Hobbyists have been assembling personal computers from their components for decades, buying the processors and other parts and putting them together in their basements. Now they're doing the same for tablet computers. Among them is Michael Castor of Make, the publisher of geek do-it-yourself info...
http://qz.com/165822/pipad-hobbyists-are-building-tablets-using-a-raspberry-pi/
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Every month, Netflix updates its ISP Speed Index to show how each provider fared in the preceding month. The rankings rarely change, especially in the US where Google Fiber is always first. For December, however, a little tidbit stood out: "Performance was up in all countries, except the US and M...
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Source: http://gizmodo.com/you-can-build-this-elegant-rapberry-pi-tablet-yourself-1500900271
Hey, a new tablet! Crisp 10-inch touchscreen? Check. Luxurious carbon fiber and wood case? Present. Huge 10,000mAh battery? Yep. Linux-based and built at home? Err...
Source: http://gizmodo.com/sony-s-xperia-t2-ultra-2014-s-first-gigantaphone-1500913706
Sony's announced a new mid-to-high-end "phablet" model today, with its Xperia T2 Ultra arriving in both normal and dual-SIM options. It combines a 1080p display with a 13-Megapixel camera, with Sony plumbing its quad-core Qualcomm MSM8928 chipset into 1GB of RAM.
Google Image Search has allowed users to filter results based on how they're licensed since 2009, but the option remained hidden under an advanced options menu where few users ever look. Now, a request by law professor and Creative Commons founding member Lawrence Lessig has changed that. Bing added the option to filter by licensing rights last July with placement front and center, and Googler Matt Cutts tweeted that his company's search engine has a similar option, shown above. Perfect for bloggers in a hurry (cough) or anyone looking to whip up an image for a new meme, it can pick out images labeled for reuse, reuse with modification, or commercial variants of either.
It was a pretty quiet year for Toshiba. Other than a few TVs and a couple of laptop PCs, all the company had to show was a single Chromebook. Granted, this was Toshiba's first Chromebook, which is sort of an interesting story in and of itself: It's basically the last major PC maker to jump on board. The $279 Toshiba Chromebook, as it's so very appropriately called, has a 13-inch screen, which, for whatever reason, has never been used on a Chrome OS device before. Under the hood, it runs off a Haswell-series Celeron 2955U CPU -- a nice boost over the sort of ARM processor used in the identically priced HP Chromebook 11. Additionally, that larger footprint means the Toshiba Chromebook offers a more spacious keyboard than most, along with deeper key travel, too. It may not have been groundbreaking enough to win a Best of CES Award, but among Chromebooks, at least, it looks like it might actually be a good deal.
The graph above comes courtesy of Tom's Hardware and, whichever way you look it, it suggests NVIDIA is onto a good thing. The company's recently announced Tegra K1 processor combines a handful of ARM Cortex-A15 CPUs with a GPU based on the same successful Kepler graphics architecture found in des...
http://www.engadget.com/2014/01/13/nvidia-tegra-k1-mobile-chip-benchmarks-vs-apple/
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Source: http://gizmodo.com/this-amazing-light-bending-metamaterial-can-do-calculu-1498877144
When we last saw metamaterials, they were helping us create real-life invisibility cloaks
Source: http://gizmodo.com/google-built-an-insane-neural-network-to-id-house-numbe-1499897368
Google Street View is brilliant. It finds us when we're lost, it shows us where we are, it reveals places we'll never get to visit, and so on and so forth. But you know what's even more amazing? The crazy neural network that Street View is built on.
Source: http://www.engadget.com/2014/01/10/polaroid-50GSR9000-hands-on-4k-tv/
Like the high school kid who doesn't get invited to go out partying with the in-crowd, Polaroid decided that the best way that it could turn some jaded heads was with a dramatic reinvention. The company pulled up outside CES with a whole new range of cameras, tablets and a 4K TV, the latter of which was one of a small few that broke the $1,000 barrier. When we went to examine the 50-inch UHD panel, an executive remarked that this un-smart TV would likely get a price cut before it hits store shelves in order to undercut rivals from Vizio and Kogan. Of course, there's no word on just how much cheaper this unit will be, but we figure it'll be hashed out with the accountants in due course.
The unit itself, meanwhile, uses an Innolux panel and comes with a trio of HDMI 1.4 inputs in addition to a USB port -- although it's our sad duty to inform you that the latter can only be used for firmware upgrades. The company also believes that most buyers will already own a Chromecast, Apple TV or similar gear, and so omitted Roku's built-in streaming stick tech, putting the gear at a disadvantage compared to the aforementioned Vizios and Kogans of this world. Still, for now, it's scheduled to arrive in May, and for now at least, you can expect to pay $1,000 for the pleasure of mounting it to your living room wall.
Nicole Lee counted all 3,840 x 2,160 pixels on these TVs by hand for this report.
Filed under: Home Entertainment, Mobile
Source: http://www.engadget.com/2014/01/10/parrot-ar-drone-thalmic-labs-myo/
Ah, Las Vegas, the perfect location for a spontaneous wedding. Earlier today, we witnessed a quick and dirty collaboration between Parrot and Thalmic Labs at CES, where they paired an AR.Drone 2.0 with a MYO gesture-control armband. The demonstrator was able to control the drone's tilt direction by using just one arm, as well as toggling the rotors by clicking fingers. This author gave it a go as well and found this control method to be as effortless as it looked, though due to the WiFi interference on the show floor (ugh, so typical of large events these days), the drone had to stay within a close proximity of the iPad that was relaying the MYO's commands.
There wasn't a way to adjust the vehicle's height in that particular demo, but there's no stopping Thalmic Labs from assigning additional gestures for that -- maybe clench fist to ascend and spread hand to descend. Understandably, neither company could confirm whether they are bringing this feature to market, but we'd be very surprised if they don't sustain their marriage moving forward.
Filed under: Robots, Wearables
Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/new-ipad-app-from-siri-creators-2014-1
Every episode of a kid's show follows a similar pattern where the main character will pause, turn to the screen and ask a question to the viewer.
Children are supposed to eagerly shout at the screen with the answer. Regardless of what someone says, the character on screen and continue on with the show.
If this is supposed to be educational, how are kids really learning anything if they're given the answer anyways?
Toytalk, a company founded by veteran Pixar Animation execs Oren Jacob and Martin Reddy, have an app that literally answers this question.
The company's first project is called The Winston Show. Its a cartoon app starring Winston and Ellington, co-hosts of a digital talk show which makes kids become the special guests. The best part? It actually talks back to you.
Oren explained the big difference between Toytalk's app and traditional kids shows is this: 'We believe that when conversation is entertaining, it fosters imagination and lets kids explore and grow.'
Voice recognition software harnesses the iPad's microphone makes it possible for Winston to ask questions, listen to the answer and respond to it. Children can actually have an immersive learning experience since the app is teaching them something instead of just giving them the answer. Despite that, Winston can occasionally provide a generic response if he can't understand the question.
Five sketches are built into the application for users to enjoy with over 12 hours of interactive content. Children can choose to compete against a multitude of colorful characters in a variety of quiz shows, create their own story in a segment called Writers Room or just have a fireside chat with Winston on any topic.
When I asked Oren what he feature he was most proud of on Toytalk, he said, "Personally I am most proud that our writing never talks down to kids. We believe that kids always have something smart to say and deserve the same from their entertainment.! "
Instead of opting to premiere their new product on TV, Toytalk decided to bring The Winston Show to the iPad since Oren considered it to be the most "advanced entertainment platform." Also, children were the ideal target for this program because the founders felt that they would be the most receptive audience.
For now, Toytalk is keeping The Winston Show just on the iPad. Season 2 will be coming out this year but the release date has yet to be announced. If parents are seeking a beneficial way to harness technology for their kids, you can download the app for free here. A demo of the app can be seen below.
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Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/verruckt-water-slide-in-kansas-city-2014-1
Kansas City's Verrückt water slide is the largest in the world, taller than Niagara Falls and absolutely unreal-sounding.
It's approximately 17 stories tall (the official height will be announced later). Look at this insanity:
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Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/game-of-thrones-tesla-coil-theme-song-2014-1
You have to love the creative pursuits of "guy in garage."
YouTube user Arc AttackMusic has loads of videos demonstrating his Tesla coils and their musical capabilities. One of the songs in his Tesla coil repertoire is the "Game of Thrones" theme song.
Here's the video description:
We built these little Tesla coils so that we could check them onto airplanes as baggage. We had to test them. That is the reason this video exists.
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Source: http://gizmodo.com/target-hackers-also-swiped-personal-info-of-70-million-1498591606
So remember a few weeks ago
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