Jul 25
How to Make YouTube Look Like Unix
Posted in: Today's Chili
YouTube has decided to celebrate its upcoming Geek Week event by giving its site an, um, underhaul—and making it look like Unix.
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Jul 24
This week NVIDIA is once again blurring the lines between desktop and mobile graphics with a note on the introduction of Kepler technology into their next-generation mobile processor. NVIDIA suggests that, “from a graphics perspective, this is as big a milestone for mobile as the first GPU, GeForce 256, was for the PC when it was introduced 14 years ago.” This is the first set of details we’re getting on Project Logan, the next processor architecture in the Tegra chipset family.
You’ll remember the comic book character collection of code-names for the processors that’ve become the Tegra 3 and Tegra 4 – and what we must assume will be the Tegra 5 as well. Here with what’s still called Project Logan, NVIDIA makes clear their intent to bring graphics processing abilities until now reserved for desktop machines to the mobile realm; for tablets, smartphones, and everything in between.
In addition to deploying Kepler’s efficient processing powers to the Logan mobile SoC, NVIDIA intents on bringing the excellence in a form that the company will be able to license to others. This licensing was outlined earlier this year amid the latest Kepler integrations into GPUs such as the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 760.
NVIDIA suggests that the technology deployed with mobile Kepler is able to use one-third the power of “GPUs in leading tablets, such as the retinal iPad”, while it performs identical renderings. They also note that this efficiency is achieved with mobile Kepler without compromising graphics capabilities, working with OpenGL ES 3.0, OpenGL 4.4, and everything else in the OpenGL universe.
Though we’re expecting this architecture to hit Google’s Android – as NVIDIA has been hitting for the past several years – they do mention that the technology also supports DirectX, the latest graphics API from Microsoft. Think Windows RT and Windows 8 – NVIDIA’s been there before.
Working with these current and next-generation APIs allow NVIDIA to bring on graphics unlike any seen in the mobile universe, developers taking hold of these environments with a variety of high-end rendering and simulation techniques. NVIDIA runs down three of the most powerful:
Tessellation – which creates geometry dynamically and efficiently on the GPU from high-level descriptions, sizing triangles optimally based on the user’s viewpoint. By comparison, fine detail in a traditional pre-generated approach is inefficient, requiring excess geometry to deal with all possible viewpoints.
Compute-based deferred rendering – which calculates the effect of all lights in the scene in a single deferred rendering pass. This OpenGL 4 capability greatly improves deferred rendering efficiency and scalability compared to current OpenGL ES based implementations, which require an extra pass for each light source in the scene. The scalability of the compute-based approach paves the way to even more advanced lighting models, such as using virtual points of lights to approximate global illumination effects.
Advanced anti-aliasing and post-processing – which deliver better image quality, particularly in areas of very sharp color contrast, by making multi-sampling more programmable and allowing applications to implement their own anti-aliasing filters. These also enable more efficient film-quality post-processing effects, such as motion blur and depth of field.
NVIDIA makes clear that a lovely collection of processing-heavy tasks will be able to be carried out with this next-generation solution including computer vision, augmented reality, computational imaging, and speech recognition. Showed off this week at Siggraph was a return of the digital head now known as “Ira”, aka Faceworks.
Stick around as we continue to jump deeper into the next big superhero-themed processor, one that’ll break barriers beyond what we’re only just seeing now with the NVIDIA Tegra 4 – living inside NVIDIA SHIELD and getting pumped up for benchmarks sooner than later!
VIA: NVIDIA
NVIDIA Project Logan processor assimilates Kepler mobile is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Jul 23
With the release of HP’s next-generation workstations in the HP Z230 Tower and SFF, the company brings a combination of compact bodies and energy efficient constructs to keep them current in today’s business environment. The HP Z230 comes in two main configurations, both of them with a set of possible configurations therein. Both units are being pushed at the same time as a series of Z Displays that’ll compliment their next-generation abilities.
The HP SFF (Small Form Factor) works with a body that’s a full 57% smaller than the Tower that shares its name. You’ve got a single 3.5-inch internal bay here, 1x 2.5-inch bay to keep it company inside, and a single internal/external 3.5-inch bay to boot. And just in case you need another, you’ve also got a single external Half-Height 5.25-inch bay as well. Expansion slots on this machine include 1 PCIe Gen3 x16, 1 PCIe Gen2 x4 slot/x16 connector, 1 PCIe Gen2 x1 slot/x4 connector, and 1 PCIe Gen2 x1 slot, the whole lot of the Low Profile.
With the Tower you’ll get six available drive bays, one of which is a versatile 2.5-inch HD bay for high speed solid state drive integration, along with optional external slim ODD bay. This optional bay allows rather easy installation of SSD Hard Drives for quick-changes and expansion. Expansion on this machine includes 1 PCIe Gen3 x16, 1 PCIe Gen2 x4 slot/x16 connector, 1 PCIe Gen2 x1 slot/x4 connector, 1 PCIe Gen2 x1 slot, and 1 PCI 32-bit.
Both of these devices work with 2x USB 3.0 ports up front alongside at least one USB 2.0 port and a headphone out. The Tower adds a single microphone in and a second USB 2.0 Charging Data Port. Both machines have 2 USB 3.0 ports on their back, 4 USB 2.0, and a variety of Display Ports – they’ve both got 1x USB 3.0 inside, these joined by 3 USB 2.0 ports under the hood as well.
The Tower in this family rings in at 15.7 x 6.7 x 17.4 in (39.93 x 17.04 x 44.25 cm) while the SFF is just 3.95 x 13.3 x 15.0 in (10.5 x 33.83 x 38.15 cm). Both work with Intel’s newest Xeon processor E3-1200 v3 family with choices for either 2D or 3D graphics. These units start at $999 USD for quad-core configurations and are expected to be available worldwide inside August of this year.
HP Z230 Tower and SFF Workstation designed for expansion is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Jul 23
This week HP is bringing on the full collection of workhorse-ready workstations for the public, hitting the image side of things with three high-powered Z Displays. These displays go by the names HP Z22i, Z23i, and Z24i, bringing with them maneuverability and power savings over their previous generation entries by a cool 26 percent. Each of them is specifically tuned to be top-notch in the sRGB color space as well, offering between 95 and 99 percent coverage as well as a wide spread of viewing angles for future-aimed workspaces.
With the Z22i, HP delivers a 21.50inch IPS display with 97% sRGB color space coverage with its IPS Gen 2 panel. This unit works with 1920 x 1020 Full HD resolution and 250 cd/m2 brightness with what HP describes as an 8ms response time. On this machine’s back are access with DisplayPort 1.2, DVI, VGA, a lovely USB hub for good measure. This unit works with mercury-free LED backlight and arsenic-free display glass, if you were wondering.
The Z24i gets a bit of an upgrade with a 23-inch IPS Gen 2 panel, working here with 1920 x 1080 pixel coverage once again. This device also works with the same ports for video input, a USB hub, and the same ENERGY STAR and EPEAT Gold qualifications that spread across the whole Z Display series.
In the Z24i display you’ve got a 24-inch panel with 1920 x 1200 pixel resolution, this time with IPS Gen 2 coming around again, this time – as with the others – bringing HP’s “Black Stretch” technology for the enhancement of dark regions to see even the smallest details at all times. This unit also works with the same 4-way adjustable stand that’s delivered with the whole Z Display line.
This stand works with adjustments that meet the TCO Certified Edge “designation for innovative products at the forefront of environmental and ergonomic stand design.” In short – it can bend every which way and allows you so much adjustment you wont know what to do with it all.
The Z22i will ring in at $239 USD while the Z23i and the Z24i will cost $259 and $399, respectively. These units are all made to be paired with HP’s new Z Workstations, but they’ll be your solution for low-cost next-generation workspace monitor reliability no matter what machine you hook them up to.
HP Z Displays revealed for Full HD on four-way adjustable stands is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Jul 23
NVIDIA QUADRO K6000 becomes new world’s most powerful graphics card for professionals
Posted in: Today's ChiliThis week at the annual computer graphics conference known as Siggraph, NVIDIA has let loose information on their next-generation NVIDIA QUADRO K6000. This is NVIDIA QUADRO release is the new most powerful graphics card on the market – so says NVIDIA, bringing the world’s largest graphics memory with 12GB onboard. This isn’t the sort of processing power you’ll be using for anything less than the most power-hungry tasks on the planet.
Faced with managing extremely large data sets and time constraints, NVIDIA is aiming to satisfy the most current demands of product creators everywhere from graphics-intensive big-screen films to car manufacturing. Showing examples in both Layout and Animation & Simulation, NVIDIA has made it clear: the memory capacity involved in the K6000 allows previews of scenes with a much more final vision than has ever been offered before.
“It’s going to allow artists to preview their scenes much earlier in the pipeline. In this case, with the K6000, it’s all interactive.” – NVIDIA
“The added memory and other features allow our artists to see much more of the final scene in a real-time, interactive form, and allow many more artistic iterations.” – Guido Quaroni, Supervising Technical Director at Pixar Animation Studios
In car manufacturing, NVIDIA aims to push reality-based design processes to a new generation as well – time restraints and massive amounts of data are needed here as well. Especially when full-on reality-based previews of vehicle renders are needed to avoid costly mistakes once the manufacturing process begins.
“I am now able to load nearly complete vehicle models into RTT Deltagen and have stunning photorealism almost instantly. Instead of spending significant time simplifying the models to fit into previous hardware, we can now spend more time reviewing and iterating designs up front which helps avoid costly changes to tooling.” – Dennis Malone, associate engineer, Nissan North America
The third of three places where NVIDIA aims to take command is with massive geological datasets. In the ecology survey universe, like the automotive world, users need to know what’s under the ground before they get there – the rendering of these possibilities is one of the most intense at this point in our collective history.
“Compared to the Quadro K5000, the Quadro K6000 tripled the performance when running jobs on Terraspark’s InsightEarth application. With jobs running in mere minutes, we can run more simulations and get better insight into where to drill. In this business, drilling in the wrong place is a multi-million dollar mistake, and the Quadro K6000 gives us the edge to make better decisions.” – Klaas Koster, manager, seismic interpretation, Apache Corporation
Sizemic exploration is what we’re looking at here. Faster simulation means faster imaging and faster analysis in the end.
The NVIDIA QUADRO K6000 will be available this Fall worldwide from both leading OEMs and resellers. If you’re aiming to bring on a massive display wall for broadcast-type applications or digital signage, you’ll be glad to see 2 DisplayPort 2.1 ports and 2 DVI ports on its back that can be run simultaneously.
• 12GB ultra-fast GDDR5 graphics memory lets designers and animators model and render characters and scenes at unprecedented scale, complexity and richness
• 2,880 streaming multiprocessor (SMX) cores deliver faster visualization and compute horsepower than previous-generation products
• Supports four simultaneous displays and up to 4k resolution with DisplayPort 1.2
• Ultra-low latency video I/O and support for large-scale visualizations
When pressed on how this product would continue to roll beside the gaming-aimed card family GeForce – specifically with cards such as the GTX TITAN, NVIDIA made it clear: these are two separate families, but they can co-exist as a friendly bunch.
“The Quadro family is targeted at professionals – while you can certainly play games, the real value is for professionals on a variety of verticals. For that Geophysicist that like to play Assassin’s Creed, could he have a good time doing that? Absolutely.” – NVIDIA
This unit will be available in, as NVIDIA says, an “October timeframe” from groups like Dell, HP, and Lenovo and with systems integrators like BOXX Technologies and Supermicro.
NVIDIA QUADRO K6000 becomes new world’s most powerful graphics card for professionals is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Jul 22
The Gateway team this week brings on not just a new set of desktop machines for students and families, but a set of Gateway NE Series notebooks as well. This series starts at 15.6-inch (1366 x 768) and ramps up to a 17.3-inch (1600 x 900 resolution) Ultrabright LED-backlit display, these models both working with the latest in Intel and AMD processors backed up by up to 8GB of DDR3 dual-channel memory. And the whole lot runs Windows 8 too, of course.
This line of notebooks brings on two built-in stereo speakers with full HD audio support. They’ve each got HD webcams to send your image out unto the earth as well, rounding out this system of student-friendly web chat with a full-sized keyboard and dedicated keypad.
ALong the edges of these notebooks you’ll find one USB 3.0 and a set of two USB 2.0 ports. There’s a full-sized HDMI port for video out to HD displays, while most models work with a real-deal super-muli DVD drive with M-DISC READY for what the company calls “proven permanent archival quality data.”
There’s a Gateway NE5 model coming in first with a 15.6-inch display that’ll be measuring in at just 1.0-inch thin. There’s also a Gateway NE7 with a 17.3-inch display at just 1.36 inches thin, this larger model starting at $449.99 USD while the smaller starts at $379.99 USD, while the full line works with a one year limited parts and labor warranty.
Gateway NE notebooks slim down and power up with Haswell is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Jul 22
This week the folks at Gateway have brought back some heat in a collection of laptops and desktops for the 2013 business year. This new collection brings Haswell Intel Core processors as well as some ever-so-slightly thinned-down bodies in the notebook line while the desktop machines amp up largely on the inside – then there’s the Gateway One ZX, an all-in-one for students in a big way. Unassumingly simple looking, the lot of them.
Also included in this weeks gush of releases from the company, Gateway KX Series displays bring 19.5-, 21.5, 23-, 24- and 27-inch screens bring tilt capabilities from -5 to 25 degrees each. These models work with IPS, VA or TN panels while the whole lot work with three-year parts and labor warranties – and the lot of them starts at $99 this week. The desktop line exists in the Gateway One ZX, Gateway DX Series, and the compact Gateway SX Series.
The smallest of this collection exists in the Gateway SX Series and works at “a third of the size of standard desktops” with third-generation (not 4th) Intel Core i3 or AMD A Series processors and as much as 8GB DDR3 dual-channel memory. You’ll find a massive 8 USB 2.0 ports on this machine’s body if you’d like as well. This compact line starts at $529.99 USD.
The Gateway DX Series brings on features tuned for families and students looking for movies and videos as well as games. This is the entertainment beast, not so much for massive video processing and hardcore rendering – not that you couldn’t try, of course. Here you’ve got 4th generation (Haswell) Intel Core i5 or AMD A Series processors with up to 10GB DDR3 dual-channel memory and 1TB hard drives. You’ll find this series bringing on two USB 3.0 and up to 10 USB 2.0 ports depending on your specific model choice. This line starts at $398 USD and sits well inside the “mini tower” universe.
In the Gateway One ZX all-in-one desktop line you’ll find a lovely 21.5-inch Full HD Ultrabright LCD powered by a Intel Pentium Processor G2030 processor and 4GB DDR3 dual-channel memory. This unit is aimed squarely at the school-faring crowd and is suggested for use with “casual gaming” and student work galore. Inside is a 1TB hard drive, an optical drive (they’re not dead yet!) and built-in 2.5W stereo speakers with 2.1-channel surround sound support and high-def audio. This unit comes in at $529.99 in its most base configuration.
Gateway One ZX all-in-one joins DX and SX desktops reboot is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Jul 21
Laptop briefcases and sleeves tend to blend together after a while, because most of them look the same and are pretty boring. That’s one of the reasons why an Italian designer decided to come up with something with a bit more flair.
Bombata bags are supposed to marry technical expertise with fashion sensibilities. Unlike most laptop bags, they’re not bulky, and some function like sleeves, so they can be used inside larger bags to keep your electronics safe.
Bombata bags are made from durable vinyl, and offered in a number of different colors and sizes. They start with the tablet-friendly Micro Bombata and go up all the way to the Chubby Bombata, which can hold much more than just a laptop. Prices start at about $45(USD) and go up to about $110.
[via Yanko Design]
Jul 19
When I look around the technology space, I can’t think of any single product that is so poorly associated with another device than Microsoft’s Kinect. The sensor, which is supposedly designed with gamers in mind, actually delivers very little value to gamers nowadays. In fact, the Kinect is designed for computers and entertainment – gaming is an afterthought.
Since its release years ago, the Kinect has been bundled with Microsoft’s Xbox 360 and will make a showing in the Xbox One box. Microsoft, meanwhile, continues to pretend that the Kinect is a great tool for gamers who want to get more out of their titles.
Unfortunately, a few game developers have helped Microsoft extend this myth. Electronic Arts, for example, used the Kinect in all kinds of ways in its last version of Madden NFL. But after the novelty wore off and wives got tired of their husbands calling an audible in the middle of the night, gamers went back to their controller and stopped the nonsense.
Let me be clear: Microsoft’s Kinect is by no means a bad product. In fact, it’s arguably one of the most sophisticated devices on the market, and one that’s worth trying out for just about anyone. But to say that it’s a gaming product ignores the true value of the device and what it can offer to tech lovers around the world.
“To say that it’s a gaming product ignores the true value of the device.”
As Microsoft showed with its Xbox One presentation, the Kinect thrives as an entertainment device. Its support for voice commands means controlling devices and entertainment is simple. And with a few waves of a hand, the Kinect can perform all kinds of functions for those who need a more intuitive experience. Gaming, meanwhile, never comes into play.
On the PC side, the Kinect is even more compelling. The device is being used by developers in all kinds of interesting ways, including allowing folks who are used to the mouse and keyboard to enjoy a more intuitive experience when interacting with Windows. More entertaining developers have found ways to leverage its camera for all kinds of fun tricks.
Meanwhile, developers continue to bundle some Kinect functionality into their video games. However, the vast majority of those installations have proven to be unnecessary add-ons that lack innovation and uniqueness and seem like they were tacked on for the sake of placating Microsoft.
The Wii’s dramatic rise and fall should prove to us all that while motion gaming was fun for awhile, it’s yet another idea that has been ignored by savvy gamers.
Getting more out of consoles, however, is not something that savvy gamers mind. In fact, it’s what they’re coming to expect. And in that regard, the Kinect is delivering. The device is the ideal living room companion, the best alternative to a remote, and is quickly becoming a gateway to entertaining content.
In other words, the Kinect has less and less to do with gaming each passing day.
Let’s Stop Pretending the Kinect Is A Gaming Device is written by Don Reisinger & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Jul 19
Down in the depths of the testing arena for Google’s Chrome known as Chromium, you’ll find the first whispers of “Chromoting”, aka Chrome Remote Desktop for Android – connecting the two worlds with a mirrored interface. While the directories themselves aren’t especially telling for the lay person, you’ll find the concept a bit more enthralling if you’re interested in controlling your computer from your smartphone from any location you may roam.
You’ll find Remote Desktop access inside of several of Google’s current services this summer, one of the most recent implementations being inside Google+ Hangouts. This service was introduced back in May of this year, allowing any user able to sign in with Hangouts to control a computer in the chat if it’d been checkmarked for access. This was well before Hangouts was introduced for Android as a bit of a re-branding of Google Talk and multi-form connection for mobile devices to the social network, mind you.
NOTE: Amongst the several apps with similar functionality to this on the market today is Splashtop, appearing not just on Android, but on Windows Phone, iOS, OS X, and Windows as well.
Chrome Remote Desktop was originally pushed out of beta back in October of 2012. That same month, SlashGear reviewed the Samsung Series 3 Chromebook and did a separate demonstration of Remote Desktop with the Chromebook and a MacBook Pro – have a peek!
Once this service appears in Android, it’ll take the form of a unique app with – tentatively – the same icon as the service inside Chrome. It was Francois Beaufort, Chromium evangelist and developer of neat new things that found the code we’re seeing here, complete with mention of the “Chromoting Android app” as it very well may be called in the end.
VIA: TNW
Chrome Remote Desktop for Android coming soon: Splashtop beware is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.
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