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Tuesday, April 01, 2014

drag2share: Airtame wireless screen-mirroring dongle shipping in October for $99

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2014/04/01/airtame-wireless-hdmi-dongle-shipping/

Airtame, the Danish startup that received our Best of CES 2014 award for its awesome wireless video dongle, has confirmed that it will be shipping its first lot to its beta users ~~this month~~ in July. Better yet, the device has since been upgraded from a single-core Freescale chip to a dual-core version, along with dual-band WiFi and hardware acceleration on all three PC platforms: Windows, Linux and Mac. Over 15,000 Airtame dongles have been pre-ordered so far, and these will start shipping in ~~May or June~~ October after some tweaking based on the beta feedback.

For those who aren't familiar with Airtame, this is an HDMI dongle that you plug into a monitor or TV. With the software installed on your PC, you can wirelessly mirror or extend your desktop to one or multiple remote screens equipped with the dongle. What's more, you can also choose to do so over your home network or over a direct WiFi connection (while somehow still maintaining your PC's internet connection). The team claims that the performance is superior to that of existing Miracast dongles and Chromecast, featuring a low 25 to 30ms latency that's good enough for gaming -- as we found out at CES. The Chromecast, on the other hand, has a one- to two-second delay (plus it's not really made for screen mirroring); and we've yet to come across a Miracast pairing that works reliably.

The Airtame dongle will eventually support smartphone and tablet video transmission, as the team received a lot of requests for a way to beam local content to the remote screen. However, app developers will need to use Airtame's SDK to enable this feature -- there will be supported apps at launch, and the dongle will also have its own browser that can be controlled from your mobile device.

In terms of retail availability, you can already pre-order the $99 Airtame dongle via the official website, or you can wait for its launch at select large, but unnamed retailers in the US, Canada, UK and Europe. Russia and some Asian countries will get the dongle later, as they require local safety certifications.

Update: We have been notified of a change in delivery date after this article went up, so we've updated the dates accordingly.

Filed under: Home Entertainment, Wireless, HD

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drag2share: Samsung confirms thinner and lighter Galaxy Tab 4 tablet range

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2014/04/01/samsung-confirms-tab4-tablet-range-will-be-thinner-and-lighter/

Though the FCC already ruined the surprise, Samsung has just launched three new lower-tier Galaxy Tab 4 tablets. The series consists of the 7-inch Galaxy Tab 4 7.0, 8-inch Galaxy Tab 4 8.0 and -- wait for it -- the 10.1-inch Galaxy Tab 4 10.1. The design has changed substantially from the Galaxy Tab 3, instead following the lead of the Galaxy Tab Pro series with thinner bezels and less weight. Unlike the high end range, though, the Tab 4's specs are squarely aimed at the mainstream: a 1.2GHz quad-core CPU, 1,200 x 800 WXGA graphics, Android 4.4 KitKat, 1.5GB of RAM, 16GB of memory, a MicroSD slot and 3/1.3-megapixel front/back cameras on all models. All three will launch with LTE Cat 4 capability from the get-go, along with Samsung services like Link and WatchOn. They're set to arrive this quarter in black and white colors, with no pricing yet -- but we'd figure on around the same as last year's $300 Galaxy Tab3 8.0.

Filed under: Tablets, Samsung

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drag2share: This quarter-sized chip platform could power future Android Wear devices

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2014/04/01/mips-ingenic-newton-android-wear/

While Intel has backtracked on its "Edison" chip size claims, another Android Wear partner is claiming that its system-on-chip is the size of the proverbial SD card. Imagination Technologies (MIPS) has just revealed the Newton platform based on its MIPS architecture, built by chip-making partner Ingenic. It uses Ingenic's power-sipping, Android-compatible 1GHz JZ4775 CPU (similar to that in the GEAK watch), to help it give smartwatches and other wearables 30 hours or more of battery life. A laundry list of other features is also baked in, like support for up to 3GB RAM, 720p video, WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0, NFC, MEMS sensors, health care sensors and USB support. Device makers can pick and choose those options thanks to the modular design, which also allows for rapid prototyping. In theory, that will help Android Wear hardware makers turn their designs into products more quickly -- and fulfill Google's ambitious product launch timetable.

Filed under: Wearables

Source: MIPS

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drag2share: Google to focus on portrait shots and effects with improved camera app

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2014/04/01/google-new-android-camera-app/

We know that Google has been looking to bring more advanced photo features to Android for a while, but it may soon be ready to show off what it's been working on. Sources aware of Google's plans have confirmed to us that the search giant is currently testing a new version of its camera app that will sport a refreshed UI, a background-blurring effect for portrait shots, and improved panorama and Photo Sphere modes. As part of its overhaul, we're told that Google has finally fixed issues with the default camera's photo framing, allowing users to snap images with a new 100-percent no-crop viewfinder. That means you'll see exactly what your Android device will capture before you hit the shutter button, with no unwanted objects creeping in at the edges.

The company is also said to be making the camera app more extensible, by opening support for third-party filters. This will allow developers (and Android enthusiasts) to create and import custom effects inside the stock camera app. The camera app's portrait skills may see some improvements too, with the addition a new lens blur mode that will take photos with a shallower depth of field, mimicking the effects you'd typically see in Nokia's Refocus app and HTC's new One.! New hig h-resolution panorama and Photo Sphere modes have also been added, improving the quality of your sweeping shots.

While many are awaiting the release of Android 4.4.3, the latest version of KitKat, Google is set to make these camera improvements available to users by way of a standalone update. Our sources indicate that the app will exist separately so that non-Nexus owners running Android 4.4 and above will be able to take advantage of the improvements, without having to wait for an OTA update from their device maker or carrier.

Filed under: Cellphones, Software, Mobile, Google

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drag2share: Amazon Prime signs '24' away from Netflix just before the new season airs on Fox

source: http://www.engadget.com/2014/04/01/amazon-prime-24-fox/?utm_source=Feed_Classic_Full&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Engadget&?ncid=rss_full

After four years away CTU agent Jack Bauer is coming back to TV on May 5th in 24: Live Another Day, and he's already being used as a pawn in a new battle: Amazon vs. Netflix. Until today, US fans of the show could catch up with all 192 episodes (plus 24: Redemption) on Netflix's streaming service, but now Amazon Prime is the exclusive subscription streaming home of 24. Amazon's deal with 20th Century Fox is timed to take advantage of the show's upcoming return, similar to exclusive agreements it's made for other shows like Orphan Black, Suits, Falling Skies, Downton Abbey, Justified, Workaholics, Veronica Mars,Under the Dome, and Extant.

Amazon's "pilot season" to crowdsource opinions on potential shows hasn't produced hits on par with Netflix Originals like House of Cards or Orange is the New Black, but we suppose this is another way of filling the library. For Netflix's part, it sent out a PR blast yesterday focusing on what it's adding to streaming this month, including an exclusive deal for the complete series of House M.D. plus Rocky I - V, Coneheads, Amistad and Braveheart. Of course, today only (check your calendar), there is also a very special Netflix Original for you to check out.

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drag2share: Verizon FiOS Media Server arrives as Quantum TV DVR that records up to 12 channels at once

source: http://www.engadget.com/2014/04/01/verizon-fios-media-server-quantum-tv/?utm_source=Feed_Classic_Full&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Engadget&?ncid=rss_full

We double checked the calendar too, but no, it's not an April Fools joke -- Verizon's FIOS Media Server is finally available in a few areas as a part of the new Quantum TV package. The VMS1100 upgrades the standard cable boxes used by Verizon and other providers by shoving six tuners and a 1TB hard drive into a box that then feeds TV to other smaller set-top boxes in the rest of the house over existing cable wiring (MoCA). Better still, you can add more DVRs for the ability to record up to 12 channels at once, 2TB of storage and feeds for as many as ten TVs. Unlike some other multiroom systems, users can pause and rewind live TV on the extender boxes as well, or pause a program in one room, then resume it in another room.

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drag2share: Tesla Model S is 'low hanging fruit' for hackers to remotely track or unlock cars

source: http://www.engadget.com/2014/04/01/tesla-hacking/?utm_source=Feed_Classic_Full&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Engadget&?ncid=rss_full

Tesla has toughened the Model S' underbody to help prevent any more fires, but apparently it needs to add some reinforcement to its network features too. An enterprising hacker can't quite drive one of the electric vehicles away (they'd need a key fob to start the car), but holes in the auto's security apparently allow a ne'er-do-well to locate the vehicle, unlock its doors and steal your belongings. As Tesla owner and corporate security consultant Nitesh Dhanjani tells it, this "low-hanging fruit" can be picked by brute-force attacking Tesla's relatively weak one-factor password system, exploiting loopholes in the iOS app's API and by accessing the ride's network-interface jack under the dashboard. Thankfully, he found that the Model S' major systems were safe from attack.

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Monday, March 31, 2014

drag2share: Extraordinary picture: Three dragon storms sweeping the US

Source: http://sploid.gizmodo.com/the-three-dragon-storms-sweeping-the-united-states-as-s-1555787976/@jesusdiaz

Extraordinary picture: Three dragon storms sweeping the US

This is a really unusual weather situation, according to the National Weather Service: Three low pressure systems in line over the entirety of North America. NASA Goddard describes them as "three atmospheric dragons." They do look like dragons! It must be a Game of Thrones' marketing ploy.

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drag2share: How Mexico's Drug Cartels Are Driving Up the Price of Limes

Source: http://gizmodo.com/how-mexicos-drug-cartels-are-driving-up-the-price-of-l-1555572876

How Mexico's Drug Cartels Are Driving Up the Price of Limes

A lime shortage is threatening the U.S. food and beverage industry, with some bars and restaurants jacking up drink prices, charging extra for a slice—or refusing to serve the citrus at all. But there's another reason to rethink that margarita: The pricey limes you're buying from Mexico might be supporting drug violence.

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drag2share: The Toy Car Company That Launched At Apple's Developer Conference Thinks It's Solved 3 Major Problems In Robotics

Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/anki-drive-and-apple-2014-3

A company called Anki made its public debut last year on one of the best stages any company could hope for — Apple's annual developer conference, WWDC.

It had been operating quietly since February 2012 to refine its product — robotic toy cars that race around a special track, all controlled by an iPhone. It's a bit like a real-life version of Mario Kart: Cars can earn powerups like faster top speeds, or weapons for disabling opponents' cars.

On the surface, it is nothing more than a toy company. But it got the attention of investment firms like Andreessen Horowitz, Two Sigma, and Index Ventures, who collectively invested $50 million. Marc Andreessen calls it "one of the best robotics startups I've ever seen." The company's chief product officer gave Business Insider an update on their progress recently.

Its $200 starter kit comes with a racetrack and two cars, and customers have so far collectively raced 42 million laps around the track. We asked Anki for sales numbers, but it declined to give out that data.

"The first problem anyone faces in robotics is positioning, or determining where your robot is in its environment," said Joe Palatucci, Anki's Chief Product Officer. "Second is reasoning. You have to give the robot a goal and it needs to determine the sequence of actions it needs to take to accomplish that goal. Last are the controls — this is the nitty-gritty, where you actually execute a task and command voltages to motors that manipulate and move the robot."

The entertainment factor can't be denied — "We eat our own dog food quite often," said Palatucci. "We have weekly tournaments at the office. It's a lot of! fun."

Here's a GIF from the WWDC presentation, in which Anki co-founder Boris Sofman demos Anki DRIVE.

anki

The Anki DRIVE racetrack is made using a special ink that's transparent in the infrared spectrum even though our eyes register it as black. The bottoms of the cars use special cameras and lights that let them see through the ink to the bits of information encoded there, and this information is sent back wirelessly to phones 500 times per second as a car moves around the track.

Positioning: Solved.

Players are racing against autonomous cars controlled by Anki software. The cars don't have an onboard "brain" that enables them to "think" for themselves; this task is outsourced to the players' phones, which receive positioning data from the cars, then beam instructions back to the cars via Bluetooth LE, a wireless communications standard. Since the phone knows the location of all cars on the track, it can plan routes and attack other vehicles with its cars' weapons.

Implementing users' smartphones this way saves Anki money because it can offload the heavy lifting of "thinking" to a device that users already own. And Anki's software has proven to be a vicious opponent: When set to "hard" mode, the cars will beat a human player nine out of 10 times.

Reasoning: Solved.

When it comes to actually moving around a track, Anki's cars are electronically and mechanically identical. They derive their unique characteristics from Anki's software, which enables things like increased top speeds, the ability to execute 180-degree turns, or the ability to wield some weapons for blasting opponents off the track. "Because so much is driven by software," said Palatucci, "we can easily send updates to the App Store that still expand the gameplay after a single hardware purchas! e."

Controls: Solved.

Palatucci and Sofman began work on Anki DRIVE about six years ago while pursuing their PhDs in robotics at Carnegie Mellon University. After a lot of night and weekend effort, the company sought out a partnership with Apple, which it's maintained for "the better part of a year." Anki approached Apple because "mobile phones are central to what we are doing," says Palatucci. "We thought their retail stores would be a perfect way for us to distribute, and Apple got behind Bluetooth LE two years before most others."

Since its launch at WWDC, Anki DRIVE was named one of the best inventions of 2013 by TIME, and Anki even got some attention on the Ellen DeGeneres Show. In keeping with the commitment to continue adding to the cars' software, the company released several new upgrades at the beginning of the year to make for an enhanced racing experience (there's even a horn upgrade — "honk" it and opponents' cars move out of your way).

Palatucci kept talk of the future a bit vague, but seems most excited by the fact that simple software updates can continue to make the game a repeatably enjoyable product: "It's really exciting for potential new customers to realize Anki DRIVE is an evolving experience."

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drag2share: Surprise! iPhone Apps Crash More Than Android Apps

Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/iphone-apps-crash-more-than-android-apps-2014-3

Mobile app performance management company Crittercism publish a study on the crash rate for apps on iOS and Android (PDF). Somewhat surprisingly, it says that iOS Apps crash more than Android. Chart via Statista.

20140331_App_Stability

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drag2share: Why Nvidia thinks it can power the AI revolution

Source: http://gigaom.com/2014/03/31/why-nvidia-thinks-it-can-power-the-ai-revolution/

Smarter robots and devices are coming to a home near you, and chipmaker Nvidia wants to help make it happen. It won’t develop the algorithms that dictate their behavior or build the sensors that let them take in our world, but its graphics-processing units, or GPUs, might be a great way to handle the heavy computing necessary to make many forms of artificial intelligence a reality.

Most applications don’t use GPUs exclusively, but rather offload the most computationally intensive tasks onto them from standard microprocessors. Called GPU acceleration, the practice is very common in supercomputing workloads and it’s becoming ubiquitous in the area of computer vision and object recognition, too. In 2013, more than 80 percent of the teams participating in the ImageNet image-recognition competition utilized GPUs, said Sumit Gupta, general manager of the the Advanced Computing Group at Nvidia.

In March 2013, Google acquired DNNresearch, a deep learning startup co-created by University of Toronto professor Geoff Hinton. Part of the rationale behind that acquisition was team’s performance of Hinton’s team in the 2012 ImageNet competition, where the group’s GPU-powered deep learning models easily bested previous approaches.

Source: Nvidia

Source: Nvidia

“It turns out that the deep neural network … problem is just a slam dunk for the GPU,” Gupta said. That’s because deep learning algorithms often require a lot of computing power to process their data (e.g., images or text) and extract the defining features of the things included in that data. Especially during the training phase, when the models and algorithms are being tuned for accuracy, they need to process a lot of data.

Numerous customers are using Nvidia’s Tesla GPUs for image and speech recognition, including Adobe and Chinese search giant Baidu. Nvidia is working on other aspects of machine learning as well, Gupta noted. Netflix uses them (in the Amazon Web Services cloud) to power its recommendation engine, Russian search engine Yandex uses GPUs to power its search engine, and IBM uses them to run clustering algorithms in Hadoop.

Nvidia might be so excited about machine learning because it has been pushing GPUs as a general-purpose computing platform — not just a graphics and gaming chip — for years with mixed results. The company has tried to do this by simplify programming its processors via the CUDA language it has developed, but Gupta acknowledged there’s still an overall lack of knowledge about how to use GPUs effectively. That’s why so much real innovation still remains with these large users that have the parallel-programming skills necessary to take advantage of 2,500 or more cores at a time (and even more in multi-GPU systems).

Source: Nvidia

Source: Nvidia

However, Nvidia is looking beyond servers and into robotics to fuel some of its machine learning ambitions over the next decade. Last week, the company announced its Jetson TK1 development kit, which Gupta called “a supercomputing version of Raspberry Pi.” At $192, the kit is programmable using CUDA and includes all the ports one might expect to see, as well as a Tegra K1 system-on-a-chip (the latest version of Nvidia’s mobile processor) that’s comprised of a 192-core Kepler GPU, an ARM Cortex A15 CPU and 300 gigaflops of performance.

Well into the 1990s, that type of performance would have put Jetson at or near near the top of any list of the world’s fastest supercomputers.

The company is touting the kit for computer vision, security and other computations that will be critical to mainstream robotics, and Gupta raised the question of how fast the internet of things might advance if smart devices came equipped with this kind of power. While Google and Facebook might train massive artificial intelligence models across hundreds or thousands of servers (or, in Google’s case, on a quantum computer) in their data centers, one big goal is to get the resulting algorithms running on smartphones to reduce the amount of data that needs to be sent immediately to the cloud for processing. Three hundred gigaflops embedded into a Nest thermostat or a drone, for example, is nothing to sneeze at.

Nvidia expects the rise in machine learning workloads to drive “pretty good” revenue growth in the years to come, Gupta said, but beyond the obvious examples he’s not ready to predict the types of computations its GPUs will end up running. “We’ve only just figured out how to use machine learning for a few things, but in fact it’s applicable to a lot of things,” he said. With respect to the Jetson kit, he added, “We’re still trying to imagine what you can do with it.”

Related research and analysis from Gigaom Research:
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drag2share: E-tattoo can monitor health, store data and deliver drugs

Source: http://gigaom.com/2014/03/31/e-tattoo-can-monitor-health-store-data-and-deliver-drugs/

Ultra-thin sticky patches packed with electronics, sometimes known as e-skin or e-tattoos, could someday track our health and deliver drugs at exactly the right moment.

Researchers at the University of Texas-Austin have taken a step closer to that future by combining many features of existing e-tattoos to create a version that can both monitor health and deliver drugs. The team says it is the first patch that can also store data, which can then be uploaded to a computer.

The patch is just 0.003 millimeters thick — far thinner than a piece of human hair. It’s capable of sensing movement and vital signs like temperature via tiny sensors. It also contains RAM for storage.

The Austin team believes the patch could someday be of use to people with epilepsy or Parkinson’s disease. It could also be used to monitor patients after they leave the hospital or deliver drugs over long periods of time.

Unfortunately, the tattoo can’t yet operate on its own, according to Nature. To support the memory feature, it still needs to be wired to a power supply and data transmitter. Researchers have already miniaturized both technologies, but no current solutions are flexible enough to be integrated into an e-skin patch. Wirelessly transmitting the data it collects would also be challenging.

“It’s a pretty complicated system to integrate onto a piece of tattoo material,” study co-author Nanshu Lu said to Nature. “It’s still pretty far away.”

Related research and analysis from Gigaom Research:
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drag2share: Ultrakam lets your iPhone capture higher resolution film-like video clips

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2014/03/31/ultrakam-app-2k-film-video-iphone-ipad/

While Sony and Samsung are busy making phones with 4K recording capabilities, one developer has worked its pixel magic to get more from iPhone cameras. Ultrakam is the first iOS app capable of recording "2K" resolution with a film-like 24p frame rate, letting iPhone 5s owners shoot 2240 x 1672 pixel video (around 75 percent more pixels than regular HD) to output higher-quality footage than the default camera app. There's support for the iPhone 5 and 5c, as well as the the iPad mini and iPad with Retina display, but the app is limited to high-definition and "2K" at 20fps on less-equipped devices.

Including an array of settings and various shooting modes that allow you to record higher bit-rate video and audio, with a minute of footage consuming up to 3GB of storage on max settings (expect that 64GB iPhone 5s to fill up fast), Ultrakam is primarily aimed at filmmakers. However, there's plenty of neat features for regular users to show off their talent. It offers slow motion video, but again the iPhone 5s has all the fun, as it supports slow motion capture at 120fps over the iPhone 5's 60fps. You can slow down your recordings by up to 10x if you choose the lowest preset. The app also supports timelapse shooting, offering custom configurations that will snap high resolution photos at set intervals, combining them to output a high-quality landscape. Once you've shot your footage, Ultrakam's built-in player and editing tools let you play video, generate stills, color correct and share them with ease. Ultrakam is available on the App Store for $6.99 -- a little more costly than your regular camera app, but the extra quality and advanced features may justify the price.

Filed under: Cellphones, Software, Mobile

Via: The Next Web

Source: Ultrakam, (App Store)

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drag2share: Intel's SD card-sized computer may not be so tiny after all

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2014/03/31/intel-sd-card-sized-edison-change/

Back at CES, Intel made a big deal of the fact that it could squeeze a Linux-based PC with Bluetooth and WiFi into the size and shape of an SD card. However, with just a few months to go before the launch of these miniscule Edison development boards, it looks like the chip-maker has changed tack. Instead of being based on the Quark SoC, which was specifically designed for wearables and the Internet of Things, the first Edison products will actually rely on a more traditional Atom chip -- in other words, the same sort used in many current Windows tablets and hybrids. An Edison PC based on Atom should deliver more grunt and connectivity options compared to Quark, and for less money, but it'd be too chubby to ever get accidentally jammed in an SD slot. That's why Intel has been forced to admit that, while it continues to work on Quark, the Edison devices coming this summer will be "slightly larger" than was first claimed.

Filed under: Intel

Via: Bit-tech

Source: Intel

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