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Monday, January 31, 2011
LG?s Optimus 3D gets pictured; to have dual-core processor and 3D display?
Just ahead of Mobile World Congress (MWC), blog Phandroid has acquired and image of what appears to be the LG Optimus 3D. The new handset will purportedly be a 4+ inch, dual-core, Android handset with a glasses-free 3D display. The report states that the Optiums 3D will use multi-channel RAM and from the photograph we can see the presence of a front-facing camera. Not too shabby looking to be honest. LG has a press event scheduled for February 14th, where the company has said it will take the Optimus “into the new�dimension.” Your friends at BGR will be at MWC to bring you all the latest and greatest happenings from your favorite smartphone vendors. Who’s ready for mobile devices that
A Closer Look at the Sandy Bridge Die
Aside from a stack of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, I snagged something else of interest at my Intel meeting at CES 2011: a shot of some exposed Sandy Bridge processor die. As a recap SNB is available in three different physical die versions today: quad-core, dual-core with GT1 graphics and dual-core with GT2 graphics. The die sizes and transistor counts are below:
| CPU Specification Comparison | ||||||||
| CPU | Manufacturing Process | Cores | Transistor Count | Die Size | ||||
| AMD Thuban 6C | 45nm | 6 | 904M | 346mm2 | ||||
| AMD Deneb 4C | 45nm | 4 | 758M | 258mm2 | ||||
| Intel Gulftown 6C | 32nm | 6 | 1.17B | 240mm2 | ||||
| Intel Nehalem/Bloomfield 4C | 45nm | 4 | 731M | 263mm2 | ||||
| Intel Sandy Bridge 4C | 32nm | 4 | 995M | 216mm2 | ||||
| Intel Lynnfield 4C | 45nm | 4 | 774M | 296mm2 | ||||
| Intel Clarkdale 2C | 32nm | 2 | 384M | 81mm2 | ||||
| Intel Sandy Bridge 2C (GT1) | 32nm | 2 | 504M | 131mm2 | ||||
| Intel Sandy Bridge 2C (GT2) | 32nm | 2 | 624M | 149mm2 | ||||
Now for the shot:
From left to right we have a dual-core GT2 die, a quad-core die and a 32nm Arrandale die with on-package 45nm HD Graphics GPU. There’s very little difference between the dual-core GT2 die and the quad-core die - each SNB core is fairly small at 32nm.
The comparison to Arrandale is also interesting as it makes dual-core SNB look pretty sensible. But keep in mind that we don’t know the full cost structure for manufacturing at 45nm vs. 32nm. Newer processes tend to be more expensive initially compared to older, more mature processes.
Source: http://www.anandtech.com/show/4118/a-closer-look-at-the-sandy-bridge-die
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Rand Paul's Plan To Save $500 Billion, Ctd
By Patrick Appel Last week Conor asked for your thoughts on Rand Paul's proposed budget cuts. The most common criticism: Defense gets a 6.5% cut, and education 83%? Can I be reading this right? Education gets the largest single cut?...
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/andrewsullivan/rApM/~3/ZykTPA2q0Yg/click.phdo
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Review: Dynavector DV-20X2L
We have yet to encounter a Dynavector cartridge that we don't like, but new ones don't come along very often, so when two arrive like buses on a cold night, it's a cause for celebration.
As is the Japanese company's style, the new DV-20X2 is available in low and high output varieties, the low output version requires a transistor phono stage or step-up device, while the high can be used with valve and MM phono stages.
This, combined with a traditional two-gram down-force, makes the DV-20X2 a very easy cartridge to accommodate on modern turntables, or even older ones as long as they don't have a very low mass arm.
Flux control
As the name suggests, the 20X2 is the second incarnation of the 20X, a cartridge whose lineage goes right back to the eighties.
The 20X2 distinguishes itself with a new body ? in fact, the body from the �1,000 XX2 MkII. It's made in machined aluminium and provides a rigid mounting for the otherwise nude generator and magnets. The flanks provide protection for the delicate innards and make alignment considerably easier.
This is the easiest Dynavector we've ever set up ? hardly any kerfuffle at all.
The cartridge benefits from Dynavector's softened magnetism and flux-damping technologies. These are two methods by which the company's founder Dr Tominari, claims to minimise magnetic fluctuation. Something that while only minimal in MC cartridges is, in the doctor's opinion, detrimental to sound quality. It's possible to see the coil winding that is designed to damp stray magnetic flux on the front pole piece of the 20X2.
The 20X2's stylus is the same micro-ridge as found in Dynavector's 17D3 moving coil. It's bonded to a 6mm-long aluminium pipe cantilever. Signal is generated with the aid of neodymium magnets, the H model producing 2.8mV and the L a more modest 0.3mV.
Solid gone
The new bodywork makes the 20X2 look like a lot more cartridge than its predecessor, but this Dynavector is as solid as anything in the needle world. Value is really down to sound quality for the money, there are no features to consider, but if there were then ease of installation puts this in the top league.
Its competition comes from Goldring's Legacy (�595), the Ortofon Rondo Blue (�525) and the Grado Reference Master (�599), a wooden-bodied moving magnet.
The Goldring is probably the strongest, but we didn't find that it has quite the openness and power
of this Dynavector.
On the record
We set the 20X2L up in a Funk FX-R tonearm aboard the trusty Townshend Rock 7 and got the vinyl spinning, a process that continued way longer than the job required, but it was just too good to stop.
It took a little bit of fettling to get the best result ? raising the downforce to the maximum recommended proved beneficial, for instance ? but with that done there was an awful lot of musical detail flowing from the speakers.
It doesn't have the speed of its brother, the Karat 17D3, and the bass is a little on the relaxed side,
but the midrange and highs are extremely fine.
With a great phono stage, it achieves a degree of openness that's truly mesmerising. That's with the right record, of course, but that's almost any record that ain't heavily compressed and contains great music as far as we can tell.
The way that the various instruments and voices in a mix are presented in relation to one another is particularly good, as is the ability to cope with denser passages without the soundstage closing up.
Match point
Just to make sure all the bases were covered, we tried the 20X2L in an SME 20 with Series V arm.
This resulted in a similarly inspiring result and one where the bass was distinctly tighter. Which suggests
that this more conventional turntable is a better tonal match.
We also found that the DV likes a high-input impedance, 47kohm is usually best for MMs, but this MC sounded its best with the phono stage thus set.
This is a powerful, precise, revealing and open cartridge that warrants hi-res ancillaries, but will work a treat in any respectable turntable. In other words, the search for a Dynavector that we don't like will have to go on!
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Active Media Products SATA Disk-on-Modules are first to hit 64GB
Sometimes in an enterprise setting a server or other computer only needs a small amount of storage and that storage needs to be fast and compact to fit into a small enclosure. Active Media Products has just announced that it has new Disk-on-Modules specifically for the enterprise market.
The modules are very small and plug into the SATA port on any mainboard. AMP says that it is the first company to offer the 64GB modules for sale and that they are shipping to OEMs for about $259 right now. The modules use 7-pin SATA header that will work with almost any mainboard and they come in Type-1 and Type-2 styles.
The only difference in the two styles is that the Type-1 has a left side connector and the Type-2 has a right side connector. The sequential read speed is up to 100MB/s and the sequential write is up to 42MB/s. The DOMs measure 2.2″ x 1.3″ and use MLC flash, ECC, wear leveling, and bad block management.
Relevant Entries on SlashGear
- Active Media Products Debuts DOM flash module for servers and embedded systems
- Active Media Products debuts Aviator-2 USB 3.0 external storage devices
- Active Media Products unveils SaberTooth ZT ZIF SSD
- Active Media Predator GT SSDs get new 220MB/s read speed
- 64GB SSD with SATA II interface from Samsung
Source: http://feeds.slashgear.com/~r/slashgear/~3/ixWy2zDSxg4/
New Verizon Wireless rebate sheet reaffirms policy change
We reported on Friday that Verizon Wireless would be doing away with mail-in rebates on its high-end devices. Instead the carrier will begin applying instant rebates to all smartphones priced at $150 and above. This means a customer will pay the final subsidized price when purchasing a high-end smartphone instead of paying an extra $50 and waiting to be reimbursed by mail. Today, the policy change is reaffirmed by a new Verizon Wireless rebate sheet provided to BGR by a tipster. As can be seen on the new sheet, which goes into effect on January 31st, nearly all smartphones priced $150 and higher have been removed. Examples include the BlackBerry Storm2 and Motorola’s DROID x and DROID Pro.�A few pricey
Source: http://www.bgr.com/2011/01/29/new-verizon-wireless-rebate-sheet-reaffirms-policy-change/
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Review: Advance Acoustic MCD-204
Established as recently as 1995, Advance Acoustic was originally a loudspeaker brand, which added electronics in 2002. The MCD-204 is one member of its second tranche of electronics components, replacing the MCD-203 M II.
The products are designed locally and built offshore. Respectively, this means France ? the parent company is Advance Paris ? and China, which helps explain the unusually attractive pricing.
For those familiar with the MCD- 203 Mk II, the new model has a 'heavier' mechanism, while the D/A converter 'chippery' has been improved to enhance resolution to 24-bit/192kHz (this is the resolution of the chips, not the musical output, which is red-lined at 16-bit/44.1kHz by definition).
Monoblock inspired
Other improvements are aesthetic, including a stunning black and silver front panel inspired by the MAA-705 monoblock and the MPP-505 preamp. The remote control is unexciting visually, but it is based on a die-cast aluminium carcass, so it can't easily be faulted.
The MCD-204 is built around a rigid, partitioned chassis, providing physical isolation between the different functional blocks and reducing the possibility of interference between them. The metal mechanical component is suspended, then fixed on to a double frame to avoid vibrations during playback.
The power supply section includes a torroidal transformer driving multiple regulated and stabilised voltage supplies.
The D/A stage uses two analogue devices 24-bit/192kHz Delta Sigma D/A converters. Where other players would interface the DAC to the outside world using a simple microprocessor-based output stage, the MCD-204 uses something much closer to a full-blown audiophile preamplifier output, whose active devices are a pair of 112AV7 low-signal level valves.
The player can read CD, CD-R and MP3 CDs and is also compatible with HDCD-coded discs. There are single-ended and balanced analogue outputs and digital outputs in optical, coaxial and AES-EBU flavours.
Kick the tube
What makes the MCD-204 different is that it has a valve output stage at a price that would be typical of a mainstream solid-state design.
We're not fully convinced that the player quite makes the most of what could be a spectacularly good output stage, but it doesn't do badly and the hardware complement under the lid is undeniably impressive.
The MCD-204 behaves like most CD players, except it does take a minute or so before it becomes responsive after you hit the power button. This is the time needed to kick the tube output stage into life ? a count-down timer keeps you appraised of the situation. Left to its own devices, the player will eventually power itself down, which is a fashionably green thing to do.
Balanced output
The player was run in and warmed up prior to use, but it went through these standard procedures quickly and without dramatic changes in sound quality. For early listening the balanced output was used (with one-metre Transparent cables driving a Krell FBI), but it had no obvious audible benefit in this arrangement, though there might have been had longer cable runs been involved.
Either way, the MCD-204 is a clean, tidy-sounding player, easy on the ear and without obvious vices, though arguably it's slightly 'slow'-sounding (a finding that is sometimes associated with high-jitter levels). It generates a warm, full sound, harmonically rich and to this extent involving and informative. This is the valve heritage.
Imagery was expansive and stable too, in both the width and depth planes, but where we feel slightly short-changed with the MCD-204 is with its snap and on-the-ball timing of the very best disc-playing hardware.
The player tends to be most impressive with large-scale material (Verdi's Requiem is one example) and with orchestral material generally. It is less impressive with some of the non-classical material. The snap and propulsive timing that can make Mark Knopfler such an exhilarating performer, or accentuate the darkness of Sara McLaughlan's voice seems diluted on the MCD-204.
Nevertheless, this player never ceases to impress us. For example, it does wonders with Christianne Stotijn's stunning mezzo-soprano voice and Fleischer's Beethoven from an old, but vital recording on CBS of the Beethoven Piano Concertos, with the Cleveland Orchestra.
A qualified hit
Dedicated CD players are becoming less common in the headlong rush to compressed audio and iTunes, so this player will be a welcome addition to the ranks of affordable CD players ? even without the hybrid technology.
But the balanced output doesn't show any obvious advantages over the single-ended and, as with many valve-based designs, there is something slightly lazy about the sound. That said, we don't doubt it is a lot better than its predecessor. Musically, it is a qualified hit, easily good enough for a well-deserved recommendation badge.
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London gets free Wi-Fi: Sky opens The Cloud in the Square Mile
The City of London will offer free Wi-Fi to all visitors from tomorrow, courtesy of a partnership with The Cloud, the mobile Wi-Fi provider snapped up by BSkyB last week.
Starting on Tuesday 1 February, The Cloud will provide everyone within the City of London with 15 minutes of free Wi-Fi access per day. Further minutes [...]
Related posts:
Starting on Tuesday 1 February, The Cloud will provide everyone within the City of London with 15 minutes of free Wi-Fi access per day. Further minutes [...]
Related posts:
- My Phone cloud sync service opens for pre-registration
- FaceTime: free calls? Get on The Cloud
- Lunchtime Lowdown: London gets free Wi-Fi, Facebook Deals and an Andy Gray iPhone app with better timing
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/electricpig/~3/nNsGz5HBrUs/
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Samsung Blu-ray players get Lovefilm access
The next in an ever increasing line of platforms and brands to get Lovefilm access is Samsung. Specifically, its line of Blu-ray players will be getting Lovefilm access via a downloadable widget app for the Samsung Internet@TV hub. All you’ll need to get access to Lovefilm on demand content is a Lovefilm subscription of �5.99 [...]
Related posts:
Related posts:
- Sony SMP-N100 Apple TV rival gets Lovefilm access
- Lovefilm Samsung TV streaming now activated
- Samsung Internet@TV adds BBC iPlayer and LOVEFiLM streaming
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/electricpig/~3/U3GmjNmfZrY/
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Silverlight TV 58: Windows Phone Design Tips With Corrina
New Windows Phone 7 applications are being uploaded to the marketplace all the time. But is your application standing out? This week, John and Corrina Black kick off a new Silverlight TV mini series called "Windows Phone 7 Design Tips with Corrina" to highlight ways you can improve the design of your application. Each week, Corrina will focus on some issues and show both how to work through them and how to improve the application's design. In this first episode, Corrina discusses the idea of the mini series and gives some insight into five of the design tips she unveils, including:
- Designing a compelling application tile
- Startup image design
- How to avoid banding with gradients
- Startup / Splash / Loading screen and avoiding navigation backstack issues
- Tips when using progress bars
Relevant links:
- John's blog and on Twitter (@john_papa)
- Corrina on Twitter (@corrinab)
Follow us on Twitter @SilverlightTV or on the web at http://silverlight.tv
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Tutorial: How to perform a forensic PC investigation
When you have a technical interest in Windows or PCs in general, there are few things as fascinating as a good computer forensics package.
This is partly because they're an excellent way to check exactly how someone is using a computer ? the files they're accessing, the websites they're viewing and any information they may be trying to hide. It's a little sneaky, but if you have suspicions that, for example, an employee is doing something they shouldn't on a work PC, then this could prove very useful.
However, forensics programs also offer many other applications. They can help you recover deleted files, uncover even the stealthiest of malware, troubleshoot all kinds of PC problems, learn more about how Windows and your applications work, and let you pretend you're in your hometown's own version of CSI ? perhaps.
This normally comes at a huge cost, with the top forensics packages running to thousands of pounds, but now there's a rare exception. PassMark Software has released a beta of a new package, OSForensics, which you can download for free and use until July 2011.
Despite being a beta, OSForensics is already fast, generally reliable, and packed with a host of useful features, so there's never been a better time to find out what forensics software can do for you.
Recent activity
Checking up on how other people are using your PC sounds a little morally dubious, but if you believe that they're engaged in activities you don't approve of ? and maybe trying to hide them from you ? then it seems to us that you're entitled to try to discover the truth. OSForensics can help you accomplish this in several ways.
Launch the program, taking care to give it administrator rights if you're running Windows Vista or 7 (right-click the shortcut and select 'Run as administrator'). Click the 'Recent activity' tab on the left-hand menu.
Accept all the default settings for the time being, click 'Scan' and, after a moment, OSForensics will list details relating to websites you've visited, files you've downloaded, documents you've opened, USB flash drives that have been attached to your PC, wireless networks that you've accessed (if appropriate) and more.
Some of this information is available from other sources. It's not difficult to browse through your web browser's history, for example, or check any cookies that have been downloaded, but other details are more unusual. If you're investigating a work PC, for instance, you could view the USB details to see if someone may be attaching unauthorised drives, perhaps in order to steal data.
Filter scan results
There's a definite advantage in having every detail available in a single interface though, and it's filterable, too. If you only want to look at the files that have been downloaded, for example, you can do this by selecting 'Downloads' from the 'Show Only' list.
If you're only interested in the events of the last week, select 'Search date range only', change the 'From' and 'To' dates accordingly, and then scan your system again.
If you click the 'Timeline' view, you'll see a classic timeline graph that enables you zoom in on a period of interest. You can click a year, a month or a day, then drill right down to the activities during that period. Right-click to export the results that interest you in CSV, HTML or TXT format.
The majority of forensic packages provide easy ways to search a hard drive beyond any system that might currently be installed (such as Windows Search), and OSForensics is no exception.
Click the 'Create index' tab, for instance, and you'll be able to choose a start folder that defines the file structure you'd like to search. Any subfolders will be included automatically, so to search the entire C: drive, you would simply specify 'C:\'.
It may take a very long time to index the whole drive, so if you only want to search for something in the Documents folder, browse to 'C:\Users\[Name]\My Documents' instead.
SEE HERE: Thumbnail previews are available in searches, making it easy to find anyimages you need, such as photos you've deleted and want to restore
The indexing is tool is already comprehensive, but you can make it even more so with a few extra tweaks. Click 'Config', then select both 'Scan files with no extensions' and 'Scan files with unknown extensions' to try to uncover content that other tools might miss. Then choose 'Files and unallocated sectors' to look for content in files that may have been deleted.
When you've finished, click 'Create index', then leave the program for a while. It will have to scan a huge number of files and the process will therefore take some time to complete.
It's worth the effort though, because when it's finished, you can use the 'Search index' tab to enter your key words and pull up matching files, images, emails and more almost immediately, including content that wouldn't necessarily be available if you used Windows search alone.
Deleted files search
If you're especially interested in deleted files, there's no need to spend lots of time performing unallocated sector searches. Just click the 'Deleted files search' tab and you'll find that OSForensics comes packaged with its own easy to use, built-in undelete tool.
The tool may appear confusing at first, but is straightforward if you understand how it works. On our test PC, for instance, the deleted files search announced that it would, by default, search the disk '\\. \PhysicalDrive0' ? which, if you're used to Windows drive letters, isn't exactly clear.
It's not that bad, though. All '\\. \PhysicalDrive0' means is that the program will search all the partitions on your first physical drive, however many there may be. If you want to restrict your search to a particular partition, then select it from the list, which for us produced something like '\\. \PhysicalDrive0: Partition 0, C: [931.21GB NTFS'. Rather lengthy, but you'll know what it means.
When you're finished, click 'Search', and the program will produce a list of all the deleted files it's found almost instantly. If you know what you're looking for, enter all or a part of the file name in the 'Filter string' box, and click 'Apply filter' to display only matching files. (You can also filter by multiple file specifications if you separate them with semi-colons, such as '*.gif;*.xls'.)
BACK FROM THE DEAD: A simple Undelete tool enables you to view and recover deleted files
What the report won't give you, unfortunately, is any preview thumbnails, so if you're looking for images then you won't be able to spot them at a glance. However, if you suspect you've found the right file, then OSForensics can usually display it for you. Simply right-click it, select 'View with internal viewer', and the program will display the image. Not the right one? Use the 'Back' and 'Forward' buttons to step through the list.
When you've found what you need, right-click the file and use one of the 'Save' options to bring it back from the dead.
Signatures
One particularly interesting feature of OSForensics is its ability to create a signature of a particular set of files, folders, or an entire hard drive. You could create one signature now, for example, and another tomorrow, then use the program's 'Compare signature' option to show you everything that's been changed ? that's new and modified files.
This clearly has all kinds of applications. You might use it to highlight changes another user has made to your PC. You could also compare signatures taken before and after installing an application to view the changes that it's made to your PC.
What about creating a signature of your Windows folder, then looking for changes that could indicate malware? Then you might create a signature of your entire system partition every day, then compare it to the previous version and look for unusual activity ? whether it's malware or just applications that are creating unnecessary files.
Whatever your reasons, this is definitely worth trying and is very easy to do. Just click 'Create signature', then specify the starting folder for whatever you'd like to scan (try an entire drive to begin with), and click 'Start'. The process only takes a few seconds to complete, and you can save the results to your desktop.
Open a browser window and visit a site or two, then switch back to OSForensics and click 'Start' again to create a second signature of the same area. Finally, click 'Compare signature', point OSForensics to the two signature files and let it highlight the differences.
It's quick, easy to use, and can be very informative.
Our favourite OSForensics feature, for its sheer originality, is the Mismatch File Search. The core idea is a simple one. All you have to do is point the program at a starting folder ? 'C:\' , say ? then click 'Scan'.
The program will begin to scan your files, looking for any where the content doesn't match the extension. This might uncover all kinds of odd behaviour. If another user of your PC has renamed some videos to have ZIP extensions, for example, then the Mismatch File Search will reveal what's going on.
If a piece of malware has renamed key executables to an apparently harmless TXT extension, then again, this OSForensics report will highlight the change.
What's in a format
More generally, you'll discover the real file formats behind many of your applications. The program revealed that our old Empire Earth '.ee3sav' save game files were actually ZIP files, and that CyberLink's '.thl' files were PNG thumbnails ? information that could come in very handy if these files were ever corrupted and we needed to make manual repairs.
In our experience, the file search can be an extremely revealing look at what's really going on with your PC. The same can be said of almost all of OSForensics' utilities ? the program has many possible applications, and there's no telling what it might be able to do for you until you try it.
So give it a try ? download a copy, explore the functions and see what this excellent forensics package can uncover about your computer, its software and users.
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Sunday, January 30, 2011
Elections Amid Chaos
by Patrick Appel The Working Group on Egypt has called "for free and fair elections for president and for parliament to be held as soon as possible." Max Boot is wary of immediate elections: As we?ve seen in Iraq and...
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/andrewsullivan/rApM/~3/x88khW-ENjc/click.phdo
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