Connectivity, Communications & Cloud News - Page 29

Google on their quest for world domination are releasing Google Drive next week, according to The Next Web. The service is expected to launch next week, include 5GB of storage, and should be available at https://drive.google.com.

Google will roll out Drive for free, and everyone starts with 5GB of storage. You can purchase more if you want, that is up to you. Google Drive is said to work "in desktop folders" on both Windows- and Mac-based machines, but there's still a few question unanswered with how it all works.

Then we have some information from TechCrunch, where they've got a teaser pic of the Google Drive app for OS X. The version they were given is 1.0.2891 and they've said it works without any problems. John from TC was able to log in to his Gmail account, but other than that there's not much he could do, he was prompted with "Google Drive is not yet enabled for your account".

It seems like just yesterday that I was updating my router from b to g spec to increase speeds. Then n came along and made me upgrade again. It hasn't even been around that long, yet Qualcomm and Broadcom would like to replace it with a new spec dubbed 802.11ac. The new spec will only operate on the 5GHz band to avoid interference.

The new standard is expected to debut late this year or early 2013. Because of the lack of 2.4GHz, the range is shortened, so the spec is including something called beam-forming technology. This allows the device to figure out where the other devices are located and broadcast that direction only.

Additionally, the 5GHz band has more channels available for use. The channels are now 80MHz wide rather than the 40MHz. Furthermore, each spatial stream has a theoretical bandwidth of 433 mbps per spatial stream versus only 150 mbps on -n. The number of spatial streams is being increased from 3 to 8 which will further increase bandwidth.

There's a new website that is offering 10GB of free cloud storage. Trouble is, the website is only in Russian, at least right now. The service launched today as a beta and is the latest in a growing number of cloud storage services providers. It is a system similar to DropBox where files can be stored locally and remotely.

The file then updates among the versions when you save it on your desktop, for instance. The files are accessible from the web, a native Windows or Mac client, or through the Yandex.Mail app on iOS and Android devices. "Yandex.Disk is a cloud service, a virtual folder that can be safely used for file storage," Anton Zabannykh, Yandex's head of Personalized Services, said in a statement. "If your personal computer or laptop catches a virus or breaks down, your files will be safely stored on Yandex.Disk. Currently, Yandex.Disk is integrated with Yandex.Mail, and we have plans to link it with other services offered by Yandex."

The service is currently available by invitation only, so users have to e-mail the site to grab an account. They say that the English version is coming soon, but there is no set date. We will have to wait and see if there is anything that distinguishes these guys from the other service providers that are already established. If you speak Russian, you can head on over to their site and sign up. It is available here.

The incredibly popular file synchronization and cloud storage service Dropbox has increased the amount of free space you get for referrals from 250MB to 500MB with the total amount of free space available to free users topping out at 16GB. 16GB of free space is pretty much enough for anyone's uses, unless they are uploading their entire hard drive.

The person who accepts the referral will also see the increase and will receive 500MB as well. Pro users see a similar bump in data space acquired by referrals. They will now get 1GB of free space with the max amount of free space topping out at 32GB. Dropbox has decided to do this after seeing that the majority of their growth was through word of mouth.

They have also retroactively applied this change, so people will get fully credited for previous referrals:

Some more details regarding the rumored soon to be launching Google Drive platform. As with all rumors, until it is officially announced, take all of this with a grain of sand. I do, however, feel that this is a pretty solid rumor. A screenshot, pictured below, has been leaked and it details a few interesting things.

First, the screenshot indicates that the service should be launching with 5GB of free storage. This rivals the 2GB provided by other services such as Dropbox because they often give more storage for referrals and other social activities. Google's tagline is: "All your files - everywhere." Google says "Put files in Google Drive and you can access them on your desktop, mobile phone or tablet, and drive.google.com."

It is said that the Android App will allow you to edit your documents right in the App. Google warns that this may increase your data usage:

A series of tests were conducted by storage vendor Nasuni. What they found is quite shocking. The results of the tests indicate that both rival cloud services, MS Azure and Rackspace, are slow to accept data. Whether this is a limitation of the network or a limitation of the hardware, we can not be sure.

Nasuni conducted five series of tests. The results are, again, quite shocking. Since all of these systems are cloud storage, you would expect similar performance, but you would be wrong. For example, moving 12TB from Amazon to Azure takes 40 hours, whereas moving the same data back took only four. 12TB from Rackspace to Amazon took five hours, yet Amazon to Rackspace took almost an entire week! Amazon "bucket" to Amazon "bucket" took only four hours.

Once again, it's not clear if this is just a limitation of the network, or if there is a massive difference in technology that is leading to these poor write speeds. Nasuni said the cloud providers were not "forthcoming about why their performance would vary so greatly." However, "Nasuni did not experience the same behavior with Amazon S3, and this measurement probably further indicates limitations in Azure's architecture or bandwidth, as other customers using the system appear to be affecting our results to a large degree."

It seems like everything is connected to the internet these days, but have you ever stopped and asked yourself what the implications of this is on your daily life? Sure, it provides convenience, but at what cost? All of these internet connected devices are able to collect information on where you are and what you're doing at the moment and use that information to generate a pretty solid schedule of your daily life.

But none of this should be of worry to you, right? But what if you become a person of interest of any of the many spy agencies? Imagine if your a person of interest and you decide to adjust your internet connected lights at home. As soon as you fire up your app, it could be sending data that contains your location and a timestamp which could easily allow a spy to follow you.

CIA Chief Petraeus said:

Cloud-based storage company, Box, has just updated their Android app and have baked in a bunch of new features. In order to celebrate this new start, Box are giving away 50GB of free storage to any Android-based user who logs into their service in the next 30 days.

Box's new Android update introduces an overhauled user interface, new features, and includes compatibility for Google's latest OS, Ice Cream Sandwich. Box worked with Google to help redesign the UI with ICS in mind, and even users of previous Android-based OS's will benefit from. New features include the ability to comment on files, add teammates to individual folders, and batch uploads for uploading multiple files at once.

Box are also adding new support for languages, with French, Italian, German, and Spanish being added to the Android app. On top of the free 50GB of storage, Box are also giving away 20 Samsung Android-based tablets to a single company who can compellingly explain how it plans to use Box to improve its daily routines. Two runners-up in the contests will win a Samsung Galaxy Tab.

CES 2012: AMD, you funny. Thunderbolt has been here for nearly twelve months now, and at CES, AMD unveiled a concept they call Lightning Bolt. For one, I love how they've kept the name virtually identical to Thunderbolt, and secondly, how long until Intel or Apple release something called Spaedon or Maedon or something to that affect, you know what I mean.

What is AMD's Lightning Bolt capable of? It can deliver USB 3.0, DisplayPort and Power over a single cable with miniDisplayPort connectors. It's designed to be simple, and affordable. For notebooks, there is a mux, which can combine power, DisplayPort and USB 3.0 into a single DisplayPort-like cable. The other end of the cable would connect to a Lightning Bolt breakout box that would provide the three connectors: USB 3.0, DisplayPort and Power ports.

The cable is a standard mini-DP cable, with changes to two of the pins. AMD's goal is to aim for affordable, single-cable docking stations for notebooks. AMD says that the cost of the mux and associated components on the notebook side would be just, one dollar. Eventually, the mux will be built into the notebook, and you'd just see a mini-DP interface with a little symbol that would indicate Lightning Bolt.

Telstra have just unveiled the details of a new "white label" 3G mobile service that they plan to sell to telco customers in a bid to boost its dropping wholesale revenues. While they'll offer access to their 3G network, Telstra keep the keys to their full Next G package, where it won't let rivals access it.

Telstra's 3G wholesale product will cover 97-perent of the population and sport typical download speeds of between 550Kbps to 3Mbps. The new wholesale plan will rollout in two phases, the first will roll out to offer post-paid-only services, while the second one which is planned for late-2012 will provide resellers with a fully fledged white label mobile service. This will le them offer pre-paid, post-paid, and wireless broadband services.

By not offering full speeds on the white label service, they stop cannibalisation of their superior Next G products, this protects their premium product lineup. Telstra have said: