The NVIDIA Shield, a portable Android-powered game console that was launched some time in the middle of last year, will apparently receive a temporary price cut. Just how much money will you be able to save if you were to pick up the NVIDIA Shield now? Well, we are looking at a savings of $50, which means the price of the NVIDIA Shield between now until the end of next month would be $199 a pop.
NVIDIA Shield To Get Temporary Price Cut original content from Ubergizmo. 
     |
Nvidia’s Shield is the best Android gaming handheld currently available, and though the field isn’t that rich or deep, a new update coming to the device in April takes a solid offering and makes it even better. The new update offers Remote GameStream for playing full console-quality PC games on the road, notebook streaming, Bluetooth keyboard/mouse support, and a redesigned Tegra Zone… Read More
Have you had a go with NVIDIA’s portable gaming console, the NVIDIA Shield so far? If you have answered in the affirmative, then you will be pleased as punch to hear that the NVIDIA Shield will be receiving an update that will increase the resolution for select compatible PC games via streaming. This GameStream functionality was first introduced in October, but back then, games were streamed from the PC in 720p resolution at 60 frames per second. This latest over-the-air (OTA) update will see the introduction of 1080p streaming support, targeting titles such as Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag and Battlefield 4.
That is not all, of course, as NVIDIA has also made additional adjustments to the Gamepad Mapper of the Shield. This would be a whole lot more than having Shield buttons assigned to the touch-based controls of Android games, but rather, you can now use the Mapper to take full advantage of the handle motion-sensitive controls with an analog input. Instead of tilting your Android device in Temple Run, you can now shift the an analog stick on the Shield for a similar action. Just in case you were wondering what the NVIDIA Shield is all about, why not read up on our review?
NVIDIA Shield Gets 1080p GameStream Support Now original content from Ubergizmo. 
| |
Nvidia has some side bets on Surface and Windows RT, but Android is the really exciting OS of the future, according to CEO and co-founder Jen-Hsun Huang on an investor call today to discuss the company’s latest financial results. Huang pointed to the Shield as its means of furthering the growing Android gaming ecosystem, but games are truly only one part of the picture for Android’s bright future, he believes.
“Shield is our initiative to cultivate the gaming marketplace for Android,” Huang said, as quoted by ZDNet. “We believe that Android is going to be a very important platform for gaming in the future, and to do so we have to create devices that enable great gaming to happen on Android.”
The Nvidia Shield, released earlier this year, is essentially a small Android tablet welded to a gamepad controller, creating effectively a portable Android-powered gaming console that can go toe-to-toe with the likes of Nintendo and Sony’s dedicated mobile gaming hardware. A recent software update for the Shield also improves its ability to output games content to big screens, including TVs, making it also a suitable microconsole for living room systems.
Huang’s statement is perhaps the clearest articulation of Shield’s intended purpose yet; the console is designed to provide a focal point for free-floating Android game developer ambitions, offering up a target to build for. This helps the overall gaming ecosystem, but also helps Nvidia, by prompting more developers to build experiences tailored for Tegra, its mobile system-on-a-chip, thus encouraging more Android device OEMs to look its way when building out specifications for their latest hardware.
Android’s potential goes beyond gaming into virtually every corner of connected living, however, says Huang. Tegra’s presence in automotive systems and set-top boxes, data centers, all-in-one PCs and more make it the perfect platform for the future, Huang noted, calling Google’s mobile OS “the most disruptive operating system that we’ve seen in a few decades.”
In many ways, the rise of Android is literally like a gold rush – prospectors are setting up shop and staking claims, and suppliers like Nvidia are congregating around the hub to benefit from the bump in the overall supply ecosystem created by the new demand. With initiatives like the Shield and the Tegra Note reference tablet (which is now being sold by British retailer Advent as the Advent Vega), Nvidia is engaging the market even further by placing seeds that it believes will slowly grow to become congregation points around which the rest of the Android ecosystem centers their own efforts, developers and device makers alike. It’s as if they found a seam of gold ore, to stretch the metaphor, and then then called out to the miner community to let them know exactly where the gold is at.
It’s a long-term strategy, and one that works in tandem with short-term ones like introducing a new LTE chip to help boost Tegra sales immediately. There’s a lot of competition, however, and Qualcomm is running away with the market, so the question remains whether or not these seeds Nvidia is planting will have time to come to fruition.
Nvidia has updated its Shield Android-based mobile game console to add a host of new features, one of which is very interesting in terms of how it might affect the growing Android-based home game console market. For users, it’s a very nice update that adds a lot of worthwhile functionality, and for Nvidia, it’s reaffirmation that this is a real platform, not just a demonstration device designed to entice OEMs.
Along with the above, this update also adds the official, non-beta release of Shield’s Gamestream PC gameplay streaming service, which plugs into Steam to let users play full PC games on their device streaming at up to 60fps over a local Wi-Fi network. Plus, you can shift full app and game files from the local storage to an external micro SD card, which clears up space, and the Home button now provides access to both recently opened apps and Google Now.
One other new feature available today is ‘Gamepad Mapper,’ which aims to answer the question of what to do with games that don’t support game controllers out of the box. It gets around that by allowing users to go through and manually map touchscreen controls to the Shield’s hardware buttons, d-pad and joysticks, and in fact it does it automatically for many of the top games already available. It’s still not the perfect solution (i.e., all game makers building support for Shield right into their code), but it does make games that would otherwise be completely unplayable, playable.
The Gamestream feature now supports over 50 titles with its official launch (and others unofficially) and feels even more polished than it did the first time I used it. Barring any other considerations around the Shield, the PC streaming is a huge benefit to anyone who finds themselves glued to their PC for hours addicted to new games; being able to take that with you anywhere around the house you want to go is a huge boon.
The other big advantage here is Console Mode, which adds to the basic HDMI-out functionality to turn Shield into a full-fledged living room console. It’s designed to work with partner Nyko’s PlayPad Pro wireless Bluetooth controller specifically, but it should work with any Android Bluetooth controller. The PlayPad Pro was designed in conjunction with Nvidia, however, which makes it more likely to be fully compatible with Tegra-optimized game titles.
Now you can tap the new Console Mode icon to run it on the TV, and also the controller now wakes from sleep when connected to a TV, even if the clamshell is closed. Because of its software support and the way it just works without requiring all that much in terms of additional work on the part of developers, this makes it a very compelling alternative to Ouya. Full 1080p output is coming via an update, and best of all, you can unplug it and take it with you wherever you go, and play without a TV, too. Shield might be $200 more than the Ouya, but this new console mode makes it a much better value overall, in my opinion. It’s already my travel console of choice, and really helps those boring nights in hotels on business trips.
Usual disclaimer about not trying this at home and all that but if you were wondering if you could use the Nvidia Shield as a bulletproof vest and then still play with it later, the answer is yes! Well, as long as it gets shot through the screen. And as long as you’re not actually using it as a literal shield. Our friends at RatedRR gave the Shield a good old shellacking and said its the first gadget to still work after getting shot. Not bad.
| |
We’ve seen your typical, sterile, tiny-screwdriver-filled teardown of Nvidia’s Shield that showed there’s actually a lot crammed in there
| |
NVIDIA today released an over-the-air update for its Shield portable gaming console. The Shield is a handheld console that is capable of streaming PC games from Steam as well as of playing Android games. It was released on July 31st. The new OTA update improves and adds a number of features so as to enhance the experience for users. The update allows users to move select application data from the Shield’s internal storage to the microSD card.
Apart from the ability to move app data, the update brings improved Miracast streaming and also improves PC streaming stability, Wi-Fi performance and gamepad detection. Support for Tegra developer tools such as the CPU sampling profiler and GPU analysis has been added as well. The usual slew of bug fixes and important enhancements are on-board too. This update weighs in at around 408MB and can be downloaded on the console itself by heading over to the Settings menu followed by About Shield. It has merely been a month since the console was released, surely NVIDIA will add more features for both users and developers in the future. If you’re skeptical about purchasing this console, do check out our NVIDIA Shield review to find out all there is to know about it.
NVIDIA Shield OTA Update Lets Users Move App Data To SD Card original content from Ubergizmo. 
| |
In this decidedly dorky edition of Fly Or Die, yours truly and TC’s resident Canadian Darrell Etherington duke it out over Nvidia’s curious Shield game console and what it means for the future of Android gaming.
In a surprising twist (well, surprising if you haven’t already read his review), Darrell is absolutely smitten with the thing. Honestly, it’s a little hard not to be — we both agree that the Shield is a top-notch piece of kit, with hearty spec sheet, one of the best screens we’ve seen on a mobile device, and a level of fit and finish that puts most standalone Bluetooth controllers for smartphones to shame. Throw in the ability to stream full-blown PC games from computers with the prerequisite graphics cards, you’ve got yourself an awfully compelling little package.
Meanwhile, I’m a little more skeptical of the Shield’s chances. My main beef is that the Android ecosystem doesn’t yet play home to the sorts of games that make a $299 portable console like this worth owning. That’s not to say it isn’t going to get there — Android recently vaulted over more traditional rivals like Sony and Nintendo when it came to game revenue so there’s clearly a consumption shift in effect here, but I’d argue there isn’t much in the way of AAA Android games just yet.
In the end, we just had to agree to disagree: Darrell gives it a fly, I give it a die, and all’s right with the world.
A brief aside: as it turns out we couldn’t contain the full brunt of out Shield debate in this video, so the conversation spilled over into this week’s edition of the TechCrunch Droidcast. Tune in to hear us dissect each other’s argument in greater detail.
Midweek, we’re here for you! Our hump day tradition of the TechCrunch Droidcast continues into its third episode with your host Chris Velazco, myself and special guest Romain Dillet delivering some worldly charm.
This week, we’ve got some new Android-powered hardware to discuss, including the Nvidia Shield portable gaming console and Wacom’s new Cintiq Companion Hybrid combo Android tablet/PC or Mac drawing tablet. Both niche devices, but good examples of what Android can do when it isn’t just being used for phones or tablets.
We also get into Google’s native app strategy, prompted by the Keep update that came out today. Is Google Now the future? Are all apps destined to become features of that on-demand, contextually aware service? Spoiler: We have no idea.
We invite you to enjoy weekly Android podcasts every Wednesday at 5:30 p.m. Eastern and 2:30 p.m. Pacific, in addition to our weekly Gadgets podcast at 3 p.m. Eastern and noon Pacific on Fridays. Subscribe to the TechCrunch Droidcast in iTunes, too, if that’s your fancy.
Intro music by Kris Keyser.
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.
