General Gaming Article

General Gaming Article

Homeless People Double As 4G Hotspots At SXSW Conference

Posted: 12 Mar 2012 09:13 AM PDT

From the "We're not sure how we feel about this" department: People attending the SXSW conference in Austin, Texas have a new way to get online -- homeless people. The Bartle Bogle Hegarty marketing firm has launched a non-profit drive called "Homeless Hotspots." Basically, they supply homeless Austin residents with a 4G MiFi hotspot; the homeless people wear a shirt listing their name and access info for the hotspot; and you give the homeless person a donation (which he then keeps) to use the connection.

It's a kind of interesting setup that solves an accessibility problem and puts cash in the pockets of those who need it, but a lot of people are expressing unease about it. A lot of the discontent revolve around the wording on the homeless people's shirts, which read "I'm <insert name here>, a 4G hotspot." Some would rather the shirts say "I'm running a 4G hotspot" or something similar.

Semantics aside, there's no questioning the good that comes from the program: BBH supplied the hotspot devices for free, and the homeless "managers" get to keep the money they raise from people using the service. (BBH suggests a donation of $2/15 minutes, and allows you to donate to specific managers/hotspots via PayPal on the homelesshotspots.org website if you don't have cash on hand.) BBH, of course, gets a case study in new advertising/message campaigns.

As we said, we're not really sure how to feel about this. Offhand, it seems like a decently well-intentioned, innovative idea, but turning the homeless into roaming 4G hotspots just seems like something from a dystopian sci-fi novel. What are your thoughts?

Thanks to Wired.com for pointing this out! Image taken from this YouTube video.

Blizzard: No PvP At Diablo III Launch

Posted: 12 Mar 2012 09:07 AM PDT

Remember when we thought that Diablo III was going to launch in 2011? Ah, those were the days. But Blizzard put a halt to that rumor train soon after the launch of D3's closed beta test, pushing the game back to Q2 2012 to avoid releasing a game that was "almost ready." They apparently don't want to release "almost ready" components of the game, either: Blizzard recently said that Diablo III won't include PvP when it launches.

Game director Jay Wilson dropped the bomb on the Battle.net website: As we're counting down the days until we're ready to announce a release date for Diablo III, we've come to realize that the PvP game and systems aren't yet living up to our standards. Today, we wanted to let you know that we've made the difficult decision to hold back the PvP Arena system and release it in a patch following the game's launch. After a lot of consideration and discussion, we ultimately felt that delaying the whole game purely for PvP would just be punishing to everyone who's waiting to enjoy the campaign and core solo/co-op content, all of which is just about complete.

On the positive side, Wilson promises that PvP will include new achievements, maps, a "personal progression system" and a matchmaking system -- when it gets around to launching, that is.

While the PvP setback is a bit disheartening, I for one appreciate that Blizzard has high quality standards and plans on releasing the majority of the game rather than delaying the super-hyped title even further. (Although an official release date would be even better.) What do you think about Diablo III's PvP delay?

YouTube Video Shows How "Real People" React To Windows 8

Posted: 12 Mar 2012 09:01 AM PDT

Consumers downloaded the Windows 8 Consumer Preview over a million times in less than 24 hours, but we're willing to bet that the majority of those downloads came from the technically inclined rather than, say, your parents. The tech world has already proclaimed what it likes and doesn't like in Windows 8 -- but do everyday people really care if W8 has an enhanced contact app? Can everyday people even locate the contact app in W8? Lockergnome's Chris Pirillo decided to put the W8 interface to the test by plopping his elderly father down in front of the new OS with no introduction.

As you can see, Pappa Pirillo struggled to find his way back to the Metro home screen after opening Windows Explorer. What does this prove? Nothing, really -- it's far from a scientific test. But anecdotally, the video shows that the loss of a Start button and the schizoid Metro/Classic interface will likely cause headaches in everyday non-techie users who think that, say, Internet Explorer is the Internet. Or, as Pappa Pirillo says, "Are they trying to drive me to Mac?"

Thanks to Geek.com for pointing this out!

AVADirect Announces Intel E5 Xeon Processor Options for Servers and Workstations

Posted: 12 Mar 2012 08:20 AM PDT

The boutique system builders at AVADirect tell us they've updated their professional server and workstation systems to now include Intel Xeon E5 processor options. Intel's E5 Xeon chips are based on the chip maker's Sandy Bridge-E architecture and come in quad-core, six-core, and eight-core flavors starting with the E5 2603 (four cores, 1.8GHz, 10MB cache, 80W TDP) on up to the E5 2690 (eight cores, 2.9GHz, 20MB cache, 135W TDP).

AVADirect offers the latest E5 Xeon processors in four different configuration types, including 1U, 2U, and 4U/Pedestal servers manufactured by Supermicro, and various workstations, culminating in AVADirect's E5 Xeon Supercomputer, a powerhouse system that starts at $4,759.73 and includes a Lian Li Armorsuit PC-80 tower case, Asus Z9PE-D8 WS motherboard, a pair of Intel Xeon E5 2603 processors, Arctic Cooling Freezer i30 CPU coolers, 8GB of Crucial DDR3-1333 memory, PNY Quadro 600 graphics card, Nvidia Tesla C2075 compaion processor, 1TB Seagate hard drive, Sony 24X DVD burner, and a Silverton Strider ST1200 power supply. Upgrade options abound depending on how deep your budget allows. For an additional $14,718, for example, you can upgrade the RAM to 256GB.

You can view/configure AVADirect's Intel E5 Xeon Servers here, workstations here, and Tesla HPC Supercomputer here.

Image Credit: AVADirect

Lian Li's Super Skinny 'PC-Q05' Mini ITX Chassis Gets a Product Page

Posted: 12 Mar 2012 07:00 AM PDT

It's been several months since Lian Li's PC-Q05 was tipped online, reportedly the first chassis to support the new Thin ITX or Thin Mini-ITX format developed by Intel. The super slim chassis then made an appearance at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas last January, and it's been relatively quiet ever since. Lian Li's lips are still sealed, though there's now an official product page for the PC-Q05 filled with glamor shots.

The PC-Q05 is an all-aluminum chassis that weighs a mere 1.76 pounds. It measures 11.18 inches (W) x 1.85 inches (H) x 12.08 inches (D), plenty small enough to accommodate boards built around Intel's Thin Mini-ITX form factor, which must limit the I/O shield to 25mm (0.98 inches) high rather than 44mm (1.73 inches) as found on regular Mini-ITX boards.

Lian Li equipped the PC-Q05 with a pair of 2.5-inch drive bays, so it's possible to install a speedy solid state drive (SSD) for OS chores and a larger capacity mechanical hard drive for storage duties. The case will be available in silver and black, though when and for how much are details Lian Li has yet to reveal.

Image Credit: Lian Li

CNN Reportedly in Talks to Buy Mashable for $200 Million

Posted: 12 Mar 2012 06:35 AM PDT

It's the beginning of a new week and what better way to kick off the humdrum of another Monday than with a juicy rumor? As the latest chatter goes, CNN is apparently really, really close to acquiring the social media news site Mashable for a cool $200 million, perhaps more, and could make an official announcement about the takeover as early as tomorrow.

Reuters blogger Felix Salmon was first to report CNN's interest in acquiring Mashable, claiming that a "little bird" told him at South by Southwest that it was essentially a done deal and would be announced tomorrow. More little birds have since started chirping.

Based on information obtained from "three people with knowledge of the talks," The New York Times today is reporting that the Time Warner company is in "advanced talks" with Mashable, though CNN officials have so far denied that an announcement would be made on Tuesday. Other than that, both sides have declined to comment, which suggests the two are at least talking about a takeover, even if no deal is imminent.

Media sites have been changing hands at a somewhat rapid pace in the last year or so, though it's usually AOL that does the buying. In September 2010, AOL announced it would acquire TechCrunch for $25 million, and then followed that up by buying Huffington Post for $315 million.

Image Credit: Mashable

Low Cost Raspberry Pi Hits "Manufacturing Hiccup"

Posted: 12 Mar 2012 05:33 AM PDT

Baking a $35 Raspberry Pi sounds like an easy recipe, but when you mix up the ingredients, the result is a sour system that should't be served to the masses. That's what happened to the first batch of Raspberry Pi devices. The cooks responsible for putting together Raspberry Pi systems inadvertently baked in the wrong type of Ethernet jacks, a minor "manufacturing hiccup" that could delay the shipment of some units.

"As you'll have noticed, there's been a bit of a delay in shipping the first batch of Raspberry Pis out to people. This is because of a hardware parts substitution that was made in the factory by accident: specifically, where we'd specified jacks with integrated magnetics in the BOM and schematics, the factory soldered in non-magnetic jacks," the Raspberry Pi team stated in a blog post. "No magnetics means no network connection. We've known about this for four days now, but we haven't been able to tell you about it because it meant we had to do some further tests to make sure that nothing else was affected."

Things aren't as bad as they could be. The Raspberry Pi team said it's a "very minor problem to fix" and that the factory making these things is nearly finished ripping out the non-magnetic Ethernet jacks and replacing them with the correct ones on the first set of boards. The Raspberry Pi Foundation expects the first batch to still ship out as scheduled, though later batches may suffer a "slight delay" if the company runs into trouble sourcing magnetic jacks.

Image Credit: Raspberry Pi Foundation

Microsoft Will Allow Third-Party Metro Browsers Special API Access To Compete With IE

Posted: 11 Mar 2012 08:56 PM PDT

Windows 8It was almost a month ago that Mozilla announced it would be working on a Metro version of Firefox, however an important question remained. Would Metro Firefox be little more than a live tile that was more of a pain than it was worth? Or would Microsoft allow them to take over default access for opening links and other non-sandbox friendly operations? We finally have an answer, and even though it is still somewhat vague, it looks like Microsoft is going to great lengths to make sure users can replace Internet Explorer in metro should they feel so inclined. 

According to Firefox developer Brian Bondy, in addition to classic desktop and Metro web browsers, Microsoft is going to allow a third category of app called "Metro style enabled desktop browsers". Apps in this category would have a desktop version similar to what you are using today, and a metro style counterpart that would take care of operations done in a non-desktop environment natively. For example; if you click a link while in a Metro application, you get a Metro version of Firefox. If you click that same link in a desktop application, you get the desktop version. 

By creating a third category of app Microsoft is also choosing to except web browsers from certain features such as Metro sandboxing, and unlock additional API's such as background processing and extensions. These permissions are only unlocked in Metro mode however if you choose to make it the default browser, and the reasons for this are still somewhat unclear. Mozilla is planning to release the Metro and Desktop version of their Windows 8 browser in one package downloadable from the Windows Store, though they admit it remains to be seen if Microsoft will approve that approach since the policy at the moment is Metro only.

Microsoft spent years in court defending itself anti-trust allegations in regards to Internet Explorer, so it makes sense they might spend a bit of extra time making sure they play nice with competitors now so history doesn't repeat itself.   
Posted by Shri Krishna

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