Latest News - Page 3065

Earlier on today we visited the VIA Technologies headquarters here in Taipei where we got our first up, close and personal look at 3D printing.

VIA had a demo of its 3D printing station earlier this month at Computex, but we didn't have enough time at this stage to stick around and see a full print. We were invited back to the VIA offices today where we got our first look at 3D printing. Although not a new technology, guys were first messing around with 3D printing back in the 1980's, it's our first time to see it in person, and for me personally, I'm impressed.

VIA hooked up one of their VE-900 Mini-ITX motherboards to a MakerBot Thing-O-Matic 3D printer along with a customised VIA user interface all displayed on a touch-screen panel. We are told the VIA user interface here is much more advanced than the standard 3D printing interfaces and it provides advanced ability such as providing Dropbox connectivity and more. It's a nice interface to use too with clear menus and information provided on screen such as the device temperatures and so forth.

Ever wished there were a reality show that wasn't based on this planet? Well, just wait another decade and your wish might just come true. A Dutch company is determined to establish a permanent colony on Mars, and is looking to spend $6 billion doing so.

The plans for a reality show is grandiose, with the project dubbed 'Mars One', and will drop four astronauts on Mars in April 2023, with none of them ever returning to Earth. In order to pony up $6 billion for this venture, the project is set to stage a media spectacle like the world has never, ever seen previously. An interplanetary reality show, along the lines of Big Brother.

Theoretical physicist and Nobel laureate Gerard 't Hooft, an ambassador for Mars One, has said in an introductory video posted on the company's website:

Music discovery and streaming service, Spotify, has a source close to them claiming that they are the second largest revenue generator for major music labels. Last month saw 23 million people use the service, and the only one to topple Spotify right now is Apple's iTunes, according to the Business Insider.

Business Insider estimates that iTunes paid around $3.2 billion to record labels last year, so with Spotify in second place we can only imagine the figure they're shelling out to record labels is much lower than the behemoth that is Apple, but being second place is nothing to scoff at, either. Considering that the service only launched in the US last year.

Sean Parker, founder of Napster and early investor in Spotify says that if the service continues to grow at the current rate, they should overtake iTunes with regards to contributions to artists in under two years. Spotify is currently in the process of raising $220 million based on a $4 billion valuation, which includes $100 million from Goldman Sachs.

The Canadian studio that were behind games such as The Darkness II and the multiplayer side of BioShock 2, Digital Extremes, has unveiled and released the first look at their upcoming free-to-play co-op first-person shooter, Warframe.

Warframe is said to provide fast-paced PvE (player versus environment) co-op action, where it lets you bash through the game with up to three friends. There's also an endless tree of improvements to build upon your abilities and character in Warframe, an ancient exo-skeletal technology, as well as other weapons while raiding new areas of space seeking exotic Warframe augmentations and other gear.

Warframe continuously randomizes raids, so it should offer some pretty killer replay value and grinding. Digital Extremes CEO James Schmalz, has said:

Over the last few months Apple have been getting hit with negative press over their OS' security, with hackers and the such gaining access to user files in less than thirty seconds, which is a concern as Apple used to always push that their operating system never got PC viruses.

But, Apple continued to run with the "I'm a Mac and I'm a PC" campaign, where they focused on the "fact" that Windows-based systems got viruses, while OS X-based systems couldn't. But now that we know that is complete BS, Apple have done what they do best, marketing and using its legal system to remove any proof so that potential liability for the company is wiped away.

As you can see in the picture above, Apple used to state that a "Mac isn't susceptible to the thousands of viruses plaguing Windows-based computers. That's thanks to built-in defences in Mac OS X that keep you safe, without any work on your part". So Apple more or less said that you just run the OS and you're protected, but for years we've known this isn't true.

After showing these bad boys off at CES in January, Samsung have finally confirmed that their Series 9 monitors will hit the US come June 29th. This will follow a brief "prelaunch" period with Newegg.

The Samsung S27B970D is a 27-inch IPS-based screen with a resolution of 2560x1440, HDMI, DVI and USB ports, an all glass and metal enclosure, a height-adjustable stand, and a contrast ratio of 1000:1. What makes these monitors stand out is that each screen is calibrated and undergoes an expert, hour-long adjustment process before it is sent to you, ensuring you get the highest-quality images directly out of the box.

The screens will retail for $1,199 and would look great in a three-screen setup for gamers, or as a single- or multi-monitor setup for video, audio or general work. I think I prefer the gaming option.

SMART Storage Systems has announced their newest entry into their Enterprise SSD family, the Optimus Ultra+. The 'Ultra' part of the name comes from two central facets of performance, speed and endurance. This SAS 6/Gb/s SSD sports some impressive numbers, with 100,000 random read IOPS and 60,000 random write IOPS. The SSD also supports dual-port SAS, which allows the throughput to climb to an unheard of 1GB/s.

The real story here is the endurance however. The Optimus Ultra+ is rated for 50 Drive Writes Per Day (DWPD) for five years. This means that the capacity of the drive can be written and deleted 50 times every day for five years.

The Optimus family of SSDs all centers around one philosophy; providing SLC-like endurance with MLC pricing. The attraction of MLC over SLC is simple; SLC commands ridiculously high prices while MLC is becoming garden-variety. Even in the consumer market we are now seeing MLC drop below the dollar per GB threshold. This low price level will always be welcome in any market, but creating Enterprise-class MLC is not an easy task.

The third outing in the Far Cry universe, Far Cry 3, was due out on September 4, but Ubisoft have just announced that the release date for Far Cry 3 has been pushed back by three months, until December 4.

The official release date for Far Cry 3 on PC, Xbox 360, and the PlayStation 3 is now early-December. Ubisoft does state that the game will reach Europe, the Middle East and Africa a few days earlier on November 29.

There's been no explanation for the delay, as the last time we saw the game was in a five-minute video which highlighted some of the multiplayer side of things. It was very Call of Duty, featuring experience points, levels, kill cams, and carpet-bombing air support. More news on Far Cry 3 as it comes.

Yammer is just four years old, but they've just been scooped up by Microsoft for a tidy $1.2 billion. Yammer has been dubbed "Facebook for the workplace" and is the latest in many steps for Microsoft's bid to shield their Office products from Google's constant challenges.

Yammer claims to have more than 5 million corporate users with companies such as Ford, Shell, Deloitte and eBay. Just twelve months ago Microsoft whipped out their acquisition credit card on Skype and paid $8.5 billion for the video-calling firm, so Microsoft are not shy, nor poor.

Yammer was started back in 2008 by PalPal founder David Sacks, where they raised around $142 million in funding since they began, it was backed by PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel, who also invested in Facebook. Sacks said:

9to5Mac have done some digging through the previously-obtained hardware code dump for Apple's next-gen iPhone prototypes and have discovered a very juicy detail in the code that references hardware components supporting near field communication (NFC) capabilities:

Apple haven't talked about NFC much, even at their Worldwide Developers Conference earlier in the month, but they did announce Passbook, a new digital wallet app that suggests the company is moving toward NFC services. Passbook is a time- and location-aware app that stores digital tickets, coupons, loyalty cards, and more:

Google have donned their magic fingers and made some changes to some of the most-requested features for their Gmail for iOS app. They've announced the changes today, which come in three new features.

First up we have full Notification Center support, the ability to send messages from your alternate e-mail addresses, and an improved login experience. Now Gmail is fully integrated with Notification Center and even supports banners, alerts and lock screen options. Plus, notifications are now 'incredibly fast', up to 5x faster than the previous version of the app.

The second update to the Gmail for iOS app is the ability to send e-mails from your alternate e-mail addresses. If you have this configured through alternate sender addresses in Gmail on your desktop under Settings -> Accounts -> Send mail as, you will see a From: option when composing new messages with the new app.

Advancements in 3D are made every day. No longer do users have to suffer through those red and cyan glasses to watch 3D movies. Some implementations nowadays, like the Nintendo 3DS, don't require any fancy headgear at all. It seems as though the future of 3D isn't that far off and the Star Trek holodeck technology may no longer remain a fantasy.

Sharp Labs Europe are leading the development of a new communication technology that will help to make 3D images indistinguishable from reality by using holographic technology. Some brush off 3D as just a gimmick, but others see it as just the first step. "The ultimate goal is to make a holographic display and what I mean by that is a display that shows images that are indistinguishable from reality," Mather says.

The first step, however, is to make it as commonplace as driving. "I think a sensible target is for 3D displays to become a natural part of modern life," Mather explains to Humans Invent. "Home cinema systems showing 3D movies, computer games played in an immersive environment and holiday photos presented with depth."

Have you ever noticed that the views on a newly viral YouTube video seemingly pause at 301? If so, I imagine you've wondered why that is. Well, previously it had just been one of those many internet myths that seemingly don't have an answer. However, thanks to YouTube product manager Ted Hamilton, we now have an answer.

The basic reason behind the views freezing at 301 is the following: Once a video hits 300 views, subsequent views are collected and sent to YouTube's central servers for verification. This verification process takes about one-half day to a day and checks that the views weren't racked up by a bot. Mr. Hamilton explains:

A new study by McAfee is showing what teenagers are really doing online and the results are a bit scary. An incredible 70 percent of teenagers in the study say they hid at least part of their online activity and behavior from their parents. What they are hiding could be even more shocking, especially if you are a parent.

43 percent of the surveyed teens accessed some form of simulated violence while surfing the web, and likely more worrying for parents is the fact that 32 percent view nude content or pornography on the internet. Even worse yet is that half of the parents believe that their children are telling them everything they are doing online.

"While it is not necessarily surprising that teens are engaging in the same types of rebellious behaviors online that they exhibit offline, it is surprising how disconnected their parents are," Stanley Holditch, Online Safety Expert for McAfee, said today in a statement. "There is a major increase in the number of teens finding ways to hide what they do online from their parents, as compared to the 2010 study."

AMD has announced a new line of APUs for use in embedded applications. The new APUs are the first to combine a low-power CPU and a discrete-level GPU into a single integrated circuit for use in embedded applications. The high performance graphics capabilities allow the APU to power a wide array of devices such as slot machines and airline schedule screens.

AMD bills the part as being perfect for Digital Signage, x86 Set-Top-Box (xSTB), IP-TV, Thin Client, Information Kiosk, Point-of-Sale, and Casino Gaming, media servers and industrial control systems. The APU comes in a BGA package featuring a new, power-optimized CPU processing core to provide more bang for the user's buck.

The features are as follows:

Windows 8 RTM is right around the corner if several sources are to be believed. Sources seem to agree that the announcement for Windows 8 RTM will come sometime in July, but they disagree about whether it will be in the build number 8500 or 8600 variety. This time frame lines up nicely for an October relase.

One source is reporting that the final build number for RTM will be 8500.0.120623-1707. However, a different source who agrees on the July time frame believes that the build number will be in the 8600 range. The announcement is supposedly coming at MGX, the event that runs from July 17 to the 20.

Windows 8 is one of Microsoft's biggest gambles yet. Some reviewers have been very upset over the lack of the start button and some of the other changes, but only time will tell if it will be successful. The ecosystem appears to be coming together with the new Surface tablets and upcoming Ultrabooks in time for the holidays.

Currently rocking an iPhone and want to switch over to that awesome new Samsung GALAXY S III but don't want to go through the hassle of manually re-entering all of your contacts, etc? Well, fear not, Samsung have released what they call 'Easy Phone Sync'.

Easy Phone Sync is an app that has been developed to make the transition between an iPhone and the GALAXY S III much easier. The app can run on both a Mac or a PC, and gives options to transfer music, videos, podcasts, pictures, contacts and even text messages. The process takes around five minutes to set up, and users can continue to rely on iTunes to manage their content after the transfer.

DRM-restricted content purchased from iTunes can't be transferred, the same goes for iOS apps.

Founder of Megaupload, Kim Dotcom, has just announced through his new Twitter account "Megabox". Megabox is destined to become a new music discovery and sharing service, and is being worked on all while he's still under arrest.

Dotcom has said that Megabox would compete with platforms such as Spotify, and would let artists keep almost 90-percent of the profits made from their music. It's a pretty big change, going from Megaupload, being put under house arrest, and announcing a Spotify-like music service.

Just before the Megabox tweet, Dotcom uploaded a photo of himself and Apple founder Steve Wozniak, who visited Dotcom in New Zealand. Wozniak is a supporter of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), who are suing the Federal Bureau of Investigation over the files on Megaupload's servers, where the EFF argues that the site's users have a right to access.

The US House of Representatives' Intelligence Committee is looking into the relationship between the Chinese government and Huawei, as well as ZTE, both Chinese telecom manufacturers. Mike Rogers, Committee chairman has said that he believes its necessary to look into whether or not the two manufacturers are receiving unfair subsidies from the Chinese government, and whether hardware from the two companies could represent a national security threat.

Later this summer the committee is expected to release a report where there'll be two versions: a classified version and an unclassified version. The report is expected to address both trade practices and security concerns in regards to Huawei and ZTE.

The report might sway US companies from buying the Huawei or ZTE goods, considering the national security aspect of things. The Intelligence Committee has been running an investigation looking into the two manufacturers and their Chinese government ties. Critics allege that the two companies receive cheap loans, land and other subsidies from the Chinese government which allow the companies to make wares cheap, and dump them on foreign markets at prices below their competitors can afford.

We know that the US government, and many others, use drones for 'security' purposes, but mostly for spying and intel gathering activities. But, even at the size they are now, they can't really be seen all that well to the unsuspecting eye.

What if they could get small enough to fly right next to you without you even noticing? Surely, I jest. But, it's no lie, or trick. Vanessa Alarcon was a college student when she attended a 2007 anti-war protest in Washington, D.C. and heard someone shout "Oh my God, look at those". Alarcon told The Washington Post: