Technologies

I Love GeForce Now on My Steam Deck — Until It Starts ‘Waiting for the Next Available Rig’

It was the first time I’d encountered it in the past week, but 20 to 45 minutes seems like an eternity when you have a console in your hands and are ready to play.

I started chair dancing when Nvidia told me about its GeForce Now cloud-gaming app for the Steam Deck. My Deck OLED is my most frequently used nonessential device, so I was stoked that GFN provided a way to play Xbox Game Pass Ultimate games on it. And it was great, even on my pretty uneven Wi-Fi connection, until it started tossing me into queues with up to 40 people ahead of me. And that was on Ultimate, the priciest tier with the shortest wait times and longest sessions.

It was a blip in my otherwise great experience during the past week — relatively glitch-free, low-latency gameplay, including when attached to a monitor with a hub for keyboard and mouse — and it cleared up later in the day, but it was a frustrating blip nonetheless. (I contacted Nvidia, but the company didn’t have an explanation like «East Coast servers down for maintenance!» at the ready.) It’s something people on the Premium and free plans might experience, though, so it merits discussion.

And yet, it’s still less glitchy and frustrating than Xbox Cloud Gaming. Sigh.

To me, the Game Pass support is the most important feature because a lot of Xbox Cloud gameplay is really erratic for me on my mobile devices. To Nvidia, battery life is most important, I suspect partly because it’s critical and quantifiable.

And yes, the Deck can last much longer — I’d say I get a couple more hours out of it — because it takes a lot less power to run the game in the cloud and stream to you than it does to run locally, which requires a lot more processing to run and render the games. That said, I also tested the app on the Lenovo Go S SteamOS model (which I’m working on a review of and otherwise really like), and that, thus far, seems to have poorer battery life than the Deck, so it may become an important factor for me as well.

In general, even weighty games such as Doom: The Dark Ages and Clair Obscur Expedition 33 (the first from Game Pass, the second Steam) played zippily (60-plus fps) on a monitor at Epic/Ultra/whatever quality presets, although I didn’t get a chance to test HDR. Platformers like Have a Nice Death (Steam) seemed equally responsive and relatively latency-free compared with running locally.

The app provides extensive, or more compact, statistics if you want, but even shrunk down, they take up a relatively large amount of (sometimes critical) real estate on the Deck’s small screen. On the flip side, the icon indicating a Wi-Fi bandwidth issue is tiny and easy to miss. While GFN occasionally gave me network warnings, which I’m used to, it never seemed to result in more than the occasional stutter.

I do find that after about an hour in most games — especially my current addiction, The Blue Prince (see above re: Game Pass) — my connection gets wonky enough that some games become bogged down until they become pretty unresponsive and unplayable. GFN seems to provide the most consistency, although I did get dizzy once from buffered camera rotations racing around the screen to catch up with my stick movement.

I have a few nitpicks about the implementation that aren’t really Nvidia’s fault. Installation requires switching to desktop mode, which I always forget to customize, so I can actually hit what I want in the touch interface. I have to look up how to switch every time. Installing only happens once, though, so it’s not really a big deal.

More long-term annoying is the app’s relegation to the Non-Steam Games section of your library, combined with the absence of any content on its screen. GFN also has its own overlay and doesn’t provide any statistics, such as how many hours you played a given game for, in its interface, even aggregated for GeForce Now use. All the info is in there, but not always where you expect or want it. As a whole, these make the GFN experience feel disconnected.

Note that for free or even Premium plans, your mileage may vary because they run on lower-end GPUs rather than the GeForce RTX 4080-class versions. And you’re still restricted to games GFN supports, which is a fraction of the games universe. But it’s still a great way to play games on the Deck, especially non-Steam games, if you have one.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Strands Hints, Answers and Help for Jan. 8 #676

Here are hints and answers for the NYT Strands puzzle for Jan. 8, No. 676.

Looking for the most recent Strands answer? Click here for our daily Strands hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Today’s NYT Strands puzzle was almost impossible for me, because it’s all focused on a certain TV show that I have never watched and barely know anything about. (Its fourth season premieres today, if you want to check it out.) If you’re like me, you need hints and answers, so read on.

I go into depth about the rules for Strands in this story.

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections and Mini Crossword answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page

Hint for today’s Strands puzzle

Today’s Strands theme is: That’s just reality (TV)

If that doesn’t help you, here’s a clue: Show with plenty of trickery.

Clue words to unlock in-game hints

Your goal is to find hidden words that fit the puzzle’s theme. If you’re stuck, find any words you can. Every time you find three words of four letters or more, Strands will reveal one of the theme words. These are the words I used to get those hints but any words of four or more letters that you find will work:

SIDE, HIDE, START, TART, FAITH, TENS, BANS, FATE, SILT, CAST, TRAIT

Answers for today’s Strands puzzle

These are the answers that tie into the theme. The goal of the puzzle is to find them all, including the spangram, a theme word that reaches from one side of the puzzle to the other. When you have all of them (I originally thought there were always eight but learned that the number can vary), every letter on the board will be used. Here are the nonspangram answers:

CASTLE, SHIELD, MISSION, FAITHFUL, BANISHMENT

Today’s Strands spangram

Today’s Strands spangram is THETRAITORS. To find it, start with the T that’s three letters down on the far-left row, and wind across and then down.

Don’t miss any of our unbiased tech content and lab-based reviews. Add CNET as a preferred Google source.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Connections: Sports Edition Hints and Answers for Jan. 8, #472

Here are hints and the answers for the NYT Connections: Sports Edition puzzle for Jan. 8, No. 472.

Looking for the most recent regular Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle and Strands puzzles.

Today’s Connections: Sports Edition was a bit of a stumper, though if you recognize famous-athlete names, you might get the purple category right away. And you might have never heard of the blue category topic. (That link is a big spoiler.) If you’re struggling with today’s puzzle but still want to solve it, read on for hints and the answers.

Connections: Sports Edition is published by The Athletic, the subscription-based sports journalism site owned by The Times. It doesn’t appear in the NYT Games app, but it does in The Athletic’s own app. Or you can play it for free online.

Read more: NYT Connections: Sports Edition Puzzle Comes Out of Beta

Hints for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: Sports in our nation’s capital.

Green group hint: Got any Band-Aids?

Blue group hint: Certain basketball league.

Purple group hint: Same first name.

Answers for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Yellow group: A DC athlete.

Green group: Supplies for an athletic trainer.

Blue group: Unrivaled teams.

Purple group: Jerry ____.

Read more: Wordle Cheat Sheet: Here Are the Most Popular Letters Used in English Words

What are today’s Connections: Sports Edition answers?

The yellow words in today’s Connections

The theme is a DC athlete. The four answers are Capital, Commander, Mystic and Wizard.

The green words in today’s Connections

The theme is supplies for an athletic trainer. The four answers are bandages, ice pack, scissors and tape.

The blue words in today’s Connections

The theme is Unrivaled teams. The four answers are Breeze, Laces, Phantom and Vinyl.

The purple words in today’s Connections

The theme is Jerry ____. The four answers are Lucas, Rice, Stackhouse and West.

Don’t miss any of our unbiased tech content and lab-based reviews. Add CNET as a preferred Google source.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Mini Crossword Answers for Thursday, Jan. 8

Here are the answers for The New York Times Mini Crossword for Jan. 8.

Looking for the most recent Mini Crossword answer? Click here for today’s Mini Crossword hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Wordle, Strands, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Need some help with today’s Mini Crossword? I found 6-Across to be especially tricky. Read on for all the answers. And if you could use some hints and guidance for daily solving, check out our Mini Crossword tips.

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: Tips and Tricks for Solving The New York Times Mini Crossword

Let’s get to those Mini Crossword clues and answers.