2014年7月31日 星期四
Apple reportedly launches own CDN amid deals with ISPs
Apple is making a lot of changes with iOS 8 and OS X 10.10 Yosemite, and to help prepare it's reportedly launched its own content delivery network (CDN).
The company's incoming new operating system upgrades will communicate with one other more than ever, and the new CDN should help deliver files and data more quickly.
Apple has been working on launching its own CDN since 2013, according to StreamingMediaBlog.com.
Moreover the company has reportedly established interconnect deals with internet service providers including Comcast and others that will allow it to connect directly to these ISPs' networks.
i-control
Apple's CDN reportedly has more than ten times the capacity that many existing service providers are using to deliver content to their users, according to the streaming media blog, which claims to have spoken with sources at multiple ISPs.
The delivery network could have speeds up to multiple terabits per second, with Apple investing more than $100m in it by the end of 2014, according to the site.
If this report is accurate, Apple has just joined the ranks of companies like Microsoft, YouTube and Netflix, which also pay ISPs for improved access to customers - though it's well known that Netflix doesn't like it.
With the Yosemite beta already arriving, this CDN may be just in time for Apple to start taking some of the load onto its own shoulders and wrest yet more control into its own hands.
Just to be sure, though, we've asked Apple to confirm the details of this report, and we'll update if we hear back.
- Here's everything TechRadar knows about the Apple iWatch
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The TIP OFF: TechRadar Tip Off: Save 10% on the Nvidia Shield Tablet at NewEgg
Always wanted an Adroid tablet, but couldn't stand their inability to bring the game? The Nvidia Shield Tablet is your answer.
Here's an excerpt from our hands on review:
"Specs-wise, the Shield tablet has an 8-inch full HD display, Tegra K1 (192 core Kepler) GPU, 2.2GHz Quad Core CPU and 2GB of RAM - meaning this comes off as one premium slate. But you wouldn't expect much less for 'the gamer's tablet,' would you?"
We liked ability to stream games from the Nvidia library, its killer specs and its price.
Today we really like the price because it's on sale over at NewEgg for just $269.99 (about £160, AU$290) when you use code AFUBTB10 at checkout.
Get the Nvidia Shield Tablet now!
Trading cards
Still rocking a 500 series Nvidia GPU? Treat yo' self to an upgrade by buying the EVGA GeForce GT740. And you should probably do it sooner rather than later because it's a steal at its current price of $132.99 (about £79, AU$143) on Amazon.
It's compatible with any PCI-E slot and sporting 4GB of GDDR5 VRAM you should be set to handle whatever games 2014 can throw at you.
Get the EVGA GeForce GT740 now!
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Opinion: Facebook's decision on Messenger is brilliant
As you may have heard, Facebook is making a significant change to the way messaging works on its mobile app. Specifically the company is removing the messaging functions from the primary Facebook Mobile app and has begun shunting its users into the separate Facebook Messenger app for chat.
And this is the crazy part: it requires an entirely separate download.
We all know how onerous it is to download apps these days. It can take tens of seconds for a new app to install, just so you can hate-play Kim Kardashian: Hollywood.
The Internet's response was, of course, measured and nuanced.
Ah ha ha ha. Sorry, that one gets me every time. The Internet's response was the exact opposite of measured and nuanced. In fact, to look at its reaction, you'd think the company had mounted an armed invasion of Kansas while simultaneously running over everyone's grandmother and strangling a paralyzed puppy.
Now, I'm always glad to see people getting energized over something truly important (after we tackle this problem we're going to get right on climate change and world hunger, right?). But I'd also like to offer a few words as counterpoint to the prevailing view.
Those few words are these: I freaking love Facebook Messenger.
Driven to distraction
Why do I love an app that most people seem so deeply persecuted by? Because it allows me to use Facebook's messaging system the way I'd most like to. Which is to say, without using Facebook.
Now let's get one thing straight up front. I am a happy and willing participant in Facebook and its trademark shallow, scattershot virtual interactions that have permanently devalued both liking something and being someone's friend. Though we may not actually talk to one another any more, over the past few years my "friends" have become extremely good at crafting droll commentary about what they're doing, how they feel about current events and which puppy videos are the very, very best puppy videos. And I find all of this very entertaining.
So I don't hate Facebook. But I do know I can't be trusted with it.
Facebook is the most scientifically advanced form of distraction mankind has yet created. Its intoxicating stew of self-absorption/congratulation/loathing results in an endless series of click-holes, available any hour of the night or day, with a reliable percentage of new things I can watch, read, shake a fist at, or comment on. It is the endless regress, the garden of earthly delights, the ultimate entertainment, the abyss from which no man returns (at least not without an inspiring story about an Ivory Coast cacao farmer that puts EVERYTHING into perspective).
Thus, much like drinking, catfishing and trolling the comments sections on Diary of a Quilter, Facebook is strictly an after-hours activity for me. As someone who works at a computer all day, if I start allowing Facebook into my daytime routine, I'm toast.
Still, though, I need to communicate with people. And for better or worse, a lot of those people are on Facebook. Facebook remains one of the most reliable ways to get in touch with anyone you've ever friended, despite any changes to that person's job/phone number/last name/country of residence/stated racial affiliation. In addition to being a global timesuck and a cause of depression, Facebook is also a messaging service that almost everyone I know is signed up with, most of whom still use it at least occasionally.
The right tool for the job
Unfortunately, though, when I get a message through Facebook, I have to run its hazardous distraction gauntlet to view it, meaning there is a high-to-100% chance I will get abducted by at least one thing in my feed, which will send me down one of those aforementioned click-holes, thereby blowing large holes in my productivity.
And Facebook Messenger solves this problem. When I get Facebook messages, it allows me to see and respond to only those messages. No weight loss come-ons, no parents getting hit in the crotch by overexcited 2 year-olds, no you'll-never-guess-what-happens-next.
That's why I like it. But I was using Messenger before this whole mess started. What about this business of Facebook forcing its users to use a separate app for messages?
I think that makes a lot of sense too. It comes down to good app design and the ways that apps fundamentally differ from programs that run on PCs. In the past, PC software (or services that run in the browser) have typically added disparate features over time, which is something the more flexible PC interface can handle more deftly. Apps, on the other hand, are typically purpose-built tools that (when made correctly) help us accomplish a single function better than we could in a multifunction tool.
Real-time and asynchronous: different beasts
Facebook's original stock in trade was asynchronous communication. You're interacting with your friends, but not in real time. This asynchronous nature is why it's so much more useful for entertainment than Twitter (which is better for keeping up on what's happening in real time). Facebook presents the posts its algorithm determines are most relevant to you from the past several days of your friends' activities. Conversations on a single topic are public, can last days, and are conveniently filed into their own buckets instead of jammed into the rest of your Twitter feed.
Messenger's functions are more about synchronous communications, as in real-time, all-in-a-long-stream chat. That chat can be done via text, emoji, sound files or Skype-like voice-over-IP. And if we want those communications to be as streamlined and easy-to-accomplish as possible, it makes sense to have a specially optimized app. In addition, these communications are also typically private or limited to just a few people for a given conversation. It makes psychological sense to separate them from our public Facebook lives.
And it makes no sense at all to have all of these real-time and private chat features bogging down the original Facebook app, which should optimized for browsing feeds, consuming content and engaging in asynchronous communication.
Different jobs require different tools and Facebook seems to understand this. Messenger is where you talk to your friends. Facebook is where you talk to your "friends." If all goes well, I hope to see Facebook bring more innovation and functionality to both these apps, each of which will hopefully enhance the specific experiences they have been built for.
Splitting these apps may provoke some short term pain (you're not getting the 23 seconds it takes to download Messenger back, you know), but it's a long term win for Facebook's users. As a side-bonus, you'll get to experience the joy of communicating with your friends without your newsfeed putting a bag over your head and shoving you roughly down a click-hole every time you say hi.
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Wave-maker OnePlus is apparently working on a smartwatch
Apparently regretting nothing about its choice of naming schemes, OnePlus is reportedly preparing to release the OneWatch smartwatch.
The OneWatch will supposedly follow in the footsteps of the OnePlus One, a budget-priced high end smartphone that's currently making waves in the industry.
OnePlus is already close to launching the OneWatch, despite this being the first we've heard of it, according to BGR.
The site received a sketch that shows a smartwatch with a round face, a sapphire OLED display, titanium trim, and a curved, wireless-chargeable battery tucked inside a leather strap.
HTC who?
OnePlus isn't the only tech company that likes to use "One" in its names, but luckily HTC's rumored smartwatch is by all reports going to be called the HTC One Wear. That's different enough, right?
And another difference between the OneWatch and other smartwatches could be the OS, if OnePlus decides to go with its own Android variant rather than the Android Wear OS that most other watch makers are choosing.
Either way, BGR also received a shot of a OnePlus OneWatch website page, indicating the watch's launch could indeed be close.
Now we'll just have to wait for OnePlus to announce the OneWatch officially - and to see whether they stick with the same invite-only buying scheme they've used for the OnePlus One smartphone.
On the other hand, these images came from an anonymous tipster, so they could be altogether BS. We've reached out to OnePlus just in case, and we'll update here if we hear back.
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LG's 65-inch Ultra HD 4K OLED TV is more affordable, but still expensive
4K Ultra HD televisions released to date have had the same Achille's heel: They're all made from LED LCD panels, but LG is coming to rescue OLED lovers with a TV set that's still too doggone expensive for most of us.
HD Guru managed to get the lowdown this week on pricing and availability for the LG 65EC9700, a 65-inch Ultra HD 4K television set the Korean manufacturer first unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show earlier this year.
Featuring an organic light-emitting diode (OLED) panel that marks a first for Ultra HD TVs, the big-screen wonder wowed CES 2014 attendees with plasma-style viewing angles and richer black levels than existing LED LCD panels.
Unfortunately, the improved picture quality comes at a relatively steep price, with a leaked pricing matrix revealing a retail price of $8,999 (about UK£5330, AU$9684), which should get knocked down to a street price somewhere in the neighborhood of $6,999 (about UK£4146, AU$7532).
You know you want it
Featuring a curved screen not unlike Samsung's latest UN65HU9000 set, LG apparently plans to begin shipping the 65EC9700 by the end of September, and expects the OLED display to offer a lifespan similar to plasma models, which are currently on their way out.
At the low end, that would work out to roughly 50,000 hours or more than 28 years, based on AC Nielsen survey data that reveals Americans watch an average of 34 hours per week watching television.
The LG 65EC9700 also promises to come loaded with goodies, ranging from Smart TV streaming to a Tru-Ultra HD Engine for higher quality upconversions and Passive 3D, complete with the glasses necessary to view such content.
If impressively large 4K OLED screens are your kind of thing, you'll have the next two months to scrounge for enough dough to actually buy LG's latest wonder, which offers four times the resolution (3840 x 2160) of regular 1080p HDTVs.
- Break off a piece of LG's 105-inch curved Ultra HD TV in our hands-on review!
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Samsung will ditch plastic for 'new materials' on a 2014 phone
Samsung will break the mold this year and release a non-plastic phone, bucking a trend it's established over several years of cheap-feeling Galaxy devices.
Not that Samsung's phones have actually been cheap, or of poor quality, but their plastic chassis have sometimes made them feel that way.
No doubt that hasn't helped the Korean firm in its battles with competitors like HTC, which has taken to using metal on flagships like the HTC One (M8).
But now Samsung Mobile Senior Vice President Kim Hyun-joon has informed investors and analysts that Samsung will release two more phones this year, one of which will be made from "new materials," reports The Wall Street Journal.
So metal
One of those phones will be a large device, possibly the Galaxy Note 4.
The other could very well be the rumored Galaxy Alpha, which could be a Galaxy S5 spin-off with metal sides and a textured, plastic back.
In addition an unknown Samsung phone being used for research and development purposes popped up in April with what was thought to possibly be an all-metal body, so that could be it too - or those could be the same phone.
Samsung revealed in its latest quarterly earnings report that profits have fallen, though not by any fault of the successful Galaxy S5.
It seems the company will try to pick up its fortunes with a metal or at least partially metal phone, a strategy that's worked just fine for its competitors.
- Guess what already has metal? The iPhone 5S
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Updated: BBM finally arrives on Windows Phone
Update July 31: Break out the bubbly. BBM beta is finally publicly available to all Windows Phone users.
You'll need Windows Phone 8 or Windows Phone 8.1 to start thumbing out messages. Features familiar to the BBM set are there, though the company is really focusing on three key ones to start - Contacts, Chats and Feeds.
The app aims to fit in with the Windows Phone look, meaning it emulates Microsoft's Metro motif. Users can also pin Groups and 1:1 chats on the Start screen for easy access.
This is only BBM version one, and BlackBerry says it's already hard at work on version two, when it will bring more features to the fore. The app is free and available now (again, as a beta) in the Windows Phone Store.
Original article below...
Android and iOS won't be alone at the BlackBerry Messenger party anymore come July, when BBM will launch for Windows Phone devices.
After BlackBerry launched BBM for iOS and Android in 2013 it was only a matter of time before the messaging service arrived on WP as well, and the company confirmed in February that it would arrive this year.
Now BlackBerry CEO John Chen has informed the public that BBM for Windows Phone will in fact arrive in July.
Four's a crowd
Chen dropped the news on an earnings call Thursday morning, CrackBerry reports.
Windows Phone will be the fourth platform to host BBM, after BlackBerry 10, iOS and Android.
The most recent advancement on the iOS and Android side was the addition of free calling among BBM users. However, it's unclear at this point what features will be available in the WP version when it arrives next month.
We've asked BlackBerry for some more details about BBM for Windows Phone, and we'll update here if we receive any.
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