Analysis: The death of Digg is not exaggerated
Since Digg came out with their much vaunted version 4 at the end of August, the social media blogs have documented in detail the trail of disaster which will surely become a case study in how to screw up a social site in business courses across the land.
Most recently, statistics have begun to emerge about the drop off in traffic at Digg.
There have been anecdotal stories of Digg's importance to publishers also being diminished, so I thought I'd share our experience on TechRadar.
There was a time when getting a Digg front page would actually crash our servers with the sheer weight of traffic; we had to re-engineer certain parts of the site to cope. That's most certainly no longer the case.
Before New Digg was launched, TechRadar was consistently in the top 30 sites making the front page of Digg; we hit the front page 177 times in the last year. Yet we have seen referrals from Digg drop off steadily until the v4 launch pretty much killed off Digg traffic entirely:
Traffic from Digg has fallen by 97% year on year, and by 86% since Digg 4 went live.
Now most Digg traffic is American, and as a British specialist site that's traffic we can, commercially speaking, manage without (despite getting nearly nothing from Digg in September we nevertheless broke all our site records).
Some US volume-based sites may not be so happy and it's certainly not making a compelling case for buying paid links on Digg.
It seems that in trying to correct the glitches which led to Mashable and Reddit owning the Digg front page, they have now excluded most of the publishers whose content made up the bread and butter of the site.
The so-called "power users" used to frequently submit our articles, but no longer have a route to do so. We don't auto-submit our articles as that seems like spam. We used to have a widget showing people which TechRadar articles were upcoming so they could vote for them, but the v4 upgrade broke that, and most of the other Digg tools.
Basically, Digg is now effectively dead to us, and I'm sure our experience is not unique: of the top 20 sites contributing front page articles in the last year, only two (CNN and Mashable) have an article on the front page today.
Something else to put in that case study.
 |  |
Read More ...
In Depth: Why the BlackBerry PlayBook has the power to beat the iPad
Earlier this week we learnt that the BlackBerry PlayBook has a UK release date of early 2011. But behind the hardware is a new OS that runs Adobe AIR apps, HTML 5 web apps and existing BlackBerry Java apps. But what else does the OS have in store? We decided to delve deeper into the BlackBerry Tablet OS while in conversation with Dan Dodge, the head of the QNX team at RIM.
The media player
What we've been shown of the built-in media player coming on the PlayBook shows a nice interface, with album and playlist thumbnails as buttons and detailed track listings.
Dodge calls it "a full-featured media engine" that can read just about any file system you can think of (FAT, NTFS, HFS, SD cards – and network file systems like NFS and SMB over Wi-Fi). A media sync component keeps track of what storage you've connected or disconnected to keep the SQL database of available music, video and pictures up to date; this also stores ID tags for music and EXIF data for images.
When you create a playlist, the media engine runs an SQL query to build it (which should make working with even large music libraries fast) and loads codecs from the codec engine.
MEDIA HANDLING: The media engine in the PlayBook OS
The PlayBook specs say it can handle 1080p video, and the screen has 1024 by 600 widescreen resolution; the media engine treats the screen as having both RGB and YUV layers and the hardware rendering can drive the RGB layer directly, whether it's going out to the HDMI port at 1080p or doing hardware blitting to scale video down to fit on screen.
ALPHA BLENDING: The PlayBook treats the display as if it was two layers – and it can handle two displays
The YUV layer is 'on top' of the RGB layer so video controls can be alpha-blended on top of the video you're playing rather than being around it.
Under the covers
QNX has real multi-tasking and (with the dual 1GHz cores in the PlayBook) multi-processing; Dodge talks about running dozens of applications at once and swiping between them using the navigator; apps will zoom up from the central strip of previews as you switch back to them and zoom down when you swipe across to another app.
Will you be able to see more one app on screen at once? The QNX microkernel could certainly deliver that, says Dodge; it's a question of what makes the best user experience.
"The apps you see in the navigator; you're actually seeing the app - they're running. Usually we tell those apps to stop to save battery life, but when we had it in debug mode we could watch OpenGL in this window here and there's a video running and they're all completely live.
To go left or right, I swipe and those are live apps sliding across the screen. Right now everybody is looking at an app per screen but it doesn't have to be that way. You'll see some amazing things we haven't seen before - and that could be one of them."
ALL LIVE APPS: Each of the app windows you can see is a live, running app, not just a graphical preview
Apps can certainly have multiple windows and the composition engine that handles all the different windows (and is also responsible for taking touch and keyboard input and passing it on to apps) is particularly sophisticated; Dodge calls it one of the key capabilities in the system.
"All these applications they all have their own renderers. So if it's an OpenGL game, it's rendered as OpenGL. WebKit is a software rasteriser, Adobe AIR apps rasterise on OpenGL.
Different rendering engines
These programs all have different rendering engines that are rendering content to surfaces and the surface are controlled by the composition manager and handed out to the apps." And those multiple windows can actually be using more than one of the different application platforms that the PlayBook will run.
The simplest example would be HTML content displayed in a web view with the interface around it built in AIR, but apps can do a lot more, Dodge told us.
"I may have an Adobe AIR application, I may have a Java window, I may have an embedded HTML 5 renderer which is a different surface, and I may actually have video playing could be yet another surface, which is talking to a hardware YUV video player."
Dodge also mentions handling PDFs natively for display and, he says, "there are a bunch of other views that we will be announcing".
COMPOSITION: You can have multiple apps, with multiple windows arranged on top of each other, each using a different renderer; the composition engine puts everything in the right place
Unlike most smartphone apps (but like desktop OSs), not everything in a window has to fit on screen at once; a concept Dodge calls a viewport. "We can render something bigger than the screen and pan over it with smooth hardware scrolling; browsers do that a lot."
Again, that viewport can include multiple types of content."If you're doing a pan, it may actually pan across other surfaces like video and it all has to work seamlessly together. This is not easy to do but we've been working at this and this is one of the areas that is key to making the system feel fluid and natural."
And while apps get less CPU power in the background, they're not frozen or suspended (and they'll only be shut down if you run out of memory completely).
Battery life or user experience?
Video and audio stops playing when you put it into the background, unless it's the 'master' media app on the system which can play in the background (and you can set any media player as the master, not just RIM's own media app).
Yes, that saves battery life, but it's also about what's the best user experience – which has been the subject of some discussion.
"When an AIR app goes to the background," Dodge told us,"we immediately drop the frame rate to about three frames per second and we stop rendering, which means even if you're changing the model inside we're not doing any of the work to put the pixels anywhere and as soon as you become visible again you will be updated.
In the case of a web page, when you go off screen we have debated many times what to do. If you're running HTML 5 video, we pause you. Some people say 'I'm listening to music on YouTube, I'd like to hear it' but then sometimes you just want to shut the browser up because I'm somewhere else. We don't want this cacophony of things playing.
So we've gone back and forth on what the proper user experience should be. Right now, our browser, when we kick it off screen, we stop the output."
That's different if you're playing the video on a second screen through the HDMI port, he explained; "If it was going out the HDMI, it would continue to play. Again, it's what makes sense. If I've redirected to the HDMI, I should be allowed to do other things on the screen."
Expect impressive games as well, because the PlayBook supports C++ and OpenGL. "What this tablet is going to able to be do in the area of gaming is going to be off the scale", claims Dodge. "You can do games in Java as well but you're probably not doing your first-person shooter there."
Expectations like that are why Dodge says; "This isn't just another tablet;this is a killer tablet." If RIM can deliver what he's promising the PlayBook will do (and developers pick up the ideas and create apps that match his grand vision), it's going to be truly impressive.
| |
Read More ...
Facebook Photos gets a high-res makeover
Facebook has announced a raft of new features to its Photo service, upgrading the picture quality of images and making it easier to share photos.Browsing and tagging have also been improved, with Facebook introducing "a better photo viewer".
The new viewer simplifies navigation of photos, and the frame around the images has been darkened to highlight the picture more.
It also means that you don't have to go onto a new page to view photos, as the image opens in the centre of the screen.
Bulk tagging has been added, so you can tag multiple photos of the same person / event a lot easier.
Photo improvements
The biggest improvement, however, is in picture quality. Images will now be shown as 720 pixels to 2048 pixels, which is a whopping eight times bigger than what the site delivers at the moment.
You can download images easier too, by simply clicking on the Download link option.
Sam Odio from Facebook says about the release: "When we originally got started on Photos, we only had two people working on it.
"We didn't build out a lot of features; we just focused on making sure photos were easy to share and this made Photos a great social experience. But we also wanted to give people on Facebook the best quality photo product on the web… So I'm excited to announce three big improvements to Photos."
The new and improved Facebook Photo will be available to the public sometime this month.
If you want to see the service in action, though, then head over the National Geographic Facebook page.
| |
Read More ...
Samsung Galaxy Tab UK release date: 1 November
The Galaxy Tab is to land in the UK 1 November, Samsung has confirmed.The Android-toting rival to the iPad is going to be available in UK stores a month from today and represents a new category of mobile products for the company.
Speaking about the impending launch of the Galaxy Tab, Simon Stanford, managing director for Samsung mobile in the UK, said: "At Samsung we recognise consumers want to experience life without limits.
"The Samsung Galaxy Tab brings a very unique proposition to the tablet market and from 1 November, gives consumers the ultimate in connectivity."
Price points
The Galaxy Tab runs Android 2.2 (FroYo), features a 1GHz processor, has a 7-inch TFT-LCD display and will run Flash 10.1.
The Samsung Galaxy Tab will be available from Carphone Warehouse, Dixons, T-Mobile and a whole bunch of other retailers.
Samsung also notes that it will be available at a number of different price points, so look out for subsidised deals.
This comes after Amazon listed the Galaxy Tab as costing £599.99.
| |
Read More ...
In Depth: Best gaming CPUs reviewed and rated
You may have read both our budget and mid-range CPU summaries and probably been inspired to buy something within your price range. But a few of you are probably thinking, "I've got an extra £50 to £500 to spend on a processor, what can I get for that kind of money?" The answer lies here, in this round-up of £200-plus CPUs.
You'll only find one AMD processor here, and it's right at the bottom - the rest is dominated by Intel's Core i7 architecture.
Of course, this comes with a higher price tag for associated components, but if you're spending £750 on a CPU you've probably got enough to spend another £500 on a motherboard and memory.
1. AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition - £205
AMD's Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition was the most expensive chip in our mid-range round-up, but here it's the cheapest. That doesn't mean it can't compete, though, and it's still the most expensive AMD chip we've recently looked at. It's that six-core performance that marks it apart, and Intel's cheapest sextuplet core is a whopping £400 more. Of course, it won't play games quite as nicely as an Intel chip, but for sheer multi-threaded performance it's a hugely impressive little chip. What's more is that you won't end up spending a small fortune on other components thanks to AMD's backwards and forwards compatible AM3 architecture.
Read our AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition review
2. Intel Core i7 870 - £226
The big difference between Intel's Core i7 870 and lower-priced Core i7 chips is the inclusion of HyperThreading, which results in incredibly impressive performance in both gaming and media encoding. It's also eminently overclockable, and we managed to push ours from the stock 2.93GHz to a rather more meaty 4.33GHz, all with standard air cooling. It's an incredible piece of technology, too: it includes an on-die PCI Express controller, although this is limited to a maximum of two graphics cards. The price is the major sticking point here, but you are getting a super-duper processor capable of just about anything.
Read our Intel Core i7 870 review
3. Intel Core i7 875K - £255
Admittedly, the Intel Core i7 875K is pretty much exactly the same as the Core i7 870, above. There's one key difference, though, and that's the unlocked CPU multiplier, which makes for idiot-proof overclocking and takes memory clocks out of the equation. Unsurprisingly, our benchmarks for the 870 and 875K proved very similar, but it's those extra overclocking features that sell the 875K, such as its Turbo Mode. We were disappointed that they don't actually give the 875K a little more oomph in practical tests, but it's perfect if you're after an easily-overclockable Intel chip.
Read our Intel Core i7 875K review
4. Intel Core i7 970 - £669
It's here that we enter the realms of silly-money processors, but if you've got a spare £670 lying around Intel's Core i7 970 is the best chip you can buy. It - naturally - includes six cores capable of 12 threads, a billion transistors, and literally the most advanced PC processor die on the planet, all in 32nm silicon. Unsurprisingly, it delivers jaw-dropping performance across everything from game benchmarks to video encoding. It also playfully overclocks to 4GHz; hugely impressive given the sheer amount of processing going on. We're a bit worried about the longevity of the LGA 1,366 architecture, but hopefully the 970's incredibly steep price will drop once the LGA 1,156 is released.
Read our Intel Core i7 970 review
5. Intel Core i7 980X - £760
The 970 is turned up to 11. The Intel Core i7 980X is architecturally the same as the 970, but with faster clocks and an extra £90 added to the price tag. The result is that it's the fastest processor on the planet, bar none. Each core is tuned to an epic 3.33GHz out of the box, and we managed to push it as far as 4GHz on an air cooler without it so much as breaking a sweat. Again, we're a little concerned about the sheer price of the blighter, and the possibility of the LGA 1,366 architecture being abandoned. But, as it stands, this is the best processor we've ever looked at.
Read our Intel Core i7 980X review
| |
Read More ...
Review: New Amazon Kindle 3
The new Amazon Kindle 3 has been the most hyped eBook reader of the year.With a hugely competitive £109 price-tag, decent specs and the backing of the UK's biggest book etailer, even before launch it's made many of the other eBook readers out there look outclassed and hugely overpriced.
But does it live up to expectations?
The Amazon Kindle looked for a while as though it was going to be lost in the tablet hype-fest as a hopelessly under-specced footnote on the path to iPad supremacy.
But with the new Kindle 3, Amazon has absolutely shown there's plenty of life in the dedicated eBook reader yet.
It's the first Kindle to be properly supported in the UK from its release date, including having a dedicated UK store (the Kindle 2 was eventually available here using the US store to make purchases).
This new Amazon Kindle has a bigger battery with 14 per cent more capacity (enough to last a month with W-Fi turned off), an extra 1GB of memory (4GB in total) and is noticeably smaller and lighter than its predecessors.
It's available is a Wi-Fi only edition, or one with added 3G support. The latter version comes in a choice of colours – white or dark grey – with the wi-fi version it's grey only.
In practice, the improvements in the Kindle specifications don't make a lot of odds.
The battery life, already long, is now a claimed one month (sorry, deadlines meant we couldn't put that to the test!).
Storage capacity was already thousands of books, and is now a claimed 3,500 - and with the 3G and Wi-Fi network connectivity enabling you to download from the web at will, capacity is effectively infinite.
But there is one change which does make a big difference – the new display.
Amazon claims a 50 per cent increase in contrast ratio, and it's certainly a big improvement - certainly one of the best eReader screens we've seen.
More than one of the people we showed it to assumed that it still had a fake display sticker on it, like the ones mobile phones have in shops, and were amazed that it was actually on and that this was the real display.
The display is sharp and the text is a deep black, making it very easy to read. Far easier, in fact, than on touchscreen tablets like the iPad.
The background is not pure white, more of an Etch-A-Sketch grey, and if you look carefully you can see ghost text from the previous screen. This is a side effect of the ultra-low-power E Ink Pearl electronic paper display which wipes and redisplays once, rather than continuously refreshing like a conventional LCD panel.
In practice the effect is no more noticeable than the show-through you get form a real book. The 800x600 display might be expected to exhibit jaggies, especially as there is no anti-aliasing, but the chosen fonts work well.
There is a definite pause when you transition pages, and the screen flicks black – no wow-factor animated page turns here - with a screen refresh time of around a quarter second per frame. It jars a bit at first but you rapidly don't notice it.
Reading with the new Kindle
Unlike the iPad and the plethora of Android based tablets, the new Amazon Kindle 3 is designed to do one thing, and to do it well – display books. It has some other bolted-on functions, but they are very much secondary, and we'll come to them later.
It's as a book reader that the Kindle excels. It's form factor is perfect – about the height and width size a small paperback, but much thinner (unless you read a lot of poetry). It's weight, at 240g, is low enough to hold comfortably in one hand for as long as you like.
New Amazon Kindle 3 next to a regular paperbackIt weighs roughly two thirds less than an iPad, and 140g less than a Samsung Galaxy Tab.
Page forward and back controls, duplicated on either side for lefties, are ergonomically perfect once you've got used to the bottom-top buttons rather than right-left for forward and back.
Compared to using the Kindle app on the iPad, it's much easier to turn pages and of course you don't get accidental page turns from touching the screen by mistake.
There are a number of ways to get books onto the new Kindle 3. The most obvious is to buy them from the Kindle store, which is now a dedicated UK operation.
Kindle definitely has the edge over Apple's rival iBook Store in both pricing and range, but both still have some way to go.
If you're expecting eBooks to offer major savings over paper, you may be disappointed. Typical savings on paperbacks are a few pence, although new release hardbacks are better – the new Terry Pratchett for example is £3.64 cheaper on Kindle than Amazon proper, but his most recent paperback release is only a 20p saving.
The case is an option extraApple's store doesn't have any Pratchett books at all.
Downloading a book takes a few seconds over 3G or wi-fi, not much longer with GPRS, and you can read your Kindle-bought books on your PC or Mac, on an iPhone, iPad or an Android device as well as the Kindle itself.
It even syncs up your latest reading position so if you don't have your Kindle on you, you can read a few pages on your HTC Desire and on getting home your Kindle will have moved on to the right place.
Alternatively, if you have documents in one of the eBook formats, you can either load them directly via the Kindle's USB connection (it appears on your PC or Mac like a memory card) or if required convert them to a supported format using 3rd party software like Calibre.
You can load PDF documents into the Kindle too. There's also a system for converting Word documents – you e-mail the documents to a special address and the docs are converted and uploaded to your Kindle automatically; there is a small fee for that.
Wi-Fi or 3G version?
We've reviewed the 3G version here, but unless your planning is so poor, or your reading so fast, that you find yourself caught short of a book to read between leaving the house and arriving at work, we'd question whether it was worth the £40 extra over the Wi-Fi only edition.
Naturally you can change the font and text size (if the book lets you; some have their own embedded fonts), and you can switch to a sideways orientation if you like.
The optional case has a light for reading in the darkThe Kindle has a text-to-speech function, but we wouldn't recommend it as it trips up over sentence endings. Margin scribblers will be happy with the ability to add highlights and notes – and even share them over the usual social networks.
You can view the most highlighted parts of the book you are reading, should the fancy take you - the 21st Century version of looking for the most thumbed sections of a James Herbert novel.
In use, the reading experience is flawless. The display is of course a passive one, so no reading in the dark (unless you buy the £50 case with a built in reading light), but it's much easier on the eyes so you won't get an "iPad migraine".
It should be great in direct sunshine too, although the British weather prevented a scientific test of that. It's matt screen certainly prevents annoying reflections. Long term reading on the Kindle is a joy.
Interface
Away from reading, the device's monomania does have a knock on effect on its usability.
Selecting a book and navigating the device's menus is done with a square four-way selector with a central OK button, along with dedicated Home, Menu and Back buttons.
It works, but it feels very old fashioned and clunky. That's not helped by the monochrome display's inability to highlight options – you have to look for the underline.
There is a QWERTY keyboard with tiny buttons and an awkward Shift key. It will get very little use for most people, and we wonder if the area at the bottom could have been better used for a more sophisticated menu control system.
The little extras
Probably stung by the multi-function loveliness of the iPad, Amazon has added some extra features to the Kindle 3, labelling them "Experimental" in the hope we won't be too harsh about them.
There is a web browser; it's based on WebKit so is compatible with most sites but as you can imagine browsing on a 16-greyscale 800 x 600 display which can't cope with animation and no touchpad is not anyone's idea of a nice experience.
You could use it in emergencies. It does have a nice Article View, which strips out all but the body text of a page and presents as straight text, making the most of the Kindle's advantages, but unfortunately you still have to use the normal view to navigate to the page you want to read.
The new Kindle also allows playback of MP3s while you read. That could be a very nice feature, but as the only controls are pause and skip forward, there's no track selector or even an indicator of what's playing, you'd have to say it's not really usable.
Remarkably the thing they could so easily have added to a device with a network connection, a great screen for text and a QWERTY keyboard – e-mail – isn't there even as an experimental feature.
The Amazon Kindle 3 is optimised for reading books above any other function, as a result it does a superb job. The E Ink display is gorgeous and incredibly easy to read. It's size and weight make it perfect as a portable eReader. And it's finally out at a breakthrough price £109 for Wi-Fi only and £149 for 3G.
There's a lot of attention being given to eBooks thanks to the explosion in multi-function tablets, but it's still the case that jack of all trades is master of none, and for reading, the Amazon Kindle is by far the best experience.
Given its price and the range of books now available, the time of the eReader is finally here, and the Kindle 3 is showing Apple the way.
We liked:
The screen is excellent, the size of the device is ideal and the range of books available is fantastic. The price is excellent compared with rival products.
We disliked:
Books could be cheaper, anything which needs colour doesn't work well, and the keyboard and menu systems are a bit clunky.
Verdict:
Amazon shows that specialising can pay as it beats the tablets at their own game.
Related Links
| |
Read More ...
Disgo unveils £180 rival to Samsung Galaxy Tab
Disgo has announced an Android-powered tablet that's set to join the mass rush to be THE tablet on the Christmas list this year.Featuring a 7-inch screen, the comparisons to the Samsung Galaxy Tab are obvious - although the disgo Tablet 6000 has a much lower £180 price point.
However, it's skimped on a number of specs to achieve that price point: resistive screen, Android 2.1, 2.5mm headphone jack and no 3G mean it's not going to be an automatic iPad rival despite the price tag.
Flash on board
It also only comes bundled with a 2GB memory card, although that can be boosted all the way up to 32GB.
Flash video is supported however, and the disgo Tablet 6000 is only 14.6mm thin too, with graphic accelerator and 1GHz processor.
The disgo Tablet 6000 will cost £179.99 and has been given a UK release date for later this month from Amazon.co.uk, Play.com and HMV.
| |
Read More ...
Sky channels HBO content into Sky Atlantic
Sky has announced it is adding a new channel to its extensive line-up – Sky Atlantic.The channel has been borne out of a deal with HBO, which means that the channel is choc-full of premium content from the States.
It's bad news for non-Sky customers as it does meant that Mad Men will be leaving the BBC after it has aired the rest of the fourth series.
The strangely-loved show will continue on Sky, with the fifth series airing some time in 2011.
Six feet under the Boardwalk
The announcement of Sky Atlantic does mean that we now have UK dates for three of the most eagerly awaited HBO shows: Game of Thrones, Treme and Boardwalk Empire.
The Scorsese produced Boardwalk Empire will land on Sky Atlantic in February, with Game of Thrones and Treme (made by the same folks as The Wire) showing in April.
Other shows to hit the channel will be Mildred Pierce and re-runs of The Sopranos, The Wire and Six Feet Under.
A UK release date for the channel is yet to be announced, but we will keep you posted as soon as Sky lets us know and there will be an HD version.
It is a busy week for Sky with the satellite service launching Sky 3D, its dedicated 3D channel.
| |
Read More ...
Vodafone announces more flexible data plans
Vodafone has announced it will be offering new 'premium price plans', designed to help users looking to get just the right amount of data.While most iPhone users are still using around 200MB on average, according to a source, many smartphone users still want the comfort of more megabytes per month.
To that end, Vodafone will be offering plans ranging from £25 to £60 per month on 24-month contracts.
Data for the internetz
Texts are unlimited on all but the cheapest of these, and you'll get between 100 and 3000 minutes depending on how much you spend.
However, Vodafone has also added in another data tier for those that want 750MB per month (on £40 and £45 per month deals), on top of its 500MB and 1GB deals already.
If you fancy knocking these deals down to 18 months, then you can do so by adding another £5 per month.
Phones available on these plans will include the HTC Desire, Nexus One and "many others" although Vodafone hasn't told us which as yet.
| |
Read More ...
In Depth: Behind the scenes with Sky 3D TV
Sky has launched its 3D channel today, with a range of sports, movies and documentaries and includes big-name films such as Alice In Wonderland and Monsters Vs Aliens.Speaking about the launch of the Sky 3D channel, John Cassy, Sky 3D's channel director, said: "Sky 3D will totally change the way entertainment is viewed in homes across the country. We see 3D as 'Event TV', an opportunity for people to share an incredible visual experience in their home.
"The launch of the channel is the just the beginning, 3D has arrived and will change TV forever."
When Sky first showed off its efforts at screening 3D TV back in December, TechRadar was there, feeling impressed but a little concerned that, with no firm commitments, it amounted to little more than a publicity stunt.
3D, after all, has been the 'next big thing' for decades, and although the latest round of polarised stereoscopic 3D is a world away from the anaglyphic coloured lens disappointments of the past, nobody would deny that it's going to take a massive push to convince the public that 3D is more than a gimmick.
Next big step
It is a decision that many would describe as brave, and some as foolhardy, but as we watched the company film the ATP Masters tennis at the O2 with modified 3D rigs, and then beam that footage live through one of its boxes, it's difficult to deny that Sky may just have a point; 3D could well be the next big step for television.
The intent of everyone within Sky to make 3D TV a success is clear; special permission was required from the ATP just in order to allow a television in one of the executive boxes so that the service could be shown to journalists. An entire second outside broadcast (OB) van was present so that the action could be filmed and shown live.
Within that OB van was not only the usual suspects – all bedecked in 3D glasses – but also three convergence experts, people just responsible for manually adjusting the field of vision, backed up by three specialist 'stereographers' that are in place to make sure that it's all working.
Well-rounded personality
Some of the lessons learned in the past 12 months are immediately obvious; in the original footage we were shown in 2008 the 3D suffered greatly from feeling like a load of 2D pictures on rails – like flattened sprites in a computer game.
But, this has now been adjusted to allow for a much improved rounded feel; it adds a level of solidity that really helps make the 3D less tiring on the eyes because, we felt, your brain settles down and accepts this much quicker.
When we interviewed Sky's 3D guru Brian Lenz in 2009 he suggested that filming live sport in 3D changed the game in a way that past improvements never really had.
For instance, when HD first arrived on the scene for Sky, people suggested that it would fundamentally change the way that sport was filmed, but the truth is that – aside from the cameras – much of the expertise and knowledge that had been honed over years was still entirely relevant.
With 3D that is not necessarily the case; new angles, new techniques and the abandoning of old tried-and-tested practice is necessary.
Take something as simple as the DOG (digital on-screen graphic) – the graphic displaying the channel name that traditionally sits in the top right corner on all Sky Sports channels. In two dimensions it is largely unobtrusive, but we happened to witness one of the first tests of the DOG on the tennis and it's, frankly, a little odd because it sits well forward of everything else on the screen; it literally stands out in a way that it shouldn't.
The setup used to film the tennis included three 3D rigs, which have been greatly improved in the past few months – not least to make them a little more robust and suitable for outside broadcasts rather then the controlled environments of the movie sets where 3D cameras have more usually been used.
These cameras were backed up by 2D cameras – but transitions between the two were perfectly palatable because the flatter pictures could be processed in real time by a computer chip which created the impression of depth.
Perhaps the biggest lesson that has been learned, at least from TechRadar's perspective, is subtlety. As the first 15 minutes of Avatar footage showed, overwhelming camera movement and gimmicks such as having things flying into the camera (and towards the viewer) are not helpful – and Sky's Tennis coverage was a study in restraint.
The majority of the action was kept from the traditional camera position behind one player, and although the line judges occasionally felt a little more imposing than is ideal (they are, of course, positioned at the back of the court nearest the camera) this made it much less tiring to watch.
Some issues
Of course, there are still the age old issues with glasses and the occasional jarring transition or, at this still early stage, malfunction that makes it sometimes difficult to watch – but this was the first extended 3D session on a smaller screen that TechRadar had gone through without ending up with a headache.
One of the most enlightening moments actually occurred in the tennis when there was one of the problems with the main camera (camera one in television parlance).
This left us for a few minutes with all the action coming from a 3D camera that was sat half-way down the court on one side looking diagonally across the net.
It should have been a horrible few minutes, but a wonderful rally and missed drop shot that bounced past the field of vision was genuinely fabulous. Much more visceral than the traditional view and far closer to how it feels watching a tennis match from courtside.
It was a small part of a big day for Sky – but it is becoming increasingly clear that this is not a technology that is going to disappear if the likes of such a major satellite broadcaster are prepared to commit this kind of effort to perfecting it.
| |
Read More ...
Sky 3D launches in the UK
Sky 3D officially launches today, with the channel offering 14 hours' 3D content a day.The channel is free to those who have taken out a Sky World HD subscription and will be showing the Ryder Cup (weather permitting) in 3D and live.
Sky and TV manufacturers will be hoping that the launch of the channel will kick-start 3D in the UK.
Sales of 3D TVs haven't exactly been on fire and the cost of setup is pretty pricey, but Sky was the main driver for bringing HD content to the UK so it is fair to say its influence on consumers is pretty high.
Sky 3D
Sky revealed its content list earlier this week, revealing that it will be showing key football, boxing and golf games and a host of movies, including Alice in Wonderland and Monsters Vs Aliens.
It will also be showing a number of documentaries, including 3D Meerkats and 7 Wonders of the Solar System.
Virgin Media also announced it is offering 3D content in the form of an on-demand movie channel.
For more information, go to www.sky.com.
| |
Read More ...
Samsung finally admits Symbian split
The Symbian foundation has suffered another blow as Samsung has revealed it is leaving the open source OS.Earlier this week we brought news of Sony Ericsson jumping off the Good Ship Symbian to hop onto the Google Android freighter, and now it seems Samsung is following the life raft.
Samsung has reportedly sent an email to registered developers of Symbian stating that it will be ending support for the Symbian platform by the end of the year, although whether it will leave the Symbian Foundation board too is unknown.
No, we're not... yes, we are
Last year, Samsung told TechRadar that it wasn't leaving the Symbian platform, stating: "Samsung is an initial member of Symbian Foundation and continues to cooperate with Symbian Foundation. At the same time, Samsung supports various existing open operating systems including Symbian, Linux, Android, and Windows Mobile."
But then it announced Bada, its own smartphone/featurephone platform, and hasn't come out with a Symbian phone since the (actually rather good) i8910HD.
But don't worry - Nokia still plans to ship 50 million-plus Symbian devices in the next year or so, offering plenty of scope for Symbian to flourish, and we've still got Symbian^4 coming too to help bolster the platform.
| |
Read More ...
In Depth: The curious case of a Facebook fake
A security researcher has infiltrated the highest levels of America's intelligence agencies using nothing more than Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and a picture of a pretty woman.'Robin Sage' appeared on social networking sites in December, claiming to be a 20-something Cyber Threat Analyst at the US Naval Network Warfare Command in Norfolk, Virginia. Within weeks, she had hundreds of friends and followers in the Department of Defense, the National Security Agency (NSA), defence contractors and the British military.
Sassy updates on hacking earned Sage access to sensitive information about intelligence officials, invitations to speak at conferences, and job offers at a bank, a gaming company and even Google.
However, Sage will not be showing up for work at Mountain View – she was invented by US cyber-security expert Thomas Ryan to test the gullibility of the intelligence and military communities.
"I wanted to see how susceptible certain groups were to social engineering," Ryan told PC Plus. "The aim was to research people's decisions to trust and share information based on gender, occupation, education and friends."
Fake ID
Ryan created what he calls a "blatantly false" identity, choosing a woman who fits the stereotype of a Central Asian spy, adding false credentials at MIT and even naming her after a famous US Special Forces training exercise.
Despite this, Sage was able to connect with staff at the offices of the chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff, the US Marine corps, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and British military personnel serving alongside Americans.
"Guys at the lower end of the military would talk about stuff on Facebook that they shouldn't," says Ryan. "At the upper end, they would use certain applications that allowed me to track where they were. The NSA was easy. They're out there actively trying to get technology people.
"When I started linking all that information together, I was able to get names, addresses and phone numbers, plus passwords to security questions, bank accounts and email."
Some organisations did prove too tough for Ryan to crack, though. "I didn't manage to make any friends in the CIA, the FBI or Secret Service," he admits. "The mentality there is different: they just don't trust you from the beginning. And it was harder to get friends from colleges than it was from security and intelligence. The universities I picked… were prestigious and kind of cliquey. If they don't remember you, they're not going to talk to you."
One cyber-security professional who did befriend Sage was Chris Nickerson, a 'Red Team' hacker who tests organisations' security using everything from digital attacks to physically breaking into facilities.
"I don't take friend requests lightly," he says. "When I saw Robin Sage was connected to a bunch of people in the security world, I accepted her on Facebook, copied all the intel from the profile and then unfriended her."
Suspicious minds
Nickerson was immediately suspicious. As he looked into Sage's background, he found that no one called Robin Sage had ever attended MIT, her work address was a shell company, and her home appeared to be controversial security company Blackwater. Nickerson outed Sage on his podcast and the news spread online.
Then strange things happened. "People kept friend requesting Sage," says Nickerson. "We watched her spiral into all these different communities. When it's a hot girl, people have blinders on."
"It kept propagating, even after the end of the [28-day] experiment," says Ryan. "The timing was right around Christmas so everybody was a lot more relaxed, and I guess they just wanted it to be true."
"People can't resist using social networks," says James Lewis of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, DC. "Workers in the intelligence community know the security risks but they also know that they can be more productive if they take advantage of these technologies. When you have 100,000 people and 99.9 per cent of them do everything right, that still means you have 100 targets."
Except that, according to The Washington Post newspaper, over 850,000 people in America today have Top Secret clearance.
"One of the beauties of using the internet for espionage is that the odds are in your favour," says Lewis. "At a very low cost, you can troll hundreds of thousands of people."
The problem is hardly limited to America's military intelligence. Last year, the head of MI6 could be seen paddling in his swimming trunks on his wife's Facebook page, while the Chinese recently banned online dating, chatrooms and social networks for anyone in the People's Liberation Army.
Social security
Judy Baker, organiser of the UK's first Cyber Security Competition for students, says, "The Robin Sage experiment proves that the most effective security professionals have some vulnerability to a well-spun con. It underlines the importance of the security services to be more aware of tricks that could lead us to bypass security measures."
"It's ridiculous that social networking was ever allowed for anyone in intelligence," says Nickerson. "It's like handing out guns to everybody and saying 'do whatever you want'. With social networks, they have to realise that information is power and packets can kill people just as easily as bullets."
| |
Read More ...
Review: The Times for iPad
First and foremost, this isn't The Times newspaper's app. What it is, is an RSS aggregator that displays news feeds in great-looking categories and columns, which you can customise to taste.
Once you're subscribed, tap a story and the page folds over, revealing the contents of the feed article, which you can view inline or as a web page.
There's also 'read later' functionality, like Instapaper – handy if you want to cache articles to read when you'll be without a mobile or Wi-Fi signal, such as on a train or plane journey.
What Times doesn't do is integrate with Google Reader, so adding feeds can be tedious, especially since there's as yet no multitasking on the iPad, so you can't just pop into Safari to grab a feed URL.
The app does a good job of picking up news feeds if you just give it a general URL, though, and if there's more than one feed available, it offers you a list to choose from.
Related Links
| |
Read More ...
Weird Tech: Wanted: Head of Intergalactic Affairs
There was an odd extra-terrestrial kerfuffle in the mainstream media this week, after claims emerged that the United Nations was set to announce the appointment of an ambassador with responsibility for dealing with alien contact. This caused a rather large outbreak of UFO mania, with bookmakers using it as an excuse to take bets on the imminent arrival of aliens. If the UN's gearing up for an alien encounter, then surely that means there's something big showing up on the long-range scans?
INVASION CANCELLED: Shame, we were hoping to get some super-long-lasting alien smartphone battery technology
Sadly, it turned out to be not quite the case. The UN called the idea "nonsense" and said that Mazlan Othman, who heads-up the UN's amazingly exciting-sounding Office for Outer Space Affairs and was the supposed alien ambassador, will instead be talking about space junk and asteroids in conferences for the foreseeable future..
Fine craft
We've been enjoying Minecraft quite a lot recently. Not playing it, but watching videos of people having fun in its incredibly versatile world - by building models of starships and playing about with fire and all the hilarious consequences that unfold.
MINER ISSUE: Hopefully he'll port Sonic The Hedgehog to it
But this latest video beats the rest by a mile. A guy's made a fully functional 16-bit processor unit within the game. It's the size of a city. And made out of grass and stone textures. And works.
Shoot this up
We're going to go out on a limb with a cool game/thing recommendation for you this week, in the shape of Kick Ass - a JavaScript Asteroids clone. Of course, Asteroids clones have been in existence since about 15 minutes after Asteroids first appeared, but what makes this one different is where you play it. On web pages.
All you have to do is add a short-cut to this Javascript bookmarklet located, then click the link when you're reading a web page you'd like to destroy. Then destroy it with the pop-up pointy spaceship that's layered on top of the page.
HOT JAVA: Not quite as satisfying as leaving an aggressive anonymous comment
Images and blocks of text explode, with the page cleverly de-constructing itself and crumbling into a heap before your eyes. Not as funny as that JavaScript joke that broke Twitter last week, but still impressively clever.
"Coat and sandals, nothing else"
If you're so devoid of free, original thought that you like the idea of having an app tell you what to wear tomorrow, there's... an app to tell you what to wear tomorrow. Wearcast hooks into the local five-day weather forecast, giving you tips on if you should bravely risk just a jumper tomorrow, or if you should go the whole hog and wear your coat.
REMEMBER CLEAN PANTS: "And do up your flies"
Apparently powered by a "proprietary meteorologist-developed algorithm" the app uses temperature and wind chill ratings to pick between suggested outfits. The comments beneath the iTunes listing are depressingly positive, with people claiming it's actually helped them pick clothes for the day. There is no future.
| |
Read More ...
Valve brings in-game payments to Team Fortress 2
Valve has announced its biggest update ever to online multiplayer Team Fortress 2, bringing in-game payments for the first time.In the update, players will be able to pay real money for items, following a business model much like Farmville, where you can buy upgrades during the game.
According to PC Gamer who broke the story, in Team Fortress 2 players can buy new community items, and all Valve-made items, by adding real money to their Steam Wallet.
Money added to the Steam Wallet can also be spent on anything on Steam. When it comes to adding cash to the wallet, the minimum you can add is $5 / £4 / €5.
At the moment you can't buy older community items yet, Valve are going to roll that out gradually once the system is working.
Never think about the money
In news that will make some fans of the game more than a little annoyed, some items will not be available at unless you spend your cold, hard cash on them.
Adding in-game payment to TF2 is a fundamental change to the game, so it will be interesting to see if there is a backlash or not.
PC Gamer spoke to Robin Walker from Valve, who said about the news: "We never really think about the money TF2 makes when we're thinking about what to do.
"In this case, the thing that we are trying to build is a framework for a more robust collaboration with the community on content creation."
The TF2 community will be able to create their own objects (they are calling this the Mann-conomy Update) and sell them within the game. When they are sold, a percentage of the revenues will go to the creator.
There was thought that the in-game payment would mean that TF2 would become free to play, but Walker said that: "We've considered it, and it's something we'd love to gather data from, but our main concern is that right now the cost of purchasing TF2 again is the main cost that cheaters pay when we catch them."
The update also brings a new dueling mini-game, crates of mystery items to be found and unlocked, and special item sets that give you major bonuses for wearing them all at once.
If you want to check out the full list of items for sale, check out PC Gamer where they have made a checklist and tell which ones are worth the money.
| |
Read More ...
Review: Nokia N8
Nokia's reputation as a leader in the smartphone market has been under increasing pressure in recent years, as a string of 'high end' handsets have failed to capture the minds and wallets of the phone-buying public.So to fix that, Nokia's gone back to the drawing board to bring out the Nokia N8, featuring a new OS and a huge amount of high end tech packed under the hood.
Having announced the phone back in April, Nokia has been holding off on release to make sure the user experience is as good as possible.
But it needs to be very good indeed seeing as most other brands announce a phone then release it within weeks – we've been waiting nearly half a year for this one.
Symbian^3 builds on the previous iterations of the OS seen on the likes of the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic and Nokia X6, but adds in multiple home screens, widgets and an improved UI.
Hardware-wise, Nokia has pushed the boat out too with the new N8, offering a full metal chassis with anodised scratch-proof paint to give the phone a really high end feel.
However, with a 12MP camera with Xenon flash bolted on the back, it's not a slim device by any stretch of the imagination - it fits in the hand well enough but the dimensions 113.5 x 59 x 12.9 mm aren't going to rival the likes of the iPhone 4 and the Samsung Galaxy S in pocket-friendliness.
The Nokia N8 also doesn't have a removable battery either - the full metal chassis is completely enclosed so unless you've got a very particular screwdriver, you're not getting in to replace any innards.
To that end, Nokia has put two hinged gates on the side of the N8, giving access to the microSD card slot and the SIM card port - both are quite hard to pull open (which isn't a bad thing as you're probably not going to be opening them very often) and clicking cards in can be tricky too.
The rest of the Nokia N8 continues the higher-end feel: the 3.5-inch capacitive OLED screen really pops with colour (although fails to match the impressive qualities of Samsung's Super AMOLED) and the minimalistic design sees only one home button on the front of the device... which seems a little familiar.
Nokia wouldn't be taking its cues from another manufacturer here, would it?
The right-hand side of the phone houses the camera key, which has staggered press levels to allow you to only push it down partway for autofocus. There's also a volume key with raised buttons, although these are fairly far away from each other, so can be hard to hit when you're not looking.
There's also the infuriating slider switch on this side of the Nokia N8 - if you're a fan of physical unlocking, then this is a good example of that, but we'd prefer a simple screen swipe to open up the phone (although you can short press a little on-screen offering).
The left-hand side of the Nokia N8 is a little more sleek, with only the aforementioned gates for microSD and SIM, as well as the uncovered microUSB slot.
The top of the N8 is where it mostly happens though - there's a mini HD port, the 3.5mm headphone jack and the power switch, which is also used to quickly change profiles when buzzing through the N8's interface.
The bottom houses the charger port - and it's a standard 'new Nokia charger' port, which is really odd when a) every other manufacturer bar Apple is going microUSB and b) there's a microUSB slot on the side of the phone already.
You can charge through this port too – it's just Nokia has supplied the old two-pin effort in the box.
But as we said before, the Nokia N8 sits in the hand well enough and allows you to access all the functions pretty easily and you don't need to jiggle it around in your palm too much. We're just not sure about that charger though.
In the box
Nokia has thrown a large range of toys in the box with the N8 - an adaptor to convert HDMI to mini HDMI, decent earbuds with an inline remote, a slim line charger and a USB lead with adaptor too.
This is all packaged in an eco-friendly slim box, and certainly looks premium and worth the money you'll need to be forking out.
As we mentioned earlier, the Nokia N8 is using a new operating system, Symbian^3. Symbian has been used by the Finns for umpteen years, and sadly hasn't gone through much development in that time.
The new iteration is designed to help bring Nokia's touchscreen phones in line with those from Apple and Google - and it fails in our opinion.
Firstly, the new home screen system - you only get three displays to scroll through, and you can only populate these with identically-sized widgets.
We get the reasoning behind this, as the Nokia N8 displays the widgets nicely in both landscape and portrait modes (and flips pretty quickly too). However, if you want to add a few specific applications to the front screen, you have to open a 'shortcuts' widget and then put up to four icons on there.
It's miles behind the simple Android system of opening the menu, holding an icon down and then seeing it jump to the front screen.
The widget offering is also limited, although more will be available to download as time goes on from the Ovi Store. However, there's a strong focus on pointless entertainment apps out the box, and the Nokia N8 suffers on first impressions because of this.
Another problem - Nokia has still got a long way to go in terms of perfecting the touchscreen interface. When you want to move between home screens you have to make a sideways swiping gesture... then wait for the screen to catch up.
No screen moving under the finger, no instant reaction. It seems like such a simple thing and once again Nokia has failed to pick up on the basics when designing a 'cutting-edge' phone.
The good thing about the new Nokia N8 is there are a range of separate areas where it's significantly upgraded over previous models - for instance, there's a 680MHz ARM 11 processor on board, and while that sounds low it belies its specs in performance.
The home screens might seem slow to respond, but it does it in a consistent way, showing it's more the way the software is put together than any inherent limitations in the hardware – although a few areas, like entering text in web applications, are really laggy indeed.
When opening up the menu (using the single button on the front of the phone) the Nokia N8 responds quickly and then when scrolling through the icons, the phone reacts exactly to your touch – which makes it all the more curious why the same system wasn't integrated into the home screens.
But the decent reaction aside, we're bitterly disappointed by what Symbian^3 offers, as it's not much more than a more in-depth version of the Symbian system that's been around for years and years.
Things like having to drill down through so many menus to get to simple options and the clunkiness of the home screen widgets make it feel very archaic when compared to the slickness of webOS, Android and iOS.
The widget manipulation is a great example: you have to press down for quite a while to begin editing the elements on the screen, and then you can only add or remove the widgets or move them up or down.
You can't move them from one home screen to another, meaning if you want to rearrange all three home screens at once you'll be spending a long time deleting and re-adding widgets all over the place.
What's more annoying is the opportunity here for Nokia - little things like switching wallpaper every time you swipe are a nice touch, if only the rest of the operation was as slick.
It just pales in comparison to the Live Wallpapers and up to nine home screens of Android - and that's before we even get into the excellent overlays such as Sense UI.
Nokia's menu-based system might be familiar to some, but the time is now right to change things - the old fans need to move into the next generation of smartphone operation, rather than Nokia catering for them now almost exclusively.
Things like having to drill down through two menus to get to an application you downloaded is far too much; and when editing a list (emails, for instance) to delete multiple items you need to press menu, mark, select the items, press menu, then delete and confirm.
Compare that to the iPhone's system: edit, select items, delete. Done.
Or re-ordering your icons: open the menu, click organise then move the icon through the grid. If you need to go 'up' a level, then you have to throw the icon into the relevant slot. It's good that you can do it, but it's just convoluted.
We know that people will say that there's a desire for such organisation, but it should be more like the iPhone: choosing to make folders than having to wade through clicks and swipes just to find where the email client is.
We don't want to keep comparing the operating systems, but we need to see more from Nokia, as Symbian^3 in its current iteration is starting to feel as convoluted as Windows Mobile in its operation - and that's NEVER, EVER a good thing for a mobile phone.
For lower-end phones, Symbian^3 might be OK - but the Nokia N8 feels like the phone the X6 or 5800 XpressMusic should have been, but with better hardware. Symbian^3's capabilities should have been shown then, not now with this high-end, flagship phone.
Nokia's heritage in using a mobile phone as a phone is on show here, and we're very glad it is; we simply couldn't stand another 'Antenna-gate' like we saw with the iPhone 4.
Contacts
We've criticised Nokia in the past for offering too many options when adding in a contact, but that's thankfully been rectified with the Nokia N8.
Admittedly the multitude of options is still there, but they're at least hidden below a multitude of menus.
However, the contacts screen is another area where Nokia has tried to improve things and failed miserably.
Having synchronised the SIM contacts with your phone (no such help with Google sync here, although you can synchronise your contacts from your corporate mail account) you're then presented with a contact card.
At the top of that is 'social networks' which, when you click it, requires you to sign into Facebook or Twitter, wait, search for the person's name if it's not the same as in the phone book and then click to add.
Even after that it's still only an option to be viewed once the social networks tab on the contact profile has been hit – you can then send a message from there or view the profile of that person.
But set up is long... very, very long and you won't do it for more than three people unless you're on a stupidly long train journey.
Plus the contact picture it pulls from Facebook or Twitter doesn't always match up to the right size of the space on offer, meaning it looks very amateurish.
Given the excellence of the HTC Sense UI on the new HTC Desire HD, with more information than you'll ever need on a person offered from their contact profile, we have no idea what Nokia is trying to do here.
Calling
At least calling is a little bit more successful – although there's no noise cancelling on offer, despite the noise reduction tool being used in the HD video capture.
All the callers we had conversations with reported being able to hear us easily, and the ear speaker was nice and loud – with a good range of volume offered by playing about with the rocker switch.
We also liked the presence of the smart dialling pad: either start typing a number to see it spring up, or use the number pad as a T9 predictive text-style operation and the names will come up that way too – nice touch.
Video calling – which, as we all know, was invented by Apple this year (although hang on, wasn't it around in 2002...*COMMENT DELETED BY APPLE'S NET PATROL*) is present on the Nokia N8, and it's... well, it's video calling. Yes, useful if you have to see someone at VGA resolution, but that's very rare and ultimately it's a pointless feature.
At least Nokia has implemented it well here – it's very smooth and easy to use, especially over Wi-Fi.
Another plus is the speaker on the rear phone – while it's a tiny bit tinny, it's certainly very loud and clear, so make sure you only use it for easier conference calling, and not annoying people on the bus with your rather terrible grime-step tunes.
Nokia is all about connecting people, and that's why it has traditionally been so strong in messaging.
In fact, it's drawn so heavily on the past it's decided that despite having a 3.5-inch screen, it should be a 12-key multi-tap option in portrait mode on the Nokia N8.
Yes, you get predictive text to make typing a bit faster, but we saw that on the Nokia 3210... and that was back in 1999.
It's 2010 now, and we're living in a world where large touchscreens have replaced a one-inch monochrome screen – so come on Nokia, let's have a mini-QWERTY offering with word correction.
(FYI that Nokia 3210 has a 1250mAh battery – which is bigger than the one in the Nokia N8).
Obviously there's a full-screen QWERTY keyboard when turning the phone on its side to move into landscape mode, but there's still no word correction, meaning a lot of frustrated backspacing until you get used to the system/slow down your typing.
Messaging options are plentiful though: you've got every kind of webmail under the sun, from Google to Yahoo to Hotmail, as well as Exchange support too.
Obviously text, MMS and conversations are included from the outset - however make sure you've copied over your contacts to the Nokia N8's memory before you start messaging, as the default Conversations mode will only show numbers and not names until you do.
There are a few cool features in here - namely things like being able to find numbers in the text - although you'll need to activate the 'Automatic Find' mode before this works.
We would like to have seen an overhaul of the messaging UI though - it's the same as the previous iteration of Symbian, and hitting the correct areas to enter names, number or the message are a little hard to hit.
Email set up is nice and easy though: you simply need to enter your address and password, and if it's a popular webmail account the Nokia N8 will pop off and find all the settings for it.
If it's Exchange you're after, you'll need to add in a few more settings, but it's still more painless than on other phones.
Element like Fring are also included as part of the application list, and will start up automatically when turning on the phone.
However once again this is a little convoluted to set up, as you need to add in accounts and then start up Fring to use the service every time.
Plus it crashed on us when making calls, which is never a good thing - although you are able to make VOIP calls if you so wish, and it does act as a Twitter client too, albeit very poorly with missing graphics and the confusing layout.
The Nokia N8 has to offer up a decent internet experience if it's to beat the current crop of internet tablet/phones.
The Google Gang and iPhone iN-crowd both have excellent implementations of a Webkit-browser, and while the Nokia N8 definitely has a better web experience, it's not going to be seen as a better option than those phones.
For instance, it seems like it will be a winner: pinch to zoom and Flash compatibility seem to offer up a decent experience, and give a lot of cause for hope.
But then you begin to use the internet, and you'll see it's not as slick as the competitors. For instance, the pinch-zooming is nowhere near as accurate, juddering along at times and making it harder to get close to the text.
Similarly, you only get two options - double tap to see the text a bit closer, or double tap again to zoom out. You can go a bit closer, but like the iPhone, the text won't reform to fit the screen.
It's a trick that HTC has perfected on its Android phones, such as the Desire HD, and now other Android handsets are catching up with - the Motorola Milestone 2 manages it for instance, although it's not automatic.
Flash is also a bit of a mixed bag too - the Nokia N8 actually uses Flash Lite 4 to interpret Flash 10 videos, which is a handy plus (and if we need to add: something the iPhone 4 will likely never do).
It's good for many videos - we'd say on a par with the HTC Desire for many. However, with more Flash-heavy videos, like those shown on the BBC website, the Nokia N8 struggles a lot and the resulting pixellated mess isn't up to much.
It also doesn't seem to like the new YouTube HTML5 site for mobiles - we've been impressed with that on the iPhone 4 and Android handsets, and yet we're forced to look at an oddly-shaped video screen on the Nokia N8.
The interface for the web browser on the Nokia N8 hasn't really changed either – we're STILL forced to go through a bagillion screen presses to just reload the page.
Nokia's got this little trick of opening up the screen to show as much of the web page as possible, and then you hit a double-ended arrow to see the options. From there, you have to hit the menu icon, and get a new grid of other icons to mess about with.
Only here can you reload, which is a little convoluted when some phones have it as a button alongside the URL.
But one nice touch: you can automatically subscribe to an RSS feed from this icon pane, and that feed will be available as a home screen widget. It's this kind of intuition that we wish Nokia would use more often throughout the N8.
Google search is also included (and Bing if you prefer that option) and it's nice to be able to search for an item no matter where you are.
History is also cool – each website is shown as a separate thumbnail to scroll through, which makes it much easier to find the page you were on, as the titles can sometimes be a little cryptic.
The speed at which you can whizz through them is again testament to the excellent implementation of the GPU and CPU working in tandem.
The web browser is decent enough – the screens render well enough and fairly quickly (especially over Wi-Fi) and the accuracy is pretty good.
It just really, really lacks the wow factor of other mobile web browsers out there, with a slight delay on link clicking at times and choppy flash, as well as a being a little slower on a number of tests than the likes of the Samsung Galaxy S, HTC Desire and iPhone 4 in our tests.
If there's any area that the Nokia N8 is going to excel at, it's on the camera, and thankfully, it does just that, and with aplomb.Forget the fact you can create coffee-table books with the 12MP sensor and Carl Zeiss optics (as well as 'proper' Xenon flash) it's in the day to day picture taking we're impressed with the Nokia N8.
There are a multitude of options to play with: for instance, raising the contrast up and down, or messing with the sharpness of an image. You can also fiddle with exposure or white balance, and there are a number of scenes to play with as well, should you require an improvement in performance.
That said, we've only once ever managed to use the 'Fireworks' mode on any camera, and even then we sort of missed the main explosion. Still nice to have it there though.
Face detection is included too – it's pretty good, although when we tested it on a group of 12 people it only ever managed to find 11 at most, and that's with a lot of manipulation.
That said, it's not critical to have every face recognised, as you only need to set the focus levels accurately, and the Nokia N8 does that with veritable aplomb with pretty much any mode (although Macro mode was a bit erratic at times when trying to take an EXTREME CLOSE UP).
NORMAL MODE: The N8 in automatic mode
LANDSCAPE VIEW: Not a lot of detail is added by switching the scenes, suggesting the general mode is good enough
CLOUDY WHITE: The white balance is set to cloudy - again, not showing a lot of difference
HIGH EXPOSURE: When dialling up the exposure, so much more detail is shown in the foreground. Nokia's decision not to add touch-focus, where you can tap on the portion of the screen you want in focus, is obvious here as this may be the shot you'd prefer
INDOOR: The natural mode captures images sharply despite a relative lack of light, and shots are easy to frame
9MP MODE: Using the 9MP mode allows you to take wider shots; the macro mode used here captures detail pretty well
HIGH CONTRAST: Upping the contrast adds a nice sheen to photos, but isn't suitable for every situation
XENON FLASH: Working as quickly as a compact camera, the xenon flash takes decent pictures and captures the colour of the subject well
GREAT ZOOM: Despite being a digital zoom, the clarity when magnifying the shot is awesome, a feature that's reproduced on the HD video recording too
In terms of comparison, it's hard to say that the Nokia N8 is leagues ahead of the likes of the Sony Ericsson Satio or the Samsung Pixon 12, although the overall ease of use is better with this phone than those from last year.
Video is in the same league as the camera on the Nokia N8 - we're talking HD video recording and a decent smattering of features designed to give you the best video possible.
The settings on offer aren't as extensive as on the camera mode, but that's to be expected.
White balance and colour manipulation are on offer, which are among the most important for setting the scene.
The night mode is odd; it's still really clear and bright, but the lack of frame rate leads to very strange footage, so it's a shame a dedicated video light wasn't included by Nokia.
It's more about the power of the image capture on the Nokia N8 – check out the world's smallest stop-motion animation filmed using a high-power lens and the N8 to show what's possible with this camera.
However, don't go thinking it's the world's best HD camcorder on a mobile phone – the iPhone 4 is easily its equal, although we'd imagine the superior optics on the Nokia N8 would give it a slight edge to the highly-tuned eye.
But either way, the Nokia N8 has a fantastic camera performance, which we'd hope it would do, given the Finns has been boasting about the HD powers of the N8 for nearly half a year now.
The Nokia N8 is designed to be a media player with some power, and that certainly seems to be the case. Be it music, video or simply viewing photos, it seems pretty good at most.
Music
The Nokia N8's music player might not have been upgraded massively for a long time, but that's not necessarily a bad thing, given that sometimes all you want a handset to do is play the files you ask and do so in an easy to use manner.
The icons on the music player screen are large and easy to use, and there's also the option to see more detailed information about the song playing, as well as the album art.
The options to mess about with the music player aren't that extensive unfortunately, which means the music quality is somewhat compromised.
While the Nokia N8 has a pretty good audio output, testing it on the audiophile-friendly Sennheiser HD-650 headphones shows it to be a bit high-end heavy.
We found the best way to balance it out was to employ the 'Bass Booster' equaliser setting, although this really masked, more than fixed, the problem.
It should be noted that the Nokia N8 can really kick out the bass though, so it's not all bad. It was a decent experience overall, just quite beating the competition into the number one spot for music playback (we're still in love with the sound emitted from the Samsung Galaxy S).
However, we do like the music manipulation offerings, such as the simple music widget for the home screen and the inline remote controls supplied on the decent in-box headphones, which have some good noise-isolating buds on them.
Another big plus is the FM transmitter, which very few phones still offer, despite it being such a handy tool. Any song will have an FM transmitter option in the settings, and you can simply set the frequency to whatever you like and the FM radio can pick it up - it even sends the song information if RDS is enabled on the receiver.
Video
Video files on the Nokia N8 also play back well, which makes sense given so many are supported. We tested out as many files as we could get our hands on, and nearly all worked.
However, we did encounter one small problem: the placement of the 3.5mm headphone jack meant it was hard to comfortably watch films when holding the Nokia N8 in one hand.
The best quality seemed to come from WMV files, which seemed to offer superior audio performance, and it's interesting to note that should you be transferring the video files over on Windows 7, the Nokia N8 will ask for them to be re-encoded to WMV, no matter what file type.
We managed to view Xvid, DivX, MP4 and AVI files with no issue on the Nokia N8, although m4v simply wouldn't even copy across and OGG files wouldn't play back either.
However, Flash video files were initially not accepted, but once on the phone and accessed through the file manager, would play back with the sparse-but-functional Flash video player.
You've also got the option to download video from the BBC iPlayer - the interface might be a little fiddly but it's very usable and downloading programmes onto your phone is simple as anything - once saved, simply open up the file to activate the license and see your video in crystal clear quality.
Image quality is good enough on the Nokia N8, although we weren't blown away. The OLED screen should offer some decent contrast ratios, but we couldn't help but feel that the lower-res of the nHD screen (640x 380 pixels) didn't impress as much as the plethora of WVGA devices on the market at the moment.
We weren't saddened by the video quality by any stretch of the imagination, but it's hard to feel that the 3.5-inch screen and lower resolution screen can really match up with the big media hitters, such as the Samsung Galaxy S.
Of course, the extra trick of sending video out over the HDMI port is a nice idea, and does help to make your media that little bit more accessible to others - however, the Tron Legacy trailers pre-loaded on our unit wouldn't work due to licensing issues, so we're not sure what Nokia slipped up on there.
However the video performance isn't superb on the big screen - it looks a lot better on the smaller screen - but it's still better than a lot we've seen out there.
And of course, DLNA is on its way, and in a big way too. The Samsung Galaxy S and Wave feature AllShare to send media all around, the HTC Desire HD and Desire Z offer easy DLNA playback and even Motorola is in on the act, so only being able to connect up via a lead isn't as cool as it used to be (but it's still a really excellent option to have).
FM radio
And speaking of the FM transmitter earlier, we hoped for a similarly good experience on the FM radio as well.
Sadly, this isn't the case, as the radio is as basic as it always has been on Nokia phones over the years. Signal was poor in most situations with any pair of wired headphones connected, and the Nokia N8 refused to find RDS details on any of the stations we found.
True, the scanning was quick and the signal issues are found on 90% of mobile phones with an inbuilt radio, but it still wasn't an impressive experience and having to go through and name all our favourite stations was really rather irritating indeed.
Looking at the specs for the Nokia N8 it's easy to get worried about the battery life when you consider it's only 1200mAh, which is a lot less than its competitors, most of which opt for a 1500mAh power cell.
However, the good news is the Nokia N8 belies this spec and actually will outlast a lot of its peers in terms of battery prowess.
We managed to easily knock out two days' use with the phone, although it wouldn't have managed to get far into the third day.
This is with push email turned on, the Wi-Fi scanner in full force and a fair smattering of internet and music too - in short, it's just fantastic and way ahead of nearly all the smartphone competition.
However, it should be noted that we found ourselves hitting the internet a lot less frequently than on other devices we've had on test, simply because it's a poorer experience so idly flicking through web pages while Neighbours is on becomes less of an attraction.
It should be noted that the power management of the Nokia N8 is likely down to the decent performance of the CPU - Nokia's decision to put a 680MHz power core in the N8 shows that it's not looking to rev the phone as fast as other devices, but we rarely saw many examples of slowdown in the OS to show this relatively low-power processor.
We can't help but wonder why Nokia has gone with the 1200mAh battery - sure, it's optimised it really well, meaning you won't need to charge regularly, but think of how long the Nokia N8 could have lasted with a battery that was 25% bigger?
It would have probably pushed the phone into three or maybe even four days' use, and that's ridiculous by today's smartphone standards.
We also tested the phone thoroughly offline - the battery performance held up, despite hammering the Bluetooth and Wi-Fi with data transfers to assess performance, and using it for long stints as a music player.
The only downside when it comes to battery life we could see is the fact it's sealed in the phone - we don't know why Nokia's chosen to do this, but it means you can't replace it should the power centre go wonky.
Connections
The Nokia N8 is full to the brim with high-end connectivity: Bluetooth 3.0 with A2DP, Wi-Fi up to 802.11n, assisted GPS, 10.2Mbps HSDPA, mini HDMI port, basically everything you could want.
Apart from the odd decision to put the older style of Nokia charger in the box, there's nothing we can fault here.
We were (sadly) quite excited to try out some high end Bluetooth 3.0 transfers, as it promises a jump from 3Mbps to 24Mbps data transfer speeds. We used a Galaxy S (also rocking 3.0) to try sending a song, and the results were a little disappointing: a 3.4MB file took 34 seconds to transfer.
However, we tried it using the BlackBerry Torch (a Bluetooth 2.1 device) and we found that same song took 55 seconds to transfer, so at least the Nokia N8 is faster.
The other settings all worked well in the background, much as you'd expect them too. However, one of the claims in Symbian^3 is an much more effective management of Wi-Fi and 3G, as other Nokia phones have required the user to set which connection should be used at any one time, and manually prioritise the connections in a ranking list.
Well, that's sort of been done away with here, although at times the Nokia N8 will default to 3G for certain applications even though Wi-Fi is present, and still irritatingly ask you which connection you want to apply when opening some applications.
It's not a big problem for some users, but for the noveau smartphone user it will be a little disconcerting - Nokia needs to avoid this kind of thing at all costs.
Basically, it's another area where the older version of Symbian comes screaming through, and Nokia needs to throw that rule book out the window and design a whole new OS to take on the bigger boys when it comes to little things like connectivity - which is hopefully what MeeGo will be.
PC connectivity
Nokia's attempts to sync your phone up with a PC have been patchy over the years, but with the current Ovi Suite it's doing a lot better; throw Windows 7 into the mix and you've got a fantastically fully featured connection suite for the Nokia N8.
We were ridiculously impressed that our PC recognised the phone so easily, and then offered a variety of options to perform without needing to actually open any programs.
If that's not your bag then you do get the option to open Nokia's Ovi Suite to do all kinds of phone manipulation, or you can hit the Ovi Player to download and copy your music.
Sadly, Ovi Music Unlimited (formerly Nokia's Comes with Music) isn't featured on this phone in the UK – man, we hope Nokia fixes that service soon as it would be awesome on a phone like this.
It's interesting that some operating systems will allow you to convert tracks and videos to a more efficient or palatable format before copying them to the Nokia N8 – it makes interacting with the phone so much easier.
The Nokia N8 comes preloaded with so many applications it's unreal, although scratch the surface a little bit and you'll see most of them are more than useless.
For instance, do we need a dedicated Rihanna app, or a Michael Jackson Wiki-style offering? Information on Lily Allen or an app to log into Facebook and tell us when our friends' birthdays are? Not really.
But there are some decent ones on there: for instance, BBC iPlayer may only be a link to the relevant mobile site, but the ability to stream or download programmes is really cool.
Gravity was one of the better S60 applications for accessing Twitter, and that's on the Nokia N8 as well – but only as a trial.
This is really gutting as the interface is clean and quick, and you can use it as a Google Reader RSS app or click into Facebook too, and those functions aren't easily natively on the Nokia N8.
There's a smattering of other average applications include, such as TuneWiki, which offers song lyrics and album artwork, although often it can't manage to locate your tracks.
Fring is also pretty neat for some VOIP connectivity, although really needs another user to have it installed to work effectively (although it's a good portal to chatting applications as well).
There aren't any good games included, which is weird when you consider Nokia made such a big deal about the GPU included on the N8.
There's only Garfield Training included, and it's such a poor and slow game (and ad-funded), we don't even know why Nokia bothered putting it on there.
There are only a smattering of decent racing games on the Ovi Store, and none of them are free – why Asphalt 5, the game of choice for every other phone in the world ever bar none, isn't on here we don't know. At least it would show off the graphical power a little bit.
However, you can download Need For Speed from the Ovi Store for free (whether it will stay free, we don't know) and that does properly show off the graphical power of the Nokia N8 - which makes it all the more curious why Nokia hasn't included it on the phone nor why it isn't subject to greater promotion on the Ovi Store.
Ovi Store is still a long, long way off being as easy to use as the Android Market or the Apple App Store, and the range needs to be improved too. Heck, we'd even say the BlackBerry App World has a better UI – and that's a harsh thing to claim indeed.
Maps
Ovi Maps has been touted as a superior product to Google Maps on mobile phones for a long time, but we can't really see how that claim can be justified.
True, it offers some extra features, such as being able to post your location to Facebook, but most of the other headline offerings from Ovi Maps are being eroded by Google.
Free sat nav? Check. Pre-cached Maps? Check (well, on the new HTC Android phones anyway – so it can't be long before Google offers the same thing). Walking navigation? Check too.
And on top of that, Google Maps offers multi-touch support, Streetview and a much more attractive user interface.
If you're going to get a Nokia phone anyway, then Ovi Maps is a brilliant service, as you can download maps for whole countries for free, which is a great thing to offer.
And the mapping service offers a lot of cool and easy to use features – it's just not, as Nokia claims, the best on the market.
Nokia's N8 is the flagship model for the firm, and it's clear to see that it's tried to make it the most premium phone it can.
The main thing was supposed to be the price: the phone was initially announced with a price tag of €370, which would have been much, much cheaper than the comparable iPhone 4 (at £499) or the Samsung Galaxy S (at £449).
However, now Nokia is selling it for £429 direct and SIM free, which means one of its main USPs has now sailed out the window.
We liked
We enjoyed a lot of things about the Nokia N8 once we had become used to the foibles of the OS.
The media experience is cracking, if a bit simplistic, and the performance above average.
The camera works well in most conditions, and the video recording lives up to its word – it really is high definition and looks it.
The range of video and audio codecs supported is dizzying, and even those it's not supposed to play back still work.
Widgets are a nice touch, and one we wish Apple would get involved with. Talking of which, being able to watch Flash video on the handset was brilliant too (when it worked).
The anodised aluminium shell is likely to win a fair few admirers, and the Nokia N8 is streets, towns, even counties ahead in terms of battery life compared to some phones, easily offering a two day use under normal conditions.
We disliked
Symbian^3. Everything that we didn't like about this phone can be traced back to the operating system and Nokia's ridiculously stubborn approach to updating its ageing platform.
Basically, Symbian^3 is the old version of S60 with a spot of spit-and-shine and some new features on top – more home screens, added widgets and multi-touch do not suddenly make it a decent smartphone platform.
Essentially, the Nokia N8 works in the same way as the Nokia N97 and the Nokia X6 should have worked when they were released, offering swift operation and a bevy of cooler features, instead of the bug-filled handsets we were given.
The internet browser still feels like a throwback to phones of yesteryear, and the lack of QWERTY keyboard in portrait mode beggars belief.
No decent games included from the start mean many won't get to realise the full power of the GPU – and to be honest, the iPhone 4's performance would probably far outstrip it anyway, when you consider the range on offer and the addition of the gyroscope.
Verdict
We started off really not enjoying the Nokia N8 – it has so many little things that are far inferior to the competition from the outset that it was hard to keep going through the review.
Having been ardent fans of Nokia in a past life, it's not fun seeing phones like the N8 coming out – yes, it's not a bad phone overall, but given the sheer weight of resources behind its development we can't help but wonder how things haven't improved to a class-leading performance yet.
If a smaller company like Acer had made the N8, we'd be congratulating it on an excellent device to build on in the future – but this is the biggest mobile manufacturer in the world we're talking about here.
What's weird is there's nothing disastrously wrong with the Nokia N8 – the elements like media playback and FM transmitter are pretty darn good, and things like Bluetooth 3.0 are a real nice touch.
But the UI has become all important on a mobile phone these days and Nokia hasn't managed to nail that yet. Slow moving home screens, a convoluted apps system and confusing social networking integration show how behind the times the Nokia N8 is.
Instead of the Dolby Digital output and 12MP camera, we'd have preferred it if Nokia just made a phone that operated as well as the likes of Apple, Samsung and HTC's best.
The Nokia N8 is a decent enough phone, that manages to perform its tasks ably and offers up some nice headline specs.
However, it lacks in terms of wow factor for most things – let's just hope MeeGo can provide the smartphone platform to put Nokia back towards the head of the smartphone game.
If you've always used Nokia phones or never played with a smartphone before, then the Nokia N8 works pretty well. You'll get a top notch camera, a good battery life and a more-than-useful media player.
But make sure you don't play with another top-end smartphone as you'll soon see the UI, keyboard and internet are all significantly better than the N8's and if you don't use the camera or music player that often you might regret your purchase.
Related Links
- TechRadar's Reviews Guarantee
- Mobile phone reviews
- How much is your old mobile phone worth?
- Phones@TechRadar - our new dedicated mobiles channel
| |
Read More ...
HTC Mondrian and Spark Window Phone 7 handset leak
New pictures of the HTC Mondrian, an unannounced Windows Phone 7-toting smartphone, have been leaked on to the internet.The pictures are the clearest yet of the handset and show off a good-looking chassis with the words Windows Phone plastered on the back.
The Mondrian has been rumoured for a while. And while its name may not be the most hyperbolic from HTC but it does have the cool factor, as it is based on Piet Mondrian, a Dutch painter who inspired the red-and-white look of the White Stripes.
Microsoft app-reciation
The HTC Mondrian looks likely to come with a WVGA screen, 3.5mm headphone jack, camera with flash and a 1.3GHz processor.
This isn't the only HTC leak, as the HTC Spark has also been snapped. This phone looks a lot like the Mondrian but Engadget is claiming that it is a different handset entirely, and may well be the real name for the HTC Trophy.
All this leaking of handsets is a little hard on the head to keep up with, but what we do know for certain is that Windows Phone 7 handsets will come with Messenger and other MSN apps.
This has been confirmed by MyMicrosoftLife who has had recent access to the Windows Phone 7 OS.
| |
Read More ...
Blinkx links with Evri for iPhone and Android video content
Video search giant Blinkx has announced it is teaming up with Evri, offering video through the company's myriad phone apps.Evri has been busy of late, expanding into the mobile world to deliver real-time content on a number of different categories.
It is launching five Android and iPhone apps this week which range from technology, celebrity news to music.
These apps will also deliver oodles of video content and this is where Blinkx comes in.
Video search
The video search engine will be used in the EvriThing applications, offering up its mobile video index to the apps and with it millions of videos.
Suranga Chandratillake, founder and CEO, blinkx, said about the link-up: "Video streaming is the fastest-growing mobile activity, and there's a tremendous consumer demand for rich media apps.
"Evri's unique technology enables them to deliver a highly compelling multimedia experience to mobile audiences, and we're delighted to be powering the video component of their new suite of apps."
Real-time content is an area which is burgeoning in the mobile market, so it will be interesting to see how well Evri and Blinkx get on.
| |
Read More ...
In Depth: How to overclock DDR3 RAM
Processors and graphics cards get all the glory, but then they're always the glitzy A-list stars that grace the covers of all the magazines. But the sad truth is there's simply less glory in overclocking memory. The gains aren't as tangible and that feeling of getting something for nothing isn't as great, as you've probably forked out for expensive overclocking memory.
Cynicism aside, the fact you can overclock your memory means you should. But before diving in head first it's always best to peer into the murky waters and see what you can learn.
Hopefully, you know that memory runs at a set clock speed and increasing this is our first tool in faster memory.
While we mention it, if you're wondering where the often used PCxxx measure used with memory comes from, it's simply eight times the clock speed. This is the theoretical throughput calculated as the clock speed, and times the number of bits (64) divided by eight to get a bytes value.
The second area of mystery is the memory timing figures that often go 8-8-8-24 possibly with a T1 or T2. These describe the amount of time memory requires to perform certain actions. They are always listed in this order and are measured in clocks:
CAS Latency (CL)
The amount of time between the processor asking for data and the memory starting to return it.
RAS to CAS delay (tRCD)
How long it takes to activate a specific RAS line and the subsequent CAS column in memory.
RAS precharge (tRP)
How long it takes to disable an active RAS line and activate the next one.
Active to precharge delay (tRAS)
The amount of time required between memory accesses.
Command rate (CMD)
Either T1 or T2 indicating one or two clock cycles and is the time between the memory being activated and when the first command can be sent.
In reality there's little you can do with the majority of these settings and you'll find you gain little if you try reducing the settings.
The best results come from reducing the CAS latency which you'll find will release a few per cent of extra performance, as you can see from our results. The alternative way comes from increasing the clock speed, as this simply increase the throughput of the memory. The balancing act comes with the fact latency increases to keep timings under control.
One thing we've not mentioned are the default SPD settings held within memory modules. When your PC posts it'll scan the memory modules for the SPD settings, these hold the default timings for the modules at specific clock speeds.
Over recent years both Nvidia and Intel have released their own extensions to these in the form of EPP/SLI-ready and XMP respectively. These offer a way for memory manufacturers to sell overclocking memory and for systems to automatically take advantage of these in a stable manner.
Volting again
As with the processor, once you start increasing the clock speed this extra burden on the memory can require increased voltages as power requirements go up.
The stock voltage with DDR3 is 1.5 volts. As guidance the maximum JEDEC recommended voltage is 1.575 and supposedly modules should be able to handle 1.975 volts without permanent damage, though they don't have to function at this level.
Most overclocking memory requires a 1.65 voltage and in reality there's no reason to go above 1.85 volts, while for general use 1.7 volts is a safe maximum.
Once again for the actual overclocking there are three options. The BIOS is the most hit and miss, the options made available to you can vary wildly from board to board, but you're usually presented with at least the ability to control the memory's clock speed, the timings we've already mentioned and the base voltages.
To measure just the performance of the memory overclock we're going to maintain the CPU speed as close to its stock 3.2GHz as possible. We can do that by knocking down the multiplier as we increase the FSB.
We'll start by reducing the CAS latency at stock speeds to see how much of an increase that can return, before increasing the clock speeds. This will increase bandwidth but also latency, so the balancing act will be to see which one pays the most dividends.
We're not using specific overclocking memory, just solid 1,600MHz 8-8-8-24 memory, so it's more in line with what most people will have in their rigs.
1. Piles of RAM
At least these days the packaging for most memory modules is pretty uniform, so it's much easier to work out the appropriate speed and capabilities of different sticks without too much head scratching and whimpering. We'll be using some relatively decent 1,600MHz 8-8-8-24 DDR3 modules.
2. Two by two
You'll need matching pairs of sticks to get the best out of your memory selection, especially if you want to overclock it. Note also that which slot you use can make a difference depending on your board, it's worth checking your motherboard manual to make sure there's no odd configuration requirements.
3. The SPD
If you fire up CPUZ and click the SPD tab you get a rundown of the default timing settings, this will also include any overclocking settings for Nvidia SLI memory or Intel's XMP. It also takes a nose through the CPUZ dump for more details. So you can use these for your own nefarious needs.
4. BIOS tricks
In certain ways the best way to overclock memory remains the BIOS, memory timings are generally so tight that it's easy to lock the machine during Windows boot. So it's a quick reboot and into the BIOS to tweak the settings again, after your umpteenth attempt at getting more speed..
5. CAS this, RAS that
The sheer number of memory timings available can be bewildering and confusing, which is why they are often listed on their BIOS page. If you stick with the core timings we've already covered that's more than enough to be playing with and ideally there's not too much variance, anyway.
6. Tweak me
For memory fiddling take a look at tweakers.fr, both its MemSet (for external controllers) and CPU-Tweaker (for integrated controllers) are an excellent way to play with almost all of the memory settings from within Windows or at least provides a way of checking the existing settings.
| |
Read More ...
Microsoft Kinect doesn't connect with messy gamers
Microsoft's Kinect console looks to be the Mrs Bucket of the games world, with the revelation that it may not work perfectly in an untidy room.According to a developer diary posted on YouTube by Inside Xbox the Kinect device needs to survey the area you are going to jump up and down in, and if this area is filled with clothes and other such unmentionables it may not be able to precisely detect your movement.
Keep it clean
In the video the Kinect sensor is seen automatically checking out the area (well, it moves up and down) like your mum used to do when she entered your room, scanning for mess and a reason to shout at you for being a teenage waster.
"Clean up and move things out of the way," is Microsoft's response to this. We wonder if the PlayStation move is such a cleanliness snob?
To be fair, it does make sense that other objects in the way will mess with the motion sensing, but this is the first time we have heard it from Microsoft that you have to keep the area completely clean.
Microsoft Kinect has a UK release date of 10 November, which should give you enough time to pick your pants from off the floor.
| |
Read More ...
BT brings announces fibre optic rollout in Cornwall
Cornwall is to get a broadband infrastructure boost, with news that BT is to rollout fibre optic cables to 90 per cent of homes in the county.The project is to take four years and is set to cost £132 million.
BT isn't bearing the financial brunt of the whole thing, however. It will be stumping up £78 million and the EU's European Regional Development Fund will contribute around £53 million.
Big steps
Ed Vaizey, communications minister, said about the project: "The government wants the UK to have the best broadband network in Europe by 2015, so today's announcement is a big step towards that goal."
There will be two different fibre technologies coming to Cornwall. The project will be a 50/50 split of fibre-to-the-home technology (FTTH) and the slower fibre-to-the-cabinet technology (FTTC).
Essentially this means that 50 per cent of the lines will be pure fibre optics (FTTH) while the other 50 per cent will be based on copper lines – which is slower.
If successful it will be used as a blueprint for future rollouts of superfast broadband to rural communities.
| |
Read More ...
Gary Marshall: When will Google buy Twitter?
If reports are true, Facebook is about to announce a major deal with Skype: in addition to bringing Facebook Connect to the Internet telephone service, the partnership would integrate Facebook and Skype contacts, enabling easy calling of Facebook friends and the ability to chat without leaving Facebook. That's bad news for Google. Between them, the two services have around 1 billion users - and by putting Skype into Facebook, it's yet another attempt by the social network to keep people from leaving its cosy, Google-free embrace.
We said last year that Google should buy Twitter. Rumours that Google planned to do just that amounted to nothing, and Google's social adventures are still limited to Orkut and Buzz. Meanwhile Twitter goes from strength to strength, and it's now bigger than MySpace.
So why should Google buy a service that isn't making significant sums of money? There are two key reasons. The first is that Twitter is becoming a recommendation engine, a place you go to find content or product recommendations. If you're a prolific Twitter user you'll know that many of the websites you visit, stories you read or products you check out aren't things you've gone looking for; they're things that have come to you via the people you follow.
Each of those links, each of those recommendations is a missed opportunity for Google: each one is a search you didn't make, a bunch of sponsored links you didn't see, a shiny coin that isn't going into Google's pocket.
A genuine social giant
The other, arguably more important, reason is that Twitter is something Google so far seems unable to create: a genuine rival to Facebook. As Facebook attempts to annex the entire Internet, Google appears to be watching from the sidelines, unable to compete.
And while Google waits, Twitter's price tag goes up. Last Spring, reports suggested that Twitter turned down a $500m offer from Facebook not because the price wasn't right, but because Facebook wanted to pay most of the money in Facebook shares. By October, analysts were suggesting that Twitter was worth $1 billion and increasing by around 1 million dollars per day. In April, the number was heading towards a billion and a half.
Would Twitter sell? There's a precedent: Twitter founder Ev Williams previously created Pyra Labs, home of Blogger, which Google acquired in 2003; he went on to co-found Odeo, which in turn was sold in 2007, so there clearly isn't any ideological objection to selling on businesses he's built. Everyone has their price - but the longer Google waits, the higher that price will be.
| |
Read More ...
BBC delivers long-distance Super Hi-Vision broadcast
In the first long-distance broadcast of its kind, the BBC has successfully filmed a Charlatans gig in the UK and beamed it to Japan in Super Hi-Vision.NHK's Super Hi-Vision technology makes Full HD look blurry. It offers a picture quality that is 16x better than Full HD (a whopping 7680-by-4320 pixels), which means an audience in Tokyo got to see Tim Burgess' face in scary clarity.
This isn't the first time the BBC has used this technology. It has previous shown off a live Super Hi-Vision feed at IBC 2008 where it broadcast from the UK to Amsterdam, but this is the first intercontinental broadcast.
Technological improvements have meant that this feed has been stretched to reach all the way to Tokyo.
This is no mean feat considering the signal of the broadcast has to be transmitted at 24Gbps and was shown on a prototype 103-inch Panasonic plasma television in the UK.
The performance was shown on a larger screen in Tokyo.
Olympics in Super Hi-Vision?
Takahiro Izumoto, a senior engineer for NHK, explained about the broadcast: "This is the experiment showing we can broadcast from the UK to Japan.
"In a year, we'll have a vision mixer and the superimposer [a means to add subtitles], so it will be easy to do a whole production as live coverage."
NHK is hoping that regular broadcasts will be done in Super Hi-Vision by 2020, while Roger Mosey, director of the BBC's 2012 Olympics coverage, would like some of the 2012 Olympics shown on screens in Super Hi-Vision.
| |
Read More ...
HP boss confirms PalmPad name
HP boss Todd Bradley has revealed the existence of a device called the PalmPad, due for release in early 2011.Tablet PCs are, of course, all the rage right now. Which is why it is interesting that HP's Todd Bradley just confirmed that the company is planning to release a new 'PalmPad' computer early next year.
PalmPad in 2011
HP's webOS-based tablet will arrive at some as-yet-unspecified date in 2011, as was revealed in an analyst meeting earlier this month, when HP EVP Todd Bradley was the first to actually refer to the product by the name 'PalmPad'.
"We've already announced the expansion of our future product portfolio well beyond smartphones. We'll have a webOS-powered PalmPad that will be set for release early in 2011," said the HP boss.
Watch out for more news updates on HP's new webOS tablet PC as and when we get them.
If you want to know lots more about the plans for the PalmPad, then you can watch a video of the aforementioned HP Securities Analyst Meeting, which the company broadcast live online.
| |
Read More ...
1 comment:
Beautifully designed silver rings or pendants can make perfect gifts for the women you want
to impress with remarkable and exquisite gifts. Let's talk about several these
gemstones as are used by the psychic to improve their psychic
ability. inspiration, creativity and intuition within the mind.
Stop by my website ... azurite (obrazkynaplochu.sk)
Post a Comment