Latest News - Page 2625

Cupertino tech titan Apple has yet to be dethroned as the world's most profitable brand and continues its global dominance for the third year in a row.

According to new 2014 rankings published by Interbrand, Apple's total value has shot up by 43% for an estimated brand value of $170,276 million. The second place competitor, Google, sits just $50 million shy from breaking Apple's three-year streak at an estimated value of $120 billion. Microsoft is in fourth place with a brand value of $67 billion increase of 11%. Despite being a world leader in tech, Samsung sits at a cool seventh place with 0% gains and a brand value of $45 billion.

With its new line of iDevices including the iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus, the 12.9-inch iPad Pro and even a smartring prototype, Apple is poised to continue its reign for 2015. Google has taken aim at the throne with its new Nexus 5X and Nexus 6P handsets that feature Project Fi network support.

Facebook and French satellite provider Eutelsat have teamed up to transmit free internet to large portions of Africa via orbital satellite.

With the help of Spacecom, the duo has secured the entire Ka-band payload of the AMOS-6 geostationary satellite which will transmit the signal. The AMOS-6 is configured with "high gain spot beams covering large parts of West, East and Southern Africa" as well as "high throughput satellite architecture" that ensure cost-effective, Direct-to-User internet access for Africans. Both Facebook and Eutelsat will split the broadband capacity, and the satellite is scheduled to launch in the second half of 2016.

"Facebook's mission is to connect the world and we believe that satellites will play an important role in addressing the significant barriers that exist in connecting the people of Africa," said Chris Daniels, Vice President of Facebook's Internet.org. "We are looking forward to partnering with Eutelsat on this project and investigating new ways to use satellites to connect people in the most remote areas of the world more efficiently."

Back in August, the creators of Pokemon ruthlessly slapped a copyright infringement claim on a good-natured Pokemon celebration. The party was to be held at PAX and was totally unofficially and not sanctioned or sponsored by The Pokemon Company.

Like Nintendo, the company has a very black and wide approach to what it considers copyright infringement and really doesn't ever make consolations. So naturally the Pokemon Company pressured and threatened Larkin Jones, the event organizer, with legal action. Jones canceled the event and cooperated. But now the Pokemon creators demand Larkin pay a $4000 fine for using copyright images like Pikachu on the fliers. Jones just doesn't have the cash to pay it, and has turned to a Go Fund Me campaign to raise the funds. This led to more than a hundred gamers coming together and pledging their support, and Jones raised the money in just three days.

"The day before the PAX party, Pokemon sued me. Without even a cease and desist. Totally didn't expect that,"

In a move that surprised absolutely no one, Twitter's board of directors has officially named Jack Dorsey as acting Chief Executive Officer of the social media giant.

As one of the original founders of Twitter, Dorsey was called back to action after ex-Twitter CEO Dick Costolo stepped down back in June. Within five months after being appointed to interim CEO, Dorsey reprised his role as acting CEO of the company--a position he previously held from 2007-2008. Interestingly enough, Dorsey will actually simultaneously stand as CEO of both Twitter and Square and also maintain his position in Disney's board of directors.

The official SEC filing notes that Dorsey won't be compensated for running the company, and Twitter has no future plans to pay him. This is largely due to the fact that as a co-founder, Dorsey owns a huge portion of company shares. "There are currently no plans to provide Mr. Dorsey with direct compensation for his role as Chief Executive Officer," reads the release.

AMD teased that its dual-GPU beast was coming earlier this year, but now we're beginning to hear talk of a "Radeon R9 Gemini' shipping from AMD's HQ in Canada.

The Radeon R9 Gemini will most likely arrive to us as the Radeon R9 Fury X2, as it can't succeed the Radeon R9 295X2 because of its name - where if it was the R9 395X2, people would think it features two R9 390X GPUs, versus the Fiji GPU found on the Fury X. The dual-GPU card should feature two fully-enabled Fiji XT cores, the same found on the Fury X, with 4GB of HBM each.

AMD would have the most powerful single video card solution on the market with this card, where it would easy beat the pants off of a GTX 980 Ti or Titan X from NVIDIA. As for pricing, we should expct somewhere over $1000, and most likely headed into the $1199 or so price point. As for availability, we should hopefully hear about this card in the very near future.

What better to make sensationalist media outlets perk up and blame real life violence on video games other than this realistic Grand Theft Auto IV (GTA 4) mod? This 'ultra graphics mod' is named 'SG ENB v2.0 [1.0.4.0] and sets out to turn GTA 4 into a hyper-realistic, action packed, real-world experience.

The video above showcases simple gaming actions which take place with the help of an NVIDIA GTX 970 running at 2560x1440, but there's no saying what will happen to your precious framerate when the going gets tough and RPG's start flying.

This mod joins the plethora of GTA IV and Skyrim enhancers that reiterate why enabling gaming communities to make expansive mods is such a good thing. If you're wanting a higher resolution look at the screenshots, click on the images below or head here for the full album. There's nothing else to say here other than: enjoy the photos.

Currently set at 50% off ($4.99) for a limited time, Tweetbot 4 has now seen iOS 9 support. This application is useful for things such as syncing your timeline across all apple devices, muting users, hashtags, sources or keywords and more. The issue with this update is the forced purchase - no matter if you have Tweetbot 3 or not, you're still going to have to pony up the dollars.

Version 4 has added iPad support, landscape support on iPhone and iPad, split view multitasking, notification quick reply and more. Officially released on October 1, this version is iOS 9.0+ only, users looking for an older iOS supported version will need to look into Tweetbot 3.

Just a few days after release this app already has a 4.5-star rating across 733 reviews in total and if you're worried about space constraints this app checks in at a small 6.8MB. With the discount being upheld for a limited time only, you should pounce before the price goes up if this app interests you.

When you think about profits in the music industry, you'd think that by now the likes of Spotify and Pandora would be making hundreds of millions of dollars - but in reality, they don't.

According to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), music streaming revenue has increased by 27% year-on-year, while vinyl sales have jumped 52% in the same period of time. In the first half of 2015, vinyl sales made $222 million while streaming revenue hit $163 million. Apple Music isn't included in these results, so the streaming side of things will see an uptick when Apple gets onboard.

According to data analyst Joshua Friedlander: "Overall, the music industry has become the most-digital in terms of all traditional media outlets - magazines, newspapers - in terms of transition. There is more optimism out there than there was. Two-thirds of the market is still physical [CDs]. It used to be monolithic. Now it's a mix of things, a revenue diversification that makes a more stable source to grow off of. [Streaming] services have mostly grown through word of mouth. There hasn't been a big Spotify advertising push. When you get a player like Apple involved, that really generates a whole new level of awareness".

We know it's coming, and we can't wait - NVIDIA begins showing off more and more of its new Pascal architecture, teasing the HBM-powered Pascal GPU at GTC Japan 2015 recently.

The last time we saw Pascal was when NVIDIA CEO Jen-Hsun Huang showed off a prototype board at GTC 2015 in March, but now we're seeing a slightly different Pascal GPU board than we saw earlier this year. The board features an actual Pascal GPU now that it has taped out, with the consumer GeForce card to feature a huge 16GB of HBM2 while the professional side of things will bump things up to 32GB of HBM2.

The design of the board is very similar to the Fiji-powered cards from AMD, as NVIDIA's Pascal chip is on a similar interposer to AMD. It looks slightly bigger, but we should expect the Pascal-powered cards to blow the doors off of the Fiji-powered cards from AMD. We will see DirectX 12 support, around 17 billion transistors, a 4096-bit memory interface, and so much more. Expect more news on this as we get closer to the New Year.

Thanks to the power of USB 3.0, AOC has released its first USB-only monitor, the 16" HD Pro USB E1659FWUX-PRO. Said to be powered with DisplayLink technology, this monitor further has a 300 cd/m2 brightness which makes "it the brightest in its class" as pointed out in a recent press release.

This plug and play monitor requires no setup protocols and is compatible with both Mac and PC systems. Designed with travel in mind, AOC has made sure that this monitor is suitable for transport in a suitcase and comes with a carry case of its own.

If you're interested in one of these for yourself, expect to spend $199 from Amazon online.

Available in a massive 64GB kit comprised of 4x16GB sticks, Apacer's new DDR4 RAM has been designed by its 'Z511 Lab' and will be available soon in 2400, 2666, 2800 and 3000 MHz editions, ranging from $139 - $299.

With the ability to withstand an incredible 120 degrees celsius (248 Fahrenheit) and operate without issue, this DDR4 SO-DIMM memory is designed purely with laptops in mind, aiming to skirt around overheating issues that some performance laptops are currently feeling.

The Z511 Lab is explained by Apacer as being a special part of this company designed to look at performance products, and performance products only. Setup in early 2015, this group is responsible for performance and stress testing products before they are available to the market.

Reload Studios has just secured $4 million in its first round of funding, with Reload Studios' CEO James Chung saying: "Now the foundation is set. Gaining partners who believed in the future of VR is like gaining a huge army for the battle. We are ready to take on the whole world of VR".

The investors included Rothenberg Ventures, World Innovation Lab, Barunson E&A, YK CRCM RS LLC as well as a few undisclosed private backers. Reload Studios has only just announced its first VR title 'World War Toons' as well as the creation of its own VR Lab. The studio has partnered up with WoofbertVR, an arts education VR company.

General Partner at YK CRCM RS LLC, Chun Ding, said: "Today's digital consumers will best experience and embrace virtual reality through its most exciting and breath-taking content. We applaud the talented team at Reload Studios for what they have accomplished and are thrilled to partner with them to bring the best of these contents to the consumers".

There's times when I'm using my smartphone or computer, and I think to myself "there has to be a faster way of using this, I wish I could just think and my computer/smartphone would do/record/act". Well, we're bloody close.

Scientists in both China and the United States have found a way of injecting a tiny electronic mesh sensor into the brain that fully integrates with cerebral matter, enabling computers to monitor brain activity. Researchers from Harvard and the National Center for Nanoscience and Technology in Beijing have successfully created a flexible electrical circuit that first inside of a 0.1mm-diameter glass syringe in a water-based solution.

When this solution is injected into the brains of mice, the "mesh unfurled to 30 times its size and mouse brain cells grew around the mesh, forming connections with the wires in the flexible mesh circuit. The biochemical mouse brain completely accepted the mechanical component and integrated with it without any damage being caused to the mouse", reports IBT.

Nearly 25 years after exiting TV screens after seven seasons and two TV movies, the CBS Network is developing a small screen reboot of 'MacGyver', which originally starred Richard Dean Anderson as secret agent Angus MacGyver.

Sources have told The Hollywood Reporter that the new series will follow a "20-something MacGyver as he gets recruited into a clandestine organization where he uses his knack for solving problems in unconventional ways to help prevent disasters from happening."

'Fast and Furious 7' director James Wan and original executive Henry Winkler have teamed up to produce, with a script being written by R. Scott Gemmill. Wan was previously attached to a big screen reboot which fizzed out a few years ago.

The Oculus Rift's Q1 2016 launch is almost here, but there are still many doubts about the VR headset's price tag. Initial reports suggested that Oculus HMD would be at least $300, but now VR pioneer Palmer Luckey says that the final Rift will actually cost more than $350.

"You know, I'm going to be perfectly honest with you. We're roughly in [the $350] ballpark, but it's going to cost more than that. I can't tell you that it's going to be $350, and I would say I think people are going to be happy with what they get for the price because I really do think it's going to be that best VR headset you can buy," Oculus founder Palmer Luckey told Road To VR. "And the reason for that is that we've added a lot of technology to this thing beyond what existed in the DK1 and DK2 days."

"The Rift is a lot of custom hardware. It's using lenses that are some of the hardest to manufacture lenses in any consumer product you can go out and buy. It's using custom displays we worked on with Samsung that are optimized for virtual reality, in a lot of ways even beyond what you're actually seeing on these prototypes on the show floor," Luckey explained, highlighting the various internal components that work together to create the low-latency illusion of virtual reality.

Rather than sticking to pre-defined PR lines, Xbox boss Phil Spencer really takes the executive rigamarole out of his interactions with the public. More than once we've seen and heard Spencer say and do things that shows he's really on the same level as gamers, and now he's actually delivered some level-headed responses to Xbox LIVE disruptions.

When a huge global service like Xbox LIVE is down, it prevents millions of users from playing their games on their off hours or even watching Netflix. Interruptions are a big deal especially during the holiday season when users are downloading day-one updates, firmware updates, or trying to play online-only games like Destiny. Phil Spencer knows that downtime is a huge inconcenience, and even went so far as to say that it makes Xbox gamers actively distrust Microsoft.

Yesterday Xbox LIVE was down for quite some time on the Xbox One. When an everyday fan asked Spencer what was wrong with Xbox LIVE, he opened up and actually answered: "We are on the issue, apologies. We know the issue and what the fix is, shouldn't be too long," Spencer said, adding in the following: "We have to earn [your] trust, each day, and I know service disruptions hurts that trust."

Microsoft has just folded one of the industry's premiere and leading 3D physics providers into its massive ecosystem, giving the Redmond-based tech giant a huge home field advantage.

"Microsoft's acquisition of Havok continues our tradition of empowering developers by providing them with the tools to unleash their creativity to the world," Microsoft said in the official announcement. "We will continue to innovate for the benefit of development partners. Part of this innovation will include building the most complete cloud service, which we've just started to show through games like "Crackdown 3."

Havok is used in pretty much every game with a 3D environment. If you pick up any game released in the last 15 years or so, odds are that it will have Havok's logo on the back. The suite has powered tens of thousands of games across the entire spectrum of gaming, from yesteryear consoles like the PS2 and GameCube to the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One as well as an entirely galaxy of PC games. Picking up Havok is a monumental step forward for Microsoft and gives them a massive new armament to have priority for its first-party Xbox One exclusives as well as AR games with the HoloLens.

Today marks the last bundle in Microsoft's second Xbox One anniversary celebration, and it looks like they've saved the best for last. Now gamers will have the traditionally meaty Fallout franchise to chew through with their new consoles.

The new Fallout Xbox bundle comes with the new 1TB Xbox One console that doubles the stock 500GB storage, a download key for Fallout 4, another download key for Fallout 3 which will be playable thanks to the Xbox One's incoming backward compatibility update, an Xbox One controller fitted with the new 3.5mm headset jack, and a 14-day voucher for Xbox LIVE Gold.

This bundle is scheduled to launch alongside Fallout 4's release on November 10, 2015. Since it has the expanded 1TB HDD the bundle will retail for $399 rather than the more comfortable $349, but that extra space will help you further down the road if you're an active gamer.

In an age where 4K Ultra-HD is just starting to take hold in smartphones and TV set-top boxes like NVIDIA's Shield TV, tech engineers are already pushing the limits of 8K.

Sharp's titanic 85-inch 8K TV stands as a momentous leap forward in high-definition tech, but what about condensed 8K models? Apple supplier Japan Display leads the charge with the world's first compact 8K LCD panel, which condenses a resolution of 7,680 x 4,320 in a 17.3-inch display.

The 8K module sports a pixel density of 510 pixels-per-inch and has a total of 33,177,600 individual pixels, and an impressive 120Hz refresh rate. Thanks to its wide 176-degree viewing angle, high 2000:1 contrast ratio and minimized color shift, Japan Display affirms the 8K panel can deliver "life-like 8K images with a true sense of depth".

Ever since the PlayStation Vita released in 2012, there has been much debate over the exact clock speeds of the handheld's ARM Cortex A9 CPU. While Sony has stayed silent on exact details, hackers have finally unearthed some concrete details on the speeds of the PS Vita's quad-core processor.

Since the iPhone 4S uses the same ARM Cortex A9 CPU and was released in a similar timeframe as the PS Vita, the major consensus pinned the handheld's CPU at the 800MHz mark. But the recent findings show that the PS Vita's CPU actually runs at 333MHz by default and can be boosted to 444MHz with Wi-Fi turned off. Given that the ARM Cortex A9 processor has a max speed range of 800MHz - 2GHz, Sony actually underclocked the CPU frequency to about half of its suspected speed.

While Sony has no interest in upgrading the PlayStation Vita with a modern SKU, Nintendo took the opportunity to refresh its popular 3DS handheld with the New 3DS. Nintendo's New 3DS packs in beefier specs and the 804MHz speeds of its custom ARM 11 CPU actually almost doubles the CPU frequency of the PS Vita.