IT-Code-News: IT News Head Lines (TweakTown) 14/06/2012

Unreal Engine 4 demo released, check it out for yourself
Epic has released a YouTube video demoing the capabilities of their next generation graphics engine. Unreal Engine 4 is designed to run on next-gen consoles and push the limit for DirectX 11 games on PCs. Unreal Engine 4 has been under construction for some time now, and is finally nearing completion.

The most world-class game engine to date, Unreal Engine 4 gives you the power to do more than ever before. Unreal Engine 4's architecture offers fully dynamic lighting features, cutting down on development time and ensuring less iteration on creative ideas.
Artists and designers can bring their creative visions to life directly in game without programmer assistance via the new Unreal Kismet. This offers programmers the freedom to focus on core gameplay features and sophisticated systems. With significant new visual features, Unreal Engine 4 enables you to achieve high-end visuals, while remaining both scalable and accessible to make games for low-spec PCs.

I can't wait to see this new engine unleashed and the games that come with it. Unreal-powered games have always been fun and graphically good, and this new engine appears to not disappoint. Check out the video above and let us know what you think in the comments.

unreal_engine_4_demo_released_check_it_out_for_yourself

Analysts expect Windows Phone market share to pass that of the iPhone
Android user? iPhone user? Well, right now you are the two major competing phone operating systems. However, analysts are expecting that to change by 2016. Windows Phone is predicted to eclipse iPhone's market share by the year 2016 due to the recent release of the Nokia Lumia 900 to emerging markets.

analysts_expect_windows_phone_market_share_to_surpass_that_of_the_iphone

The IDC predicts that iPhone's market share will drop by about 1.5%, ending at 19% by 2016. Windows Phone, on the other hand, will gain 14% and end near 19.2%, if predictions prove accurate. Android will give up the majority of the market share that Windows Phone will gain. Android is looking towards loosing about 8% market share.

Blackberry isn't going to lose much, about 0.1%. Android is going to remain the top mobile operating system, partly thanks to some of Samsung's new phone releases. "The smartphone parade won't be as lively this year as it has been in past," said Kevin Restivo, senior research analyst with IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker. "The mobile phone user transition from feature phones to smartphones will continue in a gradual but unabated fashion. Smartphone growth, however, will increasingly be driven by a triumvirate of smartphone operating systems, namely Android, iOS and Windows Phone 7."

Microsoft charging tablet OEMs an incredible $85 for Windows RT
If you were among the many who thought that Microsoft would be lowering the price for Windows RT to tablet OEMs so they could produce a lower priced tablet, you would be wrong. It turns out that Microsoft is looking to charge somewhere between $80-95 for an OEM Windows RT license to be used on a tablet.

This is actually slightly unexpected do to the fact the tablet market is growing quickly and Android allows for lower cost tablets. True, it can't do quite as much as a Windows RT tablet would be capable of, but the fact remains that it does most of what people want from a tablet. Couple that with the fact that the iPad can be had for $399 and Windows tablets aren't going to be very competitive.

It would appear as though Intel and Microsoft have decided to focus more on Ultrabooks because with this pricing, the tablets will probably sell for $549-799 and the premium ones could be as high as $899, as much as an Ultrabook. The $549-799 is right where Intel's target spot is for Ultrabooks, so it's likely the tablets won't do very well.

LulzSec hacks again, claims responsibility for leaking 10,000 Twitter accounts on Pastebin
LulzSec, a hacking group responsible for many hacks last year, has been fairly quiet this year after their leader allegedly worked with law enforcement to bring charges against its members. Now, however, LulzSec Reborn has taken over and started hacking, mainly compromising user accounts and leaking the details.

LulzSec Reborn has had two major hacks this year and otherwise has been quiet. The first was a leaking of 170,000 MilitarySingles accounts on Pastebin and now they are taking responsibility for the leaking of 10,000 Twitter accounts on Pastebin. The latter, today's leak, features much more information than a traditional password hack.

The leak comes in the form of an SQL dump which features usernames, passwords, real names, bios, locations, avatars, security tokens used by the service for authentication with Twitter and the user's most recent Tweet. The hack comes from compromising a third-party site that required the login information to work.

LulzSec Reborn compromised TweetGif, a site which allows users to post animated GIFs to their feed. TweetGif isn't a very large service and only has around 75,000 global visitors. The company's Twitter only has around 700 followers. Often compromises such as this come from third-party services which require a username/password combo to work.

It's not known if LulzSec Reborn features any of the members in the original hacking collective.

Sprint Touch Wallet slides show carrier is serious about NFC wallet app
It looks as though Sprint could be working on their own NFC wallet app. Last week, news leaked out that Sprint was developing their own NFC wallet app, and thanks to some slides passed along today, we now know that those rumors were true. The details are slim, but we certainly know more now than we did.

The thing looks pretty darn similar to Google Wallet. Sprint has been the only official partner carrier for that app, so they may have decided it would be better to make their own. The biggest questions remain unanswered. Questions like what bank partners Sprint will have or when it will be unveiled have yet to receive an answer.

Functionally, it appears to be near identical to Google Wallet. After the app is unlocked using a passcode, you receive a screen of options. If the phone is tapped to a reader, a listing of sorts will be presented to select a card to use. When you are done, the entire thing locks back up.

Users in the US need a singular app to get behind before these NFC wallets will take off. Is this the one for us, or is it just another novelty?

Zalman Radeon HD 7950-Z VF3000 2GB Video Card Review

Introduction

When I heard that Zalman was entering the video card market I honestly didn't find myself all that surprised. One of the main features that make video cards stand out from each other is the cooling solution companies opt for and with a long standing presence in the cooling market, it shouldn't be hard for Zalman to offer something that can stand out against the competition.

We've been impressed with what Zalman has offered in the past, but what happens when the company moves away from the cooler only business and throws a video card into the mix, a bundle and all that other related stuff?

Well we intend to find out, but there's as always a few things that we've got to do before we get up and running. The first thing we've got to do is check out the package that Zalman is offering us. Once we've done that we'll move onto the video card itself and see what exactly is going on with it.

We'll check out the specification side of things before we move into the testbed and then of course look at the performance of the new video card. One of the main things we'll no doubt be paying attention today is the cooling performance so that's something that we're looking forward to seeing.

First things first, though, let's see what's going on with the package here today.

Package

Looking at the box there's not a whole heap going on, Zalman really have a very basic design. That's not a bad thing as on a whole the box design looks pretty nice with the giant Z in the middle, but there's not a wealth of information on offer. Of course the one feature that is highlighted quite strongly on the front of the box is the fact that a "Zalman Cooling Solution" is being used. We'd be a bit worried if it wasn't!

As for the bundle it's really small, so small that we don't even have a manual. We've simply got a driver CD, CrossFire bridge and DVI to VGA connector. We're not surprised by the small bundle, it's similar from most companies these days and we know that the main thing that Zalman want to highlight is the cooler.

So with that said let's take a closer look at the video card itself.
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Available Tags:Market Share , Windows Phone , Windows , iPhone , Microsoft , tablet , Twitter , Zalman , Radeon ,

Thursday, June 14, 2012

IT News Head Lines (TweakTown) 14/06/2012

Introduction

Package

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