Follow Slashdot stories on Twitter

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×
Power

Comparing Performance and Power Use For Vista vs. Windows 7 WIth Clarksfield Chi 119

crazipper writes "Back when Intel launched its Core i5/i7 'Lynnfield' CPUs, Tom's Hardware ran some tests in Windows 7 versus Vista to gauge the benefits of the core parking and ideal core optimizations, said to cut power consumption in the new OS. It turned out that Win7 shifted the Nehalem-based CPUs in and out of Turbo Boost mode faster, resulting in higher power draw under load, while idle power was a slight bit lower. The mobile version of the architecture was claimed (at the time) to show a greater improvement in moving to Win7. Today there's a follow-up with the flagship Clarksfield processor that shows the same aggressive P-state promotion policies giving Win7 a significant performance advantage with Core i7 Mobile. However, power consumption is higher as well."
The Almighty Buck

Device Protects Day Traders From Emotional Trading 260

Philips Electronics, a Netherlands-based company, has come up with a device designed to protect day traders from emotionally based trading decisions. The Rationalizer measures your galvanic skin response and lets you know when you are under stress. An online trader can then take a "time-out, wind down and re-consider their actions," according to the company. This may have come too late for us, but at least future generations won't have to live through the horror of angry day trading.
Displays

First Look At Acer's 3D Laptop 151

Barence writes "Acer today revealed the world’s first 3D laptop, the Acer Aspire 5738PG, which will launch alongside Windows 7 on October 22. It uses a combination of software and specially coated glass on the 15.4in screen, along with a standard set of polarised glasses. Initial impressions were a bit iffy, and whether anyone actually needs a 3D laptop is another question entirely, but we'll find out this month."
The Military

Behind the Scenes With America's Drone Pilots 419

An anonymous reader writes "As President Obama meets with advisors on an Afghanistan strategy today (who are now leaning more toward Joe Biden's more-drones policy), and even as Al Qaeda claims it's not all that scared of drones, the new issue of Esquire takes the first real in-depth look at the American military's UAV build-up. Defense geek Brian Mockenhaupt spends some time on the ground in Afghanistan, as well as back at the Pentagon, where the pilots ('more like snipers than fighter pilots') are playing a kind of role-playing game, getting to know terrorists' daily ins and outs. Looks like these Reaper drones are the real wave of the future, eh?"
Linux Business

How Nokia Learned To Love Openness 180

ChiefMonkeyGrinder writes "Once Sebastian Nyström laid out the logic of moving to open source, there was very little resistance within Nokia to doing so. I think that's significant; it means that, just as the GNU GPL has been tested in various courts and found valid, so has the logic behind open source — the openness that allows software to spread further, and improve quicker, for the mutual benefit of all. That idea is also increasingly accepted by hard-headed business people: it's become self-evident that it's a better way."
Operating Systems

Acer Launching Dual Android/Windows 7 Netbook 105

Barence writes "Acer has unveiled an Aspire netbook that dual boots Google Android and Windows 7. 'User demand is not there for [other forms of] Linux [but] we never give up. We adjust,' said Jim Wong, Acer senior corporate vice president. 'We introduce Android with the Windows OS, and why Android? Because it has the best connectivity built into the OS.' Acer has also talked up Google's forthcoming Chrome OS. 'Chrome can be a viable alternative to Microsoft's OSes for web applications on different mobile devices,' he explained."
Nintendo

Next Nintendo Handheld To Be Powered By NVIDIA's Tegra Chipset 216

Vigile writes "When you sell over 100 million handheld gaming systems, everyone wants to be involved in your success; just ask Nintendo. As a company with many different obstacles in its path, NVIDIA could definitely use the boost in revenues that would come from partnering with a company like Nintendo on a handheld system, and it looks like the Tegra processor will make that happen. The NVIDIA Tegra processor is an SoC that runs a set of ARM cores, a GeForce-based graphics core and an HD video processor capable of 1080p output that would definitely give the current Nintendo DS/DSi systems a performance boost in line with the Sony PSP. The 'Nintendo TS,' as it has been dubbed, will apparently be ready for a late winter 2010 release and should put a spark in the mobile gaming market and give Nintendo's developers the power to bring higher quality games to the platform."
GUI

10/GUI — an Interface For Multi-Touch Input 344

Naznarreb writes "R. Clayton Miller has an extremely impressive GUI concept he's calling 10/GUI (video; written description here). Essentially, it combines the high-bandwidth input possibilities of multi-touch interfaces with the ease and immediacy of a mouse. The video is quite interesting, and, for me at least, pretty jaw dropping. This is a dramatic re-imagining of the current mouse/screen schema, one that I think has significant potential."
Cellphones

Game Development On Android 211

Gamasutra is running an article about the state of game development on Android. The author explains some of the strengths and weaknesses of the platform, and makes comparisons to development on the iPhone. Quoting: "While iPhone apps are written in Objective C, the Android SDK uses relatively more programmer-friendly Java. The iPhone store charges developers $99 a year to distribute their apps, while Android has a one-time $25 fee for developers. And the review process for iPhone apps grows increasingly lengthy — sometimes weeks or more — and it's somewhat arcane. Android apps go live as soon as the developer hits the publish button. Google handles the review process post-hoc, and is much more lax in terms of content. ... For now, if a developer decides to implement a game exclusively for a particular smartphone platform, and the choice is between the iPhone and Android, the tradeoff is between trying to get noticed in an incredibly crowded and competitive market where the potential payoff is huge for those at the top, or entering a market with low barriers, little competition, currently low returns, but the possibility of potential growth."

Comment Slackware was first (Score 1) 739

In 1995, my pal Robert (or was it Jeff?) downloaded a Slackware distro -- via slow modem, onto floppies. It took about a week.

We all passed the floppy set around, installing Linux onto our computers. By February of 1996, id had released the Quake demo. I had Win95 on my old craptastic Packard Bell, but it simply wouldn't run Quake. I spent hours trying to get the SVGALib Quake to run. I distinctly recall nuking my system in an effort to get X running, and somehow typing (as root) "rm -rf / usr/local/lib". See that extra space? Yeah, that was fun.

I got a new computer, but couldn't get Win95 to run, so I switched to OS2/Warp. It wouldn't boot at all. Linux would run, but would crash a lot. I finally discovered that the scumbags who sold me the computer had swapped the new 486 Intel chip for a much older and slower Cyrix chip, and overclocked the hell out of it so that it'd show the appropriate Mhz at boot.

I finally switched that POS out for a new computer, and ran dual-boot Linux and Win95 for several more years. Today I use Macs, but they're mainly pretty window dressing for terminal sessions on Linux machines.

Comment Re:Webmail vs. Pine (Score 1) 204

Pine is still my mail reader of choice. Every so often, I'll try using mutt again, and every time I'll switch back to Pine, because those keystrokes are embedded in my brain. I know mutt can "be made to look almost like pine", but there's a big difference between 'almost' and 'exactly'.

Feed Engadget: Dateline "exposes" iPod thieves via hidden camera (engadget.com)

Filed under: Portable Audio, Portable Video

There's probably nothing quite as embarrassing as being ambushed on national television by Chris Hansen for stealing a measly iPod. Of course, NBC's crack team of journalists are just trying to expose the growing trend of iPod theft in the world... or kick up their ratings. In a bizarre and somewhat convoluted "hidden camera" scheme, Dateline nabs thieves at their own game by allowing them to steal new iPods bundled with a "special" install disc which secretly hands over the user's information to the news program. The venus-fly-trap-like plot unfolds as the crew leaves "unattended" iPods in high traffic areas, and is then shocked to see people walking off with them. With all due respect, Dateline, you were pretty much asking for it. If you'd like to know how it all ends, hit the read link for the six page transcript.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!


Feed Techdirt: Japanese Entertainment Industry Still Very Confused, Very Wrong About YouTube (techdirt.com)

You may remember late last year that JASRAC, the group that represents various entertainment industry interests in Japan got very angry at YouTube and demanded the site prevent unauthorized videos from being uploaded. YouTube responded by trying to explain that it wasn't YouTube's fault, while also promising to put warnings about copyrights on the site in Japanese -- while also promising to travel to Japan and meet with entertainment industry officials there. This week a second round of those meetings happened and it appears that Japanese entertainment industry is still confused. They're not at all happy with YouTube, demanding that "all copyrighted material be removed immediately."

That was the statement from composer Hideki Matsutake, who apparently was the spokesmen for the coalition of entertainment industry interests that met with Google/YouTube execs. Of course, that doesn't make any sense. Thanks to current copyright laws, all new content automatically is copyrighted once created. In other words, nearly all content on YouTube is under someone's copyright. What the guy really means is that he wants all unauthorized content removed from YouTube and that's much more difficult -- because there's no easy way to know whether or not the content has been authorized. There are plenty of copyright holders who not only choose to put their content on sites like YouTube, but actually are thrilled when fans promote their content by uploading it to YouTube. Unfortunately, this Japanese group doesn't seem to understand that. Even more to the point, they apparently fail to understand that even if YouTube completely shut down today, all of that content would simply move to other sites -- and those sites are likely to care even less about what a coalition of Japanese entertainers and entertainment companies want them to do.

Slashdot Top Deals

He has not acquired a fortune; the fortune has acquired him. -- Bion

Working...