Latest News - Page 2874

Anyone who plays games or spends a lot of typing on a computer each day can tell you that not all keyboards are created equal. I've been typing on a super thin Logitech keyboard for years and find that I can't type nearly as fast on anything else. A lot of gamers and typists out there like mechanical keys.

If you are one of those sorts of people, you will be interested in the new offering from Das Keyboard. You might recognize the Das Keyboard name, the company has been making keyboards for years now. In fact, we reviewed one back in 2012.

The latest offering is called the Das Keyboard 4 Mechanical Keyboard and it has mechanical keys as you expect. You can get the keyboard in a version with names printed on all of the keys. If you are a touch typist, sure of the location of everything you can get it blank as well.

Despite flailing at the box office late last year, Twentieth Century Fox Australia has announced the joint Fox/BBC Earth CG/live action feature film Walking With Dinosaurs for release in May in a range of versions, including a 2D/3D/UltraViolet Blu-ray double pack alongside a standard 2D Blu-ray and DVD.

To be released on May 14, Walking With Dinosaurs features a collection of extra features, including one that attempts to address that which many critics (myself included) had criticised in the alternative 'Cretaceous cut' version of the film, which removes the grating character dialogue and makes other minor cuts. In conjunction with this, the film features a selection of child friendly games and activities, along with an interactive map and an in-movie trivia track.

Walking With Dinosaurs disappointed many with its needlessly anthropomorphised depiction of dinosaurs, which flew in the face of the scientific accuracy of the original 1999 BBC television series of the same name, allegedly dictated by Fox executives late in production. Limping across the line with a $120 million worldwide box office take, their decision seems to have been rejected by movie goers, but this recut might just be the olive branch that fans were seeking. We'll be sure to take a look at the Blu-ray release following it's release.

Many banks and ATM operators are making plans to migrate its ATM systems to Linux as Windows XP's support will no longer be provided from April 8th. The report indicated that this will allow companies and operators to have more control over the hardware and software of the machines.

As pointed out earlier, many companies were either planning to shift to newer Windows operating system or purchasing extended support for Windows XP until they've completed migration for all of its machines. As of now, about 95% of the world's ATMs are using Windows XP. It is expected that 60% of 400,000 ATMs in the United States will still be using Windows XP post its end-of-support deadline.

But operators would like to sync their hardware and software upgrade cycles, which is difficult to do with Microsoft's upgrade schedule. Because of this, the operators are looking towards open source.

Despite Turkey's attempt to ban social networking site Twitter, the government is now "fighting a losing battle," experts claim, with Turkish citizens using virtual private networks (VPNs), text messaging and Tor to continue tweeting.

Although Twitter hasn't publicly issued a response - following the Turkish government trying to have government corruption tweets and links deleted - Twitter's decision to post a guide on how to post tweets via SMS provides an initial insight into the company's stance on the matter.

Turkish Finance Minister Mehmet Simsek isn't overly impressed with the ban:

Microsoft Windows XP remains an extremely popular and well-liked operating system, but the security benefits alone of Windows 7 and 8/8.1 haven't been enough to get users to migrate. However, Microsoft and security experts are strongly urging both users and companies to upgrade, or potentially face harmful cyberattacks.

Pure Hacking has a few tips regarding XP: Disable what users don't need on the OS, replace XP with Windows 7, segregate legacy installations, and implement application whitelisting control.

"Across Australia there are tens of thousands of machines still running Windows XP - just think POS terminals, let alone all those SMBs," said Gordon Maddern, Pure Hacking CTO, in a statement. "Anyone still on XP will be wide open to attack. All new vulnerabilities - and countless numbers of these are likely - will no longer be fixed by Microsoft. I cannot stress enough, it's time to migrate, migrate, migrate."

It's no secret that Google has been swooping in and buying robotic companies left and right, and one of those acquisitions is making headlines today. Schaft Robotics, a company Google bought last year has made it to the finals of a DARPA sponsored robotics competition, and today Google announced that it would not accept funding for the competition that the US government had previously offered.

In a statement released by the DARPA last Friday, the government says that Google has switched to Track D of the program which means it will be fully funding the program from its own bank account, and no government funding will be accepted. The DARPA Robotics Challenge or DRC is a competition that challenges companies to create a robot that can handle disaster zone task such as navigating heavy debris, opening a door, climbing a ladder, and even turning off gas and water valves.

Google's Schaft Robot will be competing in the finals which are scheduled to be held some time between December 2014 and June of 2015. Google's other robotics company, Boston Dynamics, will also be competing in the event with its bipedal robot, Petman. This is one competition I would love to watch live, and I hope to get that chance during the next round!

Last November, Futuremark made the announcement that it would be de-listing the Samsung Galaxy S4 and Galaxy Note III from its 3DMark benchmarking results. This drastic action was taken because of some shady, behind the scenes code that was implemented on the devices that made them appear to perform better in benchmarking than they actually did. Several other phones were caught up in this scandal, but things have changed with the roll-out of Android 4.4.2 KitKat to these two devices.

"That decision (To de-list the Samsung devices from results) won us lots of praise from 3DMark users, even from those who owned one of the delisted models. We knew that de-listing would send a message to manufacturers too. We hoped it would encourage them to be fair and honest with their customers," said Futuremark. "After conducting our own testing, I can confirm that the Galaxy Note III and Galaxy S IV now conform to our benchmark rules when running the Android 4.4 update provided by Samsung."

Samsung Galaxy S IV

Time Warner Cable processed almost 12,000 government requests in 2013, with 82 percent subpoenas, 12 percent court-ordered incidents, 4 percent were search warrants, 2 percent were emergency requests, and 0.3 percent were wiretap orders.

TWC says the company received between 0 and 249 National Security Orders, though cannot identify an exact number. The company wants to become more open about customer information requests, especially after Edward Snowden's spying disclosures made last year.

We will issue future Transparency Reports on a semi-annual basis," TWC said in a statement. "We have also provided answers to frequently asked questions related to the practices we follow to strengthen protections for the privacy of customer information."

After more than a year of steady development, Google has finally added its Google Now service to the stable channel of Google Chrome for Mac and PC. Today Google announced that it has finally refined Google Now for the desktop enough to include it in the next stable release of its Chrome browser for Windows and Mac, and says it will begin rolling out in the next few days.

Once the feature has been added to the Chrome browser on your device, you can turn it on by signing into the same Google account you use on your Android or iOS device. This will sync your Google Now cards, searches, and other relevant data to your PC or Mac. If you use Google Now on multiple devices, you will need to manage location settings for each PC, Mac device, and mobile device you use the service on to ensure accurate results.

Google Now will display cards featuring traffic, weather, shipping, movies, events, and more right on your desktop. Most of this data will come from the user's smartphone, and will provide the same up-to-date information that Google Now users have become accustomed to over the last year.

Digital currency bitcoin has endured ups and downs over the past 12 months, and clearly is shaking up the financial industry. More consumers are becoming familiar with bitcoins, while businesses are embracing the payment, and governments remain unsure how to utilize the online currency.

An upcoming meeting in Paris led by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) should involve an active bitcoin discussion, in which companies such as AT&T, Deutsche Telekom, US Federal Reserve, and other major organizations listen and share experiences - as bitcoin legality and legislation still remains a difficult battle.

"The rise of bitcoin has changed everyone's idea of what a good payment system should be," said Manu Sporny, Digital Bazaar CEO, in a statement. "bitcoin raised the bar, so everyone's got to come in and match that in some way."

Actor Paul Walker played the role of Brian O'Conner in all but one of the Fast & Furious movies. Late last year Walker and a friend were killed in a car accident. The accident took Walker's life while he was on Thanksgiving vacation from filming the seventh movie in the franchise.

Walker had reportedly filmed about half his scenes at the time of his death. The loss left the movie in limbo for a while as the studio tried to decide what to do after the loss of a pivotal character in the franchise. Some thought that the character might simply be killed off, but a source claiming to be familiar with the studio's plans says that isn't the case.

According to this source, the film will be completed using four different actors that are of the same height and build as Walker. The actors will be used as a base and for movement according to the source. Walkers face will be applied to the actors using CGI.

During Game Developer's Conference, Microsoft was showing off DirectX 12. One of the notable features is the low-level access which will help to efficiently utilize the processing power of the end-user's CPU.

What's now being revealed is that certain features of the upcoming graphics API will require the new generation of video cards. Previously it was mentioned in NVIDIA's press release that slightly older and current generation video cards will work with DX 12.

Currently, its unknown how game developers plan to implement DX 12. Tony Tamasi clarified that though DX 12 will use low-level abstraction, its not a mandatory feature as there will be backwards compatibility with DX11. He also pointed out that Microsoft only teased some of the implementations of DirectX 12, and that the coming time we will more information.

More and more vehicles are going hybrid and some of the most interest hybrids are aimed at improving performance. A number of high-end sports cars are adopting hybrid tech, such as the Ferrari LaFerrari and the McLaren P1, to make the car faster more than for fuel efficiency.

Those high-end sports cars are able to drive short distances on electricity alone in many instances. Typically, the hybrid power is aimed at generating low-end torque allowing the gas engine to be tuned for high rpm performance. BMW and Toyota announced last year that they were teaming up on a new hybrid sports car.

AutoCar says that this rendering is what the car might look like. The vehicle is tipped to get a small 4cylinder gas engine with turbo power and a hybrid system. Rather than batteries like a normal hybrid, this car will use supercapacitors. Those are able to store and discharge energy faster than batteries.

To try and woo users to abandon Microsoft Windows XP, which reaches end of support in early April, Microsoft is giving consumers $100 to upgrade to a new PC or Surface tablet.

The deal is good for Surface Pro 2 tablets, select notebooks, all-in-one desktops, and 2-in-1 products.

The upgrades must be made through the Microsoft Store, and includes 90 days of free support along with free data transfer. Microsoft is keeping the promotion going through June 15, and customers will be required to show an XP-based device in-store or place an order in the store using an XP device.

Apple's already-thin MacBook Air might be a little thinner with its successor, which will reportedly ship as a 12-inch device, featuring a "fanless" design. The current MBA has a tiny, but very quiet fan.

The new MBA would also replace the mechanical "clicker" in the track pad, which would see a gesture-only and tap control, instead of physical clicks. Right now, the MacBook Air comes in two display sizes, 11.6- and 13-inch. Providing a 12-inch screen with a Retina resolution, and being even thinner, would be quite the device from Apple.

If Apple could surprise, and make the screen disconnect from the keyboard, now that would be a nice change. Imagine if when it was disconnected, it flicked off from OS X and enabled iOS, making it a 12-inch tablet. We've already heard about an iPad Pro... why can't this be it?

The malicious BlackOS software package has been updated and is now available on the cybercriminal underground for $3,800 per year.

As noted by Trend Micro, the updated software is better suited to process and manage website exploitation, providing a great return-on-investment for cybercriminals. A custom Web interface allows for better web traffic management and access to features that lead to redirected traffic and iframes injection.

"They do a mass attack, there are no specific targets as these websites are just a launch pad to perform their malicious attacks," said Chris Budd, Trend Micro threat communications manager, in a statement to SC Magazine. "They are usually looking for an easy access, once they are inside they will try to level up the privileges to gain root access on the machine and therefore be able to [make] use of the BlackOS features, which is inject a malicious IFrames in all web pages."

Titanfall will soon be updated, where we will see the first-person shooter include the ability to be played at 4K. Not only that, but Titanfall will finally support multi-GPU setups with NVIDIA GeForce GPUs.

NVIDIA's Manager of Developer Content and Technology, Ashu Rege, said: "Respawn will also release updates to support high-definition 4K display, and our SLI multi-GPU technology, for a fantastic high-end PC experience." Respawn and NVIDIA are also working together to see NVIDIA's GameWorks technologies built into the mech shooter.

This will see Titanfall include PhysX for clothing and destruction simulation, and VisualFX for hair, fire and liquid simulation. Not only that, but we'll also see Temporal anti-aliasing (TXAA), which will reduce screen flickering, and Horizon Based Ambient Occlusion+ (HBAO+) which will provide Titanfall with "more lifelike shadows."

Revenues on music sales on iTunes continue to slide, but is Apple looking at releasing iTunes on Android? Billboard is reporting just that, looking to fill in some of its financial holes by expanding iTunes to Android, and launching a paid music subscription service.

It's not like the competition hasn't done this, as Google has its Google Play Music service on iOS, but for Apple to do it, it is almost unthinkable. The iPhone maker makes up around 40% of the US digital music market, but the market itself is seeing double-digit declines in revenue over the last couple of years. Apple currently has a free, ad-supported radio service with its iTunes Radio, but it secures most of its profits in media from the standard single and album sales through the iTunes Store.

If the company moves toward a flat rate subscription music service, it could create a new revenue stream for itself, but it wouldn't exactly stem the losses it is experiencing through iTunes. Expanding the service to Android on the other hand, could open the company up to hundreds of millions of new devices and consumers who wouldn't be buying content through the iTunes Store.

The ink is fresh on a new deal struck between IMAX Corporation and Disney to a new partnership which will see titles some of the most eagerly awaited upcoming theatrical releases remastered in the large screen IMAX format and some presumably filmed (at least partially) in the gargantuan format.

Forthcoming titles such as Guardians of the Galaxy, The Avengers: The Rise of Ultron, Tomorrowland and Star Wars Episode VII will all benefit from IMAX re-jigging, the latter at least which will also be released in the IMAX 3D format - surely the definitive way to view the film when it hits screens next year.

In further Star Wars news to come out of the house of mouse, the company have confirmed that the next episode will take place 30 years after Return of the Jedi, which will be perfect for stars Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher who are all of course 30 years older. Whilst the company has not made any official announcement, all three have alluded to their appearances and Hamill and Fisher have been assigned personal trainers and put on strict diets to get back in ship shape.

Following a story indicating the White House will jump ship away from BlackBerry, follow-up reports indicate that BlackBerry will remain in the Oval Office.

The Department of Defense is reportedly testing smartphones from Samsung and LG, likely running the Google Android operating system, and losing the White House would be a major loss for the struggling Canadian smartphone maker. A White House spokesperson told the Washington Post that there is no pilot program currently underway to leave BlackBerry in favor of Samsung or LG devices.

A statement released by BlackBerry: