Hasta La Gadget!

Steam for Linux has been in the works for quite a while now, although it was only recently that Valve launched a dedicated blog where the detailed its progress. If you’re wondering what’s with the sudden increase in effort in creating Steam for Linux, well according to Valve’s boss, Gabe Newell, Steam for Linux is considered to be a “hedging strategy” in the event that the upcoming Windows 8 does not take off the way that Microsoft originally intended (think Vista). Speaking at an industry dinner in Seattle last night, Newell was quoted as saying:

“The big problem that is holding back Linux is games. People don’t realize how critical games are in driving consumer purchasing behavior […]

We want to make it as easy as possible for the 2,500 games on Steam to run on Linux as well. It’s a hedging strategy. I think Windows 8 is a catastrophe for everyone in the PC space. I think we’ll lose some of the top-tier PC/OEMs, who will exit the market. I think margins will be destroyed for a bunch of people. If that’s true, then it will be good to have alternatives to hedge against that eventuality.”

Whether you agree with Newell’s sentiments on Windows 8 or not, Steam for Windows and Mac is still going strong and the eventual port to Linux is probably going to welcome by many Linux gamers around the world.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Valve documents Steam for Linux via new blog, Steam for Linux Caught on Video [Leak],

Call the Power Pwn the champion of white hat hacking. Underneath that Clark Kent power strip exterior, there’s a Superman of full-scale breach testing that can push the limits of just about any company network, whether it takes 3G, Ethernet or WiFi to get there. Pwnie Express’ stealthy sequel to the Pwn Plug ships with a Debian 6 instance of Linux whose handy hacking tools are as easy to launch as they are tough to detect. There’s just one step needed to create a snoop-friendly Evil AP WiFi hotspot, and the box dodges around low-level NAC/802.1x/RADIUS network authentication without any help; in the same breath, it can easily leap into stealth mode and keeps an ongoing encrypted link to give do-gooders a real challenge. The hacker doesn’t even need to be in the same ZIP code to crack a firewall or VPN — the 3G link lets the Power Pwn take bash command-line instructions through SMS messages and doles out some of its feedback the same way. While the $1,295 device can theoretically be used for nefarious purposes, DARPA’s blessing (and funding) should help keep the Power Pwn safely in the hands of security pros and thwart more than a few dastardly villains looking for weak networks.

Filed under: Networking, Internet

DARPA-backed Power Pwn is power strip by day, superhero hack machine by night originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 22 Jul 2012 07:54:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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If you’re the sort of computer user who wants to be different, but you don’t want to lay out the big money that the MacBook costs you might want to check out Dell’s latest offering. Dell has announced that it’s offering an XPS 13 Ultrabook with Ubuntu Linux pre-installed instead of Windows. Apparently, the machine will only be available in select areas.

The specific flavor of Linux is Ubuntu 12.04LTS. The machine is part of Dell’s Project Sputnik, which aims to create an Ubuntu-based developer laptop. Dell notes that it’s taking the project “from pilot to product this fall” allowing developers to “create ‘microclouds’ on their laptops… and then deploy that environment seamlessly to the cloud.”

Despite their sleek form factor and power, Ultrabooks haven’t caught on in a big way so far, mostly because of the price, and already saturated PC market. The typical Ultrabook today prices out in the $800 and up range, making them quite expensive. There is no indication of what the Linux based XPS 13 will sell for, but the current XPS 13 sells for around $900.

[via C|NET]

Dell’s Project Sputnik is successful enough that the company is launching another satellite, so to speak. After a strong reception for its developer-installable distribution of Ubuntu, the PC builder is now planning an edition of the XPS 13 with the Linux variant already installed. The hardware will be identical to its Windows parallel and ship with the same Precise Pangolin Ubuntu build that previously required a download. Dell incubator lead Nnamdi Orakwue is shy with The Inquirer about how much the Microsoft-free system will cost when it ships to some corners of the world in the fall, although the $999 price of a base Windows version might serve as a ballpark figure. All that’s for certain is that the Ultrabook should represent one of the fastest pre-assembled, open source PCs to date.

Filed under: Laptops

Dell to ship XPS 13 with Ubuntu Linux in some areas, Precise Pangolin goes ultraportable originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 19 Jul 2012 19:22:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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No software update is quite so sweet as one that brings improved performance, and that’s exactly what Raspberry Pi users can expect from the latest Debian-based OS known as Raspbian. Optimized specifically for the $35 computer, Raspbian introduces more comprehensive support for floating point operations, and with that, a faster web browsing experience. The latest release also brings improvements to the firmware, kernel and applications, and is recommended as the distribution most appropriate for general users. An SD card image of Raspbian is now available for download, so do yourself a favor and snag it today.

Filed under: Desktops, Software

Raspberry Pi announces Raspbian, an optimized OS upgrade with performance improvements abound originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 17 Jul 2012 20:24:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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