This isn’t an April Fool’s joke. The Xperia Play, better known unofficially as the PlayStation Phone, is now available for sale in Europe, and launching right alongisde it are five PlayStation One titles:
* Syphon Filter
* Destruction Derby
* MediEvil
* Jumping Fish
* Cool Boarders 2
The games cost about $6.38 each. Crash Bandicoot, incidentally, comes pre-loaded on the Play for free.
Via Tech Tree
This article was written on February 12, 2007 by CyberNet.
According to John Markoff of The New York Times, today Intel will be demonstrating an experimental computer chip with 80 separate cores. This is going on at the Solid States Circuits Conferences in San Francisco today, and it’s stirring quite the buzz. Before you get all excited, this is just a prototype, and currently it’s not compatible with the most recent Intel processors. It can’t interact to external memory yet, but the plans are in the works to develop a commercial version.
The commercial version as expected, would be used in your desktops, laptops, servers, etc. Unfortunately, it will be at least five years before consumers will be able to get their hands on one. With 80 separate cores, what would you do with all that processing power? The possibilities would be endless, developers would have a lot of room to groove, and computer games would become more and more realistic.
It’s amazing to think that the Dual Core processors are just starting to get around, and yet the Teraflop chip is already in the works. And according to Gizmodo, at 1 trillion calculations per second, the 80-core chip would be able to do the same amount of calculations as 2,000 square feet of machinery could do 10 years ago.
One question that needs to be asked is whether or not increasing the cores will increase the performance. Markoff says, “In a white paper published last December, the scientists said that without a software breakthrough to take advantage of hundreds of cores, the industry, which is now pursuing a more incremental approach of increasing the number of cores on a computer chip, is likely to hit a wall of diminishing returns — where adding more cores does not offer a significant increase in performance.”
This chip would be air-cooled, and definitely raises the bar for the industry. While an 80 core processor may seem like a lot, with the way ‘some’ of the current operating systems are going, it wouldn’t be. The processors tend to evolve right along side the operating systems, and as more processing power becomes available, bloated operating systems take full advantage of the resources.
Source: The New York Times
Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com
Related Posts:
A Windows Phone 7 handset is running an automated program to find bugs in Microsoft's test lab. Photo: Mike Kane/Wired.com
Microsoft’s first series of Windows Phone software “updates” have been a mess, to say the least.
Some Windows Phone 7 customers can upgrade the software now. Some can get it later. And weeks ago, a few unlucky owners of a Windows Phone 7-powered Samsung phone bricked their handsets when they downloaded an update.
What the hell’s going on?
It turns out that delivering one substantial software update on multiple phones made by different manufacturers, on different carriers, isn’t a simple task at all, and Microsoft is still figuring out a solid process.
Microsoft’s not alone. The smartphone industry is controlled by a tangled web of interests, with hardware manufacturers and carriers holding sway. While mobile operating system vendors like Google and Apple have managed to wrest some control from the carriers, their moves aren’t easily repeatable.
Despite decades of experience delivering software updates for the PC platform, Microsoft is still learning the ropes in the mobile world.
With the Windows-powered Samsung Focus, some phones got an error when trying to install a minor update that updated the update mechanism, according to a Microsoft representative. Yes, it was an update that changed the way that phones are updated.
A technical glitch caused some phones to be interrupted in the middle of updating the update process. As a result, some Samsung Focus phones were bricked.
After that initial snafu with the Focus, Microsoft decided to proceed more cautiously and “deliberately” with a major update called “NoDo,” which brings copy and paste to Windows phones.
Some Windows Phone 7 handsets get to download the update now, while others have to wait. That’s partly because whenever a company such as Microsoft, Apple or Google wants to put out a software update, it has to allow the phone carrier to test the software on the network first for quality.
Only after the testing is complete can Microsoft begin deploying the software updates to Windows Phone 7 customers, a spokesman told Wired. Microsoft posted a chart showing which updates are available for each Windows phone model.
Notably, the chart lacks specific delivery dates.
“This table is what Microsoft and its partners are comfortable with committing to right now,” the representative said.
So, long story short, there were some technical difficulties with the first minor update, and now Microsoft is being careful to ensure the major update deploys properly, so the scheduling for now is inconsistent between devices.
However, Microsoft said that after the smoke clears, Windows Phone customers can expect to receive updates more smoothly and evenly.
It seems like a mess, but it’s understandable considering this is a brand-new phone platform that’s barely even been on the market for a few months. Keep in mind that Apple has also had issues tied to carriers and software. When the iPhone 3GS launched, some people who bought the device couldn’t activate their phones all weekend, and Apple’s e-mail to customers suggested it was an issue related to AT&T.
With smartphones, many spinning plates are involved in pushing software updates — carriers, manufacturers and the software maker. When one plate shatters, everybody likes to point fingers at the software maker — in this case, Microsoft.
It’s worth noting, however, that despite these early stumbles, Microsoft’s software update strategy appears to be less chaotic than Android’s.
Android carriers and device manufacturers get to decide when they want to push out updates. As a result, many Android phones are running different versions of Android; some have cool features that the others don’t.
That’s the problem with Google’s “open” strategy: It relinquishes control to the carriers and manufacturers, who aren’t always up to speed with Android. And indeed, it’s why Google has started reining in its manufacturing partners and exerting more control over the OS.
With Windows Phone 7, Microsoft is still the party that gets to decide when each handset gets a software update, and ideally in the future they’ll all get it at the same time after initial network testing. We’ll just have to wait and see whether the update process gets better in the next year.
See Also:
Apple’s new wireless streaming feature, AirPlay, is just starting to gain some traction. And while only a handful of AirPlay-compatible devices are currently available, several more are on the way. Here’s a look at current and upcoming AirPlay gear.
In non-Soviet Russia… presidents tend to receive some pretty swanky high-tech gifts. Dmitry Medvedev, leader of the good people of Russia and one of the few men to successfully rock denims with a suit jacket, has been bestowed with a fresh new iPad 2 and his facial expression seems to suggest he was immediately irradiated with blasts of magic, fairy dust, and the smiles of innocent children from across the world. We just hope he hasn’t seen the crummy camera yet, he is something of a tablet photography connoisseur.
Darren: “Why, lookie there! I can see Alaska from my iPad 2!”
Joe: “I can’t believe I’m playing chess with Gary Kasparov!”
Jose: “I wonder if Barack also likes to play Risk on his iPad.”
Josh F.: “See? The cat is talking but he’s saying ‘has’ instead of ‘have!'”
Don: “Kickin’ in the front seat, sittin’ in the back seat, gotta make my mind up, which seat can I take?”
Tim: “Look, it already has Words with Comrades installed!”
Vlad: “And this has push notifications for when Mr. Putin has instructions for me, yes?”
Richard Lawler: “10,000 apps and it’s still cheaper than buying the New Jersey Nets.”
Myriam: “And so if I tap here, it opens the door to the shark tank… and over here are the laser controls. Cool, eh?”
Richard Lai: “Hullo Anna!”
Caption Contest: Russian prez is impressed by iPad 2 originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 01 Apr 2011 17:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
This is freaking me out today. You see, I hardly look at my calendar date on the iPhone. But today I did. I looked at that pixel-perfect, beautiful Retina screen and this problem got instantly into my eye, like a white hot scalpel pinching through my retina until it reached the back of my skull. More »
Gadgets come in all shapes and sizes, but it’s safe to say this is a big’un. Sure, it isn’t exactly portable in the traditional sense, and no 24 month contract is going to make it fit into our budget, but that doesn’t mean it can’t have a place in your life. It’s the Roadster Sport, the latest addition to the Tesla family and released to the world last summer. Version 2.5 is the fastest yet on the road, leaping from zero to 60 in 3.7 seconds yet still getting a rated 245 miles of range.
Of course, we all know that rated range doesn’t necessarily equate to real-world range, and real-world car performance doesn’t always live up to what you read in the magazines, either. Indeed in our testing we weren’t able to make it the full 245 miles that Tesla says you can in a roadster, nor did we come close to approaching this thing’s 125mph top speed. But, after spending plenty of hours wedged inside the cockpit of this $128,500 sporty EV we did walk away mighty impressed, not only with how it drove but in how it sounded. Read on, and you might just be too.
Gallery: Tesla Roadster 2.5 Sport
Continue reading Tesla Roadster 2.5 Sport review
Tesla Roadster 2.5 Sport review originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 01 Apr 2011 16:30:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Permalink | | Email this | Comments
The era of the PlayStation Phone begins as Sony Ericsson releases the handset to nearly one dozen markets. The United States, however, will have to wait.
Originally posted at Android Atlas
Continue reading GameStop snaps up Spawn Labs, Impulse game distribution platform
GameStop snaps up Spawn Labs, Impulse game distribution platform originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 01 Apr 2011 16:16:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Permalink 
Joystiq | | Email this | Comments
Tired of having to remember how many cubicles in from the edge of the cluster yours is? Give your space some flair with this great weekend project from This Old House. More »
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
