet has not been shy about its autonomous ambitions, but it's about to get really ambitious with an alleged plan to roll out thousands of self-driving cars in the near future. General Motors will produce thousands of autonomous Bolt EVs in a partnership with Lyft, Reuters reports, citing sources familiar with the matter. If it really does scale up its rollout to this magnitude, it'd be the largest test of its type. Most automakers have self-driving test fleets in the single or double digits. Many vehicles produced for this test would go to Lyft's ride-sharing fleets across the country, the report claims, where the cars could be tested in real-world situations. There does not appear to be any intent on providing these cars to the public beyond what a rider might encounter when calling for a Lyft. Most states do not even have a regulatory framework in place for autonomous vehicles. Lyft did not immediately respond to a request for comment. General Motors said it had nothing to add, but in a statement delivered to Reuters, the company said, "We have said that our AV technology will appear in an on-demand ride-sharing network application sooner than you might think." GM has invested heavily in Lyft. The automaker invested $500 million in the company known for its pink mustaches, and it raided the remnants of another ride-sharing startup in order to bolster Lyft's offerings. The two have been close partners ever since the investment. In early December 2016, Michigan signed into law a series of bills regulating the development and eventual sale of autonomous vehicles. Shortly thereafter, GM announced that it would build and test autonomous Bolt EVs locally. Lyft competitor Uber also said it would build an autonomous research center in Michigan, which is good, because it's not on the best of terms with California.

Cape Town - A Nigerian family had to hide their baby under a bed while angry residents went on a rampage in Pretoria West, calling them drug dealers. “Can you imagine standing there and watching your property, your house burn down? Why don’t they want us here,” a Nigerian father said on Saturday. His house was one of two that were burned down by angry residents on Saturday. He had woken up to dozens of people banging outside their doors. “Nigerians come out, come out now, they were saying,” he told News24. The situation accelerated so fast that he made a snap decision to throw some of the children who lived in yard over the wall into a neighbour’s yard, just before a petrol bomb was thrown at his house. “I tried to get back inside to get our passports but it was too late,” the distraught man said, looking at the blacked out remains of the house he had been renting. “They were so angry; I had to hide my baby under the bed when I heard them coming. What are we supposed to do now? Where are we going to sleep tonight?” another resident of the house said. There were 11 adults and 3 children living in the five bedroom house, he said, but everyone had escaped in time. No arrests made No-one has been arrested after two houses were burned down and various homes raided by Pretoria West community members on Saturday, police have said. Police spokesperson Lieutenant-Colonel Lungelo Dlamini said they had deployed a number of officers to the area in a bid to quell the violence. Angry residents raided alleged drug dens and brothels on Saturday, burning two houses down as they went door to door in search of drugs. “It is under control right now. We have deployed quite a number of police in the to ensure that the violence did not flare up again,” he said. By late afternoon on Saturday, residents were still walking up and down the streets under heavy police guard vowing to root out criminality. Dlamini said the violence only started on Saturday in the community. But some business people [mostly foreigners] in the area have been feeling the heat for a couple of weeks already. A Nigerian businessman who has worked alongside Pretoria West residents for almost 10 years, fixing their cars is now running scared after his business went up in flames, without warning. The teary man was trying to pick up his life on Saturday, picking through the wreckage, when violence broke out again. The businessman, who did not want to give his name for fear of victimisation, was one of the victims of the flare up of violence in the township, as residents accused foreigners of being drug dealers. The Nigerian businessman said his business had been burned to the ground, with 29 cars a few days ago. An angry crowd had raided his workshop in search for drugs, he told News24 in an interview outside his burned out workshop. “But they did not find them. We are not selling drugs here. Arrest those who sell drugs. The police know who is selling drugs in this area. You don’t see any drugs here,” he said. He said he and other businesses in the area were contributing to the economy and not the crime in the country. The hardest thing for him, he said, was that he could not simply cry, pack up and go home. “We are past crying. If I go home, I will be an armed robber there, nothing else. I wouldn’t rob anyone, only South Africans because they target us,” he said. He bemoaned the fact that Nigerians were often painted with the same brush. “There are bad Nigerians and there are good Nigerians. They should arrest the bad ones. How can we support our families when we live in fear?” he said.

Apple has reportedly halted sales of LG’s 5K monitor following well-publicised interference issues with the display, which is affected by being in close proximity to Wi-Fi routers. According to Business Insider, the UltraFine 5K Display is no longer being sold in Apple stores – while the monitor is still on display in the firm’s many shops, if a customer wants to make a purchase, they won’t be sold one. Presumably punters will be told that Apple is waiting for the fixed versions of the 5K monitor, which LG is working on now. Business Insider said it received a tip from one of its sources, but confirmed Apple’s new policy by phoning the store in New York, where a representative said that sales were indeed suspended due to a hardware issue with the piece of kit. Replace it with the best monitor and the best wireless router of 2017 Timeframe for the fix? That said, if you head to Apple’s online store, the UltraFine 5K Display can still be purchased – but with a 5-6 week wait currently listed for dispatch. Presumably this simply reflects the timeframe Apple is expecting to get the new fixed monitors in, although obviously it’s only an estimate. Apple actually extended the online dispatch time to 5-6 weeks late last week, with the in-store policy apparently coming into play over the weekend. The problem with the displays first emerged a couple of weeks back, when LG officially confirmed that there was an issue with the monitor if it’s placed too near Wi-Fi routers, a flaw which causes interference from a flickering screen to a completely black one. LG subsequently stated it would fix the issue by using ‘enhanced shielding’ on the monitors going forward, and fitting this improved shielding to existing models, as well. We’ve contacted Apple for a comment on this matter, and will update this story with any response we receive.

Microsoft is getting serious about testing Windows 10 in a business environment, with the announcement of a new initiative: Windows Insider Program for Business. Known as WIP4Biz for short, the project was revealed at the Ignite Australia conference, with Bill Karagounis – Director of Program Management OS Fundamentals and Insider Program/Technologies at Microsoft – saying that the broad aim was to make Insider builds a better fit and easier to deploy in corporate environments. Microsoft believes that IT professionals are a large and critical group when it comes to testing new features for Windows 10, and providing subsequent feedback about the requirements of businesses. As Neowin reports, the software giant outlined its key goals for the program, which include providing a ‘scalable’ feedback mechanism for testers at all levels, along with the ability to test new commercial features, and “migrate business workflows to pre-release software where appropriate”. A Reddit-style system of ‘upvoting’ will be put in place so commercial users can highlight the most important issues to be fixed or worked on from their point of view. The Surface Studio could be Microsoft's crown jewel in terms of hardware Success stories The other main point is to push the benefits of new Windows features and make them clear to businesses, sharing success stories and the like. You can also expect dedicated WIP4Biz blogs and forums, surveys seeking the opinions of IT pros on Windows 10, and plenty of help documentation for when it comes to deploying preview builds of the operating system. As to when the WIP4Biz program will kick-off, Microsoft says the idea is to gradually roll it out over the coming months, so it shouldn’t be long before we get the first taste of how all this will work. The company is clearly keen to push businesses to adopt Windows 10, as only last month, a new offer was introduced to allow those who have a Windows subscription with the Cloud Solution Provider scheme to upgrade their Windows 7/8.1 machines to Windows 10 for free.

Recalling a whole run of cars can get complicated and expensive, but Toyota's latest recall manages to do that without raising a massive ruckus. Toyota issued a recall for every single Mirai hydrogen fuel cell vehicle sold around the world. That may seem like a ton, but bear in mind it's a niche vehicle utilizing an infrastructure that isn't fully fleshed out. Thus, only about 2,840 vehicles are affected. The issue relates to the car's powertrain. A unique set of driving conditions -- for example, jamming the accelerator to the floor after driving on a long descent under cruise control -- might cause the fuel cell's boost converter to output voltage higher than the maximum. If that happens, a warning light will come on and the fuel cell system will stop running. Since a bricked hydrogen car isn't worth a whole lot, Toyota issued the recall. A car that loses its ability to accelerate could also increase the risk of a collision, especially if it happens in traffic. Toyota will fix the issue with a simple software reflash. This process is free to Mirai owners, and it should only take about 30 minutes at a nearby dealership. After that, everything should be hunky dory.

Cape Town - Drones are one of the fastest growing hobbies in South Africa if the latest stats on illegal drone usage is anything to go by. According to the South African Civil Aviation Authority (SACAA) for every registered and licensed remotely piloted aircraft taking to the skies in SA, there are two or three more doing so illegally. And it's an expensive hobby to say the least. With price ranges between R1 000 and R100 000, drones have fast become a common phenomenon for private users as well as specialised tools in commercial fields. SEE: SACAA to crack down as illegal drone usage 'more than doubles' in SA While South Africa’s regulations on drone operation have had significant licensing cost implications for businesses, consumers may be at the highest risk for financial loss. SACAAS spokesperson Kabelo Ledwaba admits there is a perception that registration and training for drone users is an onerous and expensive one, illegal drone usage however carriers an even heftier fine of R50K and or 10 years in jail. As local authorities recognise the considerable growth in this sector and the risks associated with the use of drones - it is a big concern for recreational users who are under no legal obligation to get training. SACAA requirements state anybody above the age of 18 is allowed to purchase a drone – with or without a licence. It does recommend recreational drone users to undergo training as well as familiarise themselves with the applicable dos and don’ts of Remote Pilot Aircraft Systems (RPAS) usage, and more specifically the relevant airspace and surrounds in which they are operating. See more info here: www.caa.co.za Added to this, the South African Model Aircraft Association has been tasked with assisting aircraft hobbyists, and private users are encouraged to liaise with the organisation, says Ledwaba. Untrained drone operator risk John Du Plessis, legal advisor at Risk Benefit Solutions Pty (RBS), say risks of untrained recreational users are much higher than they might comprehend; a single drone is also capable of causing much more harm. “A drone that loses control and veers onto a motorway, has the potential to cause not only damage to property including motor vehicles, but also injuries and deaths," says Du Plessis. "Drone incidents that are involved in near misses with passenger jets increase year on year, representing a growing risk of loss of life.” Du Plessis further explains that uninsured drone pilots not only open themselves up to millions of Rand in civil liabilities resulting from injuries, deaths, and damage property, but also to criminal liability for injuries and deaths, and damage to property. “Policies do not cover loss or damage while the drone is in use, and pilot liability is also excluded. This puts operators at an increased personal risk of exposure,” he warns. Drone operators aviation school training According to du Plessis, insuring commercial drone operators against liabilities is significantly easier than providing cover for private operators. “The training is important here since the drone pilot officially learns the legal restrictions of flying the drone, needs to display competence in operating the equipment, and is required to pass a health examination,” Du Plessis says. Having training allows a user to be insured against any liability for damages or injury, says Du Plessis who also states "the number of incidents among trained drone operators is lower than that of untrained drone operators". Du Plessis points out that incidents among untrained recreational operators are "also very high". ALSO SEE: 12 Things you need to know about SA’s new drone rules While under no legal obligation to get trained, Du Plessis argues that recreational drone pilots should seriously consider training at an accredited aviation school, thereby increasing safety and chances that they are indeed insurable. He says training at an accredited aviation school costs around R12 000 per person, which often dissuades recreational pilots. “Training may be expensive compared to the cost of a toy drone, but the risks far outweighs any cost implications to a recreational drone pilot in this case,” says Du Plessis. The reality is, says the SACAA, is that it is not mandated to determine the cost as charged by RPAS retailers, training schools, or other service providers but echoes the sentiment that training is advised to avoid the risks. Fees payable to the SACAA are only applicable to commercial users and “hardly cover the associated administrative costs”, Ledwaba says. However it would be "reckless for any RPAS owner or user to remain oblivious to the serious risks that these aircraft pose to other airspace users, property, and people on the ground."