Longtime Monday Night Football announcer Troy Aikman said he is looking for his “next landing spot” with ⁠his ESPN contract set to expire after February’s Super Bowl.
“I’ll broadcast through this season, and I’ll be ⁠a free agent ⁠at ​the end of the year and kind of see what happens,” Aikman said in a radio interview ⁠with KTCK of Dallas on Thursday morning.
Aikman, a Hall of Fame quarterback who won three Super Bowls with ⁠the Dallas Cowboys, is in the final year of a five-year deal ​with ESPN that pays him $18m ‌annually.
Joe Buck, Aikman’s ‌broadcast partner for the past 25 years, recently finalized a six-year extension ‌with ESPN that is worth more than $100m, according to the Athletic. Buck’s deal runs through the network’s next Super Bowl broadcast in 2031.
In Thursday’s radio interview, Aikman appeared to confirm earlier reports from Front Office Sports that there was tension between ‌him and Buck over their contract situations. The pair reportedly had an argument before Monday’s game between the ​Buffalo Bills and Los Angeles Rams.
“There’s probably a time and a place for all that to be discussed,” Aikman said. “I don’t know if now ⁠is the time. I don’t know that it’s hard ​to figure out kind ​of what’s happened.“
If Aikman does leave ESPN, he could explore his options ​at other ‌networks or streaming services ​or perhaps ​pursue a front-office role with an NFL team.
“I’m looking forward to whatever the rest of this season does hold, with the Super Bowl and all that, and where my next landing spot might be,” Aikman said.

Apple announced the fourth-generation Apple TV 4K earlier this week, introducing the A19 chip, built-in microphones for hands-free Siri, four-speaker HomePod surround sound, and an updated ‌Siri‌ Remote. It replaces the third-generation model introduced in 2022, bringing a number of internal changes while retaining the same basic design and most of the same entertainment features.
The new model costs $299 and comes with 128GB of storage. ‌Siri‌ AI is also coming to the third-generation model, and the new remote can be purchased separately for existing devices. Apple says the assistant will be available in beta with tvOS 27.2 on second-generation and later ‌Apple TV‌ 4K models, including conversational entertainment searches, follow-up questions, and personal context through a compatible paired device.
The new model’s distinctive hardware benefit is direct voice input through the box’s microphones; access to the voice assistant itself is shared. Whether you should upgrade therefore comes down to which hardware changes you will actually use.
Configurations, Connectivity, and Price
The differences in configurations, connectivity, and pricing between the third- and fourth-generation ‌Apple TV‌ 4K are as follows:
‌Apple TV‌ 4K (3rd Generation) ‌Apple TV‌ 4K (4th Generation) 64GB model: Wi-Fi only
128GB model: Wi-Fi and Ethernet Single 128GB configuration with Wi-Fi and Ethernet Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax) Wi-Fi 7 (802.11be) Bluetooth 5.0 Bluetooth 6 Gigabit Ethernet on the 128GB model only Gigabit Ethernet as standard Thread networking on the 128GB model only Thread networking as standard Original U.S. launch prices: $129 for 64GB; $149 for 128GB U.S. launch price: $299 for 128GB Final prices before replacement: $199 for 64GB; $249 for 128GB $299 for 128GB Now discontinued Available to pre-order Released November 4, 2022 Available November 13, 2026
Apple raised the older model’s prices in June 2026, so comparing the new model exclusively with its predecessor’s original launch pricing misses an intervening increase. Against the final price of the equivalent 128GB model, the new ‌Apple TV‌ costs $50 more. Against the previous entry-level configuration, it costs $100 more and includes twice the storage, Ethernet, and Thread connectivity.
A15 Bionic vs. A19
The A19 chip brings a substantially newer chip architecture to the ‌Apple TV‌. Apple says the fourth-generation ‌Apple TV‌ 4K delivers the following improvements over the third-generation model:
Up to 50% faster CPU performance.
Up to twice the GPU performance.
The table below lists capabilities of two chip architectures.
A15 Bionic Chip A19 Chip Made with TSMC’s 5nm (N5P) process Made with TSMC’s third-generation 3nm (N3P) process Dynamic Caching Software-based ray tracing Hardware-accelerated ray tracing Mesh shading without the newer dedicated hardware acceleration Hardware-accelerated mesh shading Dedicated Neural Accelerators in each GPU core 16-core Neural Engine Updated 16-core Neural Engine architecture Display engine and image signal processor Updated display engine and image signal processor Dedicated AV1 hardware decoder Up to 4x multisample anti-aliasing Up to 8x multisample anti-aliasing Maximum 1D, 2D, and cube-map texture dimensions of 16,384 pixels Maximum 1D, 2D, and cube-map texture dimensions of 32,768 pixels Universal texture compression MetalFX denoised upscaling capability Depth bounds testing
The A19 chip has a substantially better GPU than the A15 Bionic. Dynamic Caching manages fast on-chip GPU memory according to the workload. Hardware-accelerated ray tracing and mesh shading provide more advanced graphics-processing capabilities, while GPU Neural Accelerators supply dedicated hardware for machine learning calculations.
While GPU improvements will be particularly useful for gaming, it is unclear just how much the full breadth of the chip architecture improvements will make a meaningful difference to the ‌Apple TV‌.
Hands-Free Siri and HomePod Audio
The new microphones and expanded ‌HomePod‌ support provide some of the clearest functional differences between the two devices:
‌Apple TV‌ 4K (3rd Generation) ‌Apple TV‌ 4K (4th Generation) No built-in microphone array in the box; microphone only in the ‌Siri‌ Remote Three built-in far-field microphones with voice isolation, alongside the microphone in the ‌Siri‌ Remote ‌Siri‌ voice input through the remote or another compatible device Direct hands-free activation using “‌Siri‌” or “Hey ‌Siri‌,” with echo cancellation while audio is playing ‌HomePod‌ TV audio through a single speaker or stereo pair Four-speaker ‌HomePod‌ surround sound using matching front and rear pairs Automatic positioning, timing, and level calibration for the four-speaker setup Whole Room Audio mode distributes sound across four ‌HomePod‌ speakers
The four-speaker configuration requires HomePod mini 2 or second-generation full-sized ‌HomePod‌ speakers. You can use four matching speakers or combine two matching front speakers with a different matching rear pair. For example, two full-sized HomePods can serve as the front speakers and two ‌HomePod mini 2‌ units as the rear speakers.
First-generation full-sized HomePods and original ‌HomePod‌ mini speakers are excluded from this new four-speaker configuration. Existing owners should account for any speaker replacements or additions when considering the cost of upgrading.
Whole Room Audio serves a different purpose from directional home theater sound, distributing audio more evenly around the room for music, sports, and more.
Hands-free ‌Siri‌ support also has its own language requirements. Apple lists Mandarin Chinese, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Hebrew, Norwegian, and Swedish, subject to regional availability.
Siri Remote Differences
The fourth-generation ‌Siri‌ Remote retains the familiar design and controls while making a misplaced remote easier to find:
‌Siri‌ Remote (3rd Generation) ‌Siri‌ Remote (4th Generation) Bluetooth 5.0 Bluetooth 6 Nearby finding through iPhone, with proximity guidance Find My with Precision Finding on a compatible iPhone Bluetooth Channel Sounding for precise location tracking Built-in speaker for playing a sound to locate the remote 66 grams 69.6 grams
The older remote already supported nearby finding with an iPhone. The new remote’s additional benefits are precise location guidance and an audible alert. Precision Finding uses Bluetooth Channel Sounding, providing precise tracking without requiring a UWB chip.
Precision Finding requires an iPhone 17 or later, excluding the iPhone 17e, or an iPhone Air or iPhone Duo running the latest software. You can also ask ‌Siri‌ to find the remote through the ‌Apple TV‌’s built-in microphones and have the remote play a sound.
The new ‌Siri‌ Remote is available separately for $59 and works with the third-generation ‌Apple TV‌ 4K, every earlier ‌Apple TV‌ 4K, and even the ‌Apple TV‌ HD.
Design, Dimensions, and Weight
Both generations retain the compact black enclosure and Apple logo. The principal visible changes are the microphone hardware and the repositioned front light.
‌Apple TV‌ 4K (3rd Generation) ‌Apple TV‌ 4K (4th Generation) Width 93 mm 93.24 mm Depth 93 mm 93.24 mm Weight Wi-Fi: 208g
Wi-Fi + Ethernet: 214g 217g Status light Positioned toward the right Positioned in the center Packaging At least 90% fiber-based packaging 100% fiber-based packaging
The new box weighs three grams more than the previous Ethernet model and nine grams more than the Wi-Fi-only model. The centered front light also indicates when the built-in microphones are listening for commands.
Should You Upgrade From the Third-Generation Apple TV 4K?
Most third-generation ‌Apple TV‌ 4K owners should keep their existing device. For ordinary streaming through television speakers, a soundbar, or an AV receiver, the new model does not add new capabilities. The maximum viewing resolution and HDR support remains the same. ‌Siri‌ AI’s availability on the older hardware further reduces the need to replace a working device.
The strongest reason to upgrade is a planned four-speaker ‌HomePod‌ system. If you already own two second-generation full-sized HomePods and want dedicated rear speakers, the new ‌Apple TV‌ enables a specific setup your existing model cannot provide. Include the cost of additional or replacement speakers when judging the upgrade.
Hands-free control is another practical reason if you regularly use ‌Siri‌ and want to speak directly to the device. It is likely to be more useful when the ‌Apple TV‌ is directly in the viewing room than when it is installed in a separate equipment cupboard or rack.
AV1 hardware decoding may justify the upgrade for a particular media library or playback workflow. Gaming enthusiasts may also value the newer GPU architecture, but the benefit depends on the games available for tvOS and how developers use the hardware.
If locating the remote is a source of frustration, buying the $59 ‌Siri‌ Remote separately costs $240 less than replacing the entire ‌Apple TV‌. That purchase supplies the new remote features while retaining your existing device.
Should You Buy the Third- or Fourth-Generation Model?
For a new purchase, the fourth-generation ‌Apple TV‌ 4K is the stronger choice when the price difference is modest or you intend to use its exclusive features. Compared with the older 128GB model’s final $249 Apple price, the $50 premium is easier to justify than the much larger difference suggested by comparing original launch prices.
That being said, a discounted third-generation model remains a sensible purchase. The older model is particularly appealing when the saving is substantial and you are not interested in a four-speaker ‌HomePod‌ sound system.
If you need Ethernet or want the ‌Apple TV‌ itself to provide Thread networking, choose the third-generation 128GB model or the fourth-generation model. A sufficiently large saving on the older 128GB configuration can outweigh improvements with the latest model that you would rarely use.
Related Roundup: Apple TV

Who would have thought a battle between a pop star/talk show host and a Brooklyn magic shop would dominate the cultural conversation online?
Indeed, Kelly Clarkson and her Very Online beef with Art of Play over a $15,000 (or is that $15,000,000?) bird automaton has been the story that everyone was talking about this week. But it was Pablo Torre, the host of Pablo Torre Finds Out, who actually advanced it by obtaining the security camera footage of Clarkson’s visit to the store, letting viewers see the interaction in question for themselves.
Torre, of course, is the journalist who broke the Los Angeles Clippers-Kawhi Leonard salary cap scandal, an investigation that resulted in the team and owner Steve Ballmer facing steep penalties and a possible criminal investigation. He was also on The Hollywood Reporter’s New York power list earlier this year thanks to his work breaking that story. Oh year, he won a Pulitzer for it too.
THR caught up with Torre to find out why, exactly, he wanted to look into the Clarkson spat, what goes into producing his show, and sitting at the intersection of the worlds of journalism and the creator economy. (The interview has been edited for length and clarity.)
First of all, why did you even decide to look into this?
On my show, we do have a tendency to take stupid things seriously, and also sometimes serious things stupidly. But this is a story that I became obsessed with because I live here in New York City. I had been to that shop before. I am actually a big on-the-record Kelly Clarkson fan, and this had the making of a modern morality play, in which everyone was trying to figure out what’s true. My show does, I would say, investigations into culture in every investigation that we do into sports, and this felt like something that I think we could contribute to.
I was gonna say one of the things that I love about the show is that you will take months on a really serious deep-dive investigation, but if something’s happening in pop culture, you are not afraid to dive in and explore that. How do you balance those? I have to assume you have a lot of investigations happening at any given time, but sometimes stuff happens. What does it take to reach the level where you feel like, okay, I think we can contribute something to this?
Torre: We are learning that in real time. This is all feeling to me as we make the show, like an experiment, and the returns on our many month investigations, our deepest dives, have yielded a level of result that is beyond our imagination.
But the thing we’re also doing as people who exist on the internet and in the real world is always trying to figure out: Is this thing that’s breaking right now something that we can we can illuminate? And in that way, I don’t think there is anything resembling a rule or a standard for when we blow up a given week that we had planned very carefully for months because a fucking bird automaton became the center of a national controversy.
That is a sentence that, if you were to tell that to me a week ago, I would have felt like I was on acid. But maybe there’s a breaking news story that makes you feel like you’re on drugs, and the only way to sober up is journalism. I’m sort of workshopping this with you now on the phone. Maybe that’s the standard for us, but I don’t know. And that’s kind of the joy is that the unpredictability of what our show ends up being is a mystery box sometimes even to ourselves.
It’s interesting because, when you have a real investigation that I’m sure you work on for a long time, it can lead the news cycle. But you’re right; sometimes following something that’s happening, following the news cycle, if you have a way to contribute, is a way to break through in a way that stands out. We certainly see that. We are just as guilty as everyone else of following the Kelly Clarkson magic shop story.
Well, it’s interesting because something I’ve discovered about my show is that we will do the very deep dives that take sometimes a year, and once they get published and they make an impact on the news cycle, we have seen that the news cycle itself become the best method of our distribution.
We are truly organically benefiting from the fact that we have made news, and I mean that in the sense of the conversation and the coverage, which is organic and not something we can ever control, but then I also mean it in terms of the fact that things happen in real time in response to the story, and also in the unfolding series of events that we’re covering. So it becomes a series, and we never know how many parts.
Obviously, with the Clippers story, we’re at part 16. In this case, I have no idea if we’re ever going to do a sequel on Kelly Clarkson bird stories, but I’m open to it if it’s the right approach. But it has all felt like we’re stumbling into a pseudo-psychedelic true crime series that we’re reporting in real time.
I mean, to be honest, I feel like this is one of those stories that a month from now, 99.9 percent of people will have forgotten about, but in the moment, everyone’s obsessed with it, and that’s fine. That’s part of culture.
So to me, the thing that I grapple with to your very fair point is how do you make disposable things last? And for us, we’re always prioritizing stories with durability that have depth and substance. I should point out that the real tipping point for why we wanted to cover this story, in terms of how we did it in our full episode, was we did recognize that there was a depth of conversation around the power of celebrity and how that power can perhaps be abused when it comes to the audience, and that conversation is not just about Kelly Clarkson. That’s about Taylor Swift and Beyoncé and Donald Trump and BTS and any super famous person who exists in public for whom their fandom is their business, and what happens when they direct it without explicitly saying the thing, but implicitly it seems like there’s a call to action.
At any given moment, how many stories would you say you’re in the process of kind of reporting out?
Torre: Oh gosh, our docket is comical. I mean, we have currently right now — I’m looking at our Google Calendar — we have a dozen things in various stages of production. It’s hard for me to say because the way that our show works is we are always on some sort of a runway, and we’re always unfortunately notifying the people who’ve been passed with, “Hey, can you focus on this story?” “Can you fit inside of this plane?” “We’re gonna get ready for you guys to take off on Tuesday.” Sometimes you end up waiting on the tarmac, and so there are some planes — and I’m not kidding — there are two planes right now that I think are A-plus stories that just have zero news peg, and so we’ve been having these poor people wait on the tarmac for a year, and I so look forward to getting to tell people those stories.
But stuff like this keeps on happening, whether it’s the bird automaton or the next huge Ballmer lawsuit or the next sports gambling development in the Eastern District of New York, it’s all quite a lot.
To what extent would you say your investigations play out in public versus working behind the scenes? With the Clippers investigation, as you said, it’s kind of ongoing. There’s installments that have come up after those first couple episodes, but then you talked earlier this week about Fanatics and LeBron James and that relationship.
That’s a public conversation that maybe turns into something down the line. Is there a benefit to speaking about this stuff publicly? or is it easier to operate privately and then show it when you think it’s ready?
It’s a great question, and we talk about this specific question a lot. In general, I would say that we are always doing more than we can share in public, and that’s the nature of research. That’s the nature of — we’re going to make so many calls and follow so many trails into so many weird rabbit holes — and some of those are dead ends.
But sometimes those end up being the signposts that we follow to the actual truth, and so there is a great inefficiency here, just in terms of man, we are that duck that is paddling furiously under the surface. Even as you can see us flapping our wings wildly, you know we’re still doing a lot more than I think people can ever see. And I don’t mean that to dramatize ourselves. I don’t mean that to say that’s how neurotic we tend to be, but there are also points in any given story when it’s time to show your work, and what we show is what we have deemed to be publishable, what’s deemed fair for publication, and once that’s out there, yeah, we we pride ourselves on telling you this is why we’re doing this. This is how we arrived at this. These are the questions that we still have.
And when we pose a question, sometimes we have a sense of what the answer might be, but sometimes we just don’t know, and so it brings me into, for instance — I’ll just refer to the Clippers thing because it’s the most common frame of reference — It’ll lead me into debate with Mark Cuban, in which I think I knew more than Mark at the various points that we were debating. There were things that I had not published that I did have a pretty strong sense of, that informed my confidence and my convictions, but I wasn’t ready to report that, and I wasn’t ready to say that, and so I didn’t say it. And when I was ready to report, that’s when the public got it.
One of the things that I appreciate is that you sit at this intersection of journalism and the creator economy, and as someone who is a journalist but follows the creator world pretty closely, it’s fascinating to me because there are a lot of journalists at traditional news outlets that have the luxury of spending a lot of time to develop an investigation and publish or release the segment when it’s ready.
But if you’re a creator, you do have to have a regular cadence of stuff. How did you figure out how to do that? I know you have the partnership with The Athletic, which is obviously very helpful, but how do you make sure that you can feed the beast? Whether it’s pure journalism or something like when you had [art critic] Jerry Saltz review sports trophies, how do you make sure you feed that while also doing the journalism that I think you’ve built a reputation for?
So it’s a reverse engineering problem, and so very specifically as a person who has looked into the eyes and I’ve gotten to meet — I guess they’re my fellow creators? Although I don’t think I’m necessarily quite doing what they do. But I, like you, I’m fascinated by them because I didn’t grow up that way, and I also now have a job that requires three episodes a week.
And so, in that reverse engineering of okay, you have three episodes a week, but your goals are different. Your goals are journalistic, they are along the lines of both following your curiosity and making impact. So within that framework, what do you do? I remember meeting MrBeast recently. He was on Morning Joe, and I was co-hosting the show that day. He’s prolific, but also so tired.
Yeah.
Like, they’re all burnt out. I think some of them are superhuman, but a lot of them are just tired. And so, really, the reverse engineering problem is: I have myself, and I think I’ve been privileged to prioritize what I find energizing. At the same time, when I start to create a docket, what I reverse engineer is “Okay, what is the most important stuff that we want to do? What is the shorthand here? What is the Aspiration-level investigation?” Because we’re going to work around that, and so once we sort of place that along our calendar, then we start to backfill, and we’re like, okay, so that’s going to take the most time, the most resources. What’s going to take the second most?
There’s a version of our show where we come out six times a year, and we just do like the deepest dives … But then there’s stuff happening every week, and then you look at the news cycle, and then you figure out, okay, wait a minute, Jerry Saltz. We’re fans of him. We love that guy. We’re trying to always figure out ways to do sport differently. What if we have him review statues? What if we have a butter sculpture of myself made? Did that feel like a parody of my ego, or also a way to make fun of it? So I think it’s sort of how do we plot in things that are different in concept but aren’t as heavy a lift? And once you’re along that path, which is like a different genre of show, you have a lot of fun. And that’s how we have this whole cast of characters who get pulled in to do weird shit. And it’s a bit of a palate cleanser for me, and probably I hope for the audience.
To bring it back to Kelly Clarkson: You did end up buying an automaton for a good cause. It’s a silly story, but you were able to squeeze in something that I think would actually bring some good to the world. Can you explain why you decided to do that when you when you chose to cover the story?
So, among the levels of why that story passed the bar for us, I should point out, is the fact that as soon as I saw that there was this other preferred automaton that Kelly Clarkson had no interest in, and she had so little interest in it, as evidenced by the tape we obtained of the security cameras, that she didn’t even stick around to hear how much it costs, which was $2,000, which is a lot of money.
That occurred to me … Is that too much money for us? Like, if we were to go and buy that other bird, what would we do with it? In that we are I thinking in the spirit of a show like John Oliver’s, frankly, where there’s a third act, and we’ve done our own iterations of that.
In the Aspiration Part One episode, we had a guy dressed as Iron Man plant a tree, a sad little apple tree, a sapling, in front of the Intuit Dome. That was our climactic sort of reveal at the very end of that one. This was another little version of that that we’ve been inspired to do because, in this case, we actually got to bring attention to a real life tragedy. David Samson, who is on these Aspiration episodes with us, who’s a friend of the show and is frequently contributing to the show, his daughter Kyra died over the summer, and I had gotten to know her, I’ve gotten to know David’s family, David’s now one of my closest friends, and his response to that was the most superhuman thing I’ve experienced. Which is that he decided to create the Kyra Fund, fighting glioblastoma, searching for a cure, and he proceeded to go back to work. And so, in honor of that, in honor of having a charity and a cause close to home, I thought, what better way to harness the attention to something that feels profoundly stupid, like a truly petty grievance that had saturated all of our brains. How could we turn all of that attention to something positive?
And so we put it up for auction. And my hope is that some incredibly fiscally irresponsible person can realize that they can own a piece of pop culture history and find a cure for one of the worst forms of brain cancer that exists. So, yeah, I hope people take that part seriously as well.

Starting this Friday, you’ll have multiple laptop makers banging on your door, haranguing you about buying what they’ll call a “new class of PC” as your next laptop. They’re promising to revolutionize local AI work, push rendering to peak levels, and still have the performance you want as a gaming device. The reality is more complicated, but Nvidia’s new laptop chip built for pricey devices may finally move PCs in the right direction—pushing for local compute above any AI subscription.
Nvidia invited me out to San Francisco to get even more hands-on experience with its laptops and desktops, all running its newfangled N1X chip. That being said, I’ve handled these PCs at Computex and IFA this year, too, so this wasn’t my first rodeo. However, it was the first time Nvidia decided to reveal what precise performance consumers could expect from these laptops.
So what’s going on inside these chips?
The N1X chip is distinct in several ways. One is the CPU tile co-developed with MediaTek. It’s an ARM-based processor distinct from the usual x86 microarchitecture promoted by AMD and Intel. This is called a “Grace” CPU, and the top-end configuration sports an even number of 10 performance (P) cores and 10 efficiency (E) cores spread among two clusters.
The GPU is where things get spicy. Nvidia’s plan to push local AI on PCs is a brute-force application of its CUDA GPU architecture. The top-end configuration includes 6,144 GPU cores, the same number as a desktop-level RTX 5070 graphics card. You should not expect anywhere the same performance from a laptop with a limited power threshold, though it’s still a huge hunk of processing power to throw at rendering, gaming, or—yes—AI tasks. The Blackwell GPU tile also includes 24MB of L2 cache and Nvidia’s fourth-gen ray-tracing cores.
Here’s where things get exciting. Nvidia promises that users will be able to see far better efficiency to reach peak GPU power than a laptop with a discrete RTX 5070 laptop GPU at around 80W of both CPU and GPU power. That’s for both gaming and AI prompt processing. Still, a discrete GPU will be able to max out with much more power than RTX Spark. A dedicated gaming laptop will perform better than any single chip design, especially on a smaller, thinner laptop. While you can find ARM-native versions of apps like Blender that should support the N1X processor on or close to launch, this chip is going to rely on x86 to ARM emulation for many demanding apps. Yes, that means additional CPU overhead for gaming, as well.
There are other examples where an RTX Spark laptop just makes more sense than a gaming-ready laptop. One is the unified memory, which is a shared memory pool between the GPU and CPU. If you stack this laptop with more memory, you can expect it to easily meet the VRAM requirements for real-time graphics at higher resolutions. The main question we have to ask is whether these laptops can hit solid framerates when gaming without any extra help. Nvidia let me run through Gears of War: E-Day on medium and high settings, though only ever with DLSS 4.5 and frame generation running alongside it. That’s not quite RTX 5070 levels of performance.
At the very least, Nvidia has promised more future native game support with multiple partnerships with game publishers and developers. The rest of these titles, including Microsoft titles like Gears of War, will be emulated with Microsoft’s Prism x86 to ARM emulator. The Windows maker has claimed its emulator only makes a marginal dent on overall performance when emulating apps, though it may have more impact with CPU-dependent apps or games.
Only the highest-end RTX Spark PCs are built for local AI
But this is Nvidia, folks. Did you really imagine this laptop launch wasn’t going to push AI? Team Green wants you to believe these laptops can push 120-billion parameter AI models. However, whether you can actually host AI models all on-device or have to offload some of that capability to the cloud may depend on which RTX Spark you buy.
There are two variants to RTX Spark that you should understand right out of the gate. Nvidia’s N1X chip that powers these PCs comes in two flavors: one with an 18-core CPU and a 5,120-core Blackwell GPU and another with 20 CPU cores and 6,144 Blackwell GPU cores. Whether the PC is actually made for heavy-duty local AI work may depend less on core counts and more on memory availability. The lower-end RTX Spark models are going to be limited to lower unified memory configurations—either 24GB or 32GB. The higher-end models can go all the way up to 128GB.
That’s going to make pricing extra complicated. Upcoming laptops like the Microsoft Surface Laptop Ultra cost $2,600 at base with only 24GB of unified memory. Other RTX Spark PCs, like the Asus ProArt P16, start at $2,800 and only get more expensive from there. The top-end Surface Laptop Ultra with the max 128GB memory and 1TB storage will set you back $5,900. Suddenly, Apple’s regular nickel-and-diming for memory upgrades when buying its MacBook Pro doesn’t seem so out of step with the rest of laptop-kind.
AMD already made this same move with its Ryzen AI Max+ 300 series, pushing its APU (accelerated processing unit) architecture as far as it would go with a giant GPU. The chipmaker followed up these codenamed Strix Halo chips with Gorgon Halo, the Ryzen AI Max+ 400 chips. Only this time, AMD launched versions of its chip that only support a maximum of 128GB of unified memory. This means every PC running a Gorgon Halo processor is essentially built to be an uber machine explicitly built for local AI tasks. The number of consumer-end machines is so limited that I personally have not had the chance to test them out.
Which means, currently, Nvidia can claim to be the one who’s actually pushing AI-native PCs to consumers at price points more people can potentially afford. I’ve long been an AI skeptic, but if there’s one thing I believe, it’s that the future of LLMs is not going to rest on the shoulders of big, expensive, and community-destroying data centers. Local compute that keeps your data secure on-device is the best case for these AI models. Nvidia, ironically the company that’s chief pushing the AI data center build-out workwide, may also end up showing us a better way forward.
(Full disclosure: travel and lodging were paid by Nvidia, and Gizmodo did not guarantee any coverage as a condition of accepting the trip).

We are already in Week 6 of the NFL regular season! Can you believe it? This weekend, two AFC South rivals in the Houston Texans and Jacksonville Jaguars will battle in London, while Caleb Williams looks to return to the lineup against the Atlanta Falcons after missing the last three games.
We also have an intriguing matchup in the NFC on Sunday night between the Dallas Cowboys and Green Bay Packers, while the Washington Commanders will look to get back on track against the 49ers in San Francisco following their embarrassing tie with the New York Giants. Dan Quinn needs to find a way to get his team to refocus after they completely forgot about the clock in overtime.
Which teams should you pick in Week 6, and which should you fade? CBS Sports writers Jordan Dajani and Jared Dubin are here to break down the biggest games of the weekend. For clarity, lines for these selections were taken on Oct. 13 over at DraftKings Sportsbook.
Seattle Seahawks (-2.5) at Denver Broncos (TNF)
Dajani (Seahawks -2.5): Through five weeks, I have only bet against the Denver Broncos once. It’s an uncomfortable position to be in, since Bo Nix is “captain comeback.” For example, I had zero doubt they would come back from down 16-0 against the Los Angeles Rams in Week 3. Denver has the most comeback wins (15), second-half comebacks (12) and fourth-quarter comebacks (8) in the NFL since 2025. However, I’m going to fade the Broncos in this spot for a couple of reasons.
One, Sean Payton taking back play-calling duties did not help anything against the Los Angeles Chargers. Getting this offense off the ground is, unfortunately, going to take some time — and it probably won’t happen against the No. 1 defense in the NFL. Secondly, the Seahawks have to be mad after that loss to the 49ers. Seattle has won five straight games following a loss, having not lost back-to-back games since 2024. The Seahawks have also won seven straight prime-time games, which is the longest active streak in the NFL. … Prediction: Seahawks 23, Broncos 20
Dubin (Seahawks -2.5): Sean Payton’s return to calling plays may have resulted in the Broncos coming away with a win, but it did not result in their offense looking competent. They averaged just 3.9 yards per play against what had previously been a very bad Chargers defense. I cannot rightly expect the Broncos to get anything going against this hellacious Seattle defense. It’s not like the Broncos are going to do what the 49ers did. Denver is also still banged up defensively and likely won’t have Patrick Surtain II here, which is obviously a problem against Jaxon Smith-Njigba. … Prediction: Seahawks 24, Broncos 16
Houston Texans vs. Jacksonville Jaguars (-3) (London)
Dajani (Texans +3): The Jaguars have established themselves as one of the best teams in the AFC. While that’s objectively true, they certainly aren’t perfect. They probably should have dominated a short-handed Philadelphia Eagles team last week, yet didn’t. Additionally, there are some questions about the offensive operation. Jacksonville went 0-3 in the red zone last week, including two trips where the Jags failed to score any points from the one-yard line. As for the Texans, they are coming off their first win of the season against the lowly Tennessee Titans. I predict they keep that momentum going and score an upset victory across the pond. DeMeco Ryans is calling defensive plays again, and C.J. Stroud is actually playing good football. He’s tied for the most 20-yard completions (21) in the NFL this season. Houston is also 14-2 SU and 11-4-1 ATS in its last 16 divisional games away from home. … Prediction: Texans 21, Jaguars 18
Dubin (Jaguars -3): I think it’s a real advantage that the Jaguars have already been in London for a week while the Texans haven’t yet traveled across the pond. Jacksonville, as Dajani mentioned, has established itself as one of the best teams in the AFC. The offense has been efficient and explosive, and the defense has looked good as well. I know the Jags struggled with the Eagles for a bit of last week’s game and probably should have lost, but Houston has only beaten a Tennessee team that is barely functional. It’s not like the Texans have looked good at any point. Their defense has disappointed, and they can’t run the ball whatsoever. … Prediction: Jaguars 24, Texans 20
Chicago Bears (-3) at Atlanta Falcons
Dajani (Falcons +3): It looks like Caleb Williams is going to return to the lineup after missing three games with his hamstring injury, and it also looks like Michael Penix Jr. will play after missing the very end of “Sunday Night Football” with his rib injury. The Chicago Bears have racked up their most rushing yards per contest (173.2) through five games since 1988, but keep an eye on the status of Kyle Monangai, who missed Week 5 with a toe injury. Last week’s loss to the Packers was concerning from a defensive standpoint. The Bears have actually allowed 30 points over three straight road games (dating back to last year), which is tied for the longest streak in TEAM HISTORY. I’m going to take the points with the home team, and take Bijan Robinson and Co. to bounce back. … Prediction: Falcons 30, Bears 27
Dubin (Bears -3): The impending return of Caleb Williams has me leaning toward Chicago here. In the one non-monsoon game that Williams played, the Bears dropped 59 points on the Panthers. They ran the ball at will and created explosive plays in the passing game. Their defense was exposed a bit by the Packers last week, and the Falcons could get going offensively here … if Michael Penix Jr. actually plays through the rib injury he suffered last week. At least some of this pick is thinking Tua Tagovailoa could start under center for Atlanta. … Prediction: Bears 23, Falcons 17
Baltimore Ravens (-4.5) at Cleveland Browns
Dajani (Ravens -4.5): I’m not going to bash the Cleveland Browns for their loss to the New York Jets in that gross weather, where punter Corey Bojorquez missed a snap and granted the Jets 34 yards of field position to set up the game-winning touchdown. But I am nervous about Cleveland’s injuries with guys like Carson Schwesinger, Mason Graham, Mike Hall Jr., Tytus Howard, Quinshon Judkins and KC Concepcion banged up. I think it’s fair to say that Lamar Jackson is expected back this week after sitting one game with his ankle injury, but I was wildly impressed with this Ravens defense and their ability to shut down what was statistically the hottest offense in the NFL since Michael Penix Jr. returned. Bijan Robinson rushed for 86 yards on Sunday night. He was averaging about 170 rushing yards per game with Penix under center. If it weren’t for all the walking wounded in Cleveland, I would probably side with the home dogs. Not this time. … Prediction: Ravens 26, Browns 20
Dubin (Ravens -4.5): I can’t tell if this line is assuming the return of Lamar Jackson or not, but recent reporting suggests he has a chance to return to action. If he does, I think the Ravens win this game by a lot. The Browns might be 3-2, but they have not played like an above .500 team so far. Each of their wins required a game-winning drive late in the fourth quarter, and that’s not at all sustainable. I don’t trust that their offense can get anything going given the various injuries to the skill-position players, and if Jackson is back, I don’t think the Ravens’ offense can be stopped. … Prediction: Ravens 31, Browns 14
Carolina Panthers at Philadelphia Eagles (-1.5)
Dajani (Panthers +1.5): CBS Sports legend John Breech pointed out that the Eagles are facing a scheduling disadvantage this week that no team has ever been able to overcome. Philly is, of course, coming off an international game and facing a team that is coming off its bye. This has only happened four times, but the team coming off the international game is 0-4 SU and 0-3-1 ATS. That’s pretty fascinating. The Eagles have covered the spread just once all season, while the last time the Panthers were on the field, they registered an impressive victory against the Detroit Lions. Bryce Young threw for 329 yards and two touchdowns, Chuba Hubbard rushed for 122 yards and two touchdowns and Tet McMillan caught 14 passes for 192 yards and — you guessed it — two touchdowns. I have some legitimate concerns about the Panthers defense, but I’ll take the upset in Philly. … Prediction: Panthers 23, Eagles 21
Dubin (Eagles -1.5): I don’t feel good about this one at all. I’m basically just throwing my hands in the air and saying, well, the Eagles can’t lose again, can they? … Prediction: Eagles 20, Panthers 17
Dallas Cowboys at Green Bay Packers (-1.5) (SNF)
Dajani (Packers -1.5): I told you the Packers were going to upset the Bears last week, and that something “weird” was going to happen. The “weird” came in the form of a 31-7 beatdown of Tyson Bagent. It’s tough to trust Dallas after watching an undrafted rookie quarterback making his second career start come into AT&T Stadium and drop 419 yards of total offense on the Cowboys’ head in prime time. Now, they have to go to Lambeau Field and try to stop a quarterback in Jordan Love, who is clearly finding his rhythm, having just thrown for 367 yards and two touchdowns. CeeDee Lamb and George Pickens are definitely a fun duo, but so are Christian Watson and Matthew Golden. Heck, let’s make it a trio with tight end Tucker Kraft. … Prediction: Packers 27, Cowboys 24
Dubin (Packers -1.5): The Dallas defense is just too bad for me to feel comfortable picking the Cowboys against a team that has an offensive pulse. The Packers showed last week that they are capable of throwing the ball all over the yard even if their running game can’t get going. Even with the return of Joey Porter Jr., I expect that Green Bay will get one or all of Christian Watson, Matthew Golden and Tucker Kraft going down the field. Dallas should put up points, too, because the Packers’ defense is no great shakes, but I’m taking Green Bay to win here. … Prediction: Packers 33, Cowboys 28
Washington Commanders at San Francisco 49ers (-7.5) (MNF)
Dajani (49ers -7.5): I am genuinely curious how the Commanders running the clock out on themselves affected the locker room. That’s something that seems hard to bounce back from, because everyone looks dumb. Obviously, the buck stops with the head coach, but why did offensive coordinator David Blough call a play that USED MOTION as precious seconds ticked off the clock, and how was quarterback Jayden Daniels that oblivious to the situation as the conductor of this operation? But I digress…
The 49ers are riding high following that “upset” victory over the rival Seahawks, and it’s easy to trust them to take care of business against a lesser opponent. The 49ers are 4-1 ATS this year and 10-4 ATS in their last 14 prime-time games when favored by at least three points. Maybe the Commanders surprise me and rally, but I’m leaning the other way. … Prediction: 49ers 28, Commanders 20