Asus P8Z77 WS Review
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Get the Scoop on the Windows 8 Launch Here In just about a week, Microsoft will officially launch its new Windows 8 operating system to the masses on October 26. This new OS is better optimized for touchscreen devices, like the Surface tablet, features a somewhat controversial Modern UI (formerly Metro), integration with Xbox Live, Windows Store apps, and plenty more. Unlike the past few OSes, Microsoft is only offering two versions of W8 for consumers to choose from: Windows 8 and Windows 8 Pro. There is also a Windows 8 Enterprise version, but that is only available in large volumes for businesses. ARM-powered tablets will come pre-loaded with Windows RT, so that is the only option for those devices. An upgrade to Windows 8 Pro will only set you back $39.99, with the Windows 8 Upgrade Assistant making the process an easy task once October 26 rolls around. That lower price is only good until January 31, 2013, at which point it will increase. A DVD copy can be secured for $69.99, which you can pre-order now at a number of (r)etailers. For anyone who purchased (or will purchase) a Windows 7 PC between June 2, 2012, and January 31, 2013, can upgrade to W8 Pro for $14.99. That deal starts on October 26 as well and goes until February 28, 2013. If you're coming from Windows 7, everything from personal settings to personal files and apps can be brought along, Windows Vista users can bring settings and files, while XP users only get to bring personal files. Anyone is welcome to start fresh from scratch, of course, and have nothing brought over for an entirely clean install. So there you have it. Nothing too extreme or expensive for anyone wanting to upgrade to Windows 8. Microsoft Surface tablets will be available on October 26 for anyone wanting to try out Windows RT, or you can go the other route and upgrade your desktop computer. Read More ...
GOG.com Kicks Off a Pay What You Want Promotion for Interplay Games The folks over at GOG.com sure know how to bring the gaming deals. This time, the deal is a little bit different than usual, but is loaded to the brim with classic games. GOG.com is offering a ton of Interplay games on a pay what you want promotion, where you name the price to get as many games as you want. A price between $0.99 and $13.99 gets you eight games, including Jagged Aliance 2 and Shattered Steel, while $14.99 to $33.99 bumps the total to 20, which includes Freespace and its expansion, Giants: Citizen Kabuto, and Earthworm Jim 3D. Anything at $34.99 up to $69.99 (or more) gets you all 32 games in the promotion, with titles like Fallout 1, 2, and Tactics, Freespace 2, and MDK 1 and 2. Any amount of games you buy also gets you some free extras, like soundtracks, wallpapers, avatars, the Fallout Bible, and more, with all 32 games including 21 soundtracks and 721 other "goodies." GOG.com's Interplay pay what you want promotion runs for the next 12 days, so head over there soon to get some great classics at an absolute steal. Any games you already own on GOG.com that are included in this promotion will be available as gifts to send to whoever you want. Read More ...
Microsoft Introduces Four-Year, $80 Office 365 University Subscription for University Students In the past, Microsoft has handed out free Xbox 360s to university students with the purchase of a Windows 7 PC, but now it looks to better embrace the study aspect of school. University students can pick up a four-year, $80 subscription to Office 365 University, which gives them access to Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook, Publisher, and Access. Microsoft says the deal works out to about $1.67 a month, so pretty much any student can afford that. The deal also includes 60 Skype world minutes a month and 27GB of Premium SkyDrive storage, plus free upgrades and installation on two separate systems. In order to get the Office 365 University subscription, full and part-time students must first purchase Office University 2010 or Office University for Mac 2011, then verify their credentials to gain access. Office 365 University is expected to arrive early next year. Read More ...
Avoiding Cracks in Nanoparticle Films Often nanoparticles of different kinds are suspended in liquids as their small size makes them difficult to work with directly, but also enables them to flow with the liquid which is not as challenging to manipulate. This means that to make things from these nanoparticles, the liquid has to be removed, but when this occurs, the film of nanoparticles left behind can crack. Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have found a way to prevent this cracking that, unlike other methods, is relatively cheap. Because cracking like this occurs for so many materials, the critical cracking thickness is well-known for many materials as well. If a film thinner than this thickness was required, previously one would have to expose it to high temperatures or pressures, which are difficult to produce, but the researchers found a counterintuitive way around this. Instead of trying to make a single film of the proper thickness without cracks, the researchers made multiple thinner films and stacked them together. Individually these films will crack as one expects, but when combined together, the cracks no longer form and produce a pristine film of the appropriate thickness. While a specific detail of how this method works is still unknown, the researchers believe this method could be applied to multiple materials to create crack-less nanoparticle films. Once that detail is explained, perhaps this method can be applied to even more films. Read More ...
4K Resolution Officially Renamed Ultra High Definition There have been some 4K TVs shown off over the last couple of years or so, but that 4K term was never the best way to describe it. It just didn't have a good fit, especially since the resolution varied on some sets. Recently, the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) announced the official name for 4K TVs as Ultra High Definition, with the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) declaring future 4K and 8K TVs will be marketed as Ultra High Definition Televisions. All UHDTVs must have a panel resolution of at least 3840x2160, one or more digital inputs capable of delivering a 4K signal, and be able to display 4K content natively and not just upconvert lower resolution content. It's rather nice to have an official name for these 4K screens, with Ultra High Definition being a logical step since the resolutions are four times greater than current HDTVs. The only downside, right now, is UHDTVs are not the most readily available or affordable, and the lack of a ton of 4K content. YouTube has some 4K resolution videos available, but there isn't much else at the moment. UHDTVs are expected to have a much larger role at CES 2013 in January, and hopefully then we'll learn when to expect more 4K content. Read More ...
Making Optical Vortices in Silicon Typically light travels in a straight line, which is very useful for laser pointers, levels, and more, but really it is not so limited to one-dimensional movement. With the right optics, it is possible to give a photon orbital angular momentum such that it will seem to orbit around an axis. A team led by researchers at the University of Bristol has successfully recreated these optics in silicon at a small enough scale to possibly be integrated into chips. Optical vortices have multiple uses including optical spanners and tweezers which can manipulate small particles or droplets. They can also be used to transmit information more efficiently than a straight beam of light. If two beams of light travel the same path, it is possible for them to interfere with each other and corrupt whatever data are contained by both. By changing the degree the photons are rotating around a common axis though, the data can be preserved with multiple streams travelling the same path. The devices the researchers invented are just micrometers wide and can be made with conventional silicon fabrication methods. Together this should allow for thousands of the emitters to be created on a single chip at very low cost. Potentially though this technology could reach the single photon level, which would be extremely useful for quantum computing and communication. Read More ...
AMD Lessens PC Presence by up to 50% to Recover from Losses The tumultuous PC landscape has not been very kind to AMD in recent years, and increased pressure to remain afloat has forced CEO Rory Read to make some drastic measures. "The PC industry is going through a period of very significant change that is impacting both the ecosystem and AMD." Apparently AMD has underestimated critical factors that have been identified as industry game changers, which have now advanced its influence at a faster pace. "As a result, we must accelerate our strategic initiatives to position AMD to take advantage of these shifts and put in place a lower cost business model. Our restructuring efforts are designed to simplify our product development cycles, reduce our breakeven point and enable us to fund differentiated product roadmaps and strategic breakaway opportunities." Read's restructuring initiative was to trim the company workforce, and AMD's original 2011 headcount of 11,737 is now down to less than 10,000, resulting in an expected $190 million annual savings. To put things in perspective, AMD's $1.3 billion cash is depleting rapidly considering that months ago it was $1.58 billion. Read asserts that AMD's problem lies with increased tablet sales and diminished sales in the lower end PC segment, along with the doubts in Windows 8's capacity to generate long-term interest in the platform. As such, the solution according to the CEO is to distance the company from these issues. This means that AMD will now be focusing only 40 to 50 percent of its resources to PCs, and the other half allocated to AMD server CPUs, custom solution CPUs, a segment in customized gaming APUs, as well as APUs for the ultramobile market. If the strategy pans out, Read estimates AMD to recover by Q3 2013. Read More ...
New Nanostructure Assembly Method Developed Building nanostructures is very tricky because the means by which you would build something with your hands cannot be translated to this smaller scale. This has led to researchers developing very clever means to attach simple nanostructures into complex ones. Now researchers at the University of Florida have found another way to accomplish this, but for nanorods which could not previously be assembled in a controlled manner. To achieve this controlled assembly, the researchers use multiple liquids which react to different portions of the nanorods. These reactions would push the nanorods into their places to create complex nanostructures. During the study, the researchers used two different treatments on the nanorods, which created two different nanostructures, with one of them being something they had not seen before. The other structure was less complex and they were able to grow it into a polarized film which could be used to improve the efficiency of polarized LEDs. It is hard to predict what may come of this research as all the possible nanostructures that can be made from nanorods have yet to be considered. All that can be known for certain at this point is this will lead to new materials with new properties that come from the collective properties of the nanorods in them. Read More ...
Eidos Executive to Broadband Providers: You're Holding Gaming Back An enterprise that's as enormous as the games industry needs massive broadband support that can match its constantly increasing demands for bandwidth. This was Games Workshop co-founder and Eidos executive Ian Livingstone's overture to telecom providers during the Broadband World Forum last Wednesday, in which he criticized the operators for holding back gaming. "The games industry is big…it’s the largest entertainment industry in the world," said Livingstone in a 20-minute presentation. He stressed that by 2015 the market will be worth $90 billion, and that games are in a transition from being considered a product to a service. With more games requiring constant online connectivity, networks with low latency are becoming a necessity for a seamless experience. But that's not yet a realization, as Livingstone stresses that "we’re still having to fight bandwidth to avoid latency." Newer games also take longer to download, because their digital footprint gets larger with each new version, such as the Call of Duty series. "It’s kind of crazy that we’re fighting broadband the whole time in our industry. You’re kind of holding us back in many respects. We want to do more." Livingstone then admonished the ISPs amongst the audience that it should "plan for what you can’t predict as well as what you can," and not to rest on their laurels. Read More ...
Evidence Supports Moon-Formation Theory The Moon has been Earth's companion for far longer than man has been looking to it, but since we have been looking at it, we have been wondering how it came to be. Several theories have been proposed over the theories and finally there is evidence to support one. Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis and University of California, San Diego have analyzed moon rock samples and found that the Moon was likely formed according to the Big Impact Theory. According to this theory, billions of years ago there was a collision between the early Earth and a planetary body called Theia. Though Theia was likely the size of Mars, the Earth absorbed it and spat out enough rock and debris for the Moon to form, as the material coalesced. The evidence the researchers found is a significant isotope fractionation of zinc. What that means is they found more heavy zinc isotopes than light ones. Such a difference is only explained by the fact that lighter isotopes more easily evaporate away then heavy isotopes. As this was found in samples taken from multiple areas of the Moon, this was not caused by some local event, which indicates the whole moon was at one point hot enough to boil away the lighter zinc. Understanding how the Moon formed is very important for understanding how the Earth formed and came to be what it is today. After all, if that collision with Theia formed the Moon, how else might it have affected the Earth? Read More ...
$499 Microsoft Surface Pre-Orders Run Out, Backordered by Three Weeks Now It was just the other day when Microsoft launched the pre-order page for its Surface tablet running Windows RT. Priced at $499 for the 32GB and $599 for the 64GB (both without the Touch Cover), the folks in Redmond are providing an affordable option for those wanting to try out its definitive tablet. It seems that $499 price was a major hit, as it is now sold out at Microsoft's online store. The order page says it should ship within three weeks, while the other options are still expected to arrive on October 26. Those two options are the 32GB model with a Touch Cover for $599 or the 64GB model with Touch Cover for $699. It remains to be seen just how popular those bundles are, especially when customers can save $20 over a separate Touch Cover purchase for the bare Surface. To that end, Touch and Type Covers, the more traditional keyboard version, are still available for $120 and $130, respectively, and will also ship on October 26 for pre-orders. Read More ...
Ubuntu 13.04 to be Called Raring Ringtail, Emphasis on Mobile and Battery Life Canonical has used a variety of alliterative codenames for Ubuntu releases, with ones like Oneiric Ocelot, Precise Pangolin, and Quantal Quetzel being some of the most recent revisions. The upcoming Ubuntu 13.04 is no different, as Canonical is calling the new release Raring Ringtail. Among the numerous alliterations in CEO Mark Shuttleworth's blog comes some information concerning 13.04. For starters, Canonical is focusing on the phone, tablet, and TV market, with the first two emphasizing battery life, the number of running processes, and memory size, to name a few. However, Ubuntu 13.04 is not going to be a full-fledged mobile OS by the time it launches, but rather nailing down some specifics to make it a viable alternative. Canonical launched Ubuntu 12.10, Quantal Quetzel, earlier today, and does not expect a full release of Raring Ringtail until next spring. Read More ...
Black Silicon Solar Cells Improved There are two primary ways to increase the energy output of a solar cell. You can improve the conversion efficiency, so more of the light that is absorbed is converted to electricity, and you can increase the range of light the cell can absorb. The latter is very difficult though as it is limited by what materials you are using, but research from Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft may help with that. Silicon, which is a common material for many commercial solar cells, is not able to absorb infrared light, which makes up a decent amount of sunlight. Black silicon though does absorb infrared light, but is not greatly efficient. The researchers changed that by improving the production method. Black silicon is made by shining a femtosecond laser onto a piece of silicon in a sulfur-containing atmosphere. The sulfur binds to the silicon and acts like a catalyst, enabling electrons excited by infrared light to enter the conduction band. This effect works in both directions though, so electrons had an easier time going up and falling down. By changing the shape of the laser though, the researchers were able to create a bias, so the electrons were less-able to fall. The researchers hope to see black silicon eventually integrated into traditional silicon solar cells, where the black silicon is behind the regular silicon, and catches what infrared light comes through. To help achieve this, the researchers are looking to form a spin-off company to market their laser system to manufacturers. Read More ...
Microsoft's Revenue and Profits Down for Third Quarter Microsoft, like Intel, did not have the greatest third quarter in terms of finances, as both revenue and profits were down compared to the same time last year. Revenue dropped eight percent to $16.008 billion, with operating income down 26% to $5.308 billion. Some of the downfall is due to deferred revenue for when Windows 8 and Office 2013 ship, which is October 26 and the first part of next year, respectively. Microsoft's Windows and Windows Live Division saw revenue drop nine percent to $4.411 billion, with $1.167 billion of it deferred to Windows 8. Operating income was down 50% to $1.646 billion, again because of people waiting for W8. Most other Microsoft divisions saw a decrease in either revenue or profit, although the Server and Tools and Online Services Division each had a small increase. Next quarter should be better for Microsoft, especially since all the deferred revenue for Windows 8 and Office 2013 will become available. Many people who need a new computer are no doubt waiting for W8 to arrive, so things should pick back up very soon. Read More ...
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