5
Feb

General Gaming Article

General Gaming Article

Newegg Daily Deals: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3-1600, Asus 27-Inch Monitor, and More!

Posted: 05 Feb 2015 03:36 PM PST

G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 16GB DDR3-1600newegg logo

Top Deal:

It seems like every other week G.Skill is breaking a RAM frequency record. The company is heavily involved in the overclocking, and their kits generally receive favorable reviews. That's also true of kit featured as today's top deal -- G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3-1600 for $117 with free shipping. It has a five star/egg rating after hundreds of users reviews, sports tight timings (9-9-9), and has a sweet looking heatspreader if you're equipped to show it off.

Other Deals:

Western Digital Red 3TB IntelliPower 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5-inch NAS Hard Drive for $110 with free shipping (normally $120 - use coupon code: [ESCANAS22])

EVGA GTX 970 4GB 256-Bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 SLI Support Graphics Card for $340 with free shipping

AMD FX-8350 Black Edition Vishera 8-Core 4.0GHz (4.2GHz Turbo) Socket AM3+ 125W Desktop Processor for $170 with free shipping (normally $180 - use coupon code: [EMCANAS23])

Asus 27-inch 1920x1080 2ms Full HD HDMI LED Backlight LCD Monitor for $220 (normally $240 - use coupon code: [EMCANAS27]; Additional $20 Mail-in rebate)

CTIA Posts Counterpoint Video to Net Neutrality Argument

Posted: 05 Feb 2015 03:17 PM PST

CTIA VideoThe other side of the argument

I haven't spoken with every individual at Maximum PC about net neutrality and asked what their stances all, though I'm fairly confident we all agree it's a good thing. Certainly our new Editor-in-Chief Tuan Nguyen does, as evidenced by his recent articles on the topic here and here. And obviously so does Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler, who recently proposed reclassifying the Internet as a public utility. But not everyone does. Among the comments to some of the articles we've posted on the subject are arguments opposed to treating the Internet like a public utility, which would thereby give the government increased oversight. The CTIA also opposes reclassifying the Internet as such, but I'm not sure their video on the topic will do them any favors.

What is the CTIA? It's a trade group representing wireless industry companies and is made up of members like AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon, plus a whole lot more. Here's the organization's pitch against the FCC's proposal.

In case your speakers are busted, the gist of the argument is that your wireless coverage will go to shit, taxes will go up, services like Pandora will no longer be free, and new laws will hinder your online experience if the Internet is reclassified as a utility.

"It's like the government wants to shut down the Internet," one of the actors says (with a straight face).

If you're in agreement with the CTIA, don't take the above Billy Madison clip personal -- the CTIA invited it with the ridiculous line quoted above. I'm not saying there aren't some valid concerns, but I'm also not buying into the CTIA's fear mongering. There are multiple examples of when it's had the best interest of wireless carriers in mind over consumers, though you could make the same argument about the government.

So, for those of you opposed to Wheeler's proposal, I'm curious what you think about the CTIA's response. Do you share the same concerns, or are your reservations different than the CTIA's?

Sound off in the comments section below!

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Gabe Newell Tackles Customer Support Issue Like a Boss

Posted: 05 Feb 2015 02:20 PM PST

Gabe NewellCustomer support done the right way

Gabe Newell's a busy man. It comes with the territory of managing Valve, a massive company with billions of dollars in equity. He's also personable and surprisingly accessible for someone in his position, as a Steam user in need of support recently found out. After submitting a support request to Steam and not receiving a response in a week's time, the user figured he had nothing to lose and everything to gain by contacting Newell himself. He was right.

There's an imgur post and Reddit thread that are gaining traction on the web, and it's because of the exchange between Steam user that_earlyguy and Newell (credit to Kotaku for the heads up).

"Hello Gabe, I heard you answer fan email, despite your busy schedule. I thought that was just amazing, but I couldn't believe it. So, I'd like to put it to the test. Do you think you'll reply faster than Steam support? I gave them a week head start," that_earlyguy wrote.

He was surprised to not only hear back from Newell, but to get a response with a few hours of sending his email.

"What's your ticket? At the end of the day, everyone here at Valve is in support," Newell responded.

After replying with his ticket number, that_earlyguy received an email from Steam Support letting him know that his issue had been resolved.

Naturally, the Steam user wanted to post his experience to the web, but politely requested permission first, considering that it could lead to a mountain of support requests. To his surprise again, Newell was cool about it, reminding him that everyone at Valve is in support "so it's fine for people to contact me or anyone else here if there are problems."

Wouldn't it be nice if all company bigwigs acted like this?

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The FCC Gives the Internet Back to You, the People

Posted: 05 Feb 2015 12:57 PM PST

The FCC pushes forward for you, and you win!

This week marks a huge win for the FCC, and for you, fellow netizens and Maximum PC fans. The FCC just went and pushed forward a proposal to reclassify internet service as a public utility—just like electricity and water. Last week I wrote a piece on how the FCC changed the definition of "broadband" to mean a minimum of 25Mbps down and 3Mbps up. If you thought that was huge news, this is damn bigger.

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler revealed his plans this week under Title II of the Telecommunications Act. This is a huge win for everyone—except the providers of course. There's no doubt in my mind right now that the providers are spending millions to scour the world for the very best lawyers so they can fight this move into the ground. It'll be a battle of epic proportions.

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler
FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images)

In a full statement given to Wired, "I am submitting to my colleagues the strongest open internet protections ever proposed by the FCC," wrote Wheeler. "These enforceable, bright-line rules will ban paid prioritization, and the blocking and throttling of lawful content and services."

Wheeler isn't stopping with traditional landlines though. He's going after the airwaves too, which is a major landmark move for the FCC.

"I propose to fully apply—for the first time ever--those bright-line rules to mobile broadband. My proposal assures the rights of internet users to go where they want, when they want, and the rights of innovators to introduce new products without asking anyone's permission."

For those that may have forgotten, AT&T originally blocked Apple's FaceTime service for bullshit reasons. I make no apologies here. Let's just say it like it is, and Wheeler does just that. "Before [1960s], AT&T prohibited anyone from attaching non-AT&T equipment to the network," he said. "The modems that enabled the internet were usable only because the FCC required the network to be open."

Congress will have a say later on, after the FCC votes this February 26th, on whether or not it will back the FCC or back the carriers, or come out with its own wild proposal.

There's no misunderstanding here though. I realize that there's a group of people out there, who are totally fine with what they have for internet service. They get what they can, and life moves on. In areas that are limited to just one carrier offering, the situation is even more facepalm-worthy. I've been told to "be glad" that I have fiber to my house. Yes, I am glad for that. But, I'm not glad for a monumental portion of the population, who don't have access to that kind of luxur — not because they wouldn't if they could, but because they can't. And less there be any confusion, those folks can't because the providers don't want to.

Then there are those that say less regulation is better. I get it and agree to a certain point. When big companies become monopolies, it's necessary to have oversight, and in the case of net neutrality, this is one fo those cases. There are pockets where we can cherry pick situations and say "oh, competition is already blossoming without regulation," but these areas aren't the norm, they are the exception. With communications giants become so powerful and so large—Google for Comcast wanting to buy TWC—there's no better time than now for a reckoning.

Thankfully, over 3.7 million comments that were sent into the FCC want to set things straight. The numbers were so overwhelming that even President Obama had to make a statement about it.

This is a milestone for internet uesrs everywhere, isn't for those who are happy or content with their connection or provider, it's for those that are trapped in negotiated communities and territories. Carriers have proven time and time again, that upgrading speeds is easy, even on legacy infrastructure. In areas where fiber installation from Verizon is leeching into Time Warner Cable's hood, TWC has "freely" upgraded customers several times, and some are now on 300Mbps TWC connections. Yes, just like that.

Imagine if there was just one GPU manufacturer—I know, two is nearly as bad. Imagine if you could only buy one brand of graphics cards because you lived in a certain place, or if you weren't allowed to use one brand of GPUs because you leaned particularly towards a favorite brand of CPUs. That would be fucked up.

That's how the state of the internet is for most people. Thankfully, it won't be that way any longer.

Researchers Excited Over First Silicene Transistor, What's It Mean for Computing?

Posted: 05 Feb 2015 12:32 PM PST

SiliceneWorld's thinnest silicon material could lead to faster significantly faster computer chips

It's not quite the Holy Grail of computing, though the creation of a silicene transistor has researchers at The University of Texas at Austin's Cockrell School of Engineering giddy because it's never been done before. In fact, human-made silicene was just a theoretical material up until seven years ago due to its complexity and instability when exposed to air. Now we have the first silicene transistor, and with it comes the potential for far faster and more energy efficient computer chips.

That's getting a bit ahead of ourselves. Silicene transistors are more of a proof of concept at this early stage, as they only last a few minutes. But it's also significant because it erases the question of whether silicene could even be made into a transistor in the first place.

"Nobody could have expected that in such a short time, something that didn't exist could make a transistor," Guy Le Lay, a materials scientist at Aix-Marseille University in France and one of the first scientists to create silicene in a lab, told Nature Nanotechnology.

Part of Le Lay's interest in silicene is due to growing skepticism that graphene is a suitable material for semiconductors. That's because graphene lacks a band gap, which is an energy hurdle that electrons must jump before they can carry a current. Band gaps are what allow semiconductor devices to switch on and off and perform logic operations on bits.

Silicene doesn't suffer the same shortfall, though there are other challenges, namely the fabrication process. To get around some of the challenges, Deji Akinwande, a nanomaterials researcher, teamed with Alessandro Molle at the Institute for Microelectronics and Microsystems in Agrate Brianza, Italy, to develop a new fabrication method, one that reduces silicene's exposure to air.

It consists of letting a hot vapor of silicon adoms condense onto a crystalline block of silver in a vacuum chamber. Afterwards, the researchers formed a silicene sheet on a thin layer of silver and added a layer of alumina measuring just five nanometers on top. These protective layers allowed the team to peel the silicene off its base and lay it on an oxidized-silcon substrate with the silver side up. The last step involves scraping away some of the silver, leaving behind two islands of metal as electrodes, along with strip of silicene between them.

Unfortunately, the exposed silicene degrades in as little as two minutes, though an extra layer on top of the silicene transistor is one possible way to extend its life. Nevertheless, it's still a long ways from being used in actual computer chips.

Image Credit: The University of Texas at Austin

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Twitter CEO Admits Platform Sucks at Dealing with Trolls, Change is Coming

Posted: 05 Feb 2015 11:04 AM PST

Dick CostoloTwitter will begin aggressively booting trolls and abusers

It's no secret that Twitter is a haven for trolls. You know it, we know it, and even Twitter CEO Disk Costolo knows it. The question is, will the company ever do anything about it? It appears so -- in a heartfelt memo to employees, Costolo held himself accountable for the level of trolling and abuse that takes place on Twitter on a daily basis. He used words like "ashamed" and "embarrassed" to describe how he feels, calling the situation a "truth" that needs to be dealt with, and he intends to do just that.

"We suck at dealing with abuse and trolls on the platform and we've sucked at it for years. It's no secret and the rest of the world talks about it every day," Costolo said in a memo obtained by The Verge.

What prompted the memo is a story feminist Lindy West shared with This American Life. She's often the target of harassment on Twitter, and one incident in particular involved a message she received on the microblogging service purported to be from her dead father. It was mean in nature, but far from the only incident of trolling at her expense.

After writing an article in which West said she thought male comedians are careless with the subject of rape, she was bombarded with nasty Twitter messages.

"I love how the bitch complaining about rape is the exact kind of bitch that would never be raped," one of the posts read.

Catching wind of all this, a Twitter employee asked on an internal forum if Twitter could do a better job in this regard. And then the memo came.

"I'm frankly ashamed of how poorly we've dealt with this issue during my tenure as CEO. It's absurd. There's no excuse for it," Costolo continued. "I take full responsibility for not being more aggressive on this front. It's nobody else's fault but mine, and it's embarrassing."

Costolo goes on to make it clear that he's blaming himself and only himself, but just as important, is also vowing to do something about it. He says that Twitter is "going to start kicking these people off right and left and making sure that when they issue their ridiculous attacks, nobody hears them."

He hasn't commented on the memo that's now gone public, but it's out there, and so it's up to Costolo to follow through and make Twitter a better place. It's a fine line he'll have to dance, one that teeters between too much censorship and trolling, and it will be interesting to see how it goes.

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No BS Podcast #236: Windows 10, HoloLens, GTX 970 Issues

Posted: 05 Feb 2015 10:33 AM PST

no bs podcastWe also formally introduce Maximum PC's new Editor-in-Chief Tuan Nguyen

Yes, we know we've been away from the podcast room for quite some time, but hopefully episode 236 makes up for most of the delay. We talk about a bunch of interesting things in the show that include HoloLens, Windows 10, CES 2015, and the recent GeForce GTX 970 RAM issues. In addition, we also formally introduce Maximum PC's new Editor-in-Chief Tuan Nguyen.  

  Subscribe to Maximum PC Podcast on iTunes

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Microsoft Stops Production of Last Windows RT Tablet

Posted: 05 Feb 2015 09:00 AM PST

Nokia Lumia 2520The final nail in Windows RT's coffin

For all intents and purposes, Windows RT is finally dead. That was actually true a week ago when Microsoft discontinued its Surface 2 tablets, thereby removing life support from Windows RT. But now that Microsoft announced it's no longer producing Nokia Lumia 2520 tablets, it's okay to write Windows RT's obituary -- this is, after all, the final nail in the coffin of an OS that died a slow and uneventful death.

"We are no longer manufacturing Nokia Lumia 2520; however, those still eager to buy Nokia Lumia 2520 should visit Microsoft Retail Stores, MicrosoftStore.com, third-party retailers and resellers for the latest availability," Microsoft said in a statement to The Verge.

After other manufactures had long since jumped ship (or never boarded in the first place), Microsoft was the last maker of Windows RT tablets. But with the retirement of the Nokia Lumia 2520, nobody is left to prop Windows RT up, and that's just fine.

Windows RT has no place in a market that's already looking ahead to Windows 10. You could also argue that it had no place in the Windows 8 era, though Microsoft tried like hell to push a gimped version of its OS with ARM-based devices. That effort turned out to be too confusing for some customers, and way too limited in functionality for others. It was also a costly lesson for Microsoft, which at one point took a $900 million charge on unsold Surface RT tablets.

One thing that's interesting about this is what it means for Microsoft's relationship with ARM, in terms of tablet design. With everything Microsoft has revealed about Windows 10 so far, one thing it hasn't touched on is whether there will be a version of its next OS that supports smaller size ARM tablets, not just IoT devices like Raspberry Pi 2.

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