Latest News - Page 3017

For as long as I remember, I've loved having the ability of upgrading the CPU in my computer - back in the days of the original Pentium (and even before that), and the glory days of the Celeron 300A - the option was always there, but it could have its days numbered.

According to a report, starting with Intel's Broadwell generation of processors, Intel will only offer mainstream desktop CPUs in BGA packaging - killing upgrade options, and hurting PC makers. Starting with Broadwell, Intel's CPUs will depart the current land grid array (LGA) and micro pin grid array (µPGA) packages, and only offering chips in ball grid array (BGA) form factors, just like their Atom processors.

Japanese site, PC Watch, has said that the Haswell processors might be the last desktop chips arriving in LGA packaging. This would mean you won't be upgrading your CPU anymore, with no way of changing the CPU on the motherboard when this happens. It all begins with Broadwell in 2013, where all mainstream desktop processors being made available in BGA.

Most Twitter users know that they can't download all of their old tweets, nor can they readily access them if they need to. CEO Dick Costolo has already promised to provide users a way to download a copy of all of those tweets so that they could be archived, searched, or turned into a collage, if that's your thing.

Well, he has once again promised that feature, but this time he has put a date on it. In a talk at the University of Michigan, his alma mater for those who care, he doubled down on the feature and told the audience that the engineers may be mad at him, but they should have the ability to download an archive copy by the end of the year.

Here's a fun new website to mess around with: Google Type. Google Type uses Google's image search engine to create a custom "font" from images found around the web. It manages this feat by using a quirk in Google's image search. If you type in just a letter into Google Images, it will return a bunch of pictures that are that letter.

For instance, above I used Google Type to make TweakTown out of letters found around the internet. While you can't really use this as a font, it could just become the next tool for making ransom letters. No longer will I have to scrounge around newspapers and magazines for letters to cut out and glue into a message. After all, this is becoming increasingly difficult as papers go out of business.

Google Type comes from a group called the Internet Club, which is composed of web developers from Brussels, Belgium. They go by the tagline "Because Internet gave us so much we decided to give back." It's good to see them doing something for the benefit of the web--well, sort of--rather than the detriment.

A collection of adult movie companies aren't happy with Verizon. They say that the ISP defends BitTorrent pirates by systematically rejecting court-ordered subpoenas for information and they claim that these objections are in bad faith due to Verizon supposedly getting profit from users who are BitTorrenting.

A court has previously ruled that an IP address is not enough to hold someone responsible for pirating, but that hasn't stopped companies from trying. Adult movie companies are still filing the mass lawsuits using IPs as the identification of the users. They then ask the court to subpoena the ISP for subscriber information.

Verizon currently rejects these requests systematically as the subscriber isn't necessarily the one who did the illegal sharing. Verizon argues that "[The subpoena] seeks information that is protected from disclosure by third parties' rights of privacy and protections guaranteed by the first amendment."

We all know that the governments of the countries around the world have some pretty deadly weapons and really cool spy gear, but the only stuff that we have seen is older devices, usually from the cold war. Today, CNN has gotten an exclusive look at three deadly weapons that were carried by a North Korean assassin.

As you can see above, the weapons don't have anything that really makes them out to be weapons. Two of the devices were disguised as Parker ball-point pens, and the third weapon was disguised as a flashlight. The first pen device contained a poison needle that would have caused muscle paralysis and then death.

The second pen would fire a bullet that penetrated the skin. Once it had entered the body, it would release a powdered poison, which would kill the target. The final weapon, the one disguised as a flashlight, held three bullets that were shot out of the front of the device. During testing, South Korean officials found it to be accurate and deadly.

Google's cloud computing services have seen a price drop ahead of Amazon's first big event that takes place this week in Las Vegas. The new prices are roughly 20 percent lower and Google has gone ahead and offered a new service to compliment the price drop. The new feature is like Amazon's Glacier service in that it provides large amounts of storage for cheaper prices. These cheaper prices come at the cost of slower access.

Google's new Durable Reduced Availability Storage is an ideal option for data archiving and backup. If you have data that you're required to keep and don't need to access it very often, if at all, this new cloud storage option by Google could be just the thing for you. The archiving pricing, as seen in the chart above, is $.015 to $0.02 cheaper than the new pricing for the standard cloud storage offering by Google.

Google has also introduced a new feature called Object Versioning, which does exactly what it sounds like it does. It allows users of Google's cloud storage to keep a list of updates so that files can be reverted to earlier states or be resurrected after an accidental deletion. This is an experimental feature, which means that updates to it make not be backwards-compatible and that the feature may be removed in its entirety.

When it comes to my phone, one of the first things I think about when I pick it up is "I HAVE TO CHECK MY EMAIL!" After that, my thoughts become a frenzy of impulses that have me checking Facebook, Twitter, instant messages and other things. One thing I rarely, maybe even never think about is how much thought and testing has gone through making sure my phone will work each and every time I use it.

Samsung, who has absolutely dominated the smartphone market with its Galaxy S III and Galaxy Note 2, decided to publish a video showcasing just how much work goes into stress testing its devices. After watching the video, you may have a newfound respect for your mobile devices, that is, until you forget about what you just saw and text your ex-girlfriend in the middle of the night hoping she'll love you again.

The video highlights one of Samsung's hottest devices out right now, the Galaxy S III, as it goes through some stress tests that prod at the device's home button more than 200,000 times, flex testing, different forms of water-resistance testing and, the all important back pocket test which includes a robotic rump wearing jeans that sits on the Galaxy S III over and over again.

The Wii U has yet to be sold around the world, but Nintendo is already gloating about its sales numbers of units sold in North America since its launch on November 18th.

According to internal data at Nintendo, 400,000 units of the Wii U have been sold in the U.S. and, according to Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime, is "essentially sold out of retail."

Not only did Fils-Aime disclose how many Wii U units have been sold in the U.S., but he also said 300,000 Wii units, 275,000 Nintendo DS units and 250,000 3DS units were sold in the U.S. just within a week. Altogether, Nintendo has sold over 1.2 million units of all of its hardware combined.

Before Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, one of my favorite aspects of the Grand Theft Auto series was its radio stations, primarily all of the fake music stations, their jocks and their hilarious commercials. After Vice City, Rockstar Games decided to supply real music along with their witty humor, which added a layer of realism to the series' radio stations.

Up until now, it was only possible to listen to the radio stations by popping in whatever GTA game into the console it was made for, and pretty much play through the game. But now, you can listen to every radio station from every Grand Theft Auto game right on your phone.

The Grand Theft Auto Radio application is currently available on the Google Play Store and contains radio stations from Grand Theft Auto III all the way up to Grand Theft Auto 4, although some radio stations are currently missing from GTA 4. The app developer promises to have all of the GTA 4 radio stations available in a future update.

I've been using my Nexus 4 for a week now, and you should expect our review any day now - it truly is an amazing piece of technology. But, it lacks LTE - that's not an issue for most, and I don't mind that it doesn't include LTE. But, some do, obviously.

Well, there's now a video that has popped up onto the Internet showing off the Nexus 4 working with some form of LTE. LG are the ones behind the Nexus 4, and the Nexus 4 contains hardware close to the company's Optimus G smartphone which sports the same Qualcomm Snapdragon chip that sports a built-in LTE radio.

In order for this LTE radio to work, it must be combined with certain other specific hardware such as a signal amplifier and filter, which the Nexus 4 doesn't sport unfortunately. Google decided to leave this feature out of the Nexus 4 so that they could have complete control of the software with no carriers getting in the way, meaning that there's no access to the LTE networks without working with each carrier individually.

The whole debacle with MegaUpload founder, Kim Dotcom, has been pretty bad since day one - but now new evidence has popped up and has Dotcom seeking to have the case against him dismissed.

The new evidence suggests the FBI forced Dotcom to preserve 39 pirated movies from another case unrelated to us, with Dotcom's lawyers saying that the 39 movie files were uploaded after the FBI investigated a website called 'ninjavideo.com', this site used a cloud storage database from megaupload.com to store the movies in 2010. The FBI then made a seizure on megaupload.com.

The 39 files were identified during an investigation into the NinjaVideo site, which used MegaUpload's cloud storage for their pirated movies. The FBI later took down the MegaUpload site, based that seizure on the same files being stored, even though Dotcom says he was cooperating with the FBI as much as possible.

I'm salivating at the thought of being able to use Google's Project Glass, but it looks like Microsoft have just begun throwing rumors out there that they are too, working on their own augmented reality glasses.

The Redmond-based OS giant applied for a patent back in May of 2011 for the glasses, which means that development for the new technology should be well into its life by now. Microsoft's glasses are unique in the way that instead of using a tiny transparent display, Microsoft's glasses will actually use full eye glass.

Microsoft's product will most likely end up being made more for specific events, rather than everyday use. Their glasses will be capable of displaying text, images and video directly in front of you - ideal for sporting events or a concert. There's not much else known about their glasses, but I'm sure we should hopefully hear more at CES in Las Vegas in January 2013.

It's been a long-time coming for Verizon FiOS customers who have been waiting for the FiOS Mobile iPad application to receive its inevitable live-streaming television update, and this week, the company finally released that very update.

The FiOS Mobile iPad application was promised to have live streaming when it first debuted back in 2010, but it didn't and has gone two years without the ability to stream television programing to iPad owners. With this week's update, FiOS customers can now stream 75 channels of live television to their iPads.

As with the majority of live television streaming applications, there are a number of limitations to the FiOS Mobile app that requires its users to jump through the correct hoops and hurdles in order to get full use of it. First, if you'd like to use live stream television to the application, you need to be a FiOS customer with a valid username and password. You also need to be connected to your home network with a FiOS router and you'll need to be a subscriber to both FiOS' TV and Internet services.

Seriously, Apple - innovate instead of suing. You have one god damn smartphone on the market, the iPhone 5, in a single size - and yet they just continue bashing forward with lawsuits. Their market cap has experienced over $150 billion in drops in the past two months - and it has no signs of slowing.

Well, today Apple have launched yet another suit, adding the Galaxy Note II, Galaxy S III with Android 4.1 and four other products to their latest lawsuit against Samsung. Apple have already added some of those devices, such as the Galaxy S III, but between then and now, they've received software updates - which leads us to another round of requested inclusions, sigh.

The other four devices added are Samsung's Galaxy S III mini, Rugby Pro, Galaxy Tab 8.9 Wi-Fi and the Galaxy Tab 2 10.1. With these devices, we could see the lawsuits (plural) dragged out into 2014 - hearings are expected to take place early next year.

Here I am thinking we're getting closer to the end of the Mayan long-count calender, and the world won't end - but now Disney have taught one of their humanoid robotic subordinates how to play catch and juggle with human participants.

Yes, I'm not trolling - Disney have just unveiled this new effort, and designers have given the unit (not named the T100) a cup-shaped, human-like hand which helps with the catching and juggling. The robot uses an ASUS Xtion Pro Live camera which tracks faces and incoming balls - technology similar to Microsoft's Kinect.

The project started off with Kinect, but researchers switched to the ASUS Xtion Pro Live because they didn't need the Kinect's panning motor or microphone.

Samsung have had great success in the 5-inch smartphone market, with the incredibly popular Galaxy Note range of smartphones. There's now another player joining the 5-inch ranks, with Samsung's SHV-E270L sliding through the FCC.

It sports a codename of "Baffin", and doesn't seem like it'll break Korean borders when it's released. We should expect it to don the name "Galaxy Grand" when it's released, and listed in the Bluetooth database, it is an LTE-powered device.

We should expect it to rock a 1.4GHz quad-core processor, and its 5-inch display getting its resolution knocked down to 800x4800 WVGA. Korea's Money Today has reported that the Galaxy Grand will be the perfect device for older customers as it'll feature bigger icons and letters on its 5-inch low-res screen.

This is the one thing I love about every manufacturer apart from Apple - they're not scared to mess with the general look of the phone. In Samsung's latest high-end hardware headed for China, they've unveiled the new SCH-S2013.

The SCH-S2013 is a flip phone, but sports high-end internals such as a 1.4GHz quad-core CPU, 2GB of RAM and 16GB of built-in flash storage, also expandable through microSD cards. Better yet, there are two screens - both 3.7-inch Super AMOLED, at WVGA resolution - 800x480.

Software wise, it comes with Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich as well as Samsung's TouchWiz UI - both of which are probably tweaked to handle the old school form factor. There's also dual SIM slots, one for GSM, and the other for CDMA.

If you have any sort of modding ability, this might be the time to stand up and pit yourself against the competition across the world. Elitegroup Computer Systems (ECS) have just announced that they're teaming up with Thermaltake, G.Skill and a bunch of media partners to bring you the first ever worldwide Modmen PC modding competition.

The competition started on October 11, 2012, where ECS are on the hunt for the Modmen of the year. The best bit? The Grand Prize will become a Taiwan millionaire with the prize pool of NT$1,000,000 - roughly USD$33,333.

There are two stages of the competition, with the first beginning online. The top 10 case modders will be determined from a combination of online votes and ECS' own modding judges. Whoever gets donned with the most votes, wins $1,000. From there, the top 5 PC modders qualifying for the second stage of the competition will be flown to Taiwan, put up in accommodation, and will compete at Computex 2013 for a chance of the Grand Prize - the NT$1 million, or USD$33,333. This is on top of the cash and prizes in between.

The Nintendo Wii U launched in the U.S. nearly a week ago, but others around the world are still waiting for their official release dates for Nintendo's console to release in their neck of the woods. The Wii U is set to release in Europe on November 30th, and it seems like their official launch event is going to blow the U.S. launch event out of the water in terms of goodies attendees will walk away with.

If you're in Europe and plan on attending Nintendo's launch event at the HMV Oxford Street store, you might want to get there quick as there will be a number of freebies available for those who are one of the first to purchase the Nintendo Wii U.

When the doors open at 11 P.M., the first 100 Wii U purchasers will be given two free games with their purchase from a pre-determined selection of games, one of which being New Super Mario Bros U, which we know you were planning on getting anyway.

Users of the Nintendo DS are likely to know what an R4 cartridge is. For those who don't, it's a device that allows gamers to get around the security measures implemented on the DS so that they can run homebrew or illegally downloaded games. It basically allows users to play ROMs on their system, much like you can do on a computer.

In the UK, these have actually been illegal to import, advertise, or sell since July 2010. However, in Japan, the country where Nintendo hails from, it has been illegal to sell them for three years. Only this Spring, though, did an actual arrest take place because of someone breaking that law.

Of course, Nintendo is against these cartridges because they allow people to illegally download games, which cuts into their revenue. Japan has now made it illegal for the devices to even be imported into the country, though this seems a bit late. The 3DS is taking over and the DS is falling by the wayside. Currently, no device exists that does the same thing for the 3DS.