Tuesday, 18 June 2013

Sony Xperia S NFC fix in July (update)

Some owners of the Sony Xperia S have problems with the NFC technology on their mobile phone and now the manufacturer has announced that they are going to spend for the unit in July an update.
This would update the NFC bug to solve and the rollout is scheduled for the first week of July.As yet, there is not yet known what the update for improvements / additions will further bring.
Source  Xperia Blog

you format a netbook without a cd/dvd drive

There are many ways to install windows without CD/DVD, however the best way is by creating a windows [7, vista or xp] bootable USB drive


Creating a Windows 7 [ Vista or XP] bootable USB drive in a few easy steps.

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Requirements:
Windows 7 ,or Vista or XP ISO
4GB+ USB Pen drive (for windows 7 or vista) or 2 GB (for windows XP)
UNetbootin tool, Download here http://unetbootin.sourceforge.net/unetbootin-windows-la... and save it. (is free software) 

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(backup any data on the USB, as it will be formatted)

Step 1: Insert USB pen drive into the USB port 

Step 2: From the Start menu, go to My computer, right click on the USB drive, then select Format. In format windows, under File System choose NTFS. then click Start. Once complete close the window.



Step 3: Open the UNetbootin tool (from the location you saved it in), when the the program opens up, 'Diskimage' [in the middle] should be selected . Now click on 3 dots [...] to browse
for your Windows 7, Vista, or XP ISO image file.


Step 4: At the bottom of the Unetbootin windows , the setting should be

Type: USB Drive 
Drive: for this, you choose your correct usb drive letter 

Step 5: Start the process by clicking OK

Wait as the ISO is extracted to your USB drive; once is done, you will have a bootable Windows 7/Vista/XP USB drive . 

Your USB drive is ready to boot and install Windows. Simple hay? 
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Remember you need to change the boot priorty in the Bios, change it to USB (from the HDD or CD ROM/DVD drive)

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Facebook to add video to Instagram

Facebook is preparing to launch a new video capture feature to Instagram.

The company will unveil the new service at an event on June 20th according to reports.

According to TechCrunch, the new feature will go head to head with Twitter's Vine app.

Videos will be between five and ten seconds long.

"On June 20, a source says Facebook will unveil that Instagram, its popular photo-sharing app, will begin to let people also take and share short videos," wrote TechCrunch's Ingrid Lunden. "Call it the Vine effect.

"We are still looking for more information because we understand that Facebook has not wanted the details of June 20 to leak out — so this could be an intentional blind alley.

"But if the Instagram video report is true, you could say the event invite itself — sent by snail mail, coffee cup stain charmingly in one corner — is a red herring of its own."

Vine launched in late January. It allows users to upload a short six second video.

How to use an external drive without any special software




Many, even most, Seagate and Maxtor-brand external drives are sold with bundled backup and management software.
However, in some cases it is not possible to use such software.  A few examples are:
  1. A user has lost or uninstalled their software and needs a temporary (or permanent) means of using the external drive to backup data.
  2. A user's bundled backup software is malfunctioning for a time.
  3. A user prefers to backup data manually.
  4. The drive did not include any bundled backup software.
  5. The user is using the drive for additional storage and has an alternate method of backing up.
  6. Older external drive’s bundled software may not be supported in Windows 7 or Vista.  Check software compatibility:
    Windows 8 - Document ID: 004731
    Windows 7 - Document ID: 211931
    Windows Vista - Document ID: 202393
     
Every model of Seagate, Maxtor-brand, and Samsung external drive has a ready-to-use formatting already in place.  In Windows, there is no need to do anything special or additional to make the drive work.  Simply plug in the power, plug in the USB/Firewire/eSATA cable, and the drive should appear in (My) Computer and Windows Explorer almost immediately.
Once it is detected, all you have to do is move data into it.  There are 2 general ways to do this:
  1. Drag and drop
  2. Copy and paste
(Windows 8 has an additional option called file history. See this Microsoft article for details.)
Drag and drop
Here we will discuss dragging a piece of data from the (My) Documents folder to the external drive.  This exercise can be repeated with one file, many files, one folder, or many folders.
  1. Open first one window by double-clicking on (My) Computer.
  2. If the upper right-hand corner of the window that opens includes this symbol (Image), click it.
    It will change to this symbol: Image.
  3. Now you can resize it.  Move your mouse to a corner of the window.
  4. Click and hold down the mouse button, on the corner of the window.
  5. Move the mouse, still holding down the button, and the window corner will move with your mouse.  Resize it so that it only takes up a portion of your screen.
  6. Look for the Seagate, Maxtor-brand, or Samsung external drive in (My) Computer.  It will be a drive letter, like E: or F: (unless you have changed it).Open (My) Documents by double-clicking on it.
  7. Resize the window in the same way, so that each window takes up only a portion of the screen.
  8. Now you will have two windows.  One is the source, one is the destination.
    (Click to expand the image.)
    Image
  9. Click and hold down the mouse button, on the document you want to move.  It will illuminate and a "ghost" image will move with your mouse button.
  10. Drag the mouse so that the "ghost" image hovers over the icon representing the external drive (in this example, the V: drive).
    (Click to expand the image.)
    Image
  11. Let go of the mouse button and the file will copy automatically to the external drive.
  12. Double-click on the external drive’s letter.
     Double-clicking sometimes causes Autoplay on our newer drives.
    Right-click on the external drive letter and choose Explore.
  13. The contents of the external drive will display on the window.
    (Click to expand the image.)
    Image
     
  14. The task is complete!  This is known as a "drag-and-drop" action.

For Mac:
Simply follow the same instructions.  The key is to be able to see both
  1. the file or folder you want to move in one part of the screen, and
  2. the folder where you want to move it.
Just click and hold on the file or folder to move, keep holding down the mouse button and move the mouse over to where you want it to go.
If you encounter a message that the drive cannot be modified, you need to reformat the drive. See Document ID: 191171 or Document ID: 220091 on this issue.

Copy and Paste
  1. Double-click to open the place where the file you want to copy is located.  (My) Documents, for example.
  2. Find the file or folder you would like to copy and right-click on it.
  3. A drop-down menu will appear.  Choose Copy.
    (Click to expand the image.)
    Image
  4. The file or folder is now copied and held in the computer's short-term memory. 
  5. Double-click to open (My) Computer.
  6. Look for the Seagate, Maxtor-brand, or Samsung external drive in (My) Computer.  It will be a drive letter, like E: or F: (unless you have changed it).Double-click on the external drive. 
  7. The window will change to a display of the contents of the external drive.
  8. On the top bar of the window, choose Edit.
    Alternatively, you may right-click on blank space within the window and a drop-down menu will appear.
  9. Choose Paste.
    (Click to expand the image.)
    Image
  10. The file or folder will appear inside the window.  It is copied. 
  11. The task is complete!  This is known as a "copy-and-paste" action.

With either of these two methods, there is no need to use any special software to make use of the drive's storage.  You just move your data to it manually, and nothing more needs to be done.
Though any external drive can be used apart from its bundled software, certain Seagate, Maxtor-brand, and Samsung drives are not sold with bundled software.  Here is a list of them.

Famous jailbreaker rants on Twitter about 'kid paint' iOS 7, ready to go Android

Famous jailbreaker rants on Twitter about 'kid paint' iOS 7, ready to go Android
The renowned jailbreaker Pod2g took to Twitter yesterday to express his rage with what iOS 7 has done with his beloved apple mobile OS. He seems to be especially miffed with the design, which is pretty subjective, and the new features, which might not be new for something like Android, but that doesn't mean Appleshouldn't introduce them in the first place, quite the opposite. 

As for the bugs and lag he found, it's quite an early beta effort of what is the biggest redesign in iOS history, so there will be a lot of kinks to be worked out still, alongside battery optimizations. Here's his full rant on Twitter:

After a few days of iOS 7 beta 1 testing, I must admit that I am about to switch to an Androiddevice. IMHO, this version of iOS is the worst move Apple did in a long time.

iOS 7 design is awful, it’s slow, battery life time is the worst ever, it’s full of UI bugs and crashes. OK it’s beta 1, but still… I am pretty disappointed by the features I’ve seen in iOS 7. No revolution here. No big news. Just kid painting.

source: Pod2G (Twitter) via CultofAndroid

Intel smartwatch trial confirmed but is it Apple’s iWatch?

Intel is working on a smartwatch, the company’s chief technology officer has confirmed, though there’s no hint whether long-standing rumors of an Apple collaboration are true. The high-tech timepiece is one of a range of “experimental devices in the lab” CTO Justin Rattner explained this week, VentureBeat reports, describing it as part of the chip firm’s exploration of “novel display devices.”
“Actually, we’re looking at novel display devices” Rattner said during an appearance at the Bloomberg Next Big Thing conference. “The watch is kind of – if you want to put the time on it, that’s fine. But if you’re talking about texting today, wouldn’t it be nice if you could just look at your wrist?”
Unsurprisingly, Rattner was not forthcoming on any other details about the smartwatch; nor, indeed, on the other “novel display” approaches the company was trialling.
Intel obviously isn’t alone in weighing the smartwatch market. Pebble, for instance, proved wildly successful on Kickstarter, though Sony, GEAK, AGENT and others have all made attempts to grab space on users’ wrists. Meanwhile, Microsoft is also said to be working on a device of its own in its R&D labs.
What’s particularly interesting about Intel’s experimentation, however, is the potential Apple connection. Although the Cupertino firm wasn’t specifically mentioned by Rattner this week, rumors late last year pegged Intel and Apple as collaborating on a smartwatch device, at the time said to have a 1.5-inch PMOLED display and to hook up to an iPhone via low-power Bluetooth 4.0.
The so-called “iWatch” has been the subject of longstanding speculation, especially given the potential market estimates for wearable technology over the next few years. While several firms have attempted to oust traditional watches with smart alternatives, few have managed large-scale market success, something many claim will only happen when a big name like Apple weighs in.

AMD Seattle chips ditch x86 for ARM to undermine Intel’s server market

AMD has revealed its new “Seattle” chips, processors headed to power-dense servers, and using for the first time ARM architecture as commonly found in smartphones and tablets, rather than x86. AMD Seattle, which is expected to show up in systems from the second half of 2014, will initially offer eightARM Cortex-A57 cores running at at least 2GHz, with 16-core versions headed to market after that. According to AMD, there’ll be big advantages over traditional server chips.
amd_server_roadmap_seattle
For instance, Seattle is expected to deliver between 2x and 4x the performance of AMD’s Opteron X-Series chips, despite offering better computer-per-watt numbers. As what AMD is describing “the industry’s only 64-bit ARM-based server SoC from a proven server processor supplier”, it will also debut the company’s so-called Freedom Fabric interconnect technology, improving speeds between different SoCs.
Seattle will support 128GB DRAM, server-caliber encryption, and new “offload engines” that can reduce CPU loading and improve power efficiency. It will also fit into older setups thanks to legacy networking support, such as integrated 10GbE.
AMD confirmed its ARM intentions back in 2012, building on its acquisition of super-dense server provider SeaMicro. SeaMicro eschewed the traditional path of putting a few high-power processors into each server, and instead harnessed hundreds of more power-efficient, lower-potency chips which could either work simultaneously under conditions of high-load, or be selectively powered down to save energy.
However, that’s not to say that AMD is putting all its eggs in the ARM basket. The company is also working on x86-based server processors using its APU technology and Heterogeneous System Architecture (HSA), which allows the CPU and GPU to share access to the same pot of memory. That will show up in “Berlin” in the first half of next year, with four Steamroller cores delivering up to eight-times the performance of the existing AMD Opteron 6386SE processor.

BMW's driverless car

The concept of a driverless car is very exciting to some and totally boring to others. For long motorway slogs, we can think of nothing better, but cutting back through B-roads and heel-toeing around a race track, might not be quite as exciting.
BMW recently invited us to test out its fully functioning driverless car over a stretch of Autobahn near Munich. The car is capable of changing lanes, braking and accelerating all of its own accord. A frightening concept given the speed at which the German's like to tackle the Autobahn, but exciting none the less.
The platform is based around the 5-series BMW and is entirely integrated into the vehicle. Rather than the usual dials and gizmos you see sitting on the outside of other driverless cars - Google's, say - BMW has worked hard to build everything it needs into the vehicle's bodywork.
As such when you first see the car from the outside, it's very difficult to tell it apart from a normal BMW, except for a few extra slits in the bodywork here and there. Inside things are of course slightly different, with a large computer screen taking up the majority of the space in front of the front passenger seat and the boot full of very powerful computers.
While BMW wasn't hugely keen on explaining exactly how the technology worked, it essentially uses a system of self-generated, highly detailed road maps to place the vehicle in the right position on the road. Couple that with integrated radar systems and the vehicle knows what every other car around it is doing.
Say you want to tackle a stretch of motorway or road without touching the steering wheel, you need to first drive the vehicle along it and it will then build up and store it's own digital map of the area, for hands-free driving later.
The concept can also be applied to other areas: the Nurburgring, for example, where BMW has used highly accurate GPS and a driverless car to recreate a near-perfect lap of the iconic racetrack. Those interested in learning the Nurburgring can pay to sit in the driver's seat and witness a driverless car accelerate and brake through a lightning lap of the track, without even touching the wheel.
On the motorway, with cars on every side of you, it's a slightly more intimidating experience. Once you are driving and away, all you need to do is hit a button on the steering wheel and the car will do the rest. You don't need to touch a single control, with the vehicle managing everything from overtaking to stopping in traffic.
It's a strange feeling seeing a car drive itself, but even more so when you realise how dynamically the car can behave around other human drivers. We are unpredictable by our very nature, yet the car had an uncanny knack for predicting what other drivers would do.
At one point for example, someone pulled on to the motorway right at the last minute, yet the driverless BMW had already prepared for the moment, lost a bit of speed and applied the brakes. A human driver wouldn't have reacted anywhere near as quickly.
The sad thing about BMW's driverless tech, is that it's pretty much ready for a commercial rollout. The problem it faces isn't the technology itself, but the human error a driver who isn't driving can pose. 
BMW's main concern is that you may fall asleep while the car is driving you on the motorway and as such wouldn't be prepared to take over when you needed to. So rather than going for fully automated driving technology, BMW is aiming for what it calls highly automated driverless cars.
Highly automated means the vehicle takes car of 99 per cent of things in certain situations, while still demanding enough that you don't become entirely distracted. A lot of BMW's cars are already fairly highly automated, the 6-series for example has an active cruise control which can accelerate and brake and follow the car in front of you, with the driver only needing to keep the car in its lane.
The ideal situation is the car being able to take the load of the driver for brief periods of time - when he makes a phone call, for example. Being a luxury brand, it's all about adding driver comfort for BMW, but well within the realms of safety.
It's an exciting concept and one which is clearly, from our time in the BWM driverless car, nearly ready to go out on the roads. Once the legal and safety hurdles have been surmounted, it might not be long before we can let go of the wheel, sit back, relax and enjoy a spot of Kraftwerk on the Autobahn without touching the wheel.

Samsung to live stream Thursday’s “Premiere” event on YouTube

640_SAMSUNG_PREMIERE_2013_GALAXYATIV


Samsung has announced several new devices over the past few weeks, such as the Galaxy S4 Active, Galaxy S4 mini and the Galaxy S4 Zoom. These will all be on stage during their upcoming ‘Premiere 2013′ media event on Thursday, as will new ATIV products. If you’re unable to make it to London for the big show, then perhaps you’re interested in watching the experience unfold on YouTube. Samsung has announced that the Premier event will be streamed live starting at 4PM EST (9PM BST).
Source: YouTube
Via: SamMobile

Rockchip launches RK3188, RK3168 28nm SoCs

Rockchip Electronics announced their next generation 28nm SoCs for tablets based on GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ 28nm High-K Metal Gate (HKMG) manufacturing process.


Rockchip


Chinese chip maker Rockchip announced their next-generation mobile SoCs destined to end up inside budget tablets. Based on GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ 28nm High-K Metal Gate (HKMG) manufacturing process, the new Rockchip RK3188 and RK3168 SoCs promise power-optimized performance for next-generation of low-cost Android powered tablets.


Rockchip RK3188 Quad-Core SoC
Rockchip RK3188
The quad-core RK3188 SoC is powered by four ARM Cortex A9 CPUs clocked at 1.6 GHz. As far as CPU performance is concerned, the RK3188 has it covered. Even the graphics department is backed by an adequately powerful Mali400 MP4 (quad-core) GPU, the same one found inside the Galaxy S3, but clocked much higher at 600 MHz. Apart from that, the SoC is capable of playing 1080p video @ 60fps, while video capture is limited to 1080p @ 30 fps.


Rockchip RK3168 Dual-Core SoC
Rockchip RK3168


The RK3168 is an inferior, dual-core SoC destined for the cheapest tablets (read, Chinese tabs). While the CPU front is axed in half, four cores down to two, the GPU takes a much heavier toll. A quad-core Mali400 is replaced by a much weaker PowerVR SGX540 GPU, though such low-cost tablets with low-resolution displays won’t be needing the excess power in the first place.
Despite the nature of the SoC, it still supports 1080p video playback, as well as a maximum display support of up to 1080p (1920 x 1080).
Expect to see low-cost tablets from China powered by the new Rockchip SoCs in the coming months.