TechEBlog -

Rare Burnout 3 Xbox ‘Beta 3’ Disc From July 2004 Finally Gets Dumped

By Bill Smith September 25, 2026

Game preservationist MattKC spotted an undocumented original Xbox copy of Burnout 3 on eBay this summer and paid a steep price to have it shipped from Australia. Printed on the face is July 28, 2004, the words Beta 3, and a warning that reads Confidential material: return to mastering lab. A name on the label, blurred in the video for privacy, belonged to a product manager at EA Australia, which fits the moment Electronic Arts bought Criterion and took the series in-house. How the disc left that office and landed on a public auction remains a guess.

Renault 8 Gordini Concept Rebuilds a 1964 Rally Hero as an Electric Two Seater

By Bill Smith September 25, 2026

Sixty two years after Amédée Gordini fitted a hotter 1.1 liter four cylinder and twin Weber carbs to a modest rear engine Renault sedan, the same badge sits on a low, wide two seat coupe that never has to share its garage with a production schedule. Renault showed the one off on September 24 at its Carwalk event and will park it on the Paris Motor Show stand from October 12 to 18 before it heads to the new Renault Collections museum in Flins.

Google Adds Talking Live Avatars to Gemini 3.8 Live for Enterprises

By Jackson Chung September 25, 2026

Google just gave its newest live conversation model a face. Gemini 3.8 Live with Live Avatar became generally available on September 24 for Gemini Enterprise customers, one week after the audio-focused Gemini 3.8 Live models launched and months after a first look at Google Cloud Next 2026. The update generates a 24-frame-per-second video of an animated person or cartoon character whose mouth and expressions stay locked to the spoken words, pairing the existing speech model with low-latency streaming video in a single pass.

HTX Studio’s AirDesk Turns a Whole Desk Into the AirPower Apple Never Shipped

By Jackson Chung September 25, 2026

HTX Studio spent about two months turning a full work desk into a charger that finds a phone wherever you set it down and starts feeding it power. Apple showed that idea in 2017 as AirPower, a small mat that would charge a phone, Watch, and AirPods case without lining them up on a single coil. The pad never shipped. Apple cancelled it in 2019. The YouTube builder waited through nine promised “next years,” then built a version big enough to work on.

iFixit Opens Steam Frame and Finds Valve Packed a Whole Computer Around Your Eyes With Room to Work

By Bill Smith September 24, 2026

Days after Valve started sending Steam Frame kits to buyers, iFixit already had one open on the bench and mostly liked what sat inside. Steam Frame launched September 14 as a standalone SteamOS headset that also streams from a PC through an included wireless adapter, starting at $1,059 for 256GB and $1,299 for 1TB, with controllers and Half-Life: Alyx in the box.