General Gaming Article |
- Daily Deals 9/25/12: HP 20" Monitor $100, Dell U2713HM 27" UltraSharp, and More
- Best SSD: Corsair Neutron GTX 256GB vs. Samsung 840 Pro 256GB
- Cable Companies Want to Kick Consoles Out of the Living Room with Streaming Games
- Facebook Stock Falls Again, Moves Closer to Circling the Drain
- Barnes & Noble Banks on Upcoming Nook Video Service to Compete with Amazon
- DisplayMate: iPhone 5 Display is Best Ever (on a Smartphone), Superior to Samsung's Galaxy S III
- Shuttleworth Comes Out Swinging in Defense of Ubuntu 12.10 Amazon Integration
| Daily Deals 9/25/12: HP 20" Monitor $100, Dell U2713HM 27" UltraSharp, and More Posted: 25 Sep 2012 12:37 PM PDT
Top Deal:That six-panel gaming setup you've been planning just got one step closer to reality with today's top deal — an HP 20" panel for just $99 (normally $139.99). These LED-backlit beauties boast a decent 1600x900 resolution, have DVI and VGA inputs, and are available directly from HP. Laptops: Toshiba Satellite U845-S402 14" Core i3 ULV Ultrabook for $549.99 with free shipping (normally $700 - use coupon code: ULTRA100). Computing Hardware & Peripherals: Dell U2713HM 27" UltraSharp 2560x1440 LED-backlit IPS LCD Monitor with 3-year advanced exchange warranty and free shipping for $719 (normally $799). Seagate Barracuda 1.5TB Internal 3.5" hard drive (ST1500DM003) for $69.99 with free shipping at TigerDirect (normally $80). Buffalo WHR-HP-G300N Wireless-N 300Mbps Router (DD-WRT Support) for $39.99 with free shipping at NewEgg (normally $55). |
| Best SSD: Corsair Neutron GTX 256GB vs. Samsung 840 Pro 256GB Posted: 25 Sep 2012 11:24 AM PDT SSD Flash FightCorsair and Samsung debut new SSDs and controllers in a battle for SSD-ominance The pace of development in the SSD world is staggeringly awesome, as each generation of SSD controllers has delivered substantial increases in performance and reliability, while at the same time we've seen flash prices drop like a stone. It's a great time to be storing and accessing data, for sure, but we've also seen the market dominated by a trio of SSD controllers from SandForce, Marvell, and Indilinx, with different vendors applying their own tweaks to the drives' firmware to differentiate them. Though these controllers are all pretty sweet, we were beyond stoked to see two brand-new drives from Samsung and Corsair arrive this month, both with all-new SSD controllers. Will either of them put a dent in the SandForce/Marvell juggernaut? Read on to find out! Corsair Neutron GTX 256GB
Corsair's Neutron GTX packs a punch via a new controller from Link A Media. Corsair's Neutron GTX is the first solid-state drive to arrive in the Lab sporting a brand-new eight-channel controller from a company named Link A Media Devices (LAMD for short). The controller promises top-notch I/O performance, especially in a multitasking environment, making this a drive specifically targeted at hardcore enthusiasts—which is you, since you're reading this. The Neutron GTX uses Toshiba 24nm MLC toggle-mode NAND flash memory and includes some enterprise-level technology designed to enhance reliability. It also supports the Windows Trim command and employs a routine of wear-leveling and garbage collection to help maintain performance over time. The LAMD controller uses a multicore ARM microcontroller, and hooks up via a SATA 6Gb/s interface. The enclosure itself is a slim 7mm unit, so it will fit in any notebook or Ultrabook, and if you want to stick it in your PC, Corsair provides a 3.5-inch bay adapter. It also features a metal chassis, giving it a rigid feel while keeping it amazingly light at the same time. During testing, the GTX posted impressive benchmark numbers across the board, making a remarkable debut appearance on our benchmark chart. In sequential read tests it averaged 435MB/s, which is decent but not earth-shattering. Its sequential write speeds, however, make it the second-fastest drive we've ever tested, losing only to the Samsung drive, and just by a hair. When the workload increased to 32 commands in a queue, the GTX kept up relatively well but couldn't keep pace with the SandForce-equipped Patriot and Intel drives. In our simulated real-world test, PCMark Vantage, the GTX achieved the second-fastest score ever, behind the new Samsung. Overall the only area where it lagged in any significant way was in heavily queued 32-command workloads. The GTX is an impressive drive, and we can't wait to see if other manufacturers jump on the LAMD train. Even though the Samsung 840 Pro steals its thunder a bit, Corsair's new solid state drive is still one of the fastest we have ever tested. Corsair Neutron GTX 256GB TACO TRUCK Superfast; ultra-slim, five-year warranty. SUSHI TRUCK Not as fast as Samsung's 840 and some SandForce Drives.  $250, www.corsair.com Samsung 840 Pro 256GB
We loved Samsung's 830 Series SSDs, and we love its new 840 Series even more. Samsung brings considerable resources to bear as the world's largest manufacturer of flash memory, and it has quite a stellar track record in this market, as well. The 470 Series in early 2011 earned a verdict of 8 from us, and the 830 Series, which came out at the end of 2011, received not only a 9/Kick Ass but a spot on our vaunted Best of the Best list as the fastest solid state drive money can buy. That's a tough record to beat, but the company is trying to do just that with its all-new 840 Series SSDs, available in Pro and non-Pro versions. We focus on the Pro model in this review. Unlike Corsair and other vendors that must purchase drive controllers from a third party and then tweak them to fit the flash memory that was also purchased from a third party, Samsung builds its own controllers from scratch. It also builds its own NAND flash. And its own DRAM. So the entire package is 100 percent made by Samsung. Don't get us wrong, we're not criticizing how Corsair, OCZ, and others assemble SSD drives from third-party vendors, but Samsung is uniquely capable of putting the whole drive together by itself, which it claims provides better performance. After testing the 840 Series drives, it looks like Samsung might be onto something here. Like the Corsair Neutron GTX, the 840 Pro comes in a 7mm chassis and uses toggle-mode NAND flash, though it's built on a smaller 21nm process than Corsair's 24nm flash from Toshiba. Samsung uses a multicore controller as well, allowing for increased efficiency as the drive fills up. The drives are actually quite close in terms of build and specs, so their close performance isn't much of a surprise. Even though the two drives were quite close in benchmark performance, the Samsung drive had a small edge in every single test we ran. In sequential read and write tests the 840 showed us the fastest scores we've ever seen, with its closest competitor being both the Neutron GTX and the SandForce Patriot Pyro SE. In our 32-command-queue tests, the Samsung also trumped the Neutron GTX but lost big-time to the SandForce-based drives, as they are simply head and shoulders above everyone right now. These were the only tests in which the Samsung failed to set a new record. In the final tally, the Samsung 840 Pro took top honors in seven out of nine benchmarks, so it looks like it'll be taking its predecessor's place on our Best of the Best list. Samsung also claims this drive is energy-efficient and "robust," which is great news, but in the end, just icing on a very, very fast cake. Samsung 840 Pro 256GB REAL DATES Very fast in all tests, semi-affordable. STATUS UPDATES Not as fast SandForce drives in queued workload.  $270, www.samsung.com Benchmarks
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| Cable Companies Want to Kick Consoles Out of the Living Room with Streaming Games Posted: 25 Sep 2012 10:49 AM PDT
According to Bloomberg, all three are on pace to test gaming services later this year, with widespread deployment to follow in early 2013. That could pose a problem for Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo, all three of which haven't had to worry too much about streaming competition up to this point.
If you ask us, however, the more likely scenario is that cable companies will have some success in dishing up casual games, like Angry Birds and the like, but they're unlikely to pose a serious threat to hardcore -- or even medium-core -- gaming. The other challenge for cable companies is dealing with data caps, though they could get around that restriction by allowing subscribers to play streaming games without it counting against their monthly quota. What do you think -- do cable companies pose any real threat to console makers? |
| Facebook Stock Falls Again, Moves Closer to Circling the Drain Posted: 25 Sep 2012 10:22 AM PDT
Even at the reduced price, Barron's still considers Facebook shares to be "too pricey" based, in part, on "uncertainty about the outlook for its business grows." The problem, says Barron's, is that Facebook is trading at 47 times its projected profit for 2012. Google and Apple, meanwhile, both trade for around 16 times their estimated 2012 earnings. Perhaps Zuckerberg and company had a distorted perspective of just how much Facebook was worth in the first place, but that's not the only problem. The company continually shoots itself in the foot with bad publicity. On Monday, for example, it was reported Facebook was accidentally posting users' old direct messages on their Timeline. That wasn't actually the case. Instead, users were confused over the layout of the new Timeline feature, which led to the confusion over what they were seeing. Facebook wasn't in the wrong in any way, but it has insisted on making the Timeline feature mandatory.
Despite the falling stock price, not everyone agrees that Facebook's IPO was a failure. Barry Diller, chairmain of IAC/Interactive, told CNBC that Facebook did what it was supposed to do, which is to get as high a price as it can the company's stock. "If you're going to sell stock and somebody wants to buy it at a price and that price is not a price you dictate, but demand dictates, sell it to them now," he said in reference to Facebook's IPO price. The problem is, as time goes on, demand dictates that Facebook is worth less and less. Follow Paul on Google+, Twitter, and Facebook
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| Barnes & Noble Banks on Upcoming Nook Video Service to Compete with Amazon Posted: 25 Sep 2012 09:30 AM PDT
"As one of the world's largest retailers of physical video discs and digital copyrighted content, our new Nook Video service will give our customers another way to be entertained with a vast and growing digital video collection, as part of our expansive Nook Store," said William J. Lynch, Chief Executive Officer of Barnes & Noble. "The launch of our new digital video service with our long-time studio partners allows us to bring award-winning current and classic movies, TV shows, documentaries and more to millions of customers' screens, coming soon." Nook Video won't be an exclusive service to just Nook owners; it will also be available on TVs, tablets, and smartphones. Videos that are streamed, downloaded, or purchased from the Nook Store will be held in the Nook Cloud, allowing customers to access their content on devices that support the soon-to-launch (and free) Nook Video app.
Some of the titles B&N specifically mentioned as being available include Brave, Toy Story 3, The Avengers, 21 Jump Street, Awkward, The ARtist, Breaking Bad, Dora the Explorer, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, Spartacus, Magic City, The Walking Dead, True Blood, Game of Thrones, all Harry Potter movies, The Dark Night, The Hangover, and more. Cost of the Nook Video service has not yet been announced. Follow Paul on Google+, Twitter, and Facebook
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| DisplayMate: iPhone 5 Display is Best Ever (on a Smartphone), Superior to Samsung's Galaxy S III Posted: 25 Sep 2012 08:15 AM PDT
"It [iPhone 5] is the brightest smartphone we have tested in the Shoot-Out series, it has one of the lowest screen reflectance values we have ever measured, it has the highest contrast rating for high ambient light for any mobile device we have ever tested, and it's color gamut and factory calibration are second only to the new iPad," Soniera added. On the negative side, Soniera said the iPhone 5 is still a little too blue, something that's common among smartphones, and at maximum brightness, the battery fizzles out quicker than the iPhone 4, which has a smaller display. As for the Galaxy S III, DisplayMate notes there are "a number of rough spots that show up clearly in our subjective testing," which is largely the result of Samsung going with its own OLED technology that hasn't yet been refined to the same degree as LCDs. "The brightness is about half of the iPhone 5 due to power limits from the lower power efficiency of OLEDs and concerns regarding premature OLED aging," Soniera noted. "The color gamut is not only much larger than the standard color gamut, which leads to distorted and exaggerated colors, but the color gamut is quite lopsided, with green being a lot more saturated than red or blue, which adds a green color caste to many images. Samsung has not bothered to correct or calibrate their display colors to bring them into closer agreement with the Standard sRGB / Rec.709 Color Gamut, so many images appear over saturated and gaudy."
DisplayMate takes a more critical approach to display technology than the average user, and while it sounds like the Galaxy S III performed relatively poorly in its tests, it actually received an 'Overall Display Grade' of B+, just behind the iPhone 4, which received an A- and the iPhone 5, which got an A. Follow Paul on Google+, Twitter, and Facebook
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| Shuttleworth Comes Out Swinging in Defense of Ubuntu 12.10 Amazon Integration Posted: 25 Sep 2012 05:50 AM PDT
If something like that does happen, it will be a huge financial shot in the arm for Canonical, but to bank on it would be foolish. Canonical isn't waiting for the proceeds from all those expected shipments to (pleasantly) inundate its coffers, though. In the meantime, it is going to rely on Amazon affiliate commissions to supplement its income. Last week, Canonical's Director of Technology Olli Ries revealed on the ubuntu-devel mailing list that Ubuntu 12.10, scheduled for release in October, will include Amazon search results in the Unity Dash lens. Needless to say, the company will be getting a commission every time a search result leads to an actual sale. Understandably, the announcement has angered many Ubuntu users, who see the feature as being a privacy and security concern. But Shuttleworth thinks otherwise. On Sunday, the Canonical head honcho wrote a lengthy post on his blog to address their concerns. "In 12.10 we'll take the first step of looking both online and locally for possible results," Shuttleworth wrote. "The Home lens will show you local things like apps and music, as it always has, as well as results from Amazon." He does not want people to think of these search results from Amazon as a form of advertisement: "We don't promote any product or service speculatively, these are not banners or spyware. These are results from underlying scopes, surfaced to the Home lens, because you didn't narrow the scope to a specific, well scope." For those who see this feature as a privacy concern, this is what he wrote: "We are not telling Amazon what you are searching for. Your anonymity is preserved because we handle the query on your behalf. Don't trust us? Erm, we have root. You do trust us with your data already. You trust us not to screw up on your machine with every update. You trust Debian, and you trust a large swathe of the open source community. And most importantly, you trust us to address it when, being human, we err." If you are still not convinced, Shuttleworth suggests that you try limiting your search to the scope you are most interested in by using the hotkey associated with that particular scope (for instance, Super+A for apps, or Super+F for files). Do you think Shuttleworth has done enough to address the concerns surrounding Amazon's imminent invasion of Ubuntu's Home lens, or is this far too big a PR disaster to be mitigated by anything less than a full retreat on Canonical's part? |
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