The New York Times has introduced the next title coming to its Games catalog following Wordle’s continued success — and it’s all about math. Digits has players adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing numbers. You can play its beta for free online right now. 
In Digits, players are presented with a target number that they need to match. Players are given six numbers and have the ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide them to get as close to the target as they can. Not every number needs to be used, though, so this game should put your math skills to the test as you combine numbers and try to make the right equations to get as close to the target number as possible.

Players will get a five-star rating if they match the target number exactly, a three-star rating if they get within 10 of the target, and a one-star rating if they can get within 25 of the target number. Currently, players are also able to access five different puzzles with increasingly larger numbers as well.  I solved today’s puzzle and found it to be an enjoyable number-based game that should appeal to inquisitive minds that like puzzle games such as Threes or other The New York Times titles like Wordle and Spelling Bee.
In an article unveiling Digits and detailing The New York Time Games team’s process to game development, The Times says the team will use this free beta to fix bugs and assess if it’s worth moving into a more active development phase “where the game is coded and the designs are finalized.” So play Digits while you can, as The New York Times may move on from the project if it doesn’t get the response it is hoping for. 
Digits’ beta is available to play for free now on The New York Times Games’ website

Samsung appears to be gearing up for the launch of the Galaxy A16, the company’s upcoming entry-level offering. If you keep up with the leaks, you may have already seen the device and probably know some of its key specs. Now, the Samsung Galaxy A16 4G and A16 5G have been reportedly spotted on the FCC and TUV Rheinland certification websites hinting at an imminent launch.

The Galaxy A16 4G and A16 5G were spotted on two certification websites

Today, folks over at 91Mobiles spotted the 4G and 5G models of the Samsung Galaxy A16 smartphone on the USA’s FCC certification website. The “Status Information” page for the 4G model on FCC’s website reportedly details its “Wi-Fi Mac Address,” “Bluetooth address,” and serial number.

The FCC ID for the 4G model of the Galaxy A16 is A3LSMA165M. It is worth noting that the device will come with support for Wi-Fi, NFC, Bluetooth, GPS, and of course 4G LTE. The FCC listing also details the model number of the 4G device, charger, and data cable which are SM-A165M/DS, EP-TA800, and EP-DN980, respectively.

On the other hand, the listing tells us the FCC ID of the Galaxy A16 5G which is A3LSMA166M. Besides, the FCC listing also suggests that the device will support 5G, 4G LTE, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and NFC. Additionally, the model number for its charger and data cable are EP-TA800 and EP-DN980, respectively.

The FCC listing also includes a rough sketch of the device hinting at the triple-rear camera setup. However, that seems confirmed based on the exclusive image of the Galaxy A16 5G shared by us.

The TUV Rheinland listing reveals the battery capacity of the 5G model

That’s not all, both models of the Galaxy A16 were spotted on the TUV Rheinland certification website. The TUV Rheinland listing suggests that the 5G model could come with a rated battery of 4860mAh and 5000mAh typical.

Besides, the listing reportedly suggests that both models could come with 18W fast wired charging support at 9V and 2.77A. Meanwhile, you can expect a 25W charger in the box alongside both models of the Galaxy A16.

Earlier, some leaks hinted that the 5G model could pack Samsung’s Exynos 1330 SoC under the hood. Additionally, the MediaTek Dimensity 6300 might power the device’s 4G LTE model. The best part is that Samsung could offer a massive six years of Android OS updates for both devices.

That’s not all, previous leaks also hint that the Galaxy A16 4G and A16 5G could come with similar color options i.e. Black, Gray, and Light Green. Moreover, both devices could run Android 14-based One UI 6.1 out of the box.

Although the October edition of Amazon Prime Day isn’t in full swing just yet, there are still tons of deals to be had, especially on the company’s own products. A bundle of a Blink Outdoor 4 camera and Echo Show 5 smart display is . That’s $130 off the regular price and it marks a record low for this bundle. There is one caveat, though: this deal is only available to Prime members.

This bundle is one that makes a lot of sense. You’ll be able to use your Echo Show 5 to get a live view of whatever the Blink Outdoor 4 camera is capturing with a simple Alexa command.

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A bundle of the Blink Outdoor 4 camera and Echo Show 5 smart display has dropped to $60, the lowest price to date. But you’ll need to be a Prime member to snag this discount.

$60 at Amazon

We recommend both products individually in our guides. We believe the Blink Outdoor 4 is the around. The name is a bit of a misnomer as you can easily place it inside your home too, not least because it runs on two AA batteries. You’ll only need to replace the cells every two years or so.

If you do place the camera outside, you can rest easy knowing that it’s weather resistant. Other features include night vision, motion detection and two-way audio. You will need a Blink Subscription Plan to store clips in the cloud. Otherwise, you can save footage locally with a Sync Module 2 (which is available separately) and USB flash drive.

As for the Echo Show 5, it’s one of the (only beaten out by its larger sibling, the Echo Show 8). It’s a compact, 5.5-inch smart display that works well as an alarm clock on your nightstand. The tap-to-snooze function comes in handy there, while there’s a sunrise alarm that gradually brightens the screen.

The Echo Show 5 does have a built-in camera, which might give you cause for concern if you want to place it by your bed. But the physical camera cover should sate any privacy concerns on that front.

Follow @EngadgetDeals on Twitter for the latest tech deals and buying advice in the lead up to October Prime Day 2024.

This article is part of a VB Special Issue called “Fit for Purpose: Tailoring AI Infrastructure.” Catch all the other stories here.

With more enterprises looking to build more AI applications or even AI agents, it’s becoming increasingly clear that organizations should use different language models and databases to get the best results. 

However, switching an application from Llama 3 to Mistral in a flash may take a bit of technology infrastructure finesse. This is where the context and orchestration layer comes in; the so-called middle layer that connects foundation models to applications will ideally control the traffic of API calls to models to execute tasks. 

The middle layer mainly consists of software like LangChain or LlamaIndex that help bridge databases, but the question is, will the middle layer solely consist of software, or is there a role hardware can still play here beyond powering much of the models that power AI applications in the first place. 

The answer is that hardware’s role is to support frameworks like LangChain and the databases that bring applications to life. Enterprises need to have hardware stacks that can handle massive data flows and even look at devices that can do a lot of data center work on device.

>>Don’t miss our special issue: Fit for Purpose: Tailoring AI Infrastructure.<<

“While it’s true that the AI middle layer is primarily a software concern, hardware providers can significantly impact its performance and efficiency,” said Scott Gnau, head of data platforms at data management company InterSystems. 

Many AI infrastructure experts told VentureBeat that while software underpins AI orchestration, none would work if the servers and GPUs could not handle massive data movement. 

In other words, for the software AI orchestration layer to work, the hardware layer needs to be smart and efficient, focusing on high-bandwidth, low-latency connections to data and models to handle heavy workloads. 

“This model orchestration layer needs to be backed with fast chips,” said Matt Candy, managing partner of generative AI at IBM Consulting, in an interview. “I could see a world where the silicon/chips/servers are able to optimize based on the type and size of the model being used for different tasks as the orchestration layer is switching between them.”

Current GPUs, if you have access, will already work

John Roese, global CTO and chief AI officer at Dell, told VentureBeat that hardware like the ones Dell makes still has a role in this middle layer. 

“It’s both a hardware and software issue because the thing people forget about AI is that it appears as software,” Roese said. “Software always runs on hardware, and AI software is the most demanding we’ve ever built, so you have to understand the performance layer of where are the MIPs, where is the compute to make these things work properly.” 

This AI middle layer may need fast, powerful hardware, but there is no need for new specialized hardware beyond the GPUs and other chips currently available. 

“Certainly, hardware is a key enabler, but I don’t know that there’s specialized hardware that would really move it forward, other than the GPUs that make the models run faster, Gnau said. “I think software and architecture are where you can optimize in a kind fabric-y way the ability to minimize data movement.”

AI agents make AI orchestration even more important

The rise of AI agents has made strengthening the middle layer even more critical. When AI agents start talking to other agents and doing multiple API calls, the orchestration layer directs that traffic and fast servers are crucial. 

“This layer also provides seamless API access to all of the different types of AI models and technology and a seamless user experience layer that wraps around them all,” said IBM’s Candy. “I call it an AI controller in this middleware stack.” 

AI agents are the current hot topic for the industry, and they will likely influence how enterprises build a lot of their AI infrastructure going forward. 

Roese added another thing enterprises need to consider: on-device AI, another hot topic in the space. He said companies will want to imagine when their AI agents will need to run locally because the old internet may go down. 

“The second thing to consider is where do you run?” Roese said. “That’s where things like the AI PC comes into play because the minute I have a collection of agents working on my behalf and they can talk to each other, do they all have to be in the same place.”

He added Dell explored the possibility of adding “concierge” agents on device “so if you’re ever disconnected from the internet, you can continue doing your job.”

Explosion of the tech stack now, but not always

Generative AI has allowed the expansion of the tech stack, as more tasks became more abstracted, bringing new service providers offering GPU space, new databases or AIOps services. This won’t be the case forever, said Uniphore CEO Umesh Sachdev, and enterprises must remember that. 

“The tech stack has exploded, but I do think we’re going to see it normalize,” said Sachdev. “Eventually, people will bring things in-house and the capacity demand in GPUs will ease out. The layer and vendor explosion always happens with new technologies and we’re going to see the same with AI.” 

For enterprises, it’s clear that thinking about the entire AI ecosystem, from software to hardware, is the best practice for AI workflows that make sense.