Latest News - Page 2981

NVIDIA have announced the first ever GeForce eSports World of Tanks Open Tournament, with gamers competing to win NVIDIA GPUs and a shot at the $100,000 total prize pool. Pre-registration is now open, with team and player registration opening up its doors on March 28 for two weeks. Head of Community and Wargaming in North America, Kevin Van Ness, has said:

Five regions are open to enter the World of Tanks tournament, China, APAC, the Americas, Russia and Europe. The five regional finalists will receive an all-expenses-paid trip to the Grand Finals, which will be announced at a later date. All tournament matches are seven-person teams playing the best of three game matches.

I wish this were me doing the video, but I'll continue to dream for now. The team at Oculus have received their first Rift off the production line, and have done a nice unboxing video for the world.

They've also taken the time to announce through the Oculus blog that developer kits will begin shipping to the earliest Kickstarter backers by March 29. Once the dev kit ships to the backer, they'll receive an e-mail confirmation so that they can track their Rift as it is shipping to their door. Oculus expect to deliver between 1000-1500 units per week until they've fulfilled all of their orders.

The Oculus Rift developer kit comes with a plethora of goodies, including:

Samsung may be getting ready to launch their Galaxy S4, but this doesn't stop them from working on a thousand and one other devices, especially in the very lucrative emerging markets.Samsung may be getting ready to launch their Galaxy S4, but this doesn't stop them from working on a thousand and one other devices, especially in the very lucrative emerging markets.

Samsung have plenty of devices in the low- to mid-range market, such as the Galaxy S3 Mini, but they're also wanting to hit the super low-end emerging markets, such as India and Indonesia. These markets are pretty much controlled by feature phones, with Samsung clawing considerable amounts of the market share with devices in the sub-$100 market.

The Wall Street Journal has reported that the South Korean electronics giant has seen their market share in Indonesia rise from just 2% in 2010, to a market-dominating 50% in the last quarter.

J.D. Power and Associates' new study shows that Apple leads the pack when it comes to consumer satisfaction. This is the ninth time in a row that Apple has topped J.D. Power's survey, though not everything remains the same. Second place is in fierce contention by four different manufacturers.

Apple is the only company to be above the study average, coming in with a score of 855. Just one point behind the study average, Nokia comes in at a satisfaction rating of 795. Samsung pulls a close third with a score of 793. Just behind Samsung is Motorola with a score of 792. HTC brings up the rear with a score of 790.

Once you move down the list, the scores drop off. LG received a score of 744 and BlackBerry only scored 732. Interestingly enough, about 17 percent of those surveyed said that they encountered some sort of bug or glitch. Bugs and glitches really detract from the user experience and companies should probably focus heavily in these areas.

Everyone's favorite $99 console might be getting streaming video content, at least if the CEO's hint proves accurate. At a keynote at South By Southwest, CEO Julie Uhrman hinted that the Ouya console would be able to function as a set-top box, meaning that we should expect streaming video.

The PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Wii have all successfully integrated online video streaming service apps and these have helped the consoles extend their lifespan. Uhrman noted that she "feels pretty confident" that Ouya will feature streaming content via native apps from some of the larger players.

This will probably be a fairly easy task as the console will be running Android. Hulu and Netflix already have streaming video apps available for Android. Uhrman added that if it isn't available directly at launch, it should be available shortly after. "We're talking to everyone."

Going green is the big push right now and has been for the past several years. Apple releases its "Apple and the Environment" report to show just how Apple's business affects the environment around us. The latest report shows that while Apple is moving towards green energy use, its overall production of CO2 is still increasing.

Apple has started to brag that its data centers are 100 percent powered by renewable energy sources. Even with this change, Apple's overall production has increased by 34 percent. Apple attributes this increase to its overall increase in products sold. It's true that Apple produces less CO2 per dollar revenue.

Since 2008, Apple has reduced its emissions per dollar revenue by 21.5 percent. Apple has also increased renewable energy at its corporate facilities by 114 percent. However, facilities only contribute 2 percent of Apple's emissions. 61 percent, or the large majority, come from the manufacturing of the devices.

HTC CEO Peter Chou is so committed to the success of the HTC One that he has reportedly said that he will quit his job and leave HTC if the upcoming One smartphone is a flop.

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Chou said that in the event that the HTC One is a failure, he will resign his position at the company. At the moment, things are not looking good for Chou as HTC's flagship release has been delayed until the end of this month due to delays.

The delays were first thought to be caused by HTC's new "Ultra Pixel" camera technology, or its aluminum uni-frame body, but we recently discovered that is not the case. In fact, HTC is having issues getting many of its components due to being downgraded from a tier one manufacturer.

A new virus specific to Mac has been discovered by Russian security firm Doctor Web. Named Trojan.Yontoo.1, the virus injects ads into webpages on the infected machine.

The malware works by installing an adware plugin into any of the popular browsers then overlays an advertisement in key locations on webpages. Doctor Web says that this trojan is just another piece of a large adware puzzle that has been infecting OS X for some time now.

The virus can be caught in several different ways, with the most popular method being the use of movie trailer pages in which users must install a plugin to view the content. Other methods of injection have been media player enhancement programs and download accelerators. One indication of infection is that when launched, Trojan.Yontoo.1 will prompt users to install a program called "Free Twit Tube" or something similar.

What do you do when you have more cash reserves than any other company in the world? You develop a system that magically flips your company's flagship phone into the proper position during a fall to lessen damage. Yes, Apple has patented a method that turns your phone into a cat.

US Patent #20130073095 describes a "Protective Mechanism for an Electronic Device" that appears to use centrifugal force to reorient an iPhone in the event of a drop or fall. From the patent drawings, it looks like a small motor with a weight on one end would spin up and make the phone flip into an orientation that would lessen damage to sensitive parts like the screen.

The patent also mentions alternative methods that would deploy airfoils to levy aerodynamics to reorient the phone. There is also mention of cables that could be jettisoned to catch the phone mid fall, and other far out there concepts like gas canisters used in conjunction with thrust nozzles to reorient the phone. Below you can see more of the artwork courtesy of Apple Insider.

We're willing to bet that more than a few of our readers have participated in a video game beta test before despite the fact that they are sometimes hard to get into. Up until now, you usually had to rely on being selected to participate in those beta programs, but Valve is looking to change that.

Steam has just released a new service called Early Access that makes participating in beta test easier. Instead of filling out form after form, and email after email, Valve's solution is to let game developers simply charge users to be part of the beta. Developers can chose to offer the beta for free through the service or charge users full price for the game, which rolls over to your steam library when officially launched.

As of this posting, the Early Access program has 12 titles including some heavy hitters like: Arma 3 Aplha, Kerbal Space Program and Star Forge Alpha. It is still up in the air if gamers are willing to buy a game at full price months before release just to get access to the beta program, but something tells me that it will be a success.

If you've wanted to know how it feels to be a world renown overclocker, MSI have officially announced their 2013 MSI Master Overclocking Arena (MOA) is entering its six-year anniversary. MSI are going with a "NO LIMITS" concept, that will "bring out the core spirit of overclocking and help to unveil MOA 2013".

In order to enter, all you have to do is share the "No Limits MSI MOA" video on Facebook, giving you an entry into the draw. There will be two people chosen as winners, who will receive MSI's latest Gaming Series motherboard. Here's what you need to know:

For more detailed information, please visit MSI FAN CLUB page on Facebook.

From the depths of the Atlantic Ocean, significant pieces of Saturn V's rocket engines have been recovered. What makes this a big announcement is the fact they've been there for over 40 years, and recovered thanks to a privately-funded expedition by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

Bezos explained the site of the discovery three miles below the surface, more than 400 miles from Florida's east cost as "an underwater wonderland, an incredible sculpture garden of twisted F-1 engines that tells the story of a fiery and violent end, one that serves testament to the Apollo programme." The Amazon founder announced over a year ago that they had located the engine pieces that took man to the moon in 1969.

After three weeks abord a recovery vessel named 'Seabed Worker', Bezos and his team are on their way back to Cape Canaveral with their pieces of the Saturn V rocket engines. Bezos said in a statement on the expedition website: "We're bringing home enough major components to fashion displays of two flown F-1 engines. Many of the original serial numbers are missing or partially missing, which is going to make mission identification difficult. We might see more during restoration. The objects themselves are gorgeous."

Sixty seconds on the Internet doesn't sound like much, but think of all the millions of users on simultaneously, all doing different things and the numbers add up very quickly. In only 60 seconds, around 640TB of data is transferred around the world.

The data comes from an infographic by chipmaker Intel, who breaks it down into even more interesting numbers. Google is a big part of these numbers, where more than two million searches are conducted every sixty seconds. YouTube pushes out around 1.3 million videos, while at the same time consumes 30 hours worth of uploaded video for public consumption.

Moving onto social networks, Facebook sees around 6 million views, and Twitter enjoys around 100,000 new tweets per minute. E-mail is still a huge number, with 204 million e-mails sent out every minute. Most of these are most likely spam, but they still count as data being transferred. Intel has also made some projections looking into the future, where they expect the number of networked devices to double by 2015.

Google have officially launched Keep, and if you haven't heard of it before now - like myself - it might actually become a tool you'll use on the daily. Google Keep is a note taking service, available online and through an app for Android.

Keep is aimed at users who need to quickly tap something into their device, where it is saved onto Google Drive. Those of you with Android 4.2.2-based devices get an even better way of taking notes, as there's a lock screen widget available for even quicker and easier access to jotting down notes. There's the trailer above explaining Keep, and if you're interested, check it out on the Play Store for your Android device.

Logitech are reiterating the fact that they're committed to PC gaming by unveiling their new Logitech G line of gaming peripherals. This lineup boasts six redesigned mice and keyboard favorites, as well as two brand new headsets. There's a lot to cover, so let's get introduced to Logitech's new products.

Logitech G700s Rechargeable Gaming Mouse - Logitech's G700s mouse is a wireless gaming mouse featuring the report rate of an epically fast wired gaming mouse. Logitech have made the G700s capable of maintaining a consistant report rate, no matter if you're using the mouse over its included 2.4GHz wireless connection, or physically connected through USB. You can switch out from wireless to wired gaming if your battery dies, using a data-over-cable connection thanks to its standard microUSB cable.

There are 13 programmable controls on the G700s, macros and more, which are all controlled and manipulated through Logitech's Gaming Software (LGS). Logitech are slapping a suggested retail price of $99.99 for the G700s mouse.

Samsung has confirmed that they are working on a fix for a flaw that allows bypassing of the lock screen. The bug was posted to the internet today and shows a method for bypassing the lock screen, permanently, if you have enough time to download an app from the Play Store.

The steps to reproduce the bug are below:

The bug is only present on Samsung's implementation of Android. It doesn't seem to affect the stock build. In a statement, Samsung said, "We are aware of this issue and will release a fix at the earliest possibility. Samsung considers user privacy and the security of user data its top priority."

Amazon hit a home-run when they launched the original Kindle Fire HD, and now if rumors are true, they are looking to knock another one out of the ball park. A $99 Kindle Fire of the 7-inch class is said to already be in production and could ship later this year.

The new 7-inch Kindle Fire would be a direct competitor to Apple's iPad mini, as well as other small tablets such as Google's Nexus 7, as well as offerings from ASUS, Samsung and Sony. It would also offer competition to the flood of off brand Chinese Android tablets that have been popping up in the sub $100 range.

We are not finding any reports on hardware specifications yet, but we know that the device is said to feature a 1280x800 LCD and it could contain similar hardware to Amazon's current $99 7-inch Kindle Fire HD. Would you buy a new 7-inch Kindle Fire HD at $99 if you owned a larger Kindle Fire or even another tablet? Let us know in the comments.

Today we are very excited to be announcing a new part of our website called Tweakipedia. Tweakipedia will be an amusement park of technology, filled with guides from how to overclock your computer to installing Windows from a USB drive. Not only that, but we will be taking in reader submissions on tweaks and guides.

This means that if you have a tweak recommendation, then you can submit it to us and we'll get it into Tweakipedia. We'll also love to hear suggestions on what you'd love to see next, so if you are itching to see how a certain GPU (or three) performs in a particular game, then you can request that. If you didn't know how to do a particular task - for example, building a system with Corsair's Obsidian 900D case - then we would secure that part and write a how-to build guide on it.

The idea is that the reader is heavily involved in Tweakipedia. We want you to submit ideas, requests, your own guides and tweaks - everything. This way, you're directly contributing to Tweakipedia and seeing it slowly morph into a gigantic source of great tech information. That is the next point - Tweakipedia will be a source we can continue to come back on in future reviews, articles and more. We might take a look at something in two weeks from now, say the performance of HD 7970's in CrossFire on the latest Catalyst drivers at the time, but six months from now, those numbers will be completely different, so we can come back and see how far things have come.

Fresh from the rumor mill, we have some new next-generation Xbox news. The latest rumors include some screenshots of a purported Xbox Development Kit (XDK) for the next-gen console from Microsoft.

The leaked documentation, if true, would see the next-gen Xbox feature a large HDD, large enough to "hold a large number of games". All next-gen Xbox games are said to be installable to the drive, and "play from the optical drive will not be supported." It seems as though installation of games will be a requirement, with games not capable of being played off the disc at all. This might be a nice change from Microsoft, being able to install the games to the Xbox and take the disc out - not requiring it again until you re-install it.

What about piracy? Well, Microsoft are reportedly developing an anti-used games system, requiring activation codes for 50GB capacity Blu-ray discs. This would definitely shoot holes in piracy for the next-gen Xbox, but how Microsoft play this out will be very, very important.

Things are heating up in South Korea once again, with South Korean authorities investigating a major attack on multiple fronts. Three TV broadcasters and two major banks were attacked, with the South Korean army raising their alert levels thinking that North Korea are behind the attacks.

Servers at television networks YTN, MBC and KBS were taken down, as well as two major banks; Shinhan Bank and NongHyup Bank. Some of the computers that were infiltrated had files deleted, according to the authorities. A police official has said: "We sent down teams to all affected sites. We are now assessing the situation. This incident is pretty massive and will take a few days to collect evidence."

The banks are back up and running, but the TV stations have said they don't know when they'll be fully operational again, with some workers at the stations not able to boot their systems back up. South Korean military hasn't been affected, but they've raised their state of readiness in response. Police and government have both declined to speculate on North Korea's involvement, but the North have threatened the South more than once now, stating they would attack both South Korea and their major ally, the United States after they were slapped with United Nations sanctions for their nuclear test back in February.