IT News Head Lines (TweakTown) 2/2/2015

Google Earth Pro is now free, shakes off its $399 per-year fee
If you were a subscriber of Google Earth Pro, you can put your credit card back down as the Mountain View-based search giant has just removed the subscription fee from the software.

Something that once cost $399 per year is now completely free, something you just need to fill out a form to receive. Once you're got the license, you can download the free Pro client here. The difference between the $399 per year version and now? Nothing, and that's great. The non-Pro version has print images capped at 1000x1000 compared to the Pro version at 4800x3200, and a few other limitations.


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Microsoft rumored to unveil its first flagship Lumia smartphone in May
The world has been waiting to see what Microsoft would do with the Devices and Services division of Nokia, but it looks like we'll be waiting a little bit longer to see the fruits of that expensive labor.

According to the latest reports, the first Microsoft-branded Lumia smartphone will be unveiled at Mobile World Congress, which isn't too far away. We're being told that the Lumia 1330 will be unveiled, while the more affordable and mainstream Lumia 830 will also be shown off. These will be the first Microsoft Lumia smartphones, with Windows 10-powered handsets rolling out their own devices later in the year.

We don't know much about the new Lumia smartphones except for the fact that they'll be rumored to sport a "3D-Touch" feature that will let you use your smartphone with your hands, without touching the display itself.


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Apple is asking some developers to prepare Watch apps for mid-February
Apple is preparing for the launch of its first wearable next month, requesting some of its developers to have their Watch apps ready by mid-February for the big launch.

The company is asking their high profile app developers and close partners to have their Watch-compatible iPhone apps ready to go in the App Store by the middle of February. Even though Watch isn't due until April, Apple is most likely wanting to get things prepared with plenty of time left for testing. Not only that, the apps could be used for promotional material, something we can expect Apple to push in the very near future.


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AMD: 'Evolution of GPU horsepower' very important for 4K and beyond
Just how is 4K gaming affecting AMD internally right now? According to Robert Hallock who is part of the Technical Communications division for AMD Radeon graphics, he said that gamers are adopting 4K gaming nicely, but the R&D department for AMD is already planning for the future.

For Hallock, the Radeon R9 290X was a major step in that direction, allowing for gamers to play at 4K with a single GPU. Lower-end parts of the market aren't quite there yet, so GamingBolt asked him some questions where he replied with the future of 4K gaming is an evolution of GPU horsepower, which is something AMD is working on. He said: "If you think back to the launch of the AMD Radeon R9 290X, our video card marked arguably the first time anyone could reasonably expect to play games at 4K on a single GPU. Sure, there were some games that needed two for peak image quality, but one was and is pretty solid for the majority of titles. We were also the first company to offer full support for 4K SST displays in our driver".

"4K adoption is very popular amongst the elite enthusiasts, but understandably slower being adopted in lower-end segments. I couldn't characterize the rates with hard numbers as that's not my area of expertise, but this is the sense I'm getting from interacting with the AMD community every day", he continued. Hallock added: "Ultimately, the evolution of GPU horsepower is the biggest factor in driving 4K forward. Graphics being such an important part of our business, of course, you can count on great progress on that front as the years wind on".


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The Pirate Bay is back online
Ye olde trusty wooden pirateship has sailed back! The Pirate Bay, hailed as "The galaxy's most resilient BitTorrent site", is now back online at thepiratebay.se. This long hiatus has come to an end after a Swedish police raids shuttered the site, and employee infighting led to several of the original cast and crew heading for bluer waters.

The latest Pirate Bay saga began when Swedish police raided the servers, which were housed in a converted nuclear shelter in Nacka, Sweden. The Pirate Bay was taken offline and its web ratings plunged from being the 88th largest website in the world to 176. In recent weeks a timer appeared that counted down to the time that the site came online, letting the world at large know that The Pirate Bay may have been down, but it certainly was not out.

The familiar pirate ship logo can still be found throughout the site, but upon resurfacing The Pirate Bay is sporting a new homepage logo with what appears to be a Phoenix, which is unsurprising since The Pirate Bay has once again sprung from the ashes.

The site is now using CloudFlare, which will protect the website and improve availability. Infighting began during the process of restoring the site, and several members of the staff have left to pursue other BitTorrent alternatives. In either case, expect The Pirate Bay to receive a warm welcome as the ship pulls back into port.


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Nickelodeon to launch standalone streaming service in February
Viacom plans to launch a standalone online streaming subscription for its Nickelodeon channel, aimed at children's programming. The media company wants to adapt to changing times before it is potentially left behind as viewer habits continually head to streaming content. Nickelodeon content is currently available on Amazon, while Viacom also released new apps and original series for Internet and mobile users.

"We want to satisfy the demand that is coming from the viewers out there," said Philippe Dauman, CEO of Viacom, in a statement published by the New York Times. "They have an insatiable appetite for great content. They want to view that content on every device that they own."

Cord cutting is becoming increasingly appealing to viewers tired of paying large amounts for cable and satellite subscriptions - and there are a number of standalone streaming services. CBS has a monthly subscription offering, while HBO is expected to release a standalone streaming service later this year.


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Jihadists weary of Internet, turning to Dark Web to spread propaganda
Islamic extremist groups still enjoy using the Internet and social media to spread propaganda and recruit, but are becoming more skilled in flying under the radar. Intelligence experts are collecting information from previous reckless Internet posts, and that is something the terrorists want to avoid in the future.

To help share propaganda, the groups are largely turning to the Dark Web - and using Skype, WhatsApp, and software that isn't as open. ISIS went a step further by issuing guidelines to its members posting on social media, such as blurring out faces, ensuring geographic tagging is disabled, and being careful what information they are providing on current operations.

"We realize that the people we are interested in are increasingly specialized in computing," said Philippe Chadrys, the head investigator of France's judicial police responsible for fighting terrorism, in a statement to the AFP. "They master encryption software and methods to better erase data. That makes our probes much more complicated."

It will remain a cat and mouse game between intelligence experts and jihadists trying to share information on the Internet - and it will continue to evolve.


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RansomWeb appears to be emerging new cyberattack against victims
A new cyber threat victimizing users is the 'RansomWeb' attack, which leaves compromised websites encrypted - and they will remain that way until the victim pays a ransom to cyberattackers. The threat was first detected by cybersecurity firm High-Tech Bridge, investigating a client website, which displayed a database error.

The cybercriminals demanded a $50,000 ransom in exchange for decrypting the database, despite it being compromised six months prior. A closer inspection found that several server scripts were edited so data was encrypted before it was submitted to the database, and data was decrypted after being pulled from the database.

Instead of an immediate ransom demand - like ransomware attacks against business users - the cybercriminals patiently waited until backups were also overwritten.

"We are probably facing a new emerging threat for websites that may outshine defacements and DDoS attacks," said Ilia Kolochenko, CEO of High-Tech Bridge. "RansomWeb attacks may cause unrepairable damage, they are very easy to cause and pretty difficult to prevent. Days hwen hackers were attacking websites for glory or fun are over, now financial profit drives them. The era of Web blackmailing, racket and chantage is about to start."


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AMD is offering discounts to GTX 970 owners amid VRAM controversy
By now I'm sure you've read about the VRAM issues surrounding the GeForce GTX 970, and AMD taking a stab at NVIDIA because of it, but now the former is offering gamers special discounts if they return their GTX 970s and pick up a Radeon card.

AMD's Roy Taylor has taken to Twitter, offering GTX 970 owners who return their cards special discounts if they swap them out for Radeon cards, including the R9 290 and R9 290X. Taylor tweeted "Anyone returning their GTX970 and wanting a great deal on a Radeon with a full 4GB please let us know" and even tagged the @NVIDIAGeForce Twitter account at the time.

Are you a GeForce GTX 970 owner? Will you be trading in your GTX 970 for the Radeon R9 290X?


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Microsoft earning praise for Outlook app on Google Android, iOS
Microsoft has released a native Outlook app for Apple iOS and a preview mode for Google Android, as the company continues to embrace change. The successful launch was courtesy of Microsoft's previous acquisition of Acompli, with both sides integrating the teams while continuing to develop the Outlook app.

The Outlook iOS version requires iOS 8.0 or newer, and is a 22.5MB download.

"Microsoft is absolutely doing the right thing putting these important and popular applications on Android and iOS," said Al Hilwa, analyst at IDC, in a statement to PCWorld. "An increasing number of users of these products already use multiple devices, and it is valuable for them to be able to move across platforms with the same tools."

Even though Microsoft will promote Windows 10 as an operating system that can be used across multiple devices, including smartphones and tablets, a native Outlook app for the two most popular mobile OSes was a correct decision.


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League of Legends or StarCraft II fan? The Intel Extreme Masters is on
Featuring some of the best teams in the world across two gaming titles, the Intel Extreme Masters is currently running their Taipei contingent of Season 9 - featuring thousands of dollars in prize money and being hosted at the Taipei Game Show, 2015.

Although the League of Legends part is now finished, StarCraft II players are still battling out for top spot. Without spoiling any of the results here, you can view all the results, placings and tournament information on the official landing page.

Seeing players and teams travel from Korea, Australia, Europe and America - this event is sure to tickle your fancy if eSports or competitive gaming is something you're interested in.

All live streams are available on the official website, check it out and enjoy - there isn't long left! If you have missed the action however, all content will be uploaded for private viewing in the near future.


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NVIDIA's G-Sync technology might soon work without the G-Sync module
NVIDIA has been in the headlines for all the wrong reasons this week with the GeForce GTX 970 VRAM issues, and now someone has played around with NVIDIA's G-Sync technology and got it working on every eDP display thanks to the use of a very special driver.

The driver has come from an ASUS Nordic Support representative, who leaked the internal driver (346.87) that included hidden G-Sync support. The driver itself was issued to fix a totallyt different issue, with the rep not aware that G-Sync support was added. Well, when the person received the driver and installed it, they were met with a popup saying that a G-Sync display had been connected. The leaked driver has been adding support for G-Sync to some notebooks, with the ASUS G751 being one of those.

NVIDIA confirmed with PC Perspective that this technology is still in a very early stage, with the G-Sync support not meant to be added anytime soon. NVIDIA had inadvertently confirmed that a G-Sync module is not required to enable G-Sync, which is where the excitement should begin for most.

PC Perspective has done a deep dive into this, where they've said: "This obviously leads us to the discussion of the need for a dedicated G-Sync module on current monitors. In order to get shipping variable refresh monitors in the market last year, NVIDIA had no choice but to create a module to replace the scalar in modern displays. No monitors existed then with embedded DisplayPort interfaces and the standard had not been created for Adaptive Sync". The site continues: "But as the release of AMD FreeSync displays nears, we have to ask: will a dedicated module be required for G-Sync on future products? Interestingly, NVIDIA says that the answer hasn't been 100% decided yet - the future could include this same module, a new module or perhaps even no module at all. There are features and technologies in the G-Sync module that haven't been revealed, at least according to NVIDIA, and with that line of thinking I don't see a time when NVIDIA relieves the desktop market of that requirement in the near term".


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UK surveillance chief: CCTVs are all over, and too many are useless
The UK may have anywhere from 4 million up to 5.9 million CCTV cameras in use, but many of the cameras are useless and there must be concern so the region doesn't 'sleepwalk' towards becoming a surveillance state, according to UK Surveillance Camera Commissioner Tony Porter.

"You can still maintain the balance of excellent surveillance but not have a propagation of surveillance that is actually useless," Porter recently said on BBC Radio 5. "Surveillance can be an extremely good thing and run well, it's a useful tool for society. But to quote a former information commissioner, 'we should not sleepwalk into a surveillance society.'"

Broken, damaged and older analog cameras aren't effective to enhance public safety and deter crime, Porter also added. In the future, Porter wants better interaction with the public, especially regarding regulation so cameras are not simply being added just for the sake of purchasing and installing new cameras - especially if there is no benefit to the public.


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DJI won't let its drones fly near White House again, following crash
Chinese drone maker DJI is planning to release a firmware update so its drones will no longer be able to fly inside of restricted airspace in Washington, DC. The update would also prevent aircraft from crossing the US-Mexico international border, after two recent high-profile incidents.

The first incident was when suspected drug smugglers working for a Mexican cartel crashed a DJI drone with several pounds of methamphetamine. In a separate incident, a drunk government employee accidentally crashed his drone onto White House property in an early morning accident.

With the unmanned aerial systems community growing on a daily basis, we feel it is important to provide pilots with additional tools to help them fly safely and responsibly," said Michael Perry, a spokesman for DJI, in a statement to reporters. "We will continue cooperating with regulators and lawmakers to ensure the skies stay safe and open for innovation."


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Report: Mobile shopping amounted to more than 25% of online sales
Mobile payments at checkout in retail stores has a lot of work left before going mainstream, but mobile is becoming increasingly popular among online transactions. More than a quarter of online global payments were made via smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices during Q4 2014, according to a report from Adyen.

The 25.8 percent figure is an 11 percent increase over Q3 2014, and retailers are finding new techniques to turn mobile users into paying customers.

"Across all industries including retail, gaming, ticketing, and of course digital goods, we see the emergence of successful businesses offering a mobile-only experience," said Roelant Prins, chief commercial officer of Adyen. "For many companies, mobile is now the primary sales channel, rather than simply a key sales channel, aided by the accelerated growth of mobile payments globally in the last quarter of 2014."

The Apple iPad had the most mobile online shoppers, accounting for 34 percent, while the iPhone trails closely behind with 32.3 percent.


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Renice S8 64GB SDHC UHS I and 32GB H1 Compact Flash Review

While most of us typically associate the compact flash and SD form factors with our everyday devices, these solutions often have much higher purposes in the enterprise sector. One vendor that has been quite successful in this market is Renice.

Today, we have two distinct solutions from Renice, one of which is the 64GB S8 SDHC card, while the other is the 32GB H1 Compact flash solution. Each of these cards is marketed towards industrial use and feature MLC NAND flash. Additional features include SMART management, power fail protection, along with optional AES encryption and secure erase features.

Focusing on the 64GB S8 SDHC solution, marketing performance is set at 70 MB/s read and 20 MB/s write, while the 32GB H1 Compact Flash solution allows for 57 MB/s read and 20 MB/s write.

MSRP for the 64GB Renice S8 SDHC solution is set at $129.99, while the 32GB Renice H1 Compact Flash retails for $69.99. Each carry a three-year warranty.

Our sample of the Renice S8 came in open box form. Capacity is listed to the right at 64GB with the model number below.

The backside of the card shares no further information with us, instead just the standard pin out for the SD form factor.

Moving over to the H1 Compact Flash solution, we have the same blue on black design with just the model designation on the front.

The backside of the H1 carries all the specifics of the card. Here we have its capacity at 32GB, along with serial and part numbers.

The Renice S8 64GB SDHC solution is factory formatted with the exFAT file system. Useable capacity after formatting is 60.6GB

In testing the S8, we ran through CDM and found the card to reach just 1.3 MB/s read and 21 MB/s write. This is pretty far from the marketing numbers we discussed in the beginning of the review.

Price/performance for the Renice S8 put it at the very bottom of our charts at 14% due to both its lack of performance and very high price tag.

The Renice H1 32GB Compact Flash solution is factory formatted with the FAT32 file system. Useable capacity after formatting is 30.2GB.

Running the Renice H1 through CDM, we came in numbers much closer to marketing specifications at 52 MB/s read and 9 MB/s write.

Price/performance for the Renice H1 landed the memory card at the bottom of this chart as well, again due to the lack of performance and high cost.

While neither the S8 nor the H1 did very well in any of our performance testing, both of these cards are built to be reliable industrial solutions over typical consumer variants. To that fact, Renice has packed quite a few features into each of these cards including both static and dynamic wear levelling, among others mentioned in the introduction.

With that said, we simply cannot ignore the inability for either of these cards to reach marketing specifications. Our sample of the S8 SDHC was able to reach 1.3 MB/s read and 21 MB/s write, while it was fully intended to reach 70 MB/s read. Over to the Renice H1 solution, we reached 52 MB/s read and 9 MB/s write where this card is said to be capable of 57 MB/s read and 20 MB/s write. Of course, this in its entirety shows up in our price/performance chart where each of these solutions landed at the bottom of their respective chart.

Overall, the Renice S8 and H1 have a plethora of industrial features to improve reliability and increase longevity of the product. On the flip side, performance is terrible, especially in the case of the S8 where read performance peaked at 1.3 MB/s.

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