May 30
Windows 8.1 is getting real improvements over Windows 8, some of which will please longtime users who found the shift from Windows 7 jarring or uncomfortable. And yet it also goes even farther in the new direction Microsoft is taking.
May 30
Ardumower: The Lazy Man’s Lawnmower
Posted in: Today's ChiliSome students at the LeCroy Career Technical Center have created an automated lawn mower for a national robotics competition. I say they just didn’t want to mow the lawn anymore. But no matter the reason, they have made a pretty cool lawnmower. Having it do all of the work is a nice bonus though.
This Ardumower was made from a motorized wheelchair, a push mower, an Arduino mini-computer, sensors and other parts. First they disassembled the wheelchair, then created the metal frame and then fitted the programmable hardware that allowed them to autonomously or remotely operate it.
They used Google Maps as the coordinate locater, so that they could program the Arduino to cut grass all by itself. They have to work on obstacle avoidance next.
Or if they had about $3000 lying around, they could just go for one of these.
[via DamnGeeky]
May 30
NVIDIA announces GeForce GTX 770 for under $400, says it’s faster than last year’s GTX 680
Posted in: Today's Chili
It probably won’t come as a huge surprise, given the GTX 780‘s appearance last week, but today’s launch of the GTX 770 nevertheless brings us a very interesting product. The card is claimed to be about five percent faster than last year’s much more expensive flagship, the GTX 680, thanks to faster memory (7Gb/s instead of 6Gb/s), a slightly higher base clock speed (1,046 vs. 1,006MHz) and an equivalent number of CUDA cores (1,536). Seeing as how the the GTX 680 still holds its own with current games, this performance parity strikes us as something of a deal — assuming independent benchmarks back it up. We’re awaiting a confirmed US price, but we’ll eat our SATA cables if it’s anything other than $399 for a 2GB model (the press release just says “under $400”). UK and European prices match those of the GTX 670 (£329 inc. VAT, 329 euros exc. VAT), and availability begins today. Check out NVIDIA’s slide deck for more details, including power consumption and noise, SLI scaling (which looks healthy) and some in-house frame rate comparisons against other products.
Update: $399 is confirmed. The cables are safe.
Gallery: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 770 slide deck
May 30
Windows 8.1 unveiled: new apps, new features and the return of the Start button
Posted in: Today's Chili
More Info
How big of an upgrade is Windows 8.1? Put it this way: we just might need to review the OS all over again. Microsoft just unveiled the first major update to Windows 8, and it includes tweaks to nearly every aspect of the operating system: the lock screen, Start menu, Windows Store and onscreen keyboard. As we saw in some leaked screenshots, Microsoft also updated its native apps and added some new ones, including a stopwatch and fresh calculator. In some cases, the update even changes the way you interact with the OS. Yes, that means the Start button is back (sort of). You can now snap more than two windows into place, depending on your screen resolution, and also adjust the width of those columns so that it’s not necessarily an 80 / 20 split. Additionally, Microsoft revamped the way built-in search works so that it’s now more of a universal search engine, serving up apps, files, settings options and web suggestions.
As you might have guessed, some of these revisions are a response to feedback Microsoft has received in the past seven months. In other cases, like with the new settings menu, they were part of Microsoft’s plan all along — the engineering team just didn’t get to them before it was time to ship the first version of Win 8. As we reported earlier, Windows 8.1 will be available as a free update (in preview) starting June 26th, the day Microsoft’s Build developer conference kicks off. We’d still encourage you to follow our Build coverage, however, as Microsoft will be making additional announcements then, particularly with regard to its first-party apps. Also, Microsoft is only sharing a handful of screenshots today, so we’ll have to wait until June 26th to give you the full visual tour. For now, though, join us after the break as we walk you through all the major (and not-so-major) changes.
Gallery: Windows 8.1 screenshots
May 30
It’s not hard to navigate to a Facebook Event if there’s an address: it’s much harder if the organizer simply assumes that we’ll know where to go. Thankfully, we can now lean on some collective help through Waze 3.7 for Android and iOS. The update not only populates the destination list with Facebook Events, but fills in the blanks for everyone involved — enter an address and it will be sent to others on the guest list. It’s also easier to be fashionably late with the new app, as Waze members can see when others are likely to show up. Anyone who’s ever had to navigate to “that place near the guy with the thing” will likely want to grab the 3.7 upgrade at one of the source links.
Filed under: Cellphones, GPS, Mobile, Facebook
Source: App Store, Google Play
May 30
You drifted off to sleep easily enough. But all of a sudden, it’s 4 a.m. and you’re wide awake. What gives?
To an extent, this phenomenon — called middle insomnia, or difficulty maintaining sleep — is normal. After all, sleep goes in cycles throughout the night, moving from deeper, slow wave sleep to lighter sleep, explains James Findley, Ph.D., CBSM, clinical director of the Behavioral Sleep Medicine Program at the University of Pennsylvania. But as the night goes on, “we’re moving toward lighter stages of sleep, so we’re more likely to have an awakening,” he tells HuffPost. For that reason, many people are more likely to experience fragmented sleep in the morning.
Age can also be a factor; Findley notes that people tend to wake up more often during the night as they get older.
May 30
By Kellie Davis
The sun is heating up, and there’s no better way to squeeze into those summer shorts than to squeeze those cheeks in a butt-building sesh.
Read More…
More on Health Fitness
May 30
Pastry Gun Suspension Leads To NRA Membership: Josh Welch Becomes Lifetime Member
Posted in: Today's ChiliThe 8-year-old Anne Arundel County boy who was suspended for biting a pastry in to the shape of a gun received standing ovation and a lifetime membership to the National Rifle Association Wednesday night.
At a fundraiser for Anne Arundel County Republicans, House Minority Leader Nicholaus R. Kipke presented Josh Welch with the membership, which cost $550, during a tongue-in-cheek presentation that involved a Pop-Tart fashioned into pistol and gun safety tips.
Josh’s March 1 suspension from Park Elementary School for chewing a pastry into the shape of a firearm captured national attention over how seriously students should be punished for such threats.
May 30
May 30
Who's in charge here?
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.