Tag Archives: Gaming

Posted on Author Atlantic Computer Services Categories Blog

Windows 10 Update Gives Graphics Cards Users More Control

Does your PC have more than one graphics card in it?

If so, and you’re a Windows 10 user, there’s good news.

Microsoft recently announced some coming changes to Windows 10 that will give users with multiple GPU’s more control over how their cards are used when running applications.

Currently, Windows makes the decision about which card to use on the fly, but in a preview of Build 20190, under settings Display Graphics Settings there is a new dropdown that allows users to set which of their GPU’s is the default.

In addition to being able to set their own default GPU, users will also be able to make GPU decisions on a per application dropdown list, rather than surrendering selection control to the OS. That will allow you to, for example, select a GPU that may not be your most powerful, but still offers superior performance in a given game.

It’s a cool addition, and one that’s well worth playing around with. If you’re curious to try it out now, just download the latest Windows Insider Build. If you’re not a member of that program, you’ll have to wait till a bit later in the year to experiment with it. If the past is any guide, the new feature should be appearing in one of the Fall updates, this year.

In any case, it’s an area that seldom gets much attention since it only applies to a minority of the Windows 10 user base, so kudos to Microsoft for paying attention to the needs and desires of their power users.

It’s not at all hard to find things to complain about where Microsoft is concerned, but it’s also clear that the company is working hard to improve the user experience, so credit where credit is due!

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Posted on Author Atlantic Computer Services Categories Blog

Nintendo Switch User Information Breach Affected Over 300,000 Users

A couple of months ago, Nintendo announced that their Switch gaming and live streaming service had been hacked, and as a result, some 160,000 user accounts had been compromised. As the company has continued their investigation into the incident, however, they’ve updated their disclosure, revealing that an additional 140,000 accounts were compromised, bringing the total to just over 300,000.

The information gained as a result of the hack includes screen names, dates of birth, the email addresses associated with each account, location, and gender data. If there’s a silver lining to be found in the incident, it is the fact that credit card information does not appear to have been accessed.

Also note that based on information provided by Nintendo, it appears that the hackers used brute force and other methods to access accounts, as opposed to taking advantage of some type of security flaw. The company also reports that although the total number of compromised accounts has increased markedly, it still represents less than 1 percent of the total accounts on the platform.

If anything, these types of attacks are only increasing in their frequency, so the usual recommendations still apply. Change your passwords on a regular basis. Use a different password on each of the websites you frequent. If you are in the habit of using the same password on multiple web properties, it’s long past time to break that habit. If a hacker gets into one account, you’ve just handed him the keys to large swaths of your digital kingdom.

Also, anytime it’s offered, enable and use two-factor authentication, which provides an added layer of security. If you want to be extra cautious, it wouldn’t hurt to make use of a VPN on top of that. Even if you don’t have the funds to use a paid service, there are a number of decent quality free ones available. Stay safe out there.

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Posted on Author Atlantic Computer Services Categories Blog

Mobile Flash Storage Getting Faster To Accommodate 5G Rollout

Are you ready for the world of 5G? Even if you are, the available storage you have on your favorite devices may not be as robust as you’d like it to be.

Anticipating this problem, Western Digital has announced a new bit of technology that will be available on the next generation of devices. The new technology is a new Universal Flash Storage (UFS) device that will go a long way toward ensuring that storage isn’t the performance bottleneck on the new, more robust network.

Western Digital’s Itzik Gilboa had this to say about the new technology:

“Clearly, 5G will bring on new types of very high-performance applications – from gaming to AR / VR, machine learning and AI. Yet these applications can only exist if they have the hardware to support the performance levels they require…our goal is to make sure that our part in the data path is never the limiting factor for the user experience.”

We don’t know much about the new drives, but we do know that they’ll use multi-level NAND to achieve better cost efficiencies and offer sequential write speeds of up to 800MB/s. This will be a big benefit to gamers, to people downloading high resolution (4k and 8k) media files, and to anyone who is in the habit of transferring large amounts of data from the cloud.

According to the Western Digital announcement, the new drives will be available beginning in March 2020, and will be available in your choice of 128 GB and 256 GB configurations.

This is excellent news and we’re very excited to give the new tech a test drive. If they live up to the hype, they’ll be good additions indeed. Any device outfitted with one of these will be well-positioned to take advantage of everything the world of 5G has to offer.

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Posted on Author Atlantic Computer Services Categories Blog

New Dangerous Malware Is Disguising Itself As Fortnite Launcher

LokiBot burst onto the scene in 2015, and has earned a reputation as being a powerful. This fearsome trojan is being distributed in a new way that poses a very real threat to targets of all shapes and sizes.

The latest campaign emulates the launcher for Epic Games, which is the developer behind the game Fortnite. Fortnite is one of the most popular online games in the world right now.

Researchers at Trend Micro discovered the new campaign. They note that thanks to a few unusual aspects of the install routine used, the malware can (in many cases) avoid detection by many popular antivirus programs.

In particular, the code borrows heavily from the official Epic Games launcher. The malicious features are too deeply embedded in the code to be noticed by most A/V programs in use today.

Like previous campaigns, this one relies on phishing emails. Those emails dangle hooks before potential victims, giving them a free, easy and convenient way of installing an incredibly popular game.

Unfortunately, any email recipient who clicks the link will not only not get a copy of the game installed, they’ll also wind up with a backdoor placed on their system and a copy of the malware itself. The copy acts as a keylogger and actively searches the infected system for usernames, passwords, banking details, and the contents of any cryptocurrency wallets that may be tied into or accessed from the system in question.

In other words, despite the fact that the software is five years old, it’s a serious threat and should not be taken lightly. The latest obfuscation tweaks have given the aging code a new lease on life, and all indications are that that trend will continue. It appears that Lokibot will be part of the threat matrix for quite some time to come.

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Posted on Author Atlantic Computer Services Categories Blog

Apply Security Update To Protect Against Nvidia Vulnerability

Have you downloaded the NVIDIA GeForce Experience (GFE) app?

It’s a helper app designed to work in tandem with GeForce GTX graphics cards. It is designed to automate the process of keeping your drivers up to date and automatically optimize your game settings.

If it’s something you rely on, you should be aware that NVIDIA recently discovered a serious security flaw that will require patching in order for you to protect yourself. Tracked as CVE-2019-5702, the flaw allows an attacker to corrupt a system file. In doing so, it allows a potential attacker to escalate privileges to take total control over it, or to trigger a denial of service attack.

If there’s a silver lining in the recent discovery, it lies in the fact that in order to exploit the flaw, physical access to your device is required. Given that, it’s not as serious a threat as some other recent vulnerabilities. It still represents a genuine threat. That is because the attacks designed to be used in conjunction with this vulnerability are of relatively low complexity and require no user interaction.

The flaw impacts any Windows-based PC running NVIDIA GeForce Experience version prior to 3.20.2. If you’re using the app, there are two ways to get the update. You can launch the GFE client, which will automatically search for updates and download the latest version. Or you can visit NVIDIA’s GeForce Experience Download page and manually download and install the latest version.

Again, while the flaw isn’t the most dangerous one we’ve seen in recent months, it’s better to be safe than sorry. So if it’s something you rely on to make your gaming experience more convenient and automate the driver update process, the safe bet is to upgrade your way around the flaw. Kudos to NVIDIA for their rapid resolution of the issue.

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