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BattleTech is a turn-based strategy video game developed by Harebrained Schemes and published by Paradox Interactive. It was released on Windows and OS X on April 24, 2018, with a Linux release to follow. The developers set aside US$1 million to create the game, and turned to Kickstarter to secure funding for additional features, including a single player campaign, an expansion of that campaign, and a player versus player multiplayer mode. In the game, the player assumes the role of a mercenary commander leading a team of powerful combat vehicles called battlemechs. The player is responsible for selecting each mech's model, armor, pilot, armaments, and skills, and controls a team of four mechs (a 'lance') in combat. The world of BattleTech is dominated by powerful noble houses locked in a devastating war, and the player selects one or more houses to serve. The game shares a setting with the board game that launched the BattleTech franchise, Classic BattleTech, and many members of the development team have worked on previous games in the franchise. This includes both of the studio's co-founders; Jordan Weisman created the franchise while at FASA, and Mitch Gitelman was the producer for MechCommander and MechAssault. Gameplay : BattleTech is a turn-based strategy video game. Players assume the role of a mercenary commander leading a "mech lance", or group of four giant humanoid-shaped combat vehicles. The developers state that the game will have the spirit of the board game but will not use the board game's rules. The player selects each mech's chassis, the weapons and armor mounted on that chassis, as well as smaller details such as actuators and gyros that influence a mech's turning radius. In addition to choosing hardware, the player can also specialize the mech's pilots (called "mechwarriors") by selecting talents from a skill tree Setting : BattleTech shares a setting with the original board game, now called Classic BattleTech. The game takes place during the 3025 Succession Wars Era, in which powerful noble houses employ an ever-shrinking number of giant fighting vehicles called Battlemechs ('Mechs for short), piloted by individuals called MechWarriors, to fight for control of the Inner Sphere. The fighting has lasted for so long, and has been so intense, that it has caused technological regression. The small number of remaining 'Mechs makes them exceptionally valuable to the warring houses, and the player will have the opportunity to select which house or houses to serve.[3][4][5][6] In a map published by Harebrained Schemes during the Kickstarter campaign, the Inner Sphere is depicted as an area of space stretching between 400 and 600 Light-years away from Earth in every direction. It is divided between five major states, each tied to a noble house, and four minor states. Each major state borders Earth and expands outward, while the minor states occupy small areas on the outside edge of the map known as The Periphery.[7] The game takes place in the peripheral realm of the Aurigan Reach. The Reach is governed by the Aurigan Coalition which is made up of several independent systems led by noble houses in accordance with the standard Inner Sphere feudal system. The Reach lies between the peripheral realms of the Taurian Concordat and the Magistracy of Canopus, and bordering the Inner Sphere Successor State of the Capellan Confederation. Much of the Aurigan Reach is made up of former holdings from the Taurians, Magistracy, and Capellans, though the three realms abandoned many of the systems for defensibility reasons. After their abandonment, the Reach systems became unified under Arano family and began consolidating and expanding, incorporating not only the abandoned planets into the Aurigan Coalition, but even annexing border planets from their neighbors.[8] The Aurigan Reach was created by the HBS design team led by Kiva Maginn as a space where players could move through an original story line without infringing on the already set lore of Third Succession Wars BattleTech. "Our first priority was to find a way to coexist with BattleTech lore... We needed somewhere interesting, close but not too close, and basically empty. A blank slate where we could do whatever needed to be done to make our story work." The area of space chosen for a Reach was a blank space between the Magistracy of Canopus and the Taurian Concordat that had planets occupying it, but has little to no mention in sourcebooks, novels, or other media. Development : BattleTech was developed by Harebrained Schemes. The studio is led by Jordan Weisman, who created the BattleTech franchise while working at board game and wargaming publisher FASA.[1][9] Many members of the development team worked on another game in the franchise, MechCommander.[1] Along with Weisman, the development team will be led by Mitch Gitelman, the producer for MechCommander and MechAssault, and Mike McCain, who served as creative director for Harebrained Scheme's games in the Shadowrun franchise.[7] Harebrained Schemes is working with Catalyst Game Labs and Piranha Games, who also publish BattleTech works, to maintain continuity across the franchise. This includes using art from Piranha Games' MechWarrior Online.[2][10] Studio co-founders Weisman and Gitelman implied in a May 2015 interview that they might soon be announcing a game based on an intellectual property that they had previously created, with Game Informer speculating that they meant either BattleTech or Crimson Skies.[11] BattleTech was revealed in July 2015.[12] The Kickstarter campaign for the game launched on September 29, 2015, and received its funding goal of US$250,000 within an hour. The studio had already committed $1 million to the development of the game before launching the Kickstarter, which would fund a basic "skirmish mode". The Kickstarter campaign set stretch goals of $1 million, $1.85 million, and $2.5 million to fund a single player campaign, an expansion to the campaign, and an online player versus player multiplayer mode, respectively.[4][9][13] The $1.85 million level would add procedurally generated levels and would make the campaign open-ended, allowing for an indefinite campaign.[14] Harebrained Schemes planned to release the game in early 2017 for Microsoft Windows, OS X and Linux.[2] According to Weisman, fans of the franchise had been asking for a new BattleTech game for years, and the only thing holding his team back was that they did not own the rights to the game, which are held by Microsoft. Weisman was not interested in developing a spiritual successor, stating in an interview that the fantasy mech game Golem Arcana was as close as he was willing to get towards creating a BattleTech game without the license.[1][7] Harebrained Schemes chose the turn-based strategy genre because they wanted the game to play out at a slower, more methodical pace. Weisman emphasized that in a turn-based game, players could be presented with the chances of success or failure for each action, and have time to think through their decisions.[2] In an interview with PC Gamer, he explained that the idea was to make a game with "even more depth than we did in the old days as a pen-and-paper but make it fluid and fast playing so you're focusing on the strategy, not on the mechanics".[15] This depth is reflected in the number of options players have in customizing their mechs. Players that are only interested in combat, however, will be able to play the game without spending time on customization.[2] The studio wanted the game to feel realistic and believable, with Gitelman explaining "We're grounding BattleTech, so it doesn't just feel like this goofy sci-fi future".[1] Harebrained Schemes paid special attention to ensuring that the size of the mechs was apparent to players, despite the limitations of the top-down view in showing scale. This informed several of the team's decisions. The development team intentionally set the mechs to move at a slow pace, and the in-game camera shakes when they move. The mechs' movement also leaves cracks in the ground and causes damage to objects in the environment.[1] In May 2017, Paradox Interactive announced that they had partnered with Harebrained Schemes to publish the game, meaning that they will provide additional funds, as well as marketing and localization support.[16] In August 2017, Paradox announced that the game had been delayed to 2018 in order to give the development team more time to refine the game.

You won't see much that you haven't already when you dive into The Heist, the first of three pieces of downloadable content for Marvel's Spider-Man on PlayStation 4. By and large, The Heist offers more of the same thing that Spider-Man did: a smattering of fun, quick open-world activities, coupled together with a more character-focused storyline. That's not to say you shouldn't play it, though, or even that The Heist reiterating what worked previously is much of a negative. It adds more of what made Spider-Man an engaging, reliable,, and very fun experience. Sure, it fills its open world with activities that are pretty much what you have seen already--almost all new crimes to stop in New York are just slight spins on offerings in the vanilla package. But after a break following Spider-Man's release, it's great to get back into Insomniac's beautiful rendition of New York and punch some bad guys, sling some webs, and uncover the first part of a new and affecting story. That story is what really makes The Heist interesting, as the rest is just open-world window dressing to take advantage of Spider-Man's solid systems. After being teased in the main game, Spider-Man's old friend-slash-former-lover-slash-semi-nemesis Black Cat is back in town. She's both up to no good and potentially in trouble, since her arrival coincides with the resurgence of a mafia crime family in the wake of Spidey's removal of the Kingpin at the start of the main game. Like the base game, what makes the story work is the personal connection of it all. Peter Parker and Black Cat have a deep and fraught history together, and it clouds his judgment from the jump.The relationship between Pete and MJ is already complicated--and that was before his ex showed up and started robbing museums. That Black Cat has seemingly thrown in with the mob, which makes her dangerous, might put her in danger, and messes with Peter's head even more. Mission by mission, the best part of The Heist is watching Peter grapple with how he feels about Black Cat and what exactly her return means for his life going forward. Apart from the story, it's not all a rehash of the main game's glories. The story missions offer some great, refreshing takes on elements that have shown up in Spider-Man before, like an opening museum heist in which Spidey has to save the art from grabby mafiosos, or a later tag-team scenario in which Spidey and Black Cat stealth-beat down a bunch of bad guys. Insomniac capitalizes on just how well-designed Spider-Man is, and these ideas are especially engaging when they're added to the unfolding story. The Heist won't keep seasoned spider-folk busy for long--it's easy to wrap up everything it has to offer in a handful of hours--but that's also part of the appeal of the game itself. Spider-Man does a good job of avoiding the feeling of your time being wasted, and the story campaign clips along so that it feels substantial without being an investment in busywork. Apart from the story, a new slate of challenges offer some tougher activities to master. This time, they're geared around one of the main game's better side activities, created by the online streaming psycho Screwball. Again, they're not terribly different from Taskmaster's challenges from the main game, but they carry some fun twists, like "photobomb areas" where Spidey can earn bonus points for performing cool moves, or requirements like only using a certain set of gadgets in a fight. Insomniac's strong character work and solid storytelling are combined with a few new fun activities in New York, making The Heist an engaging return and a meaningful addition to what is already an impressive open-world title. The biggest bummer of the whole thing is that it ends on a cliffhanger that leaves you wishing November, and the next chapter of The City That Never Sleeps, would hurry up and get here.

Life Is Strange 2 is an episodic graphic adventure video game developed by Dontnod Entertainment and published by Square Enix. It is the second main entry of the Life Is Strange series. The first of five episodes was released on 27 September 2018 for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. Episodes from the series will be released for macOS and Linux by Feral Interactive in 2019 Gameplay : Life Is Strange 2 is a graphic adventure played from a third-person view. The player takes control of Sean Diaz, who is on the run from the police with his younger brother Daniel. Sean can interact with the environment, obtain objects, and talk with non-player characters via dialogue trees.[1] Decisions that were made in the game demo The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit will carry over into Life Is Strange 2;[2] choices in Life Is Strange 2 will lead to different branches in the storyline and affect Daniel's behaviour. Development : Prior to production, developer Dontnod Entertainment decided that Life Is Strange 2 would feature new characters and a new location to the original.[6][7] Led by Life Is Strange directors Michel Koch and Raoul Barbet,[8] development on the sequel began in early 2016, while the predecessor shipped its retail edition.[9][10][11] Life Is Strange lead writers Christian Divine and Jean-Luc Cano and composer Jonathan Morali also reprised their roles.[3][12][13] The concept was influenced by the photography of Mike Brodie, who would freighthop across the United States and take pictures of drifters.[14] The game is structured like a road movie, inspired by the film Into the Wild and novella Of Mice and Men. Dontnod conducted field research on the West Coast of the United States, meeting people and taking pictures there.[12][15] The two primary themes of the game are education and brotherhood.[16] Using the Unreal Engine 4, they upgraded the animation system, physics, and shaders.[15] According to Dontnod, one of the biggest challenges of development was the artificial intelligence of the character Daniel.[12] The music will contain both original and licensed tracks Release : The first of five total episodes, Roads (formerly called Seattle),[17][18] was released on 27 September 2018 for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.[19][20] Feral Interactive will publish the macOS and Linux versions in 2019.

Overkill's The Walking Dead is an upcoming first-person shooter developed by Overkill Software and published by Starbreeze Studios and 505 Games. The title, based on the comics of The Walking Dead, has a strong emphasis on cooperative gameplay. The game is set to be released worldwide for Microsoft Windows in November 2018 and in February 2019 for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Gameplay : Overkill’s The Walking Dead is a first-person shooter with an emphasis on cooperative gameplay. The game features four characters, namely Maya, Aiden, Grant, and Heather. Each has their own unique skills and abilities, and players must work together in order to complete their objectives. Set in Washington D.C., a post-apocalyptic environment which was overran by zombies, the game will also feature stealth, survival horror and role-playing elements.[1] Development : Overkill's The Walking Dead is developed by Overkill Software. According to brand director Almir Listo, although the game is a licensed title, Overkill was free to have their own interpretation on the source material and create the game with their own vision. Robert Kirkman, the creator of the comics, was involved in the game's production, providing advice and feedback. Listo added that the game was designed for "adults", and the story will explore "different things emotionally that aren't investigated much by the TV show".[2] Despite being set in the comic series' universe, the game's four playable characters are original.[3] According to Kirkman, the gameplay will be similar to Payday: The Heist.[4] Listo noted that the game's gameplay will be similar to the raids featured in Destiny.[2] The game was announced on August 14, 2014 by Overkill Software. To celebrate the collaboration, Overkill announced that Lucille, a weapon from The Walking Dead, will be available for players of Payday 2.[1] The game showed up at E3 2015 at a "proof of concept" for the virtual reality headset developed by Starbreeze Studios.[5] In 2016, the game was delayed to ensure that the game would be available in Asian markets during the game's initial launch. It was delayed again in 2017.[6] At E3 2018, the first gameplay footage was released.[7] Starbreeze Studios will release the game for Windows in November 2018 while 505 Games will release the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions in February 2019

Wolfenstein: The New Order Battlefield 4 Call Of Duty: WWII Call Of Duty: Advanced Warfare Call Of Duty: World At War Call of Duty : Modern warfire Calf of duty : Black Ops 1 & 2 and 3 (soon 4) Far Cry 2: Fortune’s Need For Speed Most Wanted : 1 & 2 Blur Fifa : 18 (soon 19) Online Lol (league Of legends) (i have playing it for 4 years) Dota 2 (only 1 year) Paladins (2 years) There is a lot of others game but i set only my favourits One !

Windows 8 is out! In this tutorial we will upgrade our Windows 7 machine to Windows 8 in just a few simple steps! Requirements: In order to proceed you'll need a copy of Windows 8 and an existing installation of Windows 7. Step 1. Insert the Windows 8 dvd and run it, a windows 8 window will appear Step 2. Check "Go online to instal updates now (recommended)" and hit "Next". The installer will now get the latest updates. Step 3. Enter your product key and hit "Next", read the license terms, check "I accept the license terms" and hit "Accept". Choose which files you want to keep and hit "Next". After a few minutes the "Install" button appears, click "Install". Step 4. Wait, a while. The installer will now upgrade your Windows 7 machine to Windows 8. This can take a very long time depending on your hard Step 5. Enjoy! Your machine is now upgraded to Windows 8.

Many of us have bad sleep habits, whether it's scrolling through our phones, getting too engrossed in a book or just not getting up to turn the light off. But what are the worst things to do before going to bed? Colin Espie, professor in the Nuffield Department of Clinical Neuroscience at the University of Oxford and co-founder of Sleepio, has some answers. “Any activity that would cause an individual to have an increase in stress levels can impact a good night's sleep,” he told The Independent.“Generally, as a rule of thumb, anything that might cause excessive anxiety or stress hormones will cause an increase in wakefulness, preventing a proper night’s sleep.” Experts have warned that lying in bed scrolling through a smartphone before dozing could risk sabotaging quality of sleep.Professor Espie advised avoiding any stimulating activity before attempting to sleep. “It’s important to have a ‘wind-down’ routine – an hour to an hour and a half before you go to bed when you don’t do any work, avoid any ‘stimulating’ activity such as strenuous exercise, turn off any electronic devices and give yourself time to relax," he said.Research reveals avid users of technology pre-bedtime can take up to an hour longer than average to eventually nod off than those who do not. A Naturalmat survey suggests 15 per cent of Britons look at their smartphone or tablet last thing at night before they go to sleep. Professor Espie also warned that the activities that affect sleep will vary depending on the individual. For example, he said those who become over-involved in books and find them hard to put down may find reading before bed is not the best choice for them.

Eleven people have been killed, officials say, in a gun attack on a synagogue in the US city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The gunman, who opened fire as the Tree of Life synagogue held a service, was later taken into custody. President Donald Trump said "a lot of people" had been killed and injured in a "wicked act of mass murder". The suspect, who has been officially identified as Robert Bowers, 46, was injured and is receiving treatment. Two other people are in hospital in a critical condition, police said. Pittsburgh shooting: What we know so far America's gun culture in 10 charts Federal investigators are treating the shooting as a hate crime. The Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish non-governmental organisation that fights anti-Semitism, said: "We believe this is the deadliest attack on the Jewish community in the history of the United States."A vigil for the victims of the synagogue attack is taking place in Squirrel Hill. Sophia Levin, a local resident and one of the organisers, told the BBC she hoped this would help the community, and people "can come together and support each other". President Trump said he would visit Pittsburgh, following the attack. How did the shooting unfold? On Saturday morning, worshippers had gathered at the synagogue, in the Squirrel Hill neighbourhood, for a baby naming ceremony during the Sabbath. Squirrel Hill has one of the largest Jewish po[CENSORED]tions in Pennsylvania and this would have been the synagogue's busiest day of the week. According to reports Mr Bowers, a white male, entered the building armed with an assault rifle and two pistols. Reports say he barricaded himself in a room at the synagogue when police approached. Emergency services arrived at the building at about 10:00 local time (14:00 GMT), and gunshots could be heard. Pittsburgh's Public Safety Director Wendell Hissrich later confirmed Mr Bowers was in police custody and was being treated in hospital. The crime scene was "horrific", he told reporters. "One of the worst I've seen, and I've [worked] on some plane crashes. It's very bad," he added. He said that two officers were injured in an "initial confrontation" and that a further two Swat officers were later hurt by the gunman when they entered the building. He said that no children were among the casualties. What do we know about the gunman? US media said he had shouted "All Jews must die" as he carried out the attack. Social media posts by someone with the name Robert Bowers were also reported to be full of anti-Semitic comments. Pittsburgh FBI's special agent in charge of the investigation, Bob Jones, told a press conference that he did not know if Mr Bowers was known to authorities prior to events on Saturday. He said that any motive remains unknown but that authorities believe he was acting alone. Mr Jones added that the investigation was "in the early stages". "We will look at every aspect of the suspect's life," he said. Mr Bowers is receiving treatment for what has been described as multiple gunshot wounds. What has been President Trump's reaction? He called the shooting a "terrible, terrible thing". "To see this happen again and again, for so many years, it's just a shame," he told reporters on Saturday. He described the gunman as a "maniac" and suggested the US should "stiffen up our laws of the death penalty". "These people should pay the ultimate price. This has to stop," he said. Gun control around the world Fight or flight: Would you tackle a gunman? Mr Trump added that the incident had "little to do" with US gun laws. "If they had protection inside, maybe it could have been a different situation," he said. The president later appeared at the Future Farmers of America Convention in Indianapolis, saying: "There must be no tolerance for anti-Semitism. It must be condemned and confronted everywhere and anywhere it appears." Speaking to reporters after the event, Mr Trump said the attacker was not one of his supporters, describing him as "sick".

Comment Windows isn't working – and Microsoft urgently needs to change how it develops the platform, and jettison three filthy practices it has acquired in recent years. In 2014 Microsoft decided it could do a better job if it discarded a lot of software testers. This bright new dawn was lauded at the time by Peter Bright at Ars Technica in a piece titled "How Microsoft dragged its development practices into the 21st century". Testers were soooo 20th century. The previous month, Microsoft had laid off many of its Windows testers. "Under the new structure, a number of Windows engineers, primarily dedicated testers, will no longer be needed," wrote Mary Jo Foley in her scoop for ZDNet. Crowdsourced testing would be the way forward – and we should be thankful for this, Ars advised. "The goal is to make the OS team work more like lean startups," we learned. Lean. Agile. Heard this one before? "QA still exists and is still important, but it performs end-user style 'real world' testing, not programmatic automated testing. This testing has been successful for Bing, improving the team's ability to ship changes without harming overall software quality," Bright wrote. The following year my piece voicing misgivings to the crowdsourcing part – the Windows Insider programme – got plenty of attention at Microsoft. The Insiders were not representative of the core Microsoft business customer, I argued."Normal people don't sign up in large numbers to try out very rough alpha software, or at least not knowingly. This means only the most devoted fanbois and developers have been using early builds of Windows 10," I wrote. Interesting, we were told. The company carried on regardless. Well, here we are. Over the past three years Windows 10 has been released at six-month intervals, so someone was doing the QA, but it showed less and less each time. Development slowed to a glacial pace. I would leave my biannual NDA walkthrough scratching my head at some of the headline features. 3D Paint? A new toolbar for gamers? An acrylic calculator? These were not only trivial, but they didn't seem to be on any professional user's wish list. Perhaps concerned at this slow pace, Microsoft managers decided to take the foot off the brake. Caution was thrown to the wind.The result was catastrophic. October 2018 was the first major update to be recalled for quality reasons. It deleted your data. In particular, it deleted data that users had stored in the cloud, that apparently eternal data backup destination, where no data should ever be lost. Right? It was merely the worst in a series of serious bugs which continue to this day. And I'm focusing on the problems caused by the big update. The car-crash autumn update followed a poorly received spring update. The agony continued for weeks. The patches are a nightmare too, one recently caused HP PCs to BSOD. And although it received far less attention than the Windows 10 recall, the Windows 7 patch rollup vital to many businesses was also halted this month. Windows 10 is officially a shit show. How did this happen? Windows watchers see a company in a rush. Windows Insider builds migrate through three stages – Fast, Slow and Release – and each should be less risky than the last. Build 17758 sped from the bleeding-edge Fast Ring to the Slow Ring in just three days (breaking .NET). A few builds later, the RTM 17763 bypassed the Release stage entirely and leaped into the wild. "Microsoft closed that window in record time," noted Neowin's Rich Woods. "It's entirely possible that the absurd breakneck pace of change we're seeing masks a complete breakdown in Microsoft's ability to produce reliable software," wrote Woody Leonard. "All I know for sure is that Windows is on a vicious downward spiral." Enterprises are now wary, sticking with older versions, ensuring the PC hardware industry – which sees an uptick in sales from Windows 10 – remains in the doldrums. Then there's the problem of crowdsourcing. This crowd isn't worth much, and certainly isn't wise enough to spot the problems Microsoft's dysfunctional software processes are throwing up. "Microsoft has come to rely on Windows Insiders to act as canaries for the operating system. With reliability issues too severe to be fixed in an update, it may be that too much quality control work has been offloaded onto these helpful enthusiasts," my colleague Richard Speed noted earlier this year. So three urgent changes are required. Firstly, reintroduce dedicated testers. Don't rely on automation and the crowd – that clearly isn't working. Raise the prestige of testers in the company. Secondly, repurpose the Insider programme – reclassify it as a fan club. Anything, really. It's not a substitute for professional testers. And thirdly, slow down. The rush to bring immature software to market has clearly deteriorated software quality. Are annual releases such a bad thing? Or even delaying the software until it's actually ready?Elevating the prestige of Windows within the organisation is not a bad idea either, even though it goes against Satya Nadella's proselytising of the cloud as the primary Microsoft platform. Working on Azure is the cool thing to do at Microsoft, and in the Cloud and AI Platform group under Scott Guthrie. Windows is "legacy". Yer Dad's OS. But this is shortsighted. There's far more potential at the edge than contemporary fashion permits – all those untapped cores. Here's an example of that power being put to very innovative use – avoiding the cloud, and producing better results. In addition, if the perception of the Windows in front of you is flaky – and right now it is – why would we assume instances of Windows running somewhere else will be more reliable? Call it the anti-halo effect: dreadful Windows software takes the shine off the cloud too. Making these changes will take time – especially if hiring is involved. But QA is broken, and Windows is broken. Someone has to grasp the nettle.

Last month, NVIDIA finally released their GeForce RTX 20 series graphics cards. Taking a complete departure from traditional GPU design and creating a hybrid architecture that includes a range of new technologies to power the next-generation immersive gaming experiences. The key highlight of the GeForce RTX 20 series was the enablement of real-time raytracing which has been the holy grail of graphics and something NVIDIA spent 10 years to perfect. In addition to raytracing, NVIDIA also aims to place bets on AI which will play a key role in powering features such as DLSS or Deep Learning Super Sampling, a unique way of offering the same quality as the more taxing MSAA AA techniques at twice the performance. We looked at the performance in detail of the GeForce RTX 2080 Ti and GeForce RTX 2080 FE cards and found them to be a good improvement over their predecessors, the GTX 1080 Ti and GTX 1080. When it comes to pricing, the GeForce RTX 20 series are some of the most costly graphics cards NVIDIA has offered to consumers. The reference variants are great with their new cooling design and good looking shrouds but AIBs have also prepped up their own custom models which would rival the FE (reference) cards. With just a few bucks of asking price over the reference models, the custom variants will offer a range of features such as triple fan coolers, bulky heatsinks, and custom PCBs allowing for better heat dissipation, higher air flow and more overclocking performance and clock stability at their respective boost clocks which will be higher compared to the reference variants.So today, I’ll be taking a look at the AORUS GeForce RTX 2080 Xtreme, featuring a Windforce 3X cooler and shroud that is redesigned from scratch to offer the best looks and also the best GPU performance by offering a custom PCB for overclocking and to top it all up, a factory overclock higher than the Founders Edition, out of the box. If you are planning to purchase a GeForce RTX 2080 graphics card, then you should definitely be checking out this review ahead as the AORUS may just prove to be the choice of custom card you are looking for.

¤ Nickname : lock ¤ Grade : elder (suspend from wilmer for now) ¤ New Tag :  can you open

If there is a third certainty in life, it is surely that all matters relating to taxation will be horribly complicated. Company car tax is no exception, and when changes are made to the system on a seemingly annual basis and the tax bands themselves are fiddled with just as often, the complexity of it all spirals out of control. However, the reason why Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) charges tax on the car your employer makes available to you is at least easy enough to understand. A company car is a benefit second only to the salary you are paid and HMRC therefore sees it as a taxable one. It calls it a ‘benefit in kind’, a term applied to any taxable perk or incentive other than your basic salary. So if you run a company car, you will have to pay a certain amount of tax. A company car is defined as one that is made available to you by your employer and that you are allowed to use personally outside of working hours, as well as for work. HMRC considers your commute to and from work to be personal use. European car sales drop sharply due to impact of WLTP tests Calculating the amount of tax you’ll be liable to pay appears daunting at first, but it is actually reasonably straightforward. We’ll take a closer look at that later on. But put simply, the calculation is based upon the value of the car, your salary, the car’s CO2 emissions and the type of fuel it runs on. CO2 is the primary factor here because the government wants to incentivise us all to drive cleaner cars. Therefore, the lower the car’s CO2 emissions, the less tax you pay, all other things being equal. In recent years, there have been significant changes to the way company car tax is structured. Diesel cars are subject to a 4% surcharge because they emit more nitrogen oxide, which is harmful on a local level. This was increased from 3% in April this year as part of the government’s efforts to discourage us from driving diesels. 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Another big change was made last year that concerns employees who are offered the choice between a company car and a car allowance, which is simply a sum of money paid on top of a basic salary. It usedto be the case that such employees were taxed according to the option they settled for. So if they chose the company car, they would pay tax based on its value, but if they chose the cash alternative, they’d pay tax on that sum. It was therefore possible to reduce your tax liability by choosing a company car whose value was much less than the car allowance that had been tabled. Now, however, HRMC collects tax on whichever has the highest value. In effect, the change closes a loophole and removes one of the ways in which your tax bill could be lowered. Put simply, it means more money in HM Treasury’s coffers. Calculating your company car tax bill: First of all, it is worth knowing that the 29 company car tax bands – which are based on CO2 emissions – are adjusted annually, so your tax bill will rise slightly year on year. Your employer will deduct yourtax payments from your salary each month, just as it deducts your income tax and national insurance contributions. That means you don’t have to do anything yourself, but you must make sure your employer has calculated your tax liability correctly. Your tax bill depends on the car’s CO2 emissions, its value and your salary. The CO2 emissions correlate to a tax band, expressed as a percentage. (All percentages here relate to the 2018-19 tax year.) Thevalue of the car includes its list price and all optional extras, and HMRC refers to this as its P11D value. Your rate of income tax – basic at 20%, higher at 40% or additional at 45% – is the third factor. The more CO2 a car emits, the more of its value is taxed. For instance, if the car emits 120g/km of CO2 and runs on petrol, you will pay tax on 25% of its value. The lowest rate, for cars emitting 0g/km of CO2, is 13%, and the highest rate is 37%. Once you have worked out the tax band, apply the relevant percentage to the car’s P11D value to find its benefit-in-kind value. By way of example, a BMW 520d M Sport emits 117g/ km of CO2 and sits in the 28%tax band (including its 4% diesel surcharge caused by the Real Driving Emissions test, for which no car yet meets the standard). Its P11D value is £40,515, so tax will be 28% of that, meaning a benefit-in-kind value of £11,344. Once you have that figure, multiply it by your income tax rate. Using our example above, £11,344 multiplied by 40% (assuming higher-rate income tax) means an annual bill of £4538. Therefore, that particular car will cost £378 each month. In some cases, a company car driver’s bill will be reduced if the driver contributes to the monthly lease cost of the car, or if the car is only available to the driver part-time. Petrol vs diesel: The 4% surcharge on diesel cars is there to discourage us from choosing diesels and persuade us into supposedly cleaner petrols. That may seem punitive, but because diesel cars emit less CO2 than their petrol equivalents, even after the surcharge is applied, the difference in tax liability between the two may not be significant.] For drivers who cover higher than average mileage, meanwhile, the benefit of better diesel fuel economy will probably outweigh the 4% surcharge. Let’s look at three examples. BMW 5 Series: Let’s assume our company car driver is a higher-rate tax payer who drives 1500 miles per month. The petrol 520i emits 134g/km of CO2 and is in the 27% bracket. The 520d diesel emits 119g/km and sits in the 28% band. The petrol BMW will therefore cost £355 per month compared with £378 for the diesel. Each month, the petrol car will cost £177 to fuel compared with £145 for the diesel, so overall the diesel works out cheaper by £9 per month. However, if the driver covers only 1000 miles per month, the petrol is the cheaper choice by £2. Mercedes-Benz S-Class: Our driver is an additional-rate tax payer and covers 2000 miles per month. The petrol S-Class emits 169g/km of CO2 and falls in the 34% tax bracket, while the diesel S-Class emits 153g/km and slots into the 35% bracket. The petrol car will cost £1099 per month while the diesel will cost £1103. Each month, the petrol S-Class will therefore cost £1410 in tax and fuel compared with £1352 for the diesel one BMW i8: It may to be a few years old, but the BMW i8 is still one of the most eye-catching cars on the road. And although it doesn’t match a Porsche 911 for sheer driving thrills, the i8 is great to drive in its own way. With CO2 emissions of 42g/km, it slots into the lowest, 13% tax band. Its P11D is £112,680 and its benefit-in-kind value £14,648, so an additional-rate tax payer will pay £549 per month for it. The £100,781 Porsche 911 Carrera 4 GTS, meanwhile, would cost the same driver £1398 per month – an additional £10,000 each yea