USB Auto Update Guide
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Barnes and Noble Adds Google Play Store Access to Nook HD and HD+
Good news for anyone with or looking to get a Barnes and Noble Nook HD or HD+ e-reader, as the company announced both devices now have access to the Google Play store. Before the two could only access Nook Apps, which were separate from regular Android apps, despite the use of a heavily modified version of Android 4.0. Now, however, the Nook HD and HD+ are more akin to other Android tablets, as well as moving ahead of the Amazon Kindle Fire and Fire HD. The update for the Nook HD and HD+ should have arrived earlier today over WiFi, so be sure to connect to an available network if you haven't received the update prompt. Once installed, you can browse more than 700,000 apps to get whatever you desire on your Nook HD or HD+, plus more music, movies, and TV shows.
Source: Business Wire
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US Scientists Build Smallest Flying Robot
Scientists at Havard University have built the smallest robot capable of flying, named the 'robo-fly'. The device weighs less than a gram, and employs insect-like 'wings' to fly, instead of conventional rotors or propellors. The construction is mainly carbon fiber, and uses piezoelectric material contracting around 120 times a second to power the 'wings'.
The robot's designers suggest that the robot may eventually have applications in rescue operations, for example locating surviors in cramped spaces, although it was not initially designed for this purpose. At the current stage of development, the robo-fly requires an external power source, however scientists are working on incorporating a small internal power source instead of using the external supply.
Source: BBC News
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Studying how Gravity Affects Antimatter
They say opposites attract, and electromagnetically, this is true, but what about gravitationally? For many years, researchers have been wondering if antimatter, the electromagnetic opposite of normal matter, falls up or down in a gravitational field. Now researchers at Berkeley Lab are examining their data for 434 anti-hydrogen atoms to answers the question.
Antimatter is a source of many questions concerning the entire Universe as theoretically the Big Bang that produced all normal matter should have produced equal parts antimatter. Obviously this is not the case because normal matter remains today. Since realizing this inconsistency, researchers have been trying to find all the differences between antimatter and normal matter, including the direction the particles move in a gravitational field. Watching atoms fall is not easy though, but the Berkeley Lab researchers realized they could use the magnetic traps holding the anti-atoms to make some measurements. Within a magnetic trap, magnetic fields will counteract gravity and hold the particles up, but once the fields are switched off, they will be free to move, and they can be detected when they strike the walls of the trap.
While this approach is very promising, the data was not very revealing. All it really demonstrated was that this approach could work, but the equipment and experiment needs some upgrades before the uncertainty is small enough to know for certain.
Source: Berkeley Lab
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Intel has a New CEO as Current COO Takes Over on May 16
Intel CEO Paul Otellini's retirement from the company has been known since last November, but it wasn't clear who would suceed him. He planned to retire this May, and since we're now a couple of days in, we finally know who is next in line. Intel announced that current Chief Operating Officier (COO) Brian Krzanich will assume the CEO title on May 16, during the company's annual stockholders' meeting. Krzanich has been with Intel for 31 years, so he's the perfect internal candidate for the job. The company also announced Renée James was elected president of the board of directors, and she'll begin her new role on May 16, too. Both executives are looking forward to their new roles, with Krzanich particularly looking forward to moving Intel faster into "ultra mobility."
Source: Engadget
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Creating Touch-Based Interfaces On-Demand
For decades science fiction has told us that the future will be filled with touch-based interfaces, and while in some cases that is true today, it is still limited to specialized devices. For that fantastic vision to be realized, projector, sensor, and computing technologies will have to be combined and intelligently designed to respond to a variety of inputs. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University have brought that combination a little closer with the creation of WorldKit; a system to generate interfaces on the fly.
To create a smart room essentially requires a projector and a depth sensor, such as the Microsoft Kinect. WorldKit is the software to use with this hardware in order to interact with them and other devices. Instead of requiring an interface to have been created beforehand, WorldKit allows a user to paint an area they wish to use as a controller, and select what it controls from a menu. Using the data from the depth sensor, the software is also able to compensate for the curvature of objects in the room and warp the projections so they appear flat on a surface. This also allows the system to work with a standard coordinate system.
Next the researchers want to improve WorldKit to allow users to interact with interfaces floating in free-space, instead of just on the surfaces of objects. They see many applications for this technology, especially as devices become so advanced that we may see interactive light bulbs, that combine all of the hardware into a single unit.
Source: Carnegie Mellon University
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Intel Introduces Iris Graphics
Intel has just announced Iris, the newest iteration of its built-in graphics solutions. Iris marks an upgrade over previous versions of Intel HD Graphics and is targeted at ultrabooks and similar mobile platforms. New systems that combine Iris with fourth generation Intel Core processors will see 3D graphics performance increases of two to three times, depending on processor model. In addition to improved graphics performance, Iris will also offer improvements in video and photo editing as well as providing the ability to display at 4k Ultra HD resolutions.
Source: Intel
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Noctua Updates NF-A14 Fans
Noctua is adding a pulse width modulation version of its popular NF-A14 series of fans. The fans have a max speed of 1500RPM, and the advanced speed control options provided by PWM give the fans an impressive feature set. Like previous models in this series, the new fan comes with Advanced Acoustic Optimization as well as Flow Acceleration Channels. CEO Mag. Roland Mossig gave the reason behind the new fan, stating that "we got many requests for a square frame PWM version for use as a case fan and on watercooling radiators. We can now meet this demand with the new NF-A14 PWM."
Source: Noctua
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Gamers will Assume Leadership Structures Despite Lack of Training
Leadership can be an interesting topic of study, as one tries to discover the intricacies that make someone a good leader and the reason a leadership structure is needed in the first place. When it comes to survival, it makes sense that the most experienced and skilled persons would direct those less capable than they, but what about in games? That is the question researchers at Penn State sought to answer by analyzing 54,000 posts by 2500 players of an augmented reality game.
Leading up to the release of Halo 2, Microsoft created the I Love Bees game that had players decoding messages that sent them to payphones, for additional information. Naturally players communicated with each other to work together and discover the clues, and even though there was no formal leadership structure to the game, the players developed their own. Pouring over the posts at various websites and forums, the researchers made the interesting discovery that these generated leadership structures actually mimicked military leadership structures in both design and even designation. One group actually established generals to handle strategies, lieutenants to deal with specific tactics, and privates to follow orders, but none of the players were assigned their rank; they naturally selected their own.
Despite the similarities to the US military leadership structure, the researchers point out that very few of the players had any military experience to draw from. The leadership structures the players employed just spontaneously emerged from their desire to play the game most effectively.
Source: Penn State
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Hardware Roundup: Thursday Edition
Corsair is a name known to virtually every computer enthusiast, and today we have two reviews on different spectrums of the hardware scale. There's the AX860i power supply with digital (DSP) control for voltage regulation, and the Neutron Series 256GB SSD for all your storage needs. For something entirely different altogether, there's a hands-on preview of the Oculus Rift VR headset to see what a possible future of gaming has in store. We also have a review of the Arion Urban Zen headset featuring the Samurai Song design to help set it apart from the crowd. For the RTS gamer there's a review on StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm, the second part of Blizzard's long-awaited sequel. We also have a book written by Whoopty, an admin at XSReviews, that is now on sale after four years of work.
Video
Video Perspective: Oculus Rift Development Kit Hands-on Preview @ PC Perspective
Storage/Hard Drives
Corsair Neutron Series 256GB SSD @ [H]ardOCP
Power Supplies
Corsair AX860i 860W Power Supply @ ThinkComputers
Speakers/Headphones
Arion Urban Zen: Samurai Song @ LanOC Reviews
Gaming
StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm @ PC Perspective
Miscellany
Whoopty wrote a book @ XSReviews
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Haswell May Not Play Well with All Power Supplies
Intel's Haswell processors are on the way, but it appears some power supplies may have some issues getting things started. A new report shows that Haswell's C6/C7 states require 0.05 amps on the 12V2 rail, which could be a problem as some PSUs can't supply that low level power. If that's the case then it opens up a lot of stability problems or the simple fact of having a PSU shut off entirely. Intel's Reseller Center website includes a handy list of power supplies, and when you sort by a minimum 12V2 load of zero amps, there's a grand total of 23 units that meet the requirement: 19 Corsair, three InWin, and one Seasonic. There could be more that support it that aren't included on Intel's list, but chances are it won't be too many more.
However, despite all of this there is still some good news. Corsair's Robert Pearce believes motherboard manufacturers could disable the C6/C7 states in the BIOS to ensure compatibility with more PSUs. Users can always enable those states later on once their power supply supports them. Corsair is working to make sure all of its PSUs support the C6/C7 states, and hopefully other companies do too.
Source: Tech Report
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The International Returns in August
The International, a $1 million Dota 2 tournament put on by Valve, is back for the third year in a row. Taking place in Seattle, WA from August 7-11, the tournament promises days filled with competitive Dota. Valve has announced the 13 invited teams which include a mix of Western and Chinese teams including returning champions Invictus Gaming and fan favorites like Natus Vincere and Team Liquid. Western qualifiers will take place from May 13-19 and will be hosted by The GDStudio while Eastern qualifiers will take place May 20-26 and are hosted by Beyond The Summit. The qualifiers will fill out the remaining three teams in the 16 team bracket.
Source: Valve
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Controlled Growth of Carbon Nanotubes with Specific Chirality Achieved
Carbon nanotubes are funny little things as they come in so many forms with so many different properties. For example, some are great conductors of electricity while others are semiconductors, and all of this is determined by their structure. One critical characteristic of a nanotube's structure is its chirality and finally researchers at Aalto University, A.M. Prokhorov General Physics Institute RAS, and the Center for Electron Nanoscopy of Technical University have found a way to grow nanotubes with preferred chirality.
A simple example of chirality is handedness, as some objects twist in the right-handed direction or in the opposite, left-handed direction. Carbon nanotubes are more complicated though and require two chiral indices to be described. The researchers discovered that by reducing a solid solution in carbon monoxide they were able to form special cobalt nanoparticles to serve as a catalyst. From these catalysts the researchers were able to grow nanotubes with a 90% preference to being semiconducting and a 53% preference to having the chiral indices (6, 5), at 500 ºC. After dropping the temperature to 400 ºC, the researchers found the preferred chiral indices shifted to (7, 6) and (9, 4).
That is a lot of numbers relating to a complex topic, but what it boils down to is that the researchers have achieved something that could lead to a better understanding of how nanotubes grow. From there nanotubes with specific properties could be more easily produced, and thus used in devices and technologies.
Source: Aalto University
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Getac Offers Laptops for Extreme Use
Do you need a laptop for field research, is it necessary for your survival that you have a laptop with you on camping, or are you just generally clumsy and need a durable laptop? If you answered "yes" to any of the questions, then Getac has got you covered. Its new X500 Rugged Server is, according to Getac, certified to military specifications for operation in extreme conditions, so it should be able to handle pretty much anything you throw at it.
The X500 Rugged Server is approximately the same size as a briefcase, which might refrain some from calling it a laptop, but everything is relative. It sports a 15.6 inch display, a Core i7 820QM, 16GB of RAM, a GeForce GT 330M, 500GB of SATA storage, three USB 2.0 ports, one USB/eSATA combo port, dual GbE LAN ports, and 802.11n WiFi. The laptop also supports up to five shock-protected hard drives that are replaceable via two quick access doors. The drives are managed by a built-in RAID controller board.
So if you have some extreme demands for your laptop, then the X500 Rugged Server might just be your thing. All you need to do is request a quote from Getac, and you should be able to buy one now.
Source: Maximum PC
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Corsair Dismisses Rumor About Being For Sale
There has been a rumor about Corsair being bought by Francisco Partners, a private equity firm; however, that rumor has now been dismissed by Corsair. Corsair told Maximum PC that the rumor is inaccurate, but the company is instead looking for investments. Corsair sent a FAQ to Maximum PC, which explains that "we would like to make more acquisitions and this requires outside investment." Corsair tried to acquire the needed funding through public funding, but that idea was discarded. Corsair estimated that the company would not be able to obtain the required funding using that method, since it is selling to niche markets, which limits the amount of people interested in buying shares. Instead Francisco Partners offered the needed funding in exchange for a share of the company. Despite Francisco Partners obtaining part of Corsair, the hardware company will still operate the way it always has. The newly obtained funding will be used to purchase small, less well-run companies that produce technology Corsair can benefit from to ensure continuous growth and an ever expanding product catalogue.
The investment is going to be approximately $75 million and it is expected to happen during the next few weeks.
Source: Maximum PC
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