The January sales have begun, and we're looking to these fantastic Fitbit deals to hit 2020 running straight from the off. Across the US and UK, these Fitbit Versa fitness trackers (and a few other devices) have already seen price drops over the holiday sales, and there's still time to pick up your own.

The excellent Fitbit Versa deals below can land you a nifty little fitness tracker for far less than you'd usually part with, and span the full Versa range so you can find the perfect wrist piece for you. The Fitbit Versa is a good choice for someone looking for a top fitness tracker for a lower price - these have been slashed in cost ahead of the sales, making them a far more palatable choice if you're hoping to get a screen to go with your tracker.

Coming in cheapest is the Fitbit Versa Lite. It's a pared-down version of the fully-fledged Fitbit Versa, but ideal for anyone looking to track their fitness without spending over $100 / £100 and getting bogged down with a set of features they won't use. 

This cheap fitness tracker doesn't exactly skimp on its offerings either, however. If you choose the slimline Versa Lite, you're getting all the fitness and sleep tracking you'd expect from a Fitbit as well as app and notification integration with your phone, four-day battery life, and a swim-proof casing. 

The Versa and Versa 2 fitness trackers offer a step up in the range of features on offer, with the slight increase in price tag to match (though you're still getting a great price in these Fitbit Versa deals). 

Fitbit was there right from the start of the fitness tracker revolution, and continues to off a strong suite of tracking dynamics paired with a good app experience too.

• Check out more After Christmas sales at Walmart
• Check out more After Christmas sales at Amazon

Today's best Fitbit Versa deals

Still looking for more? We've got all the best Fitbit prices right here on TechRadar, but we're also tracking the very best smartwatch deals around. If you're after more fitness goodies and you're an avid iPhone user, you might also want to check out the best Apple Watch sales around. 

SplashData has released its annual list of the most commonly-used passwords across the world, uncovering that old security habits really do die hard.

The security firm investigated over five million leaked passwords over the past twelve months, and found that many of the most common logins would be easy to guess for even the most incompetent hackers.

In perhaps the most surprising news, "password" has for the first time been knocked out of the top two spots, being replaced by the painfully simple "123456" and "123456789".

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Complex

SplashData estimates almost 10 percent of people have used at least one of the 25 worst passwords on this year’s list, with nearly three percent using "123456".

The company noted that while many computer programs now prevent such simple passwords from being created in the first place, older applications and some websites lack this ability, allowing for some dangerously weak passwords. 

Among this year's new entries were “1q2w3e4r” and “qwertyuiop” - simple patterns using contiguous keys on the keyboard - however SplashData says that using such letter/number combinations will still be easy to crack.

“Our hope by publishing this list each year is to convince people to take steps to protect themselves online, and we think these and other efforts are finally starting to pay off,” says Morgan Slain, CEO of SplashData.

“We can tell that over the years people have begun moving toward more complex passwords, though they are still not going far enough as hackers can figure out simple alphanumeric patterns.”

Here are the so-called "worst passwords of 2019"

1. 123456
2. 123456789
3. qwerty
4. password
5. 1234567
6. 12345678
7. 12345
8. iloveyou
9. 111111
10.  123123

• Stay safe with the best antivirus of 2020

Star Wars is dead… long live Star Wars? The Skywalker saga may have ended with The Rise of Skywalker, but the galaxy lives on, with The Mandalorian and the upcoming Obi-Wan series on TV and a new Star Wars film arriving in 2022. 

But what will that movie be? At the moment, no one outside of Lucasfilm and Disney has a clue. We know that MCU mastermind Kevin Feige is down to produce something, that The Last Jedi’s Rian Johnson may (or may not) still be developing a series of Star Wars films and that Game of Thrones showrunners David Benioff and DB Weiss definitely aren’t, but until an announcement (strongly rumored to be early next year), we’re all in the dark.

Still, it’s fun to speculate. Here then are five directions the saga could potentially go in…

The Next Generation of Jedi

One of the open goals that The Rise of Skywalker misses is in picking up the loose threads from The Last Jedi. If you’ll recall, Episode 8 ends with the implication that the Force is growing once more, far away from the Skywalker bloodline. There may well be an entire new generation of Force-users waking up to their powers. Now that the war is over, someone needs to get them in line...

Imagine an X-Men type film, where a group of charismatic tutors must help troubled young initiates avoid the perils of the Dark Side. Rey would be involved in some capacity for sure, but you could also include Maz Kanata (not a Jedi, but very much in-tune with the Force) and new characters in the vein of The Force Awakens’ Lor San Tekka, trying to guide this gifted - but also extremely dangerous - new generation into the future. Hell, even Force Ghost Luke could show up, if we can pull Mark Hamill away from Twitter.

The Syndicate Wars

One of the most fascinating aspects of Solo - a film that absolutely nobody wanted, but which managed to be fun enough to retroactively justify its existence - was its exploration of the galaxy's various criminal organizations. By the end of the movie Crimson Dawn (led by Maul, no less) is a fearsome force in the galaxy and Qi'ra (Emilia Clarke) is in deeper than ever before. 

It's hard to imagine we'll be seeing a Solo 2 any time soon based on its box office, but there's plenty of mileage in following his ex. Game of Thrones may have finished, but Emilia Clarke is still a big name and could easily carry a film exploring the galaxy's shadier nooks and crannies as Qi'ra tries desperately to escape her past, dodge her saber-wielding boss and make a new life for herself. Team her up with Donald Glover's universally-loved Lando Calrissian and you have everything you need for a fun, exciting Star Wars film that’s mostly detached from the familiar bigger picture of the Empire and the Rebellion.

Knights of the Old Republic

The Knights of the Old Republic video games have become a beloved Star Wars era in their own right, every bit as cherished as the films. Set some 4000 years before the events of A New Hope, they explore the raging conflict between the Jedi and the Sith, both at the height of their powers. 

Sound overly familiar? It’s really not. KOTOR stands out thanks to its shades of grey and rich, complex characterization. Revan, in particular, is a fascinating character - truly embodying both the dark side and the light in a way that Anakin never quite managed. The era also has the benefit of being sufficiently distant from current canon that you could do pretty much anything, while still feeling like Star Wars.

Of all of these suggestions, this is the one that may actually be in development right now... Back in May, Buzzfeed reported that Altered Carbon screenwriter Laeta Kalogridis has penned a script for a potential Knights of the Old Republic film. We’re keeping all our lightsabers crossed…

Into the Unknown

Did you watch the Star Wars animated series Rebels? If you didn't, you missed out on some of the best - and most adventurous - Star Wars storytelling of the last few years. Spoilers for the fate of protagonist Ezra Bridger ahead...

Set a few years before A New Hope, the series follows the young Jedi as he joins a growing rebel cell. Now, we all know that by the time of A New Hope, Obi-Wan is the only (known) surviving Jedi, so there was always a heavy question mark hanging over his eventual fate. As it happens, Ezra survives the series, fleeing into the Unknown Regions, albeit chased by the wicked Grand Admiral Thrawn.

Something that Star Wars has sometimes suffered with is its tendency to smallness. Everyone and everything is connected. A film set in a brand new area of the galaxy, though, offers the chance to start again. The Unknown Regions are, well, unknown. There's no Empire or Rebellion here, so you wouldn't have to rely on the backstory of Rebels. Instead, this would be the story of a single Jedi, truly lost and alone, forced to rely on his wits and his lightsaber to survive. 

Poe Dameron: Sith Hunter

Honestly, who doesn't love Poe Dameron? Of all the characters introduced in the sequels, he's the one that most embodies the adventure serial vibes of the original trilogy. Somewhere between Han Solo and Indiana Jones, he's a hugely appealing lead. And, of course, it doesn't hurt that Oscar Isaac is easy on the eye.

But what does he do next? In The Last Jedi Poe is being positioned as a leader of the Resistance, but it's hard to imagine him settling down and becoming a senator in a new New Republic. Instead, we can see him living for the thrill of adventure, venturing out on missions for the new order, possibly tracking down the remainder of Palpatine's Final Order, like a futuristic nazi hunter.

He wouldn’t have to be alone, either. The Rise of Skywalker sets him up with a perfect companion in the form of Zorii Bliss, plus there would be plenty of room for his other co-stars to show up. This would be a great chance to explore the new status quo, while telling a rattling adventure yarn.

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If you're looking to capture the best moments of 2020, these GoPro deals are offering a fantastic price cut on some of the cheaper GoPro models in the January Sales. You can save over £100 on the Hero 7 Silver (down to just £169) and the Hero 7 Black (£278), or if you want the cheapest version possible, the Hero 7 White is reduced to just £118.30 this week. 

With the Hero 8 model releasing just two months ago, we've been looking to the Go Pro Hero 7 Silver and Black models for some hefty discounts in the 2020 sales. 

These two models represent the mid-range and higher end of the Go Pro Hero 7 range, so you're getting an excellent action camera for your cash whichever version you pick up. Both offer the hardy outer shell on which GoPro has based its name, but the Silver is slimmed down version of the high-tech Black model with the price cut to match. While you can still shoot 4K 30fps footage with video stabilization and a wide lens on the Silver, there are a few features on the Black that may draw more professionally inclined customers. 

These GoPro deals are a great way to cash in on 2020's January sales, you're picking up a GoPro Hero 7 Silver for just a hair over the cheapest it's ever been and saving a good £100 on the Black model. 

• Check out more January sales at Amazon

Today's best GoPro deals in the January sales

You can find all the best January sales right here on TechRadar - we're collecting all the best savings to bring you amazing deals throughout the holiday period. Or, if you're just looking for the best GoPro price possible, we've got you covered as well. 

What's the perfect way to celebrate the New Year? A big party? Celebrations with the entire family? Or maybe you just want to watch Doctor Who on your TV or online - surely the best way to start 2020!

And considering Whovians have had to hold out an entire year since the last time they got to see a new dose of Doctor Who action, this will be at the top of most people's festive TV watching plans.

And some even better news - this episode is set to be one of the biggest and longest in the show's entire history, so big in fact that they've split it into two parts just to fit all of that action.

Of course, Doctor Who is normally somewhat of a Christmas tradition, moving from its Christmas Day slot into the New Year. So for those losing their favourite Christmas past-time, this double bill action will be just the news you were looking for.

We've done the research, tracked down times, locations and everything you need to know to watch Doctor Who New Year Special online and listed it all below. We've even got options for those out of the UK while the episode airs!

How to watch Doctor Who New Year special online for free in the UK:

Ready to catch Doctor Who in all of its glory once again? Tune into BBC One on Sunday, January 5 at 7pm GMT.

Rather watch the episode from your laptop, tablet, mobile or other device? Luckily, that's still possible. Simply head to either the BBC iPlayer app or the TVPlayer service. Both are completely free to use and will give full access to both New Year Doctor Who episodes.

Stream Doctor Who from anywhere else in the world for free:

Away on holiday for New Year's Day or currently living abroad? Sadly, this will mean the Doctor Who episodes are geo-blocked for you. Luckily there's an easy solution to remedy this.

All you have to do is appear like you're back in the UK thanks to the use of a VPN. A VPN is a tool that alters your IP address to make it look like you're somewhere else - perfect for trying to stream TV.

Our vote for the best VPN service goes to ExpressVPN but how do you install one and how can that be used to watch Doctor Who New Year Special online? Read on to answer all of these questions.

How to watch Doctor Who in the US

Watch old episodes of Doctor Who online

New to the Doctor Who franchise? There's a lot to catch up on but luckily, no matter where you are, it's easy to watch all of the Doctor Who episodes:

Watch all the series of 'new' Doctor Who from the UK

Doctor Who has a very long history and unfortunately there is no easy way to watch every episode ever. However, BBC has stepped on up in heroic fashion to offer you everything since the show returned in 2005. That means you can catch up a wealth of content over on BBC iPlayer.

The show was also free to watch on the Amazon Prime subscription for a while but will now cost you per episode if you look to go that way. Looking for a full session of binge-watching? Britbox will be the way to go, with all the classic Doctor Who dating from its first ever episodes in the 60s. However, Britbox will require a VPN to circumvent its USA and Canada geo-restriction – scroll up for all the info on that.

Watch previous Doctor Who seasons online in the US

Doctor Who fans Stateside can also revisit old episodes of the programme via the Britbox service mentioned above.

A constant flow of information in business is more like a firehose than any of us want to imagine. It’s a steady stream, often bursting at the seams, and it doesn’t let up. Tracking and managing that firehose of data can be a Herculean task because you’re always playing catch-up -- analyzing the data after it has been transmitted and generating reports at a later date. The problem, of course, is that “the later date” never comes and sometimes we process reams and reams of data, store it and archive it, without ever really analyzing it.

Amazon Kinesis is a real-time cloud analytics engine that collects, analyzes, and reports on data transmission in your company as it happens, using the power of cloud computing services. You can think of it as a pipe that connects two firehoses -- the data comes in, Amazon Kinesis can analyze it as it transmits, and then the data keeps flowing. Instead of using an analytics dashboard or generating that are only helpful later, you can make business decisions and respond to data flows in real-time.

As an example of this, think about a vast multiplayer gaming system where thousands or even millions of gamers participate online. Talk about a steady flow of data. There are thousands of data requests in terms of player movements, rewards they collect, and achievements in the game not to mention the transactional data -- what they purchase in the game and their records in terms of what they can access and how they pay for their membership.

For a company running a gaming network like that, it’s easy to see how complex the interactions are between gamers, the network, and the IT infrastructure management required to host the game. Amazon Kinesis tracks the interactions at every level as it happens. For example, if there’s a new high-score for a multiplayer battle -- say, completing a level in record time or defeating every opponent -- Amazon Kinesis can report on this information within seconds.

For other data throughput scenarios, real-time analysis and reporting are incredibly valuable. This can include scenarios such as connected smart home devices and Internet of Things devices, medical records for a large hospital chain, data collected from a car and analyzed for machine learning application such as autonomous driving, or even on a website to find out exactly which sections of an e-commerce website someone visits and where they click.

Benefits of Amazon Kinesis

One of the key benefits to Amazon Kinesis is that the business decision-makers, developers, analysts, and data scientists are all better informed and able to make better (and faster) decisions. The firehose of data is not so overwhelming. The rich analytics and business intelligence is all available right away, not just as part of a report or a dashboard that summarizes findings. There’s no need to wait until all of the data is collected and put under a microscope because the microscope is constantly looking at the data as it flows on the network.

There are quite a few practical benefits to this, starting with the ability to improve your service. In the case of the multiplayer gaming system, there are tradition benefits such as reporting back to the user on high-scores and achievements, but perhaps even more importantly it means companies can examine and problems on the system in real-time and deal with them as they occur, not after the problems have caused users to unsubscribe.

Another practical benefit has to do with the speed of decision making. Because the analytics are provided in real-time as they happen, companies can then make real-time decisions about that data. In the example of the autonomous car, an automaker might run a simulation in a crowded urban area to see how the robotic vehicle performs, and make decisions about the GPS fleet tracking, location data and the sensors that track how the car adjusts its speed.

In a traditional model, where data is summarized later, the automaker might run simulations and then analyze the data later. One reason this is sometimes true has to do with the scope of the needs for data discovery and reporting. Some companies just can’t manage and maintain the infrastructure required for real-time data analytics. That’s another major advantage to use Amazon Kinesis because the service can scale according to your real-time data analysis needs. There’s no need to build-out the infrastructure first or to scale p or down for each new project.

This also helps tremendously with the costs. Typically, real-time data analytics is complex, difficult to manage, and requires high-end servers, networks, and vast amounts of online storage but Amazon Kinesis can scale according to the project needs and scope. Yet the costs are related to the actual analytics you perform. With traditional batch processing for data analytics, one that is housed and analyzed in a traditional on-premise data center, that’s just not the case.

• Keep your business safe with the best cloud firewall.

Ben Stokes, Olivia Colman, Margaret Atwood/Bernardine Evaristo. They all took home some prestigious prizes in 2019. And phone network Three joined in the back-slapping fun when it won the prize for 'Phone Deal of the Year' at October's Mobile Choice Consumer Awards.

Its unlimited data SIM only deal took home the gong for the second time in three years, which is obviously great news for Three. But the even better news for you is that you can still get the offer now.

So that means absolutely unlimited data, calls and texts for a mere £18 per month. In a SIM only deals market that seems to get fiercer and fiercer by the day, Three's all-you-can-eat offer remains our favourite of the lot.

We've got more details about the offer below or, if monthly bills of £18 still sound a bit on the high side, keep scrolling to see what other SIM only deals are out there right now.

• More like this: The best early January sales and deals for 2020

Three's award winning SIM only deal:

• Check out the best SIM-free phone deals to combine with these offers

What does a SIM only deal with Three offer?

If you haven't already been won over by this amazing offer from Three then you'll be excited to hear that the network doesn't shy away from offering up some extra incentives as well.

Whether that be free exclusive prizes or extra roaming. You can see all of best parts of a Three SIM only deal or Three mobile deals down below.

• Wuntu - Exclusive offers and freebies with Three's rewards app
• Go Roam - Roaming abilities in 71 worldwide countries at no extra cost
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What other SIM only deals are out there?

£18 per month for unlimited data is undeniably great value, but you can trim your bills even more. In fact, you can get them all the way down to a fiver a month with iD Mobile, if you can manage on 1GB of data.

Our other go-to recommendation at the moment comes from the lesser-known Smarty. With two limited time offers, it is attracting swathes of new customers its way. Choose from either 30GB data for a tenner, or go all out on 50GB for £15 per month. Fantastic value that gets even better when you discover that you'll be put on a 30-day rolling contract that you can break whenever's convenient for you.

Although the widespread use of artificial intelligence (AI) in business is still in its infancy and questions remain open about the pace of progress, the lack of adequate skills to support AI projects, immature market ecosystem, lack of clean data and regulatory implications are the key challenges which might slow down the adoption in the Middle East, an industry expert said.

Speaking to TechRadar Middle East, Manish Ranjan, Program Manager for software and cloud at research firm International Data Corporation (IDC), said that there are a lot of AI-centric initiatives and mega projects in various stages in the Gulf countries.

In the UAE, there is UAE AI Strategy and various AI research labs by public and private sectors (ADDA, Dewa, Huawei and Smart Dubai), and AI university.

Saudi Arabia recently unveiled a new National Centre for AI, a national AI regulator, a National Data Management Office and is already delivering its first AI college.

“Organisations, especially from government, banking and finance, retail and resource industries are increasingly leveraging AI and ML to automate and optimise their businesses and operations,” Ranjan said.

The use cases around AI is still evolving where organisations are using various sub-sets of the AI technologies such as natural language processing (NLP), image/video analytics, machine learning (ML), and other technologies to answer questions, discover insights, and provide recommendations.

Many believe there may not be a single technology that will shape our world more in the next 50 years than AI, Sam Blatteis, CEO of The MENA Catalysts, a public policy consulting firm for government innovation arms and high tech multinationals, said and added that it has rapidly evolved into the hottest area in legislation in the Gulf.

This is the first time governments around the world are simultaneously releasing national plans to develop the same field, he said.

Being a subset of AI techniques, Ranjan said that ML enables computer systems to learn from past experiences by analysing a huge amount of data and improve their behaviour for a given task.

Many global vendors have started embedding AI, ML, and cognitive applications to provide ultimate business benefits to their users.

• Top five trends that will shape the technology sector in UAE in 2020
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Lack of adequate data

In general, globally or regionally, Ranjan said that organisations are leveraging data and information (both structured and unstructured data/information) to educate their AI platforms to bring automation and improve operational efficiency—this has put data as a focal point.

“Data is instrumental for AI platforms and solutions to help the system become more intelligent by learning fast. If there is a lack of adequate and variety of data, AI would reflect a slow learning curve and the accuracy might also be impacted. The AI systems which can be able to process a vast amount of data in real-time would show greater results,” he said.

According to a survey conducted on CIOs by IDC, over 50% of organisations across the Middle East highlighted their plans to leverage cognitive and AI solutions by 2020.

“Definitely, the year 2020 would highlight some of the AI projects which were in proof of concept or sandboxing phase last year. We will see more commercial AI use cases emerging as the market matures,” Ranjan said.

According to IDC, spending on artificial intelligence systems for the UAE and Saudi Arabia combined is forecast to reach $132.3 million in 2020, witnessing an increase of 23.8% compared to 2019.

The spending in the UAE for next year is forecast to be $73.6m and $58.6m for Saudi Arabia.

  “The AI software applications and AI platforms markets continue to show steady growth in the Middle East and Africa region, and we expect this momentum to continue over the forecast period,” Ranjan said.

The top use cases of AI solutions in the UAE and Saudi Arabia are automated threat intelligence and prevention systems, automated customer service agents, IT automation, fraud analysis and investigation, defence, terrorism, investigation and government intelligence systems, and digital assistants for enterprise knowledge workers.

However, Ranjan said that even if AI matures in future, “we can still not think of complete seclusion from human intelligence. We will have bots and machines taking the workloads which would be extremely efficient and at one point almost error-free; however, we would still require human intelligence.”

“How we legislate AI will become one of the defining themes of the next five years,” the CEO of the MENA Catalysts said. “We need to set strategic ‘rules of the road’ from the start — not to over-regulate, but to provide regulatory predictability to attract expertise, ideas, and capital.”

Moreover, if the Gulf is to develop knowledge industries of the future, he said that education here must be reimagined.

“We have to think about how we can ‘hack education’ to reprogram our education system, change course and plot a new education strategy. We should be teaching physics to kindergartners, robotics and computer programming in every school,” Blatteis said.

Machine learning, deep learning and big data are some of the most highly sought-after skills in the industry.

Nvidia in 2019 may have gotten some pretty stiff competition from its top rival. However, that doesn’t mean that the graphics card (GPU) manufacturer has been taken down from its lofty perch. Yes, it’s suffered a few revenue hits that started in 2018 as well as a couple of setbacks – particularly due to release delays and uncovered security vulnerabilities. Plus, let’s face it, AMD has made a rather valiant attempt at usurping the throne with its impressive yet more affordable cards.

• We'll show you how to build a PC
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However, Nvidia’s popular GPUs are still king of the hill (we’re looking at you, Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 Ti) when it comes to gaming, design and content creation, allowing it to keep the crown. In fact, thanks to its RTX products, Nvidia has reasserted its dominance in the graphics card market. With its RTX Super line getting released in Summer 2019, we’re certain it will stay that way when 2020 rolls around. The highly anticipated RTX 2080 Ti Super hasn’t even made an appearance yet – if it indeed exists.

And 2020 definitely also looks very promising for the manufacturer, with its 7nm Ampere architecture rumored to make an appearance by June 2020 to start. But before we look to its future, let’s take a look first at what Nvidia has accomplished in 2019, alongside what it could have done better.

 Breathtaking gaming at a budget price 

Nvidia ended 2018 with a bang: not only did it release both the GeForce RTX 2070 and RTX 2080 graphics cards, which delivered decent 4K gaming as well as ray tracing to the masses – albeit only if they were willing to pay the steep price. But, the company also unleashed its beasts – the RTX 2080 Ti, which remains unbeatable in mainstream gaming, and the appropriately named Titan RTX.

It wasn’t done. As soon as January 2019 rolled around, the GeForce RTX 2060 hit the streets to the delight of RTX graphics cards fans who may not have had enough cash to spare to shell out for the higher-end cards. Indeed, RTX 2060 was the graphics card of your mid-range dreams, armed with ray tracing and enough power for 4K at 30fps gaming.

Now, all that was left was to cover the entry level market. Nvidia had a few aces up its sleeves for that, too. February 2019 witnessed the release of the GeForce GTX 1660 Ti in the budget sector, proving itself more than capable yet generally more affordable than the RTX 2060. The GTX 1660 and GTX 1650 both followed in the spring of 2019, with ray tracing in GTX 1660 and 1660 Ti coming shortly after. Those rounded up the lineups nicely so that Nvidia had a capable graphics card for you, whatever your need or your budget was. 

AMD giving it a run for its money 

There was much anticipation behind AMD’s Navi cards before they were even released, especially because leaks were showing how they rivaled Nvidia’s existing RTX cards while dialing down the price for budget-minded gamers. For a hot minute there, the future did look grim for Nvidia – after all, the Radeon RX 5700 is a juicier option than the RTX 2060 in term of value, and the AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT holds its own against the RTX 2070 at a much better price.

Luckily for Nvidia, AMD hasn’t brought ray tracing onto its new cards, and it seems to be focusing its efforts – at least, for now – in the mid-range and budget markets. And, so far, none has come close to the performance that the RTX 2080 Ti is offering.

Juicing up its best-selling graphics cards 

Still, with AMD starting to rack up sales with its affordable alternatives, Nvidia had to do something. However, instead of releasing a whole new lineup, Nvidia simply gave its RTX (and GTX) cards a boost in specs and added the word “Super” to their names.

It was a bit of a gamble, but one that largely paid off. The RTX 2070 Super is up to 24% faster than the RTX 2070, with an average performance increase of 16%, for the same price; and the RTX 2060 Super offers roughly the same over its predecessor. The RTX 2080 Super, on the other hand, doesn’t really offer a huge bump in specs than the RTX 2080. However, it’s also $100 cheaper and it gets you closer to the RTX 2080 Ti in terms of performance, which is something. 

While these cards may be a lot more expensive than their AMD rivals for not much performance difference, they’ve also got the advantage of ray tracing. So for folks who are deciding whether to stay with Nvidia or switch to AMD, the option to stay is more compelling than ever – even if AMD still beats Nvidia over price.

The death of cryptocurrency 

Alongside AMD, Nvidia definitely rode the crypto wave at its height, benefiting in the surge of graphics card sales for mining. Unfortunately that wave finally crashed, resulting in a massive blow to Nvidia’s sales.

After announcing its earnings for the second quarter of the 2019 financial year, it was revealed that Nvidia’s revenue fell by 17%, which is huge. On the upside, the manufacturer actually beat analyst expectations, racking up with $2.58 billion instead of $2.54 billion. 

With gaming as popular as ever, and Nvidia’s gaming products accounting for over 50% of its total revenue, it’s not like its struggling with the loss of cryptocurrency sales. As its chief financial officer Colette Kress said, “Essentially our business is normalized.”

Nvidia shield becomes the streaming video player to beat 

Nvidia Shield TV has been the top Android streaming box since it came out in 2015, but it’s been due for a refresh since 2017. Luckily, it was revealed in August 2019 not one, but two models were on their way. Roughly about two months later, the Nvidia Shield TV and Nvidia Shield TV Pro hit the streets, receiving glowing reviews.

In 2019, Nvidia’s streaming players are still the ones to beat, offering things like premium 4K/HDR streaming, AI image upscaling and GeForce Now service, all wrapped in fresh new looks.

Predicting Nvidia in 2020

Though 2019 may not have been a particularly stellar year for Nvidia, it’s gotten a few wins with its GeForce 16 series and Super RTX lineup. Unlike AMD, it’s got all sectors of the market covered, and has essentially introduced ray tracing to the world of mainstream gaming. That’s without mentioning the fact that laptop sales continue to rise, which Nvidia will only benefit from. There’s also the success of Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch Lite consoles, which utilize Nvidia graphics, and of course, the Nvidia Shield TV streamers.

So you might say that Nvidia is more than chugging along, even if it didn’t have any Internet-breaking releases in 2019.

The question now is, will 2020 be a better year for the graphics card giant? It’s highly likely that 2020 could be its year. The long rumored Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 Ti Super is expected to rear its head in early 2020, and it’s supposed to be a beast with 4,608 CUDA cores and 16Gbps memory speed. 

That’s not all; the next generation Ampere cards might also arrive in 2020. And, these are expected to utilize 7nm process and double down on ray tracing – not to mention, cut the price so they’re cheaper than ever. In addition, PhysX 5.0, Nvidia’s Finite Element Model (FEM) solution for improved physics effects, is also coming in 2020.

And though AMD’s explosive FEMFX may have already stolen Nvidia’s PhysX thunder, with both the RTX 2080 Ti Super and Ampere cards up its sleeves, Nvidia is likely to leave AMD in the dust, especially since AMD has yet to implement ray tracing. But, we guess we’ll have to wait and see how it all plays out.

• Here are the best gaming PCs

The Samsung Galaxy S20 series may be coming nine years sooner than expected, as a new leak suggests what we've heard before: Samsung is set to leapfrog the Galaxy S11 and a bunch of numbers in its flagship phone naming scheme.

The unverified rumor gets even more interesting, as there may not be a Samsung Galaxy S20e in 2020. Instead, the South Korea company would start with the Galaxy S20, and offer the Galaxy S20 Plus and Galaxy S20 Ultra as higher-end models, according to the leak from case-maker Schnailcase.

The details in the new leak include all of the names of the phones as well as their respective screen sizes, as noted in a tweet by the founder of Shcnailcase.

The Galaxy S10 lineup included a total of four phones, with the Galaxy S10e on the lowest end and the specialized Galaxy S10 5G on the highest end (it launched a bit later than the rest of the S10 phones). This doesn't count the still rumored Samsung Galaxy S10 Lite, which we could see at CES 2020.

All of this appears to be changing for 2020's lineup, as 5G becomes prevalent among flagship phones and a requirement of the Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 chipset.

All 5G means one fewer device

The jump from S10 to S20 is still somewhat unexpected, though not an unheard of move. After all, Microsoft jumped to Windows 10 out of nowhere, Apple skipped past the iPhone 9, and the Xbox 360 may well have been named so that it wouldn't be called Xbox 2 while competing with a PlayStation 3.

But, the shift from four phones in the lineup to just three is a bit more interesting. This is likely because Samsung plans to support 5G on all of new Galaxy S20 phones, as we had suggested. This would eliminate the need for a Galaxy S20 5G designation.

The Galaxy S20 would be left as the new base model, with a 6.2-inch display and a less refined design but cheaper price point, mirroring the Galaxy S10e experience. Then the Galaxy S20 Plus would stand in the place of both the S10 and S10 Plus, with a 6.7-inch display. For those who want the ultimate Samsung experience, the Galaxy S20 Ultra would stand at the top of the pack with a 6.9-inch display.

Whether it's the Galaxy S11 or Galaxy S20, the collapse of the Galaxy S11e follows the strategy of Samsung's closest competitor: Apple. Apple did the same thing when it replaced the entry-level iPhone XR (the S10e equivalent) with the iPhone 11, giving its new 'cheap' smartphone full honors in the series numbering scheme, while the iPhone 11 Pro and iPhone 11 Pro Max offered more features at higher prices.

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