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Matrox returns with dual-GPU card built for synchronized multi-display setupsA380 Octal supports up to eight 5K screens and high-end audioQuad version offers fewer outputs, less power, for simpler installationsOne of Nvidia’s earliest rivals, Matrox was well known in the 1990s for its high-quality graphics cards.Although it eventually moved away from the mainstream gaming market, the company has remained active in professional and multi-display environments, including supplying display systems for the Sphere, the massive music and entertainment venue just off the Las Vegas Strip.Now, Matrox is preparing to release a new dual-GPU graphics card aimed at powering video walls and multi-display setups.Up to four 8K displaysThe upcoming Matrox LUMA Pro A380 Octal features two Intel Arc A380E GPUs and eight Mini DisplayPort 2.0 outputs, allowing it to drive up to four 8K displays or eight 5K screens at once.The A380 Octal is a single-slot PCIe 4.0 x16 card and includes 12GB of GDDR6 memory, with a 130W power requirement and active cooling.Supported APIs include DirectX 12 Ultimate, OpenGL 4.6, Vulkan 1.3, and OpenCL 3.0, making it compatible with a wide range of professional software environments. Matrox’s PowerDesk software and its Mura Developer tools are also supported.In terms of capabilities, the card can deliver high-definition video across eight synchronized displays, including support for HDR, VESA DSC compression, Adaptive Sync, and HDCP 2.3. The maximum bit depth reaches up to 36 bits per pixel. Users can also stream multi-channel high-definition audio through four digital outputs.According to Matrox, two cards can be used in a single system and can be frame-locked for synchronized output.A second model in the lineup, the A380 Quad, offers similar features with a single GPU, 6GB of memory, and four full-sized DisplayPort connectors instead of eight Mini DisplayPorts. The Quad model draws less power and is aimed at less demanding applications.There’s no word on pricing or availability for either model. Matrox lists them only as “coming soon.”You might also likeThese are the best GPUs for video editing you can buy right nowNvidia's entry level GPU can handle 66 million pixels, enough to feed two 8K monitorsAMD unveils first graphics cards that can handle 50 million pixels on one port

This is a spoiler-free preview of the first five episodes of season three.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds ended its second season with arguably the single strongest run of any streaming-era Trek. The show was made with such confidence in all departments that if there were flaws, you weren’t interested in looking for them. Since then, it’s gone from being the best modern Trek, to being the only modern Trek. Unfortunately, at the moment it needs to be the standard bearer for the show, it’s become noticeably weaker and less consistent.

As usual, I’ve seen the first five episodes, but can’t reveal specifics about what I’ve seen. I can say plenty of the things that made Strange New Worlds the best modern-day live-action Trek remain in place. It’s a show that’s happy for you to spend time with its characters as they hang out, and almost all of them are deeply charming. This is, after all, a show that uses as motif the image of the crew in Pike’s quarters as the captain cooks for his crew.

Its format, with standalone adventures blended with serialized character drama, means it can offer something new every week. Think back to the first season, when “Memento Mori,” a tense action thriller with the Gorn, was immediately followed by “Spock Amock,” a goofy, starbase-set body-swap romantic comedy of manners centered around Spock. Strange New Worlds is the first Trek in a long while to realize audiences don’t just want a ceaseless slog of stern-faced, angry grimdark. And if they want that, they can go watch Picard and Section 31.

Marni Grossman/Paramount+

But, as much as those things are SNW’s greatest strength, it’s a delicate balance to ensure the series doesn’t lurch too far either way. And, it pains me to say this, the show spends the first five episodes of its third season going too far in both directions (although, mercifully, not at the same time). No specifics, but one episode I’m sure was on the same writers room whiteboard wishlist as last season’s musical episode. What was clearly intended as a chance for everyone to get out of their usual roles and have fun falls flat. Because the episode can never get past the sense it’s too delighted in its own silliness to properly function.

Marni Grossman/Paramount+

At the other end of the scale, we get sprints toward the eye-gouging grimdark that blighted those other series. Sure, the series has gone to dark places before, but previously with more of a sense of deftness, rather than just going for the viscerally-upsetting gore. A cynic might suggest that, as Paramount’s other Trek projects ended, franchise-overseer Alex Kurtzman — who has pushed the franchise into “grittier” territory whenever he can — had more time to spend in the SNW writers’ room.

Much as I’ve enjoyed the series’ soapier elements, the continuing plotlines take up an ever bigger part of each episode’s runtime so far. Consequently, the story of the week gets less service, making them feel weaker and less coherent. One episode pivots two thirds of the way in to act as a low-key sequel to an episode from season two. But since we’ve only got ten minutes left, it feels thrown in as an afterthought, or to resolve a thread the creative team felt they were obliged to deal with (they didn’t).

In fact, this and the recently-finished run of Doctor Who suffered from the same problem that blights so many streaming-era shows, which is the limited episode order. Rather than producing TV on the scale broadcast networks were able to — yearly runs of 22-, 24- or 26 episodes, a lot of (expensive) genre shows get less than half that. The result is that each episode has to be More Important Than The Last One in a way that’s exhausting for a viewer.

But Strange New Worlds can’t solve all the economic issues with the streaming model on its own. My hope is that, much like in its first season, the weaker episodes are all in its front half to soften us up for the moments of quality that followed toward its conclusion.

ASIDE: Shortly before publication, Paramount announced Strange New Worlds would end in its fifth season, which would be cut from ten episodes to six. It's not surprising — given the equally-brilliant Lower Decks was also axed after passing the same milestone — but it is disappointing. My only hope is that the series doesn't spend that final run awkwardly killing off the series' young ensemble one by one in order to replace them with the entire original series' roster as to make it "line up." Please, let them be their own things. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/tv-movies/star-trek-strange-new-worlds-third-season-falls-short-of-its-second-020030139.html?src=rss