Earlier Hardware
Moist iPhone fanbois tempted with golden Apple shower offer
Apple has reportedly agreed to shake $53m (£35m) in change out of its pockets to settle a lawsuit accusing it of wriggling out of gadget warranties using a water-detecting tool.
Fanbois who brought their busted iPhones and iPods into Apple Stores for repair watched employees check the status of a Liquid Contact Indicator - which …
Oh S**T, here comes a ROBOT to take my JOB
Something for the Weekend, Sir? The enormous lump of shit sat steaming directly outside the publisher’s door facing the first-floor landing, welcoming early morning office workers as they arrived with a cheeful “Hello! I’m a giant turd! And I smell really bad!”
Each member of staff who had chosen to begin work at 7.30am that day reacted the same way: wrinkled …
The Man Who Fell to Earth: Plane plummet plod probe phone
The man who spread himself across a street in Mortlake, London, after falling from an aircraft undercarriage has been identified. Police finally managed to crack open the SIM in his pocket and study it to discover who he was.
Jose Matada was the chap's name and he was 30 years old, the BBC tells us. He landed on Portman Avenue …
'Sorry, I don't get the drama around having an always-on console'
Quotw This was the week when former British Prime Minister Baroness Margaret Thatcher died, setting the Twitosphere alight with opposing deluges of vitriol and veneration. The passing of the woman the media insists on referring to as "divisive" inspired a whole slew of people to post "Ding dong the witch is dead" tweets, while others …
Microsoft Xbox exec quits after ENRAGING the INTERWEBS
A high-flying Microsoft creative director has quit after enraging Xbox owners with a widely publicised tweet saying they should get used to consoles being constantly connected to to the internet.
A week ago, Adam Orth provoked the wrath of bedroom-bound gamers and industry experts alike after sharing his thoughts on the always- …
Foot-long slab too big? Microsoft 'has a 7-incher' to stroke
Microsoft will put a smaller, 7-inch Windows 8-powered Surface laptop-cum-tablet into production this year, according to insiders.
Shrinking the touchscreen slab wasn't part of Microsoft's strategy when the then-Windows chief Steven Sinofsky unveiled Redmond's own 12-inch Surfaces and similar-sized Windows 8 devices from PC …
Sonic the Hedgehog
Antique Code Show Pocket-money saved, game ordered, wait for the postman and... nothing. A friend had the game already – rubbing salt into the wound – yet my journey of anticipation home from school each day still arrived at a big hole of spiky blue hedgehog nothingness. The original Sonic the Hedgehog was especially hyped throughout its long …
WTF is... H.265 aka HEVC?
Feature When Samsung unveiled its next-generation smartphone, the Galaxy S4, in March this year, most of the Korean giant’s fans focused their attention on the device’s big 5-inch, 1920 x 1080 screen, its quad-core processor and its 13Mp camera. All impressive of course, but incremental steps in the ongoing evolution of the smartphone. …
Shaky liftoff for Sputnik: Dell's Linux lappie runs its own cloud, ish
Review Want a laptop running Linux? You could do worse than Dell's XPS 13.
This svelte model began life a year or so ago as a Windows Ultrabook. More recently it was updated with Intel Ivy Bridge processors and a 13.3" 1080p screen. The XPS 13 Developer Edition - because only software developers use Linux, right? - uses a high-end Core …
HGST straps Intel Thunderbolt onto uber-pricey drives, docks
The first external hard drive with Intel's extremely pricey Thunderbolt fast cabling system has been announced by HGST, along with a Thunderbolt interface 2-drive dock supporting 2.5-inch disks.
G-Technology is HGST's branded line of external drive products and HGST is a WD operating unit. Intel's Thunderbolt runs at 10Gbit/s …
The gloves are on: Nokia emits super-sensitive £99 Windows Phone
Nokia's sub-£100 Lumia 520 has rolled out in the UK this week, alongside a keenly priced and attractive unibody sibling, the Lumia 720. Both were announced at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in February.
The Lumia 620 put a modern Nokia at a price point under £150, but now the slightly larger size has made it even cheaper. …
Review: Kobo Arc Android tablet
As pocketable Android tablets gather momentum and e-reader manufacturers look to offer a more flexible platform, the twilight zone where both meet is certainly looking lively.
A criticism of Amazon’s Kindle Fire e-book-meets-Android offerings is the company’s imposition of a walled garden for installing apps: you have to …
Microsoft ships Surface firmware fixes with April patch batch
Along with the usual Patch Tuesday fixes for Windows, Internet Explorer, and other software, Microsoft's April 9 updates also include hardware driver and firmware fixes for its Surface RT and Surface Pro fondleslabs.
The releases mark the fifth time Redmond has issued fixes for hardware issues with Surface RT, which shipped in …
The ten SEXIEST computers of ALL TIME
Product Round-up Does a computer need to look sexy? You might say that the looks of such a pragmatic gadget don’t matter. After all, most of us have, at one time or another, had to make do with bland, beige boxes almost exactly like everyone else’s bland, beige box, and it didn't hinder us from getting the job done, or made play any the less …
Android FOUND ON TABLETS inscribed with WORD OF GOD
A church has handed out tablets instead of hymn books - but not stone ones etched with the 10 commandments: these are Android fondleslabs whose pinch-to-zoom feature is a godsend for elderly parishioners, we're told.
The first tab-equipped Church of England congregation at St John's Church in Mickleover, near Derby, clutched …
USPTO backs down on iPad mini trademark objections
The US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has withdrawn its primary objections to Apple's trademark filing for the term "iPad mini" – but Cupertino is not completely off the hook quite yet.
"Upon further review of the application, the examining attorney has determined that the following refusals issued in the initial Office …
Review: HP ElitePad 900 Atom tablet
If HP’s ElitePad 900 is anything to go by, not everybody expects a business Windows 8 Pro Atom tablet to be a pocketable wafer. You only have to hold it in your hand to get the impression that this model has been built for endurance rather than designed as a fashion accessory. That’s not to say that it doesn’t look good, quite …
Panasonic develops DNA-scanning 'lab-on-a-chip'
Boffins at Japanese IT giant Panasonic have been showing off a “lab-on-a-chip” capable of rapidly analysing patient DNA so that doctors can quickly and easily identify disease and prescribe effective medication.
The testing chip, developed with Belgium-based research firm IMEC, is less than half the size of a business card and …
Android's US market share continues to slip
Apple may be taking its lumps these days – what with a falling share price, pesky activist investors, troubles in China, and the like – but there's one important area in which Cupertino is steadily gaining ground: US smartphone sales.
For the past 100 months, the stat-happy analysts at comScore have been tracking mobile-device …
Microsoft: 'Facebook Home just copies Windows Phone'
Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg might think his company broke new ground by building its Facebook Home skin for Android around the idea of "people first," but according to Microsoft, all the social network has done is borrow a page from Redmond's playbook.
In a post to the company's official blog on Friday, Microsoft mouthpiece Frank …
The healing hands of guru Dabbs
Something for the Weekend, Sir? A colleague strides purposefully across the open-plan office to the production desk. She has the wrinkled brow and wild eyes of someone who is simultaneously baffled and angry. She’s on deadline but her computer is “doing stupid things” and she doesn’t understand what or why or how to stop it.
Oh no, I'll have to ask Dabbsy "Oh …
Gartner: RIP PCs - tablets will CRUSH you this year
PC sales are in terminal decline thanks to the continued popularity of tablets and there’s nothing an anticipated surge in ultramobiles can do to stop it.
That’s according to beancounters at Gartner, who reckon the outcome will be anaemic growth rates for Microsoft’s Windows in 2013 as Google’s Android blows the doors off. …
Gaming's favourite platters get another stir of the pot
Game Theory Another month goes by and, as ever, gaming isn’t short of its share of news and controversies. While recent reveals of Battlefield 4, Metal Gear Solid V, The Witcher 3 and Thief: Out of the Shadows show us what the future holds, there's no getting around the fact that we're currently entrenched in a present in which …
Aussie AI boffins let fly with Angry Birds automation code
Java code used in last year's Angry Birds artificial intelligence competition has been released into the wild.
The Australian National University's Artificial Intelligence Group last year decided the game would be a fine way of testing just how brainy artificial intelligences have become, because as anyone who's played the game …
OLPC shuns Indian founder after anti-tablet screed
The One Laptop Per Child Association has posted a statement distancing itself from Satish Jha, an entrepreneur who founded the Association in India.
The Association's beef with Mr Jha relates to what it describes as “certain recent statements”.
It seems highly likely this piece about India's Aakash project, which aimed to give …
'Pong' ported to 29-storey skyscraper 'screen'
Seventies gaming classic 'Pong' will reach a hitherto undreamed of scale later in April, when a version of the game is launched for play on lights adorning a skyscraper.
The building in question is Philadelphia's Cira Center, a 29-storey edifice opened in 2006. The building features a programmable array of 1500 light emitting …
60-inch Apple iTV to be controlled by iRing remote?
You may have had it up to here with reports that Apple is juuust about to release a full-on big-screen television – such rumors have been clogging the interturbes since at least 2009 – but the most recent one has a wrinkle that you, dear Reg reader, might find of interest: you'll wear its remote on your finger.
So wrote analyst …
Gates and Allen reshoot historic 1981 Microsoft photo
One of the most iconic photos from the history of Microsoft, featuring a lanky young Bill Gates perched next to his coding mentor (the way he tells it) Paul Allen, has been recreated at Seattle's Living Computing Museum.
Bill Gates and Paul Allen 1981 Stand back ladies, form a line
In a 1981 publicity shot for the then …
Disney shutters Star Wars game unit with 200 layoffs
Just a few months after snapping up George Lucas' Star Wars empire, Disney is shutting down its game unit LucasArts and laying off around 200 employees.
All work has ceased on the two new games announced last year, Star Wars: 1313 and Star Wars: First Assault, although they could be revived if another game-maker takes over.
In …
Review: Intel Next Unit of Computing barebones desktop PC
Intel must really like the sound of its own ‘voice’. How else can you explain the fact that sliding open the box containing the chip giant’s latest desktop package plays the ding-da-ding-ding-ding jingle as soon as you open it. Amaze your friends! Irritate your colleagues! Keep opening and closing the box to replay the ditty …
‘Unstoppable WEEE Tsunami’ staunched by PPP plan
The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) and several Central American Governments have decided waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) is both a threat to and an opportunity for the region.
A dictionary’s worth of lengthily-be-acronymed groups convened for the ITU/United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) …
Holden bakes Siri into Barinas
General Motors' antipodean outpost, Holden, is trying to put a bit of cool into its four-cylinder shopping trolley, the Barina, by integrating Siri into its electronics.
Well, not just cool: with a suitable iPhone running iOS 6 connected to its electronic innards, Siri will let drivers make “eyes-free” calls, and to avoid …
Chinese search king Baidu testing Google Glass competitor
Baidu, the search firm that handles the requests of over three quarters of China's internet users, is trying out a wearable headset of its own – but it's hardly the svelte headset Sergey Brin's so fond of showing off.
Baidu Glass prototype Sophisticated it ain't
The first photos of the prototype on Sina Tech show a clunky …
Memory vendors pile on '3D' stacking standard
More memory responding faster in a smaller footprint: that's what chip vendors are hoping to achieve with the announcement of the HMC 1.0 specification.
The standard, available here, sets down the specs for memory chip stacking using through-silicon vias (TSVs). In other words: individual memory dies, stacked vertically on top …
Steve Jobs to supervise iPhone 6 FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE
Apple designed the next two versions of the iPhone while Steve Jobs was alive, it has been claimed.
San Francisco District Attorney George Gascón was told by an Apple representative that the next two iPhone models "preceded Tim Cook", according to a report in The Examiner.
He met with Apple’s government liaison Michael Foulkes …
Review: Jabra Revo Wireless headphones
I’ve tried a fair few wireless headphones over the past ten years, almost all of them unsatisfactory in one way or another. Many of the early ones were over-the-ear jobs with those round-the-back-of-your-head bands, but all suffered from either excessive weight - thanks to the on-board battery - or simply didn’t play for long. …
Facebook prepares to dominate Android
Facebook's upcoming Android announcement could see Zuckerberg & Co. take over smartphone homescreens, making the social network an ever-present companion for people with a thirst for e-validation.
The company will announce on Thursday an HTC phone that comes loaded with a Facebook app that supplants the traditional smartphone …
Apple denied trademark protection for 'iPad mini'
The US Patent and Trademark Office has denied Apple's request to trademark the term "iPad mini" – but there's good reason to assume that Cupertino will overturn the decision on appeal.
The central reason for the denial is rather straightforward: that "mini" is merely identifies the original iPad's little brother as being, well, …
Giant solar-powered aircraft to begin cross-country flight
The photovoltaics-powered Solar Impulse HB-SIA aircraft has arrived at the NASA Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley's Moffett Field to prepare for a flight across the US.
After it has been offloaded in pieces from its Boeing 747-100 transporter, the Swiss-made HB-SIA will be reassembled in a Moffett Field hanger, then embark …
Smartphone running 'Facebook OS' said to debut this week
Facebook has sent out invitations to an event at its Menlo Park headquarters this week that many believe will see the launch of a new, Facebook-branded smartphone – and an Amazon phone may not be far behind.
Facebook's invites themselves were fairly cryptic. "Come See Our New Home on Android" was all they said, along with the …
Relaxed Windows 8 rules hint at smaller slabs to come
Microsoft has quietly changed its OEM certification guidelines for Windows 8 to allow devices with lower screen resolutions, a move that could mean smaller Windows tablets are on the way.
ZDNet's Ed Bott was first to spot the rule change made earlier this month, which lowers the minimum screen size for a device bearing the …
Gartner forecasts pro 3D printer prices below $2,000 by 2016
Analyst house Gartner has caught the 3D printing bug with its latest forecast on the future of the industry, and predicts enterprise-quality printers being cheap and plentiful by 2016.
"3D printing is a technology accelerating to mainstream adoption," said Pete Basiliere, research director at Gartner. "The hype leads many people …
