General Gaming Article |
- Report: Nuance Acquiring Swype Keyboard for $100 Million
- Intellectual Ventures Suing Motorola for Patent Infringement
- Nexus Specs Leak Out, Device To Be Called Galaxy Nexus
- The 18 Best Web Shows You've Never Watched
- Overclocker Takes Unreleased Intel Core i7 2700K Processor to 5GHz on Air
- Microsoft Considers Making Another Run at Yahoo
- Genius SW-G2.1 1250 2.1 Speakers
- Western Digital Rolls Out New Generation WD TV Live with Spotify
- Nvidia Offers Work-Around To Unlock Rage's Hi-Res Graphics
- Browser Extension of the Week: Tasks
| Report: Nuance Acquiring Swype Keyboard for $100 Million Posted: 06 Oct 2011 08:34 PM PDT
Swype has been a huge hit on Android devices for the past year or two in beta form. The main business model of Swype has been to sign deals with OEMs to get their software pre-loaded. Users of phones without that access have been able to use the free beta, which is actually updated more often. Nuance is known mostly for voice input, but their T9 keyboard for Android does have a gesture system like Swype, it's just not very good. It's unclear if Nuance will keep the Swype product alive, or if the technology will simply be rolled into the Nuance products. Any Swype users out there feeling a bit worried? |
| Intellectual Ventures Suing Motorola for Patent Infringement Posted: 06 Oct 2011 02:45 PM PDT
IV has made name for itself acquiring patents from all over the country, and using them to extract licensing fees from organizations large and small. Many of the patents are for extremely broad processes that could be applied to most pieces of technology. IV says that Motorola itself is infringing on six patents, but did not specify which ones. It could be that Motorola is trying to wait out IV until the Google acquisition goes through, but that could take longer than expected. How do you feel about what IV does? |
| Nexus Specs Leak Out, Device To Be Called Galaxy Nexus Posted: 06 Oct 2011 02:19 PM PDT
The Galaxy Nexus is expected to run Android Ice Cream Sandwich with no manufacturer skins or alterations. The 9mm thick chassis houses a TI OMAP 4460 dual-core SoC at 1.2GHz. Although GSM Arena claims the processor will be a 1.5GHz Exynos. There will also reportedly be 1GB of RAM, 32GB of storage, a 5MP rear camera, 1.3MP front sensor, and NFC. The reason for the Verizon tie-in is apparently so the device can run on Big Red's fast 4G LTE network. BGR has been reporting some of these details for several weeks now, and other sites claim to have heard similar things. We'll find out for sure on Tuesday, but it's looking quite impressive if true. |
| The 18 Best Web Shows You've Never Watched Posted: 06 Oct 2011 12:20 PM PDT Raise your hand if you've heard of Epic Meal Time. Great. What about Leo Laporte's This Week in Tech? Excellent. Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog? If most of you geeks aren't raising your hands by now, something's wrong. Is your YouTube broken? Thanks to the combined powers of the Internet, Webcams, and creativity, a world full of bored office workers now has access to some of the most interesting, funny, and downright weird video content at the mere click of a mouse. And when these popular videos all center on a specific theme, we call that a "show"—in some cases, a "channel," depending on who's hosting the videos. Get my drift? But here's the age-old problem: There's just too much content out there. If you aren't an Internet sleuth, there's a pretty good chance you're missing out on all sorts of awesome episodic video content if it doesn't contain the words "Red," "Blue," or "Revision" somewhere in the title. And that's why I'm here: I'm not going to point you in the direction of super well-known video shows that you could (really, should) be watching. I'm here to show you some of the slightly less popular gems that might have flown under your Geek Radar for some odd reason. I'll wait while you make the popcorn. How It Should Have EndedExcellent production value, excellent comedy, and excellent use of creative, alternative storylines for all of your favorite movies and games: Welcome to How It Should Have Ended. If you've been hacked off at a less than stellar ending to something you've watched or played, then you owe it to yourself to check out this parody series' alternate, animated shorts. Doesn't World of Warcraft's Arthas Menethil deserve a vacation instead of daily heroic raid defenses, after all? I think so. The LXDIt's hard to find a good place to start desciribing the LXD. Here are the essentials: The Web show takes place right in the brief period of time between 1920 to just around the year 3,000. Two rival groups are sparring for dominance: The League of Extraordinary Dancers (not Gentlemen, we note) and The Alliance of the Dark. But don't let the corny names dissuade you, for this beautifully choreographed Web series is nothing short of the best parts of So You Think You Can Dance combined with the best parts of, say, the X-Men. Episodes of The LXD is easily one of the more cultured ways you can spend 10 minutes of your busy day. You Suck At PhotoshopYou do. And I do. Becuase few possess the raw, artistic mastery of fictional PhotoShop guru Donnie Hoyle, exemplified in a series of video tutorials that really have to be seen to be believed. For you don't watch these for the tutorials per se; you watch these videos for the subtext—like that of Episode 3, where Hoyle shows users exactly how to use PhotoShop's clone tool by editing out his supposed wife's wedding ring from their official photos. Unfortunately, Hoyle now sucks at YouTube, for the series only delivered 20 episodes in 2008. I'm not trying to bait-and-switch you with a legacy Web series on purpose. This is just one classic gem that's definitely worth an afternoon viewing session. TroopersOkay, this one's on College Humor, but that doesn't mean that it's necessarily permeated Internet pop culture as much as a Samwell or a Tosh.0 or what-have-you. The Web series Troopers chronicles—what else—the lives of those poor legions of clones running security on a big-as-a-moon battle station that may or may not have a striking resemblance to another spherical battle station from a certain series of movies being constantly refreshed by that George Lucas guy. Got it? Here's a spoiler: Never leave a suggestion in your workplace's suggestion box, especially if your boss wields the mastery of the Force. Wreckless EatingTake the average mindset of an Epic Meal Time contributor and exchange the love of bacon for a love of projectile vomiting and horror. What you've just created is the average plot for a typical episode of Wreckless Eating. In this show, as the name implies, the contributors do just about everything possible to put each other in a coma (not food coma) from the poor, poor ideas that they conjure up in the kitchen. I mean, really, who would have ever thought that a mustard-chugging contest was a good idea? Hilarious, yes! Good? No! My Drunk KitchenContinuing the food theme, what happens when—instead of trying to make your friends throw up by drinking and eating vile concoctions (or massive quantities of alcohol)—you instead imbibe your booze yourself and attempt to make scrumptious meals? Welcome to Hannah Hart's kitchen, where the first recipe on the menu is: Get loaded. And the main course? Well, it's certainly supposed to be something. Hart's attempts to go from ingredients, to baking, to edible products are highly entertaining so long as she promises to never make you sit down at the table. The Drunken HobbyistStraight from a Reddit thread to your YouTube, The Drunken Hobbyist is an emerging series for those who don't give a lick about drunk cooking, but would much prefer to watch some dude imbibe and attempt everyday tasks. Or perhaps every other day tasks, as it's not very often that you or I probably saunter up to the barre and attempt a few ballet positions—let alone attempt to recreate the best of Black Swan—after a brief warm-up at the wine bottle. The production quality isn't stellar on this video series, but the idea is certainly there…as is the hilarity. Angry Video Game NerdMight not want to put this one on the ol' speakers at work, because the title reflects exactly what you're getting: Scathing gaming videos that combine clever cursing with creative commentary. James Rolfe might have a lot of inner rage—and a never-ending supply of old-school gaming titles—but he actually has some valuable insight lurking behind his angry showmanship. And here's how you know he's the real deal: Dude's even got his own feature-length movie in the works. GOLDDungeons and Drago—er, Goblins & Gold—is serious business. And with the stakes higher than ever for the upcoming World Goblins & Gold Championship, a team of intense adventurers hit the tables, unzip the dice bags, and throw down critical hits across six episodes in this Web series' first big season. It's smart, it's funny, it's geeky: You aren't going to find more fun Dungeons and Dragons-themed Web videos unless they involve the phrase, "attacking the darkness." FacerockerTechnically, Facerocker isn't a show—it's a website, hosted by three cool Internet dudes: Matthew Arnold, Freddie Wong, and Brandon Laatsch. But their names aren't nearly as important as their video skills. From their presentation, to their funny, to their FX—well, OK, mainly their FX—these guys know how to cut right to a geek's core. I realize none of this is very descriptive to what the videos they make actually are, so I'll cut to the chase: Anyone who can augment a standard go kart video with fancy graphics to make it appear as if it was some kind of real-life Mario Kart is a win in my book. These dudes are definitely worth checking out. Killing My LobsterThis series of comedy shorts is mostly themed around the San Francisco Bay Area, but don't just throw away this particular video project because you don't live in California. From time to time, the sketch comedy group Killing My Lobster transcends geography to bring some heartwarming, nostalgic narratives to the digital equivalent of the silver screen. Case in point: The group's tribute to outdated technology (except for those horrible things called fax machines) should bring a tear to the eye of any Maximum PC enthusiast over the age of 7. The Legend of NeilRaise your hand if you've ever played any games within the Legend of Zelda series. Ok. Now put your hands down, all of you. The very, very few of you that did not raise your hands are now tasked with borrowing a friend's Super Nintendo and firing up the greatest title of them all, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (no arguments!). And those of you that have indeed sampled this delightful game (or any game in the Zelda world) will surely enjoy The Legend of Neil. It's the story of a common man transported into The Legend of Zelda and tasked with, well, getting out. My tip? Get Zora's Flippers, man. (Thanks to Michael Lerch for the tip on this one!) The CompatishThree guys. One love of sportsmanship. Tons of idiotic ways to try and best each other. That's the entire premise of the YouTube series, "The Compatish." Think of it as a variant of all the various "Watch us eat tons of food and barf" Web shows on the Internet. Only, replace "eating food" with "awesome tests of skill and bravery," like the dreaded Belly-Flop competition, the silly Cup-Stacking competition, and good ol' fashioned Strip Spelling, and you've got the ingredients for a funny—but not all that disgusting—series of face-offs. The Piano GuysAlright, Maximum PC readers. It's time to class up the joint a little bit. The Piano Guys isn't just your average YouTube channel of people jamming to one of the following two scenarios: Songs you've never heard of, or the exact same rendition of Super Mario Brothers that you've heard 38,000 times. The Piano Guys—technically, a pianist and a cellist—both play a variety of songs themselves (musicals, pop covers, classical stuff, Charlie Brown, Star Wars, et cetera) accompanied by some beautiful cinematography on the production end. Ultimately, these guys are half-geeks, half-musicians, and all-entertainers. Now when do we get a video for the Halo theme? Around the World for FreeI'm not going to spare any punches on this one: This show is absolutely nuts. Or, rather, the premise of the show is absolutely nuts: Tasking a person to pull a 21st-century Ferdinand Magellan and make it completely around the globe. The traveler comes into the journey without any cash whatsoever, just a backpack full of essentials and the power of the show's Internet-based fan base offering tips, help, and other assistance. As the show puts it, Around the World for Free comes with, "no script, no itinerary, no security." These people are playing traveler on Hardcore Mode, and their adventures are pretty exciting to watch from the comfort of one's desk. The Black Cab SessionsStraight from London (usually), The Black Cab Sessions is an awesome simple Web series. Singers, bands, or any combination thereof are invited to come play in the rear seat of a typical British taxicab. Yes, these are going to be acoustic sets unless someone's found a way to power an amp with a cigarette lighter adapter (and then there's the issue of getting the amp in the car in the first place). No, the strange idea doesn't mean that you're just going to see a lot of bands in a cab that you don't really know. For the full lineup—no fare required—check out The Black Cab Sessions' site! Little Cat Version of MeIt was bound to happen sometime: The art of developing successful YouTube videos got turned into a YouTube series itself. Meta, yes. Funny? Also yes. Little Cat Version of Me, as the name implies, follows two guys attempting to themselves follow the footsteps of the 58,041,413 cat videos on YouTube. The goal? Striking instant popularity through the exploits of their adorable cat, Meowla. The bummer? You only get the 11 episodes you see. Apparently, Meowla wasn't that big of a success after all. It nevertheless seems fitting to include a commentary on Web video popularity within a list of popular Web shows, no? UnskippableBad video game cutscenes suck—that's almost self-explanatory, I realize. That's why they deserved to be mocked in a fun, voiceover fashion, and that's exactly what The Escapists's Unskippable show delivers. Sit back, relax, and enjoy all the horrible video game cinematics that you've always mocked with your friends on couches in living rooms nationwide. And developers, please, do better than these |
| Overclocker Takes Unreleased Intel Core i7 2700K Processor to 5GHz on Air Posted: 06 Oct 2011 12:17 PM PDT
That's a nice bump over the chip's stock 3.5GHz clockspeed. Getting there required setting the BCLK to 100MHz and the multiplier to x50. The overclocked chip completed a successful SuperPi run through 1M and a CPUmark pass. It's not quite the same as Prime95 or Orthos, but it is an early indicator that the chip is stable well past its rated clockspeed. In addition to running at 3.5GHz stock, the Core i7 2700K sports a 3.9GHz Turbo frquency, 8MB of L3 cache, Intel HD 3000 graphics (850MHz/1350MHz), dual-channel DDR3-1333 memory controller, and a 95W TDP. Image Credit: Coolaler.com (u48802109) |
| Microsoft Considers Making Another Run at Yahoo Posted: 06 Oct 2011 11:52 AM PDT
According to Reuters, Microsoft is one of many companies preparing offers for the $20 billion search entity. The other parties don't have same name recognition as Microsoft -- DST Global, for instance -- but they're loaded with cash. Microsoft, while interested, has yet to fully decide if it will submit an official bid, and it's possible it would do so with a partner, Reuters heard from one of its sources. Despite all the chatter, not everyone is convinced Microsoft will make a move, or even should. "I think it's unlikely because they have been down this path before," Ben Schachter, an analyst with Macquarie Research, told Reuters. "In a lot of ways they've gotten what they want out of it already, with the search deal. I could make a case for a lot of synergies. But it's certainly not a strategic priority in any way." BusinessInsider thinks the only way the deal makes sense for Microsoft is if it guts a large portion of Yahoo by firing "all the people involved in duplicate corporate functions -- HR, legal, the board of directors -- and then DOESN'T TOUCH ANOTHER THING." The upshot to an acquisition is Microsoft would end up with the most traffic and ad reach, surpassing Google by a significant margin. |
| Genius SW-G2.1 1250 2.1 Speakers Posted: 06 Oct 2011 11:34 AM PDT We don't bring products into the Lab just to beat them up, so we almost didn't bite when Genius pitched these speakers. We also try not to prejudge products, but we didn't have high expectations for this 2.1-channel speaker system: It looks cheesier than a wedge of Vermont cheddar and sells online for less than 50 bucks. We were fully prepared for a craptastic audio experience. Wow, were we ever off base. Corsair needn't worry that Genius will bump its exceptionally good SP2500 speakers off our Best of the Best list—the SW-G2.1 1250 isn't that good—but it is better than we thought any $50 speakers could be. We're not sure if the weird hourglass shape of the ABS plastic satellite cabinets is supposed to serve a function or is just an odd design decision, and we hate the hardwired speaker cables that connect them to the subwoofer. But we have no complaints about how they sound.
We're also not sure what Genius sprayed on the one-way drivers to achieve that shiny red finish. These are simple 3-inch paper cones with inexpensive foam surrounds, so we were quite surprised with their capacity for reproducing both midrange and high frequencies without dedicated tweeters. While listening to "He Was a Big Freak," from funk diva Betty Davis's They Say I'm Different, we found that the satellites rendered the drummer's high hat unexpectedly tight and crisp without compromising Davis's lusty screams and guttural growls. The compact subwoofer's design is equally simply: a 5.25-inch paper cone driver with a foam surround housed inside a 9mm MDF cabinet. This isn't the tightest sub we've heard, and it's easily driven to distortion if you crank the bass dial much farther than the halfway point, but it does move an incredible amount of air through its rear reflex port. We thought the bar across the face of the compact sub might be there to protect the woofer, but Genius tells us it's just for decoration. Most 2.1-channel speaker systems tuck the amplifier inside the subwoofer cabinet, but Genius houses this one in its own enclosure. And we suspect the amp is the component most responsible for this system's better-than-average sound. Most inexpensive active speaker systems utilize class D amps, but a more sophisticated class AB amp drives this system. The amp delivers just 9 watts RMS per channel to the satellites and 20 watts RMS to the subwoofer, though, so don't expect to fill a large room with sound using this system. It's plenty loud for near-field listening—including gaming—and the satellites don't distort, even with the volume control pegged. The aforementioned hardwired speaker cables limit your options when placing the components, and having the amp in its own enclosure will add to your desktop clutter, but we like its large primary volume knob, and we doubly appreciate having a discrete bass control. This is no audiophile system, but we predict we'll kiss a lot more frogs before we find another set of cheap speakers that sound this good. $50 (street), www.geniusnet.com |
| Western Digital Rolls Out New Generation WD TV Live with Spotify Posted: 06 Oct 2011 11:18 AM PDT
The new device sports a slightly updated look compared to its predecessor. You won't find a 1TB hard drive inside like there is with the WD TV Live Hub, or any internal storage for that matter, though WD did add 802.11n Wi-Fi and Full HD 1080p video support to the list of features. It also has two USB ports you can use to plug in your own external drives. Western Digital doesn't appear to have skimped on its Spotify integration. Many of Spotify's popular features are included, such as being able to create and manage playlists, share songs, and subscribe to other people's playlists. The WD TV Live is available now for $100 MSRP. |
| Nvidia Offers Work-Around To Unlock Rage's Hi-Res Graphics Posted: 06 Oct 2011 11:08 AM PDT
The tweak involves the creation of a new config file named, appropriately enough, rageconfig.cfg, which will override Rage's auto-balancer program and force the game to play in hi-res. You can find step-by-step directions and file text over at the Nvidia website, but you'll only want to check it out if you have a beefy graphics card: author Andrew Burnes warns that you'll "almost certainly require a video card with 1.5GB of Video RAM to enable 8K textures, other graphical niceties and GPU Transcoding, though it may also work on systems with just 1GB of VRAM if said options are toned down." If you have an Nvidia card, Burnes explains how you can further increase playability by adding more lines of text to the rageconfig.cfg file that affect GPU transcoding to "increase your frame rates, improve in-game visual fidelity, and reduce texture streaming issues." |
| Browser Extension of the Week: Tasks Posted: 06 Oct 2011 11:06 AM PDT
Tasks is a Chrome browser extension that allows users to peruse, add, and check off items from their Google Task list from their browser's navigation bar. So long as you've got a browser window open, you'll have access to your tasks through a minimal or full sized Google Tasks interface designed to suit your needs no matter how much or how little you've got to keep track of.
For those of you out there who prefer their task management be left to other online services such as Remember the Milk or Toodledo, Tasks has you covered. Tasks offers full support for Remember the Milk users, and experimental support for other online task management services as well. Just right click on the extension, select options, and input your credentials. Nothing could be easier.
Be sure to check in every Monday for another edition of Maximum PC's Browser Extension of the Week.
|
According to Uncrunched, Nuance has 
If you've never heard of Intellectual Ventures, get your confused face ready. This patent holding firm, which makes nothing but does hold about 35,000 patents, has filed suit against Motorola Mobility for 
With Samsung's CTIA event just days away, the Android leaks are really starting to hit. According to BGR and GSM Arena, the upcoming Nexus device has been dubbed the 
There's reason to be excited about the upcoming launch of Intel's Core i7 2700K processor. News of this processor's existence and eventual release were leaked to the Web just a few weeks ago, and already engineering samples have fallen into adventurous hands. One person who got their mitts on one put the chip through its paces by overclocking it to 
There's something about Yahoo that Microsoft finds irresistible. Maybe it's the fact that others are interested and it's driving Microsoft crazy, or perhaps it's because Yahoo rejected the software jock's advances three years ago. In any event, new reports are surfacing that suggest Microsoft still wants what it couldn't have and is considering making another bid for Yahoo.
We've been duly impressed with Western Digital's media streamers, handing out high marks to both the WD TV Live and WD TV Live Hub in our reviews (
Rage: more than a game, 
As anyone who's used a computer will tell you, a service or application's usability is directly influenced by its accessibility. In other words, if you can't get to it, you're not going to use it. Google in particular has learned this lesson well. Their popular Google Calendar and Gmail services, which were once an online-only affair, were recently given a load of offline functionality by the Mountain View based company, making countless users around the interwebz very happy puppies indeed. Unfortunately, since Google hasn't gotten around to giving us the same offline awesomeness with Google Tasks, a third-party developer has taken it upon himself to make using Google's already very useful product just a little bit easier.
| You are subscribed to email updates from Maximum PC - All Articles To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |
