Gregarius » BetaNews.Com » septembre 30, 2014

BetaNews.Com (22 non lus)

One way (maybe the only way) Yahoo can succeed

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 9:45pm CEST par Robert X. Cringely

Alibaba’s IPO has come and gone and with it Yahoo has lost the role of Alibaba proxy and its shares have begun to slide. Yahoo’s Wall Street honeymoon, if there ever was one, is over, leaving the company trying almost anything it can to avoid sliding into oblivion. Having covered Yahoo continuously since its founding 20 years ago it is clear Y! has little chance of managing its way out of this latest of many crises despite all the associated cash. But -- if it will -- Yahoo could invest its way to even greater success.

Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer, thinking like Type A CEOs nearly always seem to think, wants to take some of the billions reaped from the Alibaba IPO and dramatically remake her company to compete again with Google , Microsoft , Facebook, and even Apple. It won’t work.

Those ships have, for the most part, already sailed and can never be caught. Yahoo would have to do what it has been trying to do ever since Tim Koogle left as CEO in 2003 and regain its mojo. There is no reason to believe that more money is the answer.

It’s not that Mayer isn’t super-smart, it’s that the job she is attempting to do may be impossible. She has the temperament for it but the rest of Yahoo does not. Even if she fires everyone, Yahoo still has a funny smell.

In practical terms there are only two logical courses of action for Mayer and Yahoo. One is to wind things down and return Yahoo’s value to shareholders in the most efficient fashion, selling divisions, buying back shares, and issuing dividends until finally turning out the lights and going home. That’s an end-game. The only other possible course for Yahoo, in my view, is to turn the company into a Silicon Valley version of Berkshire Hathaway. That’s what I strongly propose.

Mayer seems to be trying to buy her way ahead of the next technology wave, but having been at this game for a couple of years so far, it isn’t going well. Lots of acqui-hires (buying tech companies for their people) and big acquisitions like Tumblr have not significantly changed the company’s downward trajectory. That’s because that trajectory is determined more by Google and Facebook and by changes in the ad market than by anything Yahoo can do. It’s simply beyond Mayer’s power because no matter how much money she has, Google and Facebook will always have more.

It’s time to try something new.

While Berkshire Hathaway owns some companies outright like Burlington Northern-Santa Fe railroad and GEICO, even those are for the most part left in the hands of managers who came with the businesses. At Coke and IBM, too, Berkshire tends to trust current management while keeping a close eye on the numbers. Yahoo should do the same but limit itself to the tech market or maybe just to Silicon Valley, keeping all investments within 50 miles of Yahoo Intergalactic HQ in Sunnyvale.

Yahoo’s current stakes in Alibaba and Yahoo Japan are worth $36 billion and $8 billion respectively and Alibaba at least appears to be on an upward trajectory. With $9 billion in cash from the Alibaba IPO Yahoo has at least $50 billion to put to work without borrowing anything. $50 billion is bigger than the biggest venture, private equity or hedge fund.

Mayer is smart, but maybe not smart enough to realize the companies in which she is interested could do better under their own names with a substantial Yahoo minority investment. That would leverage Yahoo’s money and allow a broader array of bets as a hedge, too. Mayer can pick the companies herself or -- even better -- just participate in every Silicon Valley B Round from now on, doing a form of dollar cost averaging that puts $15 billion to work every year. With future exits coming from acquisitions and IPOs (and possibly winding-down its own tech activities) Yahoo ought to be able to fund this level of investment indefinitely. Yahoo would literally own the future of tech.

Silicon Valley companies that make it to a B Round (the third round of funding after seed and A) have dramatically better chances of making successful exits. Yahoo wouldn’t have to pick the companies, Hell they wouldn’t even have to know the names of those companies, just their industry sectors and locations. Forty years of VC history show that with such a strategy investment success would be practically guaranteed.

As opposed to the company’s current course, which is anything but.
Microsoft takes the wraps off Windows 10 -- No, seriously

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 7:43pm CEST par Wayne Williams

Microsoft has finally announced its new OS. The Wi-Fi password at today’s intimate San Francisco event was "Windows 2015", leading some to speculate that Microsoft might have chosen to return to naming its OS after the year of launch (a nod to Windows 95/98), but that turned out not to be the case -- a wise move. So what name would the tech giant choose? Not Windows 9, the obvious and expected pick, nor Windows One, the rumored alternative.

No, to the surprise of everyone, Microsoft has revealed that the next version of its operating system will be called… drum roll… Windows 10! Wait, What? Way to confuse consumers Microsoft. I guess Windows X was too close to OSX. Or maybe Microsoft choose Windows 10 because 7 8 9 (seven ate nine)? Infoworld's April Fool's joke got it right.

The operating system will run on a wide range of devices, and Microsoft is summing it up as "One Product family, one platform, one store". Something my colleague Ian Barker rightly observed is rather reminiscent of "Ein volk, ein reich, ein fuhrer". Terry Myerson, executive vice president of the Operating Systems group at Microsoft, focused much of the early part of the presentation on the Enterprise side of things. Microsoft is really going after businesses with the new launch.

Next on stage was Joe Belfiore, giving the audience a very short demo of Windows 10, which turns out to be build 9841, the last leak we saw. The Start menu was, naturally, the first element shown off. Click the Start button and the menu appears. There’s the menu on the left, and tiled apps on the right. Windows 7 crossed with Windows 8. There’s universal search from the Start menu, so you can search your PC and the web.

Although we got the name wrong (as did everyone) the operating system itself is pretty much what all the leaks lead us to expect. Although the demo didn’t really go into too much detail on what Windows 10 offers, you can look forward to virtual workspaces, apps running windowed, and a notifications center. Take a look at our guide on what to expect here.

It was believed the Windows Charms bar would disappear from desktop systems, but it’s still in the build Microsoft demoed. That will change though.

Microsoft is going after keyboard and mouse power users with the OS, and one of the new changes demoed was an improved Command Prompt which gives users the ability to paste in directories using Ctrl+V. Yay.

Microsoft also took the wraps off its Windows Insider Program, which will launch tomorrow and be accessible through preview.windows.com. This will give people the chance to test the technical preview build for laptops and desktops and participants will receive a steady stream of builds through the development cycle. Microsoft wants feedback in order to help create the OS consumers actually want. I like this new Microsoft.

"Windows 10 represents the first step of a whole new generation of Windows, unlocking new experiences to give customers new ways to work, play and connect," said Terry Myerson. "This will be our most comprehensive operating system and the best release Microsoft has ever done for our business customers, and we look forward to working together with our broader Windows community to bring Windows 10 to life in the months ahead".

Windows 10 (which will also be the phone OS too) will be shipping in the middle of 2015, but no word on pricing yet (will it be free for Windows 8 users? Who knows) or what upgrade options will be available. If Microsoft can find a way to get people easily upgrading from Windows XP and 7 then it will have a winner on its hands.
Acer bringing Aspire V Nitro Black Edition gaming laptops to North America

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 6:54pm CEST par Brian Fagioli

Acer makes some great machines, but the company is often associated with budget laptops. This is not a bad thing though, as the company's notebooks are inexpensive, but not cheap. In other words, Acer computers give you a lot of bang for your buck.

Today however, Acer is going the hardcore-gaming route and is delivering some beasts to North America, with the Aspire V Nitro Black Edition laptops. Make no mistake, these laptops are not budget-oriented, but power-oriented.

"V Nitro Black Edition models come equipped with an SV (standard voltage) 4th Generation Intel Core i7-4710HQ Quad Core processor for maximum power. Acer also included the Nvidia GeForce GTX 860M graphics for powerful performance and smooth game play. It is up to 60 percent faster than Nvidia’s previous generation GPUs. Various models include 8GB, 12GB or 16GB of memory. Dual wireless antennas supporting both 2.4GHz and 5GH frequencies enable speedy Internet connections. In addition, fast 128GB or 256GB solid state drives provide fast wake times and rapid access to files, movies, songs and photos and/or up to a 1TB hard disk drive for storing massive amounts of multimedia files. ", says Acer.

The manufacturer further explains, "full high-definition displays with IPS technology provide brilliant, crisp visuals and wide viewing angles, while Acer Comfy View, a non-glare display, helps reduces eye fatigue. Four built-in speakers (8W total output) combine with Dolby Digital Plus Home Theater for powerful surround sound for gaming, movies and music. Various models in the V 17 line include either a Blu-ray Disc drive for a crystal clear movie experience or an 8X DVD Super Multi Double Layer Drive that is M-DISC enabled".

Acer lists the following specs:

Clearly, these laptops have amazing specifications and should appeal to both gamers and power-users alike. My only complaint would be the 3-Cell battery. Obviously, with standard voltage processors, these machines will drain a battery quickly, so a 6-cell would be preferred. However, I can imagine many consumers mostly using these tethered to the wall, so battery life may not be a huge concern.

Battery aside, these notebooks look great; both on paper and aesthetically. The red back-lit keyboard is quite striking and should be perfect for late-night gaming marathons.

Will you be buying an Acer Aspire V Nitro Black Edition laptop? Tell me in the comments.
Occupy Hong Kong protesters are locked in a technology arms race with the Chinese government

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 6:12pm CEST par Paul Cooper

Thousands of protesters have flooded into the heart of central Hong Kong over recent days to demonstrate against the Beijing government's plans to phase out the semi-autonomous province's democratic elections by 2017. The campaign seeks to blockade Hong Kong's financial center, and represents the first major challenge to the rule of the new Chinese President, Xi Jinping.

For anyone confused by the protests, here's a bit of background: when the UK handed the territory of Hong Kong back to China in 1997, the Chinese government agreed to a policy of "one country, two systems" that allowed the city a high degree of control over its own affairs and kept in place civil liberties unseen on the mainland. It also promised the city's leader would eventually be chosen through "universal suffrage". That appears to not have been entirely true, and it's got thousands of people taking to the streets.

As with protest movements around the world, from Gaza to the UK, from Thailand to New York, technology has played a major part in civil unrest and the organization of protest. Let's look at some of the ways tech has defined the #OccupyHongKong protest movement, and how the constant arms race between repression and freedom of expression is holding up. Here's three ways we've noticed that technology has impacted the protests.

1. Instagram

Over the weekend, the Chinese government took the unprecedented step of censoring Instagram on mainland China. Mostly used for sharing heavily-filtered images of one's own food, Instagram accounts belonging to protesters were soon filled with images of massing crowds, clouds of tear gas and suited-up riot police in Hong Kong's Central financial hub.

As of Sunday, monitoring services such as blockedinchina.net and greatfire.org showed that Chinese mainlanders do not have access to Instagram.

While the image-sharing site is still available in Hong Kong itself, it seems Chinese censors have taken steps to ensure that the Chinese mainland isn't flooded with pictures of thousands of protesters. Particularly of concern are the images of gas-masked police officers firing tear gas and pepper spray into crowds of peaceful protesters, which evoke the painful and repressed memories of the brutally crushed Tienanmen Square protests of 1989.

Of course, many Internet users in China are already well-versed in the need for a virtual private network (VPN) to access certain banned pages like Facebook and Twitter.

2. Twitter and Weibo

Microblogging sites like Twitter and Weibo have been instrumental in the spreading of #OccupyCentral message. While the hashtag has been blocked from the heavily-monitored Chinese microblogging site Sina Weibo in the wake of the protests, the trend has skyrocketed on Twitter.

You can also follow the protests' official Twitter account, @OCLPHK, for updates and pictures from Central Hong Kong.

While Twitter is blocked in China, some Chinese users access it through a VPN, and images from the protest have inundated users' Twitter feeds over recent days.

3. Apps to break the communications blackout

Amid rumors of a complete communications blackout of all phone and Internet coverage, protesters in Hong Kong have taken to an app called FireChat. The app uses technology from the Wi-Fi tethering whizzes at Open Garden to go off the grid, allowing conversations with anyone with 200 feet of your location using absolutely no network coverage of mobile data. Using Bluetooth and Wi-Fi networks to hop between communicants, FireChat is also fully anonymous, which is a plus given the circumstance.

This kind of peer-to-peer communication has caught people's imagination during the protests, and some 100,000 people have downloaded the application for smartphones over the last 24 hours in Hong Kong, according to the developers.

They also claim that the application was used simultaneously by around 33,000 people between Sunday and Monday morning. The live and anonymous discussion groups set up on FireChat can gather as many as 10,000 people simultaneously. If you're interested, you can download the app here.

Published under license from ITProPortal.com, a Net Communities Ltd Publication. All rights reserved.
eBay and PayPal to split into separate businesses in 2015

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 5:35pm CEST par Mark Wilson

A giant of the modern web is to be cleft in twain. eBay Inc is set to split its online payment service PayPal into a separate, independent, publicly traded company; eBay and PayPal will be divided into two in the second half of 2015.

By keeping the auction and payment services at arm's length from each other, eBay will be hoping to breathe new life into the beleaguered selling site. The move comes after a review of the company’s structure and growth strategies by the board of directors, and is described as providing "shareholders with more targeted investment opportunities".

It's around 12 years since PayPal was snapped up by eBay, but it has been decided that it makes more sense for each arm of the business to concentrate on its own field. eBay Inc President and CEO John Donahoe said that the two businesses "will be sharper and stronger, and more focused and competitive as leading, standalone companies in their respective markets".

Although no mention has been made of possible future ventures for either eBay or PayPal, splitting in this way will give the two the opportunity to branch out in slightly different directions. "As independent companies, eBay and PayPal will enjoy added flexibility to pursue new market and partnership opportunities. And we are confident following a thorough assessment of the relationships between eBay and PayPal that operating agreements can maintain synergies going forward. Our board and management team believe that putting eBay and PayPal on independent paths in 2015 is best for each business and will create additional value for our shareholders," said Donahoe.

The move will be welcomed by investors who are keen to see money put to particular uses. Splitting into eBay and PayPal is something that has been talked about for some time, with fuel having been added to the fire when activist Carl Icahn called for the breakup many months ago. But eBay insists that the decision has nothing to do with Ichan's demands. When the split takes place, Dan Schulman from American Express will become PayPal's new CEO.

Photo credit: Chukcha / Shutterstock
Another data breach... Yeah, yeah, whatever

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 5:06pm CEST par Ian Barker

It seems like data breaches are seldom out of the news these days, but whilst that means we're more likely to be aware of their existence it also means there's a risk that individual threats begin to fade into the general day-to-day techy chatter and we don't give them the attention they deserve.

The growing number of breaches -- up 10 percent over last year according to a recent study by the Ponemon institute -- means they're less likely to catch our attention. Security training firm KnowBe4 refers to this phenomenon as "breach fatigue" and warns that it may be placing companies at risk.

"The increasing volume of customers affected by these data breaches may be causing a complacency that creates even more risk," says Stu Sjouwerman, CEO of KnowBe4. "For most companies, it is not a matter of if, but when, followed by a free year of credit monitoring. For users, the constant barrage of breach news can cloud their awareness of cyber-threats as it all becomes background noise".

The company warns that a careless attitude on the part of individuals can carry over to the business environment. This in turn leads to more risk of being hacked, phished or socially engineered into giving away company information.

Michael Bruemmer, vice president of the credit information company Experian's data breach resolution group which sponsored the Ponemon study, says that 80 percent of the breaches his group works with, "had a root cause in employee negligence." He goes on to say, "It could be from someone giving out their password, someone being spear-phished, it could be a lost USB, it could be somebody mishandling files, it could be leaving the door to the network operations center open so someone can walk in".

You can find out more about how KnowBe4's security awareness training can help employees stay alert to the risks on the company's website. It's also offering a free whitepaper charting the rise of ransomware.

Photo Credit: Suzanne Tucker/Shutterstock
Windows 9 -- What to expect from the new OS

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 3:49pm CEST par Wayne Williams

Microsoft will be announcing its new OS later today, with things kicking off at 10am PT/6pm BST. Although we’ve already seen various leaked images and videos, this will be our first official look at Windows 9 (aka Threshold) and Microsoft will reveal what it has planned for the successor to the much maligned Windows 8.

There isn’t a live stream unfortunately, and although a technology preview will be released for the new OS, it isn’t expected to be made available today. So what can we expect from Windows 9?

The return of the Start menu

Of course top of the list of changes in Windows 9 is the reintroduction of the Start menu. Before Windows 8 even launched people were crying out for its return, and that demand has never wavered. The Windows 9 Start menu looks good, and is exactly what most keyboard and mouse users have been asking for. It works much like the Start menu in Windows 7, but adds tiles from the Windows 8.x Start screen which, for me, is the perfect compromise.

Tiles can be added, removed and resized, and you can resize the Start menu itself.

You can use the Start screen if you prefer simply by switching to it in the Navigation properties window. Tablets running Windows 9 won’t have the Start menu, only the Start screen which makes sense.

Better integrated Modern UI

If you hate the Modern UI then you won’t really have to worry about it in Windows 9. You can switch off the tiles in the Start menu, and never see the Start screen or Charms bar. Apps can be run full-screen, or snapped, but also run in a windowed mode on the desktop, which is great news. A new Options button on the right lets you customize them and access system commands.

Switching between running apps is done using the new Task view button on the taskbar.

Virtual desktops

Linux and Mac OS X users are very familiar with the idea of virtual desktops, where you can switch between different workspaces, but Windows 9 will be the first time Microsoft has offered this featured natively. It’s a big boost for productivity, and great news for power users.

Cortana

Microsoft’s personal assistant is expected to find her way from Windows Phone to Windows 9, which makes sense. Cortana wasn’t in any of the leaked builds, so whether she’s included in the technical preview remains to be seen, but we’d bet on the feature being added at some point.

Notifications center

Windows 9 will gain a new Notifications center which will provide a single place to view all of the alerts and messages that the operating system flashes up. You’ll be able to view all of the Windows notifications directly from the system tray, including Skype messages, and delete individual ones, or all notifications at once.

General improvements

Windows 8.x has been a work in progress since launch, and Windows 9 will continue the improvements we’ve seen, while adding a further layer of polish.

What are you hoping for from Windows 9?
Windows 10 -- What to expect from the new OS [updated]

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 3:49pm CEST par Wayne Williams

Microsoft has announced its new OS today, and although we’ve already seen various leaked images and videos, this was our first official look at Windows 10 (not Windows 9, as everyone was expecting), Microsoft's successor to the much maligned Windows 8.

The demo itself was very short, and the technology preview isn't yet available, but we already have a good idea of what the new operating system will offer. Here's a guide to the main features.

The return of the Start menu

Of course top of the list of changes in Windows 10 is the reintroduction of the Start menu. Before Windows 8 even launched people were crying out for its return, and that demand has never wavered. The Windows 10 Start menu looks good, and is exactly what most keyboard and mouse users have been asking for. It works much like the Start menu in Windows 7, but adds tiles from the Windows 8.x Start screen which, for me, is the perfect compromise.

Tiles can be added, removed and resized, and you can resize the Start menu itself.

You can use the Start screen if you prefer simply by switching to it in the Navigation properties window. Tablets running Windows 10 won’t have the Start menu, only the Start screen which makes sense.

Better integrated Modern UI

If you hate the Modern UI then you won’t really have to worry about it in Windows 10. You can switch off the tiles in the Start menu, and never see the Start screen or Charms bar. Apps can be run full-screen, or snapped, but also run in a windowed mode on the desktop, which is great news. A new Options button on the right lets you customize them and access system commands.

Switching between running apps is done using the new Task view button on the taskbar.

Virtual desktops

Linux and Mac OS X users are very familiar with the idea of virtual desktops, where you can switch between different workspaces, but Windows 10 will be the first time Microsoft has offered this featured natively. It’s a big boost for productivity, and great news for power users.

Cortana

Microsoft’s personal assistant is expected to find her way from Windows Phone to Windows 10, which makes sense. Cortana wasn’t in any of the leaked builds, so whether she’s included in the technical preview remains to be seen, but we’d bet on the feature being added at some point.

Notifications center

Windows 10 will gain a new Notifications center which will provide a single place to view all of the alerts and messages that the operating system flashes up. You’ll be able to view all of the Windows notifications directly from the system tray, including Skype messages, and delete individual ones, or all notifications at once.

General improvements

Windows 8.x has been a work in progress since launch, and Windows 10 will continue the improvements we’ve seen, while adding a further layer of polish.

What are you hoping for from ~~Windows 9~~? Windows 10.
Google Glass adopted by Edinburgh Airport staff as wearables explode in popularity

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 3:49pm CEST par Mark Wilson

At the airport, it's normal to see customer service staff equipped with phones, walkie-talkies and perhaps a tablet. Passengers travelling to and from Scotland who pass through Edinburgh airport will soon find that they are greeted by staff adorned with Google Glass. Google's wearable specs are to be trialled in the Scottish airport in a bid to provide more help and information to travelers.

Customer support representatives will be able to call up flight details and answer queries using the head-mounted Android-powered hardware.

Gordon Dewar, Edinburgh airport chief executive, explains: "We're always looking for new and innovative ways to improve the airport experience for our passengers and Google Glass trial is a great example of how we’re thinking out the box".

For now it is just a trial that runs until the end of the year, but if Google Glass proves useful, it could be rolled out on a permanent basis. "The fact it's the first trial of its kind in a UK airport is exciting, as it shows we are leading the way in how we interact with our passengers. Over the next few months we'll be able to establish whether this product is suitable for an airport environment".

The news of the airport's adoption of wearables comes as Juniper Research reveals that over the next three years shipments in this sector are set to quadruple. The report suggests that by 2017, shipments will rise to 116 million units compared to 27 million in 2014. It is predicted to be an incredibly lucrative market, with revenues soaring to an estimated $53 billion in 2019. With big players like Apple finally getting into the sector with the Apple Watch, it certainly seems that the momentum wearables have managed to garner will continue.

Photo credit: Mopic / Shutterstock
Audacity refines user interface, improves selected effects

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 3:35pm CEST par Nick Peers

Popular open-source, cross-platform sound recording, editing and mixing tool Audacity 2.0.6 has been released. The new build contains a number of minor improvements and various bug fixes.

Most of these changes affect the user interface. Both Cut and Delete options have been moved to the top of the Edit menu, for example. The Transport menu has also been altered to offer a single Play/Stop button as well as a "Play/Stop and Set Cursor" option for leaving the cursor set where playback has halted.

One consequence of this change is that users must now access the Keyboard preferences menu -- accessible via Edit > Preferences -- to set separate keyboard shortcuts for Play and Stop.

Speaking of which, the Keyboard preferences has been redesigned and made searchable to speed up the process of adding or modifying keyboard shortcuts. It also now provides a choice of three views: Tree, Name and Key.

Elsewhere, the Tracks menu gains a new "Mix and Render to New Track" selection, while the Track drop-down menu offers "Move Track to Top" and "Move Track to Bottom" options.

The context menu gains a "Delete Label" entry for removing single labels, while the "Snap To" option offers a choice of snapping to the closest or prior position. Snap To settings are now independent for each project, and the old "Snap To On" keyboard shortcut no longer works.

Version 2.0.6 also improves its selection of effects: Truncate Silence adds a new "Truncate Deleted Silence" setting to shorten the specified length without compressing the silence.

The VST Effects dialog has been redesigned with a new Settings dialog, while VST effects now support standard FXP presets. LV2 effects are now also supported -- via a textual interface only -- across all platforms.

Platform-specific changes see Windows builds now supporting FLAC exports of more than 2GB in size, while the OS X DMG installer has been made easier to use. Self-compiled Linux builds now search for system LADSPA effects in the /usr/lib/ladspa folder.

The update is rounded off by a number of bug fixes for both user interface and effects, but as with all new releases, a number of known issues remain -- see the release notes for details.

Audacity 2.0.6 is available now as a free, cross-platform download for Windows, Mac and Linux. A portable build of Audacity 2.0.5 is also available -- this should be updated to the latest release shortly.
Simpler, faster, more secure file transfers with Send Anywhere 2.0

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 3:31pm CEST par Ian Barker

Sending files to someone else has always been a bit of a problem. Often they’re too big for email, sharing via public cloud services raises security concerns and of course flash drives and DVDs can fall into the wrong hands.

Korea-based startup Send Anywhere has an answer to making file transfers easily and safely in the form of an updated version of its iOS app and a new app for Windows Phone.

Send Anywhere uses peer-to-peer file transfer technology. The way it works means that users don't need to sign-up, log-in, or even know their recipients' contact information. They simply select the files they want to send and get a six-digit one-time key that is only available for 10 minutes before it self-destructs. The code is then sent to the recipient who uses it to download the files.

The updated iOS version offers more complex encryption codes for better security along with a fresher, cleaner design. In addition it has a feature to make sharing the key easier, holding the center of the Send screen automatically copies the key to the clipboard. Pressing a Share button then gives easy access to email and messaging in order to send it.

The Windows Phone app currently offers just basic sending and receiving functions but the company says it will be used as a platform to develop the Windows offering.

Send Anywhere is also available on Android and as a web service, allowing files to be sent and received on any type of PC or mobile device. There's a plugin for Chrome browsers as well. Version 2.0 is available on the app stores from today.

Image Credit: dny3d/Shutterstock
Grace Digital aptX Bluetooth Speakers (GDI-BTSP201) -- bringing music to life [Review]

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 3:01pm CEST par Brian Fagioli
Bluetooth speakers are a dime a dozen, nowadays. Quite frankly, it is hard to get excited about them. While they can be used with a desktop at a workstation, the true allure is portability with a smartphone or tablet. You see, there is typically a trade-off of quality for convenience, and the average audiophile would likely turn up their nose at using them.

While I have heard some great Bluetooth speakers like the UE BOOM and JBL Flip, they ultimately were not enough to replace my desktop speakers, the Logitech Z-2300. Those desktop speakers are quite phenomenal and hard to beat. I recently tested the Cambridge Audio Minx M5 and found them to be wonderful, but they do not offer a wireless connection. Today, I am looking at the Grace Digial aptX Bluetooth Speakers, which work as both wired and wireless.

Features and specs
- Stream music wirelessly via Bluetooth from any Bluetooth-enabled device
- Integrated RCA audio inputs to connect optional wired home audio devices such as iPods, CD players and TVs as an optional audio source
- Delivers sound with striking accuracy with our world-class acoustic tuning and modeling
- Supports universal Bluetooth protocol SBC as well as CD audio quality aptX
- Volume, playback, audio source controls, and Bluetooth connect button are conveniently placed on the top of the left speaker
- Bluetooth version 4.0
- Amplifier: 36 Watt Output Power, 2x 18 Watt RMS Distribution, 50 Hz – 20 kHz Frequency Range
- Speakers: 1-Inch Tweeter Drive Unit, 3.5-Inch Woofer Drive Unit
Test hardware

My goal for testing the hardware was to hear performance with both Bluetooth and wired connections. As desktop speakers, the wired performance is more important to me, but I like the ability to connect wirelessly too, if say a friend comes over with music on a smartphone. For the wireless connection, I used an iPad Air, Hackintosh and LG G3.

For the wired connection, I tested with a Surface Pro 3 in the official docking station. While the dock does have a 3.5mm output, I instead opted to use a USB DAC; the amazing Cambridge DacMagic XS. The Grace Digital speakers come with a generic analog cable, but I swapped it for the Cable Matters Gold Plated 3.5mm to 2RCA Stereo Audio Cable, which has a better build. The included speaker wire to link the speakers is a nice thick gauge and I stuck with that, rather than upgrading.

Impressions

Upon unboxing the speakers, I was immediately impressed with the appearance. You see, they are wrapped in a black faux-Leather (also available in red or white) with white stitching. Sure, the material is "fake", but the appearance is quite breathtaking (they class-up my pathetic basement office). The rear of the left speaker is rather unimpressive; it only has plugs for speaker wire and a port for bass. The true magic is on the right speaker, which features RCA input, a USB charging port (because, why not?), power input, on/off switch, bass port and speaker wire plugs to send signal to the left speaker.

The top of the right speakers is home to the controls -- a volume wheel, pause/play, track forward/back and a power/source button. The source button allows you to easily switch between analog input and Bluetooth. What I really like is that when powering on, the speakers will immediately take audio from the analog connection while searching for Bluetooth pairing. Since I plan to use them mostly with the analog connection, this method is preferable, as I never have to worry about switching to analog when no Bluetooth is present.

Unfortunately, the controls (pause/play, track forward/back) only work with a Bluetooth connection, but this should be obvious. After all, when connected through the analog RCA cable, there is no way for the speakers to communicate with the computer. Either way, it does not matter when using with a desktop, as the Windows or program controls are sufficient. In Bluetooth mode, the controls do work well, including Google Play Music All Access in Chrome on Windows 8.1.

Sound quality

Enough about the features, the true test of any speaker is how it sounds. Of course, this is entirely subjective and dependent on the listener and the source material. I make no apologies for being a massive Hip-Hop fan; however, I also appreciate other genres such as Rock, Dubstep and more.

My first test was with Google Play Music All Access on Windows with a wired connection to the speakers. This is a streaming service that offers compressed music, which audiophiles will decry. However, this is a popular way of consuming music, so it must be tested. I played many songs, including:
- Dr. Dre "What's the Difference"
- Unspoken Heard "Truly Unique"
- Shyne "It's OK"
- Joni Mitchell "Overture-Cotton Avenue"
- Paul Simon "Kodachrome"
- Skrillex "Kill EVERYBODY"
- The Clash "London Calling"
- Meat Puppets "Aurora Borealis"
My goal was to listen to an eclectic mix of songs that I like. On all of the songs, it was quite remarkable; it was hard to tell that they are compressed, or lossy. Even while listening to streaming music, the Grace Digital speakers produced sounds in songs I hadn't heard before.

Music sounds vibrant and alive and very well balanced between right and left channels. Bass is very punchy, but not overpowering, and I do not miss having a dedicated subwoofer from a 2.1 setup. Actually, I appreciate not having a subwoofer under my desk as its absence lends to a cleaner appearance.

Unfortunately, I no longer own any CDs, so I downloaded a free classical music FLAC file described as, Debussy: "II. Jeux de vagues" from "La Mer" on this album (1447-2) Singapore Symphony Orchestra / Lan Shui. I must confess that what I know about classical music can fit on the head of a pin, but I felt it to be an important test, nonetheless. To play it, I used Foobar 2000 and the ASIO output plugin (using the Cambridge Audio ASIO driver). The DacMagix XS can handle 24-bit, 192kHz audio, and this file is 24-bit 88.2 kHz.

Good lord; I felt as if I was at the symphony, listening to an orchestra live. I relaxed and leaned back in my chair, letting the sounds take over. With my eyes closed, I literally got goosebumps as I experienced the music -- it is both warm and alive. Hell, I should probably listen to more classical music!

Since these are also wireless speakers, I decided to test that aspect with the iPad Air, Hackintosh and LG G3. Pairing was easy and the dedicated controls worked well. Sound quality is very good, although noticeably less than the hardwired connection. That is not to fault the Grace Digital speakers, but a limitation of Bluetooth; however, this is by far the best sound I have heard from Bluetooth connected speakers. The aptX connection definitely makes a difference when available (the iPad Air does not support aptX, but still sounds great).

Conclusion

At $249, these Grace Digital speakers are designed for music enthusiasts that want exceptional quality at home, with the convenience of Bluetooth. Make no mistake, these do not have a battery and are quite heavy; you will not be taking them to the beach. If you want portability, look elsewhere.

If you are looking for speakers for a computer room, office or even a family room, these should be high on your list of considerations. I have heard many computer speakers in my time, and these rank among the top; they truly make me smile every time I listen to music through them. While the price is high for occasional YouTube watching, it is a bargain for music lovers. Highly recommended.
OnePlus will launch One successor around mid-2015, ponders smaller devices

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 1:04pm CEST par Mihaita Bamburic

By now I am sure that everyone with an interest in smartphones has heard about One Plus and its One phablet. It is undoubtedly among the most interesting Android devices launched this year, and one of the most hyped also. How did OnePlus, basically a new player in the mobile space, achieve that? Well, One managed to make a splash in no small part thanks to its $299 entry-level price, which allows it to undercut virtually every known rival, paired with some of the best and most powerful hardware around. That's a recipe for success in the Android realm, and OnePlus knows it all too well.

But, what tops its lovely hardware and the low asking price is that One has never actually been available to the general public, per se. Sure, people have been able to buy One, but they have been able to do so only through invites. As a way to sell smartphones -- commodities, really -- that is crazy. But, what is even crazier is that, even as One is still not generally available, OnePlus reveals a launch date for its successor.

In a Reddit Q&A, answering a question regarding the successor of One, OnePlus says that 2, as it is apparently referred to as now, will be available in Q2 or Q3 of 2015. One of the hosts of the Q&A adds that Android L should be running the show on the device (assuming Google doesn't launch anything newer in the meantime).

OnePlus is also pondering launching smartphones that are smaller than One, which is a pretty huge device (152.9 x 75.9 x 8.9 mm, but just 162 grams) thanks to that large display, that would cater to a wider audience, one that is not yet ready to embrace phablets. That does not mean that OnePlus 2 will be a smaller affair, as it will likely be the company's next flagship, and these things do not get smaller -- they either grow in size or stay the roughly the same, generally speaking.

There are no other details at this point, but it is fair to say that OnePlus will be doing its best at offering potential customers the top hardware at the time 2 is available. Next year, we should see Qualcomm's mighty Snapdragon 810, which is 64-bit ready, popping up, and Quad HD displays becoming the norm for new flagships.

Of course, by the time 2 is available, I am sure we all hope that OnePlus figures out a way to make it generally available from the get-go, without making prospective buyers go through the ordeal of having to beg, enter contests or do some crazy things to get invites.
You can now mute audio in Chrome with a single click

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 12:39pm CEST par Martin Brinkmann
Have you encountered situations before where audio suddenly starts to play in your web browser of choice without you clicking on a play button? This can be extremely frustrating, especially if you have opened multiple sites in rapid succession.

It happens because websites start to autoplay audio, either in the form of an embedded video or audio file, when a site gets loaded in the browser -- even if it is not the active tab.

The main issue that most web users have with this practice is that it is necessary to become active to stop the audio from playing on the system.

This can be done in several ways, for instance by finding the control on the web page that is playing the audio and muting it there, or by muting the volume of the entire browser.

Google Chrome displays audio indicators in open tabs in the browser which helps, but still requires users to click on the tab (or close it) and find the audio source to disable it.

Google has added an experimental flag to Chrome Dev and Canary (and Chromium) recently which improves the process further. All that it takes now is to click on the audio indicator to mute the sound.

Enable the feature

Please note that the feature is not available for Beta or Stable Chrome installations currently. It is however likely that the feature will land in those channels as well. Experimental flags are like beta features that Google needs to evaluate before the decision is made to integrate the feature into the browser directly.

To enable the new feature do the following:
1. Type chrome://flags/#enable-tab-audio-muting in the browser's address bar. This should open the experimental flags page of the browser and jump straight to the right flag.
2. Switch the flag to "enabled" with a click on the link.
3. Restart Chrome afterwards.
To disable it later, repeat the process outlined above but change its state to "disabled".

The feature works only when Chrome displays an audio indicator in the tab. This is the case when YouTube videos play in the browser but not necessarily the case for other media elements on other sites. It does not work for Vimeo videos right now for instance.

The flag adds a new entry to Chrome's tab context menu as well when multiple tabs are selected. You can use it to mute audio in all of those tabs at once.

Closing Words

Video or audio contents that play on websites are a nuisance for many web users. While some might say that Google's effort is not sufficient yet (as it does not currently provide a mute option for all audio contents), it is without doubt a step in the right direction as it improves the process for users of the browser.

Have you encountered auto-playing media contents on websites before? If so, how did you react to that?
Weak passwords are still a major problem for business security

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 12:26pm CEST par Ian Barker

According to data released by security company Trustwave which has analyzed evidence from almost 700 security breaches that took place in 2013, retail is the most compromised industry, accounting for 35 percent of attacks investigated.

The food and drink industry ranks second on 18 percent followed by hospitality on 11 percent. Perhaps not surprisingly e-commerce is most at risk, making up 54 percent of assets targeted whilst data centers account for only 10 percent. Point of sale breaches made up 33 percent of Trustwave’s investigations.

A little worrying is that the median time from an initial intrusion to its being detected was 87 days. Also over 70 percent of compromise victims didn’t detect the breach themselves.

The report looks at the top 10 vulnerabilities found in network penetration testing too. This reveals that weak passwords are still a major problem when it comes to security. During its penetration tests Trustwave collected 626,718 stored passwords and managed to recover more than half of them in minutes. 92 percent of the sample were able to be cracked in 31 days.

Weak or default passwords contributed to a third of the investigated breaches. The three most common passwords in order are "Password1", "Hello123", and "password". Password length is mostly around eight characters -- probably because many systems use that as a minimum.

The report suggests that administrators need to, "Educate users on the value of choosing longer pass-phrases instead of simple, predicable, easy-to-crack passwords". It also recommends deploying two-factor authentication.

More details of Trustwave's 2014 Global Security Report are available in interactive form on the company's website.

Image Credit: Africa Studio / Shutterstock
Why is Dell crippling its low end server RAID cards?

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 11:39am CEST par Derrick Wlodarz

When scoping out new servers for customers, we usually look towards Dell, as their boxes have the right mix of price, performance, expandability, and quality that we strive for. RAID card options these days are fairly plentiful, with our sweet spot usually ending up on the PERC H700 series cards that Dell preinstalls with its midrange to higher end PowerEdge server offerings.

But recently we were forced into using one of its lower end RAID cards, the H200 PCIe offering. This internal card was one of the few dedicated RAID options certified to work in a refurbished server we had to put back into production, a Dell R210 1u rack unit. The specs looked fine and dandy in nearly all respects, except for one area that I like to avoid: the lack of dedicated battery backed flash cache.

This is clearly denoted on Dell's full PERC rundown site. You can dive into the benefits of BBF on this excellent Dell whitepaper. For the uninitiated, battery backed flash caches on RAID cards allows for near bulletproof data safety in the face of power failure, while increasing performance of RAID arrays considerably.

I didn't think going with an H200 for an R210 refurbishment would be the end of world. Even lacking a dedicated cache unit on the card, I knew full well that disk drives in a RAID have their own onboard cache that works pretty well on its own. Heck, most drives made in the last ten years have some form of dedicated cache space to provide workstations some performance benefits of writing to cache before writing to the disk.

The advent of SSDs has rendered the need for caching mechanisms almost extinct, but the reality of the situation in the server world is still that spinning disks make up a majority of the current and ongoing new server installations. Until SSD prices come down to the cost/GB levels of what SATA or SAS can provide, spinning hard drives will be the cream of the crop for the foreseeable future.

And this described the exact situation we were in for this customer Dell R210 rebuild. We paired a dual set of (rather awesome) Seagate 600GB SAS 15K drives together in a RAID 1 for this H200 controller so that we could pass a single volume up to Windows Server 2012 R2. Our storage needs for this client were rather low, so employing Windows Storage Spaces was a moot point for this rollout. It also doesn't help that the R210 only has a pair of 3.5-inch internal drive bays; not the 4-8 hot swap bays we usually have at our disposal on T4xx series Dell servers.

The problem? After we loaded on a fresh copy of Windows Server 2012 R2, things just seemed strange. Slow, as a matter of fact. Too slow for comfort. All of the internal hardware on this server tested out just fine. The hard drives were brand new, along with the RAID card. Even the SAS cable we used was a brand new Startech mini SAS unit, freshly unwrapped from the factory, and otherwise testing out fine.

It seems that we weren't alone in our sluggishness using default settings on the PERC H200 card. The Dell forums had numerous posts like this describing issues with speed, and the fine folks at Spiceworks were seeing the same problems. After some Googling, I even found sites like this one by Blackhat Research that detailed extensive testing done on these lower end RAID cards proving our suspicions true.

Most people are recommending that these low end H200/H300 cards be replaced ad hoc with H700 and above level cards, but this wasn't an option for us. The Dell R210 is rather limited on what RAID options it will work with. And seeing how many other parts we doled out money for on this particular server, going back would have proved to be a mess and a half.

What Is Dell Doing to Cripple the Performance on These Cards?

I didn't want to take suspicion at face value without some investigation of our own. While collective hearsay is rather convincing, I wanted to see for myself what was going on here.

The culprit at the heart of these performance issues seems to be Dell's boneheaded policy of disabling the native disk cache on SAS drives, even though they seem to leave it enabled for SATA disks as a matter of default configuration for H300 level controllers.

Blackhat Research pinned a nice screenshot of this language in a Dell user manual:

Since we are using the H200 card on our R210, it wouldn't matter if we had SATA drives in our RAID array. They were going to disable the cache regardless.

Dell is going out on a limb here to make the lives of server admins rather hellish in situations where low end RAID cards are in use. Selling such lower end RAID cards without BBF is not my issue -- cutting costs on lower spec'ed hardware is the name of the game.

But to assume that those installing these servers aren't educated enough to be using battery backup units in any way? That's a bit presumptuous on its part, and honestly, anyone installing servers into a production environment without proper battery backup power to the core system likely shouldn't be in the driver's seat.

I know very well it can happen, and likely does happen (I've seen it first hand at client sites, so I digress), but then again, you can assume lots of things that may or may not be done. A car may be purchased with AWD, and a car manufacturer may disable the functionality if the vehicle is sold in Arizona, assuming that the driver will never encounter snow. Is that potential reality something that should be used to decide configuration for all users of the product? Of course not.

So Dell disabling the cache on hard drives for users of its low end RAID cards is a bit of an overstepping of boundaries in my opinion. One that has likely caused, judging by what I am reading, legions of PERC purchasers to completely dump their product for something else due to an incoherent decision by Dell's server team.

I decided to do a little testing of my own in an effort to resurrect this server rebuild and not have to move to a plan B. All firmware was updated on all ends -- server BIOS, RAID card fw, as well as the firmware on the hard drives. We made sure the latest PERC driver for this card was pulled down onto the server (which happened to come from Windows Update).

Prior to enabling the local cache of the underlying disks, here are the results of a single run of CrystalDiskMark 3.0.3:

Not terrible numbers, but I knew something was up, and seeing how everyone on forums was up in arms over this H200 controller, turning that cache policy back on was likely a requirement at this point for workable performance.

I ended up using LSI's MegaRaid Manager utility to get the cache enabled on the card, and here are the numbers we saw after a full server reboot:

The biggest change from prior to the cache being enabled? Look at the sequential write figure with caching at 86.11MB/s compared to the pre-caching figure of 52.42 MB/s. That's more than a 64 percent change for the better -- pretty darn big if you ask me.

The pair of 4K write tests experienced decent boosts, as did the sequential read number ever so slightly, which I'm not sure can be directly attributed to the cache enablement (but I may be wrong). The 512K write test went up slightly, too. All in all, flipping a single switch improved my numbers across the board.

Is Dell crippling these cards by turning off the native HDD cache? Most definitely, and the numbers above prove it.

How Can You Easily Rectify This Problem?

While I used the LSI MegaRaid Manager utility (from the maker of the actual card that Dell rebrands), you can use the more kosher Dell OpenManage Server Administrator utility that is tailor made for overseeing Dell servers. It's available for free download on any supported Dell PowerEdge unit (nearly every one in existence), and it only takes a few minutes to install.

After going into the utility, just navigate down into the virtual disk(s) in question, and you will find the Disk Cache Policy as set to "disabled" most likely (if it's an H200, most definitely). Just flip the selection to Enabled and hit save, and reboot your box just to ensure the change takes place.

Once your server comes back up, you will have the performance improvements that local cache can provide. While not as powerful in whole as a dedicated BBF like on the H700/H800 RAID cards from Dell, this is as good as it's going to get.

Run your own tests to see what kind of results you are seeing. CrystalDiskMark is a great utility that can measure disk drive performance on any Windows system, including servers, and is a good baseline utility that can tell you what kind of numbers you are getting from your drives.

Should Dell continue to cripple future generations of low end RAID cards by doing this to customers? I hope not. The safety of your server data is up to you as the customer in the end, and if you choose not to use a proper battery backup power source like an APC or Tripp Lite unit, then so be it.

But having to dig through forums to see why my H200 card is behaving abnormally slow, none of which is from my own doing in misconfiguration of any sort, is downright troubling.

Here's hoping someone from Dell is reading the legions of forum posts outlining this dire situation and changes their stance on newer RAID cards for future servers. Trimming features off your RAID cards is acceptable practice, but not when you begin forcing otherwise default functionality off on disk drives that offer caching.

Long story short? Stick to getting more capable Dell RAID cards, like the PERC H700 series units, when possible. You can avoid this necessary roundabout then altogether, and you've got yourself a higher quality, more capable RAID card, anyway.

Photo Credit: nito/Shutterstock

Derrick Wlodarz is an IT Specialist who owns Park Ridge, IL (USA) based technology consulting & service company FireLogic, with over eight+ years of IT experience in the private and public sectors. He holds numerous technical credentials from Microsoft, Google, and CompTIA and specializes in consulting customers on growing hot technologies such as Office 365, Google Apps, cloud-hosted VoIP, among others. Derrick is an active member of CompTIA's Subject Matter Expert Technical Advisory Council that shapes the future of CompTIA exams across the world. You can reach him at derrick at wlodarz dot net.
Microsoft rolls out the new MSN, rebrands Bing apps for Windows, Windows Phone

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 11:36am CEST par Mihaita Bamburic

Microsoft did something rather unexpected earlier this month. The software giant unveiled a revamped MSN, saving the online portal from oblivion -- its biggest merit lately is being the default website for Internet Explorer. The new MSN looks great, connects users to Microsoft's consumer-facing cloud services, and can be tailored to suit their preference. It also makes it easy to trigger a search across the InterWebs. Heck, I have even said it might work as the Bing landing page.

Fast forward to today and Microsoft announces that more than 10 million users have tested the new MSN, with more than 80,000 of them also submitting feedback. Those numbers look really good. And they should, considering the online portal's Microsoft-focused audience. The feedback it has received must have been good also, as Microsoft announces it is rolling out the new MSN in the next three days.

Microsoft says that "more than 425 million people in over 50 countries around the world [...] come to the site each month", which makes this a very important change, that can either attract a bigger crowd or, in the worst-case scenario, alienate the existing user base. The way I see it, the former sounds much more likely. (As you can probably tell, I like what Microsoft has done with the new MSN.)

Microsoft is confident that you will love the new MSN so much so that it has even decided to rebrand the Bing app suite to MSN, on Windows and Windows Phone. The writing has been on the wall for the Bing brand on those operating systems, as the software giant has long removed it from app names. The MSN name hasn't surfaced next to the app's title, however, but it can now be easily seen once they're open. Corresponding MSN apps will launch on Android and iOS next, in "the coming months".

"While Bing will continue to provide search and intelligent experiences, now the apps will be branded to reflect their alignment with MSN as a premium experience for content, combined with personal productivity features", adds Microsoft. "Aside from Bing Finance, which will now be MSN Money, all of the apps retain their existing names".

At this point, I should mention that Health & Fitness and Weather for Windows Phone have received something extra in the latest round of updates, which mainly replaces the Bing brand with MSN. Lockscreen support for the latter has been extended to include additional weather information, while the former gains a step counter and GPS tracking information on the lockscreen on certain Windows Phones, like Lumia 630 and Lumia 1520. It's rather nice of Microsoft to do that; it certainly increases the value of those offerings and improves the mobile experience for users. Here's what those changes look like.

Microsoft reveals that it built the new MSN on its Azure cloud platform. It makes use of more than 30,000 cores and 100 TB for data storage -- that sounds rather impressive, doesn't it? Microsoft says it needed those sort of resources to deliver a "consistent experience" to its customers, no matter if they are using Money, Sports, Food & Drink or any other major feature of the new MSN. As it is customary in what Microsoft calls a "cloud-first, mobile-first world", Microsoft accounts tie users' preferences across the new MSN and today's major platforms, including Android, iOS, Windows, Windows Phone and the web.

For the new MSN, Microsoft has partnered with the likes of The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, CNN and AOL, in US, while, in other markets, it has teamed up with publications like The Yomiuri Shimbun, The Asahi Shimbun, Sky News, The Guardian, NDTV, Le Figaro and Le Monde.
HTC One (M8) bends just as much as the iPhone 6 -- and the 6 Plus is stronger than both

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 10:29am CEST par Wayne Williams

When reports first surfaced that the new iPhone 6 and 6 Plus were susceptible to bending after a just a few days of everyday use, it looked as if Apple had a major problem on its hands. Tech blogs and Apple haters were quick to seize on the flaw, coining the term BendGate.

Apple downplayed the problem, saying it had only received nine complaints relating to bent phones -- out of ten million sales -- and now independent testing by Consumer Reports shows not only does it take a lot of force to bend an iPhone 6, but the HTC One (M8) also deforms when the exact same amount of pressure is applied.

Consumer Reports used an Instron compression test machine to apply pressure to six smartphones -- the iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus, HTC One (M8), iPhone 5, LG G3, and Samsung Galaxy Note 3.

The tests applied 10lbs of force for 30 seconds, then upped the pressure in 10lb increments, noting when the phones began to bend.

Both the iPhone 6 and HTC One (M8) bent when 70lbs of pressure was applied. The iPhone 6 Plus held out until 90lbs, the older iPhone 5 and LG g3 withstood up to 130lbs, and the strongest of the bunch was the Samsung Galaxy Note 3 which took 150lbs of pressure before it started to yield.

After testing had completed, both the iPhone 6 and HTC One (M8) continued to work, despite being badly bent out of shape, so additional pressure was applied to discover at what point it really was game over. The HTC smartphone gave up first, at 90lbs, followed by the iPhone 6 at 100lbs.

Consumer Reports also tested some pencils for comparison, and found it took 80lbs to break four.
iPhone 6 and 6 Plus available in China next month

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 10:10am CEST par Mihaita Bamburic

In case you did not know, China is the largest smartphone market worldwide, bigger even than the good old US of A. For the major players in the mobile industry, it is hugely important to be leading there, as being successful in China leads to a healthy market share growth overall, but, more importantly, a healthy increase in the bottom line also.

You can imagine then just how important it is for Apple to have its new iPhones on sale in China as soon as possible. Due to regulatory approvals, it has not happened yet, but luckily for the company, that will soon change.

Only moments ago, Apple officially announced that its iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus will be available to pre-order in China, from its online store, on Friday, October 10. The two will go on sale a week later, on October 17. Apple adds that eager prospective customers can reserve an iPhone 6 and/on iPhone 6 Plus for in-store pick-up on October 14, and get it on launch day.

"We are thrilled to bring iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus to our customers in China on all three carriers at launch", says Apple CEO Tim Cook. "With support for TD-LTE and FDD-LTE, iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus customers will have access to high-speed mobile networks from China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom for an incredible experience".

What Tim Cook does not say is that Apple had to apparently increase the security of iOS 8 in order for its new iPhones to receive the nod of approval from the Chinese regulator, which had shown some concern regarding a number of background services. The US company also promised not to work with any government to bake backdoors into its mobile operating system. You can read all the official details, posted by the Chinese regulator, by hitting the link above.

The two new iPhones, which are coming with their 4G capabilities in tow to China, will also be available on October 17 through the aforementioned mobile operators' slew of retail stores as well as local resellers that Apple has authorized, which considerably expands the pool of potential buyers, as Apple Stores are not as prevalent in China as they are in the US.

I cannot stress enough just how big of a market China is for Apple. A year ago, its then-new iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c were available there on launch day, allowing the two to generate then-record sales of 9 million units in the opening weekend. Fast forward a year later, but without being officially sold in China, the new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus barely manage to break that record, only by a mere 1 million units.

With all the much-awaited features they bring, their opening weekend lead they have over their predecessors should have been much more substantial. That may not have happened, but, by the looks of it, the new iPhones stand to more comfortably break other records after October 17.

Apple says iPhone 6 will start at CNY5,288 (about $860), while the bigger iPhone 6 Plus will be available from CNY6,088 (about $990). The entry-level prices are for the 16 GB models; add CNY800 or CNY1600 to see just how much the 64 GB or 128 GB models, respectively, will cost.
Say hello to Amelia -- the 'cognitive knowledge worker' set to transform business

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 10:00am CEST par Alysia Judge

As 2014 races into the home straight, a new artificially intelligent computer system has been unveiled with the promise of transforming the global workforce. She's called Amelia.

Named after the American aviator and pioneer Amelia Earhart, the intelligent system is designed around the idea that it can shoulder tedious and labor-intensive tasks, freeing up its human co-workers to focus on more creative opportunities.

Amelia has been created by IPsoft, a New York based company whose ethos revolved around automating IT processes for enterprise across a wide range of industries.

"Amelia, our cognitive knowledge worker, interfaces on human terms," reads IPsoft's blog introducing the new technology. "She is a virtual agent who understands what people ask -- even what they feel -- when they call for service.

Like a human, she learns through written instructions. However, the difference is that Amelia will absorb the information she reads (across 20 languages) in a matter of seconds. She can also use context, applied logic and inferred implications to understand the full meaning of what she reads rather than just individual words.

When exposed to new information, she will apply what she already knows to solve problems across a broad range of business processes. IPsoft also claims that she can observe the work of her human colleagues and use what she sees to keep building her knowledge.

It's an interesting step forward for the AI industry. Intelligence is, by definition, the ability to not just acquire but to apply knowledge. A truly intelligent system shouldn't just be able to read a document, but it should be able to understand and answer questions on it too.

IPsoft recognizes this, and has been working on Amelia's technology for 15 years with the core premise that she will not merely mimic human thought processes -- she should be able to comprehend their underlying meaning too.

According to the Telegraph, so far Amelia has been trialed "within a number of Fortune 1000 companies." Here she has successfully helped staff helplines, taken control of procurement processing, financial trading operations support, and provided "expert advice" for field engineers.

By the end of a two month trial period, she was able to answer 64 per cent of queries independently with the figure set to rise month-on-month as she learns more.

Amelia is the latest in a string of AI breakthroughs. In February 2011, IBM Watson used a powerful concoction of intelligent skills including natural language processing, knowledge representation, reasoning and machine learning to beat two Jeopardy champions at their own game.

A year later in 2012, Google combined the power of 16,000 processors to achieve the ultimate goal of human intelligence: correctly identifying cats in YouTube videos.

More practically, Microsoft's Kinect system and voice assistants like Cortana and Apple's Siri are all built around artificial intelligence research. IPsoft's claim that the next few decades will see the advent of tangible androids wandering office corridors is a debate for another article, but clearly the notion of intelligent software systems is already being realized.

Published under license from ITProPortal.com, a Net Communities Ltd Publication. All rights reserved.
Chromebooks are in trouble -- HP unveils $199 Windows laptop and low-cost tablets

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 2:35am CEST par Brian Fagioli
When I bought my first Chromebook, the 2012 Samsung model, I did it mostly for one reason -- price. I drove down to my local Best Buy and was blown away by how inexpensive it was; at $249 it looked like a MacBook Air and promised good battery life. Even though I knew the limitations of Chrome OS beforehand, I still handed over my money thinking I could find a place for it in my home. For the most part it was OK; I mean, it changed the way I thought about computing, but it soon became apparent that it could not replace my Windows machine. I didn't return it; I kept for basic typing on the go, but I later sold it as it collected dust. You see, my iPad Air when coupled with a keyboard-case was a better portable machine.

Now, in 2014, Chromebooks are making huge strides in homes, schools and the enterprise, but Windows still reigns supreme. While I do recommend Chromebooks for people low on cash that only have basic computing needs, today this changes. You see, HP announces the $199.99 Stream 11 laptop, and with a price that low, why would you bother with Chrome OS?

"Customers can enjoy entertainment in high-definition (HD) with an 11.6 inch HD display or 13.3 inch HD optional touch display. While the innovative fanless design with high efficiency Intel Celeron processor and 32GB of eMMC flash memory allows for quiet, cool operation and quick file recall. Stunning colors and stylish gradient design available in Orchid Magenta and Horizon Blue are sure to turn heads", says Hewlett Packard.

While HP is tight-lipped on specs, according to Engadget (who got to play with them in person), they will be powered by a Celeron N2840 CPU and 2GB of RAM . Battery life is promised to be up to 8 hours and 15 minutes, which is more than enough for a day of college classes or some quiet time at the library. Speaking of quiet, it is fanless, so there will be no noise from a whirring fan. Best of all though, both models have HDMI output, so they can serve as a media machine when connected to a TV, or desktop when connected to a monitor, keyboard and mouse. Hell, the 13.3 inch model can even be quipped with a 4G modem that comes with 200MB of data per month for life.

Arguably, the only downside is the limited colors. They look to me to be pink and purple, but HP calls them "Orchid Magenta and Horizon Blue". Wasn't there a children's TV show called Blue's Clues with a dog named Blue and a dog named Magenta? Maybe that show was the inspiration, but I digress; while colors should be gender neutral, these colors seem to me as a bit feminine, at least as society has traditionally dictated. I would have no problem owning and using a pink laptop, but I can foresee it being an issue for some shoppers. An option for black or silver would probably be appreciated.

HP has also announced new tablets, powered by an Intel Atom Z3735G. Sadly, the slates will only have 1GB of RAM, and I am worried that it will not be enough. Hewlett Packard says, "the HP Stream 7 and HP Stream 8 Windows tablets keep customers connected to work, friends and content all at an exceptional value. The cloud-connected, Intel-powered 7 inch and 8 inch tablets include one year of Office 365 Personal and 60 minutes of Skype each month, 1TB of Microsoft OneDrive storage for one year, and a full Windows 8.1 experience. The HP Stream 8 tablet includes an optional 200MB of free 4G data each month with no annual contract for the life of the device".

HP lists the following prices:
- The HP Stream 11.6 inch diagonal starts at $199.99.
- The HP Stream 13.3 inch diagonal starts at $229.99.
- The HP Stream 7 Tablet starts at $99.99.
- The HP Stream 8 Tablet starts at $149.99.
Sure, this $199 HP Windows laptop is hardly top of the line, but it is more than enough for the average home user. Believe it or not, the laptops even comes with a $25 credit to the Windows Store, for buying apps or games. Technically, with that said, you could look at the price as only being $174.99 -- a steal.

While I hate putting down the Chromebook, it is just impossible to justify a purchase of a low-end Google-powered machine when you can buy a true PC for under $200. Don't forget, running the Chrome browser in Metro Mode on Windows is pretty much the Chrome OS experience anyway. Low-end Android tablets are safe for now, but trouble could be on the horizon there too; if Microsoft closes the app-gap (a big "if"), a $99 Windows tablet could be very attractive.

Will sub-$200 Windows laptops kill the Chromebook? Tell me in the comments.

Image Credit: Barnes and Noble
There is no escape -- with Atlas, Facebook ads follow you between devices

Publié: septembre 30, 2014, 2:20am CEST par Mark Wilson

How much do you hate ads? How much do ads piss you off? Well prepare to turn into an even bigger ball of hate-filled pissed-off-ness when you hear about Facebook's latest ventures in advertising. Few people would argue against the suggestion that Facebook has all but given up any pretence of being a social network and has become little more than a huge cog in a massive advertising machine. Claims have been made that ads are being made more relevant to users, but the truth of the matter is that users are being made more relevant to advertisers. And Facebook now has a whole new way to follow you around the web to make sure you are delivered even more better-targeted ads.

Facebook has been criticized for forcing users to reveal their real names -- information which is as valuable to advertisers as it is anything to do with security -- and there have long been concerns about privacy settings on the site. Users of Facebook may complain that their newsfeeds are cluttered with news and posts at the wrong time, but one of the biggest issues people have with the site is with ad delivery. Last week we learned that Facebook was on the verge of revealing something "more powerful than what Google can currently do" in terms of user tracking. Facebook has now launched Atlas, an ad platform that can track users as they move from desktop to mobile devices -- and it's sure to raise plenty of privacy hackles.

Atlas has been built "from the ground up" to give advertisers a powerful set of tools to push their message to more people. The platform is a response to the fact that "cookies don't work on mobile, are becoming less accurate in demographic targeting" and makes it possible to track users as they move between devices. More than this, "ad tags" and "action tags" make it easier than ever for an advertiser to follow an individual user around the web. If an advertiser wants to "capture the events and understand the paths that lead to desired outcomes", it can do so with ease. There is even the promise of "connecting offline sales to your digital marketing".

Facebook has a number of partners on board -- including Instagram -- meaning that users can be tracked moving not only between devices, but also between services. The extra information that will be afforded to advertisers will enable them to build up even more precise user profiles than in the past, and deliver even more specifically targets ads. On the one hand, it could be argued that this will result in even more relevant ads being displayed, but the privacy implications are rather more worrying. Read through some of the blurb on the Atlas web site, and it's hard not to shrink back with revulsion: "Atlas enhances existing workflows by programmatically sharing media plans, placements and tracking information with partners".

The specificity of ad campaigns that Atlas makes possible completely strips away any last remnants of anonymity -- be it real, or just the sense of anonymity in the crowd -- that may have remained. Facebook just upped the ante when it comes to privacy invasion. You are, now more than ever, the product. Perhaps Ello -- even with its ugliness and threat of paid-for features -- isn't such a bad option after all...

Photo credit: Krasimira Nevenova / Shutterstock