ABCI: Japan plant 130-Petaflops-Supercomputer für 2017

Noch kommendes Jahr soll der ABCI-Supercomputer einsatzbereit sein, angesetzt sind 130 Petaflops. Die lassen sich aber nicht mit denen des derzeit schnellsten System vergleichen. Japan möchte den ABCI für Erforschung von Künstlicher Intelligenz einsetzen und könnte Tesla-Chips von Nvidia nutzen. (Supercomputer, Computer)

Noch kommendes Jahr soll der ABCI-Supercomputer einsatzbereit sein, angesetzt sind 130 Petaflops. Die lassen sich aber nicht mit denen des derzeit schnellsten System vergleichen. Japan möchte den ABCI für Erforschung von Künstlicher Intelligenz einsetzen und könnte Tesla-Chips von Nvidia nutzen. (Supercomputer, Computer)

Die Woche im Video: Das mobile Büro

Geräte wichtiger Funktionen berauben und das als Feature an Hipster verkaufen, kann nicht nur Apple: Wir haben eine Schreibmaschine mit Cloud-Anbindung getestet. Mit Autos gespielt haben wir auch – und das mitten im Umzugschaos. Sieben Tage und viele Meldungen im Überblick. (Golem-Wochenrückblick, Malware)

Geräte wichtiger Funktionen berauben und das als Feature an Hipster verkaufen, kann nicht nur Apple: Wir haben eine Schreibmaschine mit Cloud-Anbindung getestet. Mit Autos gespielt haben wir auch - und das mitten im Umzugschaos. Sieben Tage und viele Meldungen im Überblick. (Golem-Wochenrückblick, Malware)

Netflix 4K Playback on PC Locked to Edge Browser, Latest Intel CPU, Due to DRM

PC users who have entered the 4K age for gaming may still have to purchase expensive hardware upgrades in order to stream Netflix at Ultra HD resolution.Microsoft announced this week that Netflix’s 4K streaming, previously limited to 4K TVs a…



PC users who have entered the 4K age for gaming may still have to purchase expensive hardware upgrades in order to stream Netflix at Ultra HD resolution.

Microsoft announced this week that Netflix's 4K streaming, previously limited to 4K TVs and compatible Ultra HD Blu-ray players, is coming to PCs at long last. But the hardware and software requirements listed will ensure most users won't be able to streaming in 4K, as it force users to use a browser almost nobody users, and the latest Intel CPU only launched in August. Hollywood's insistence on DRM, unfortunately, is to blame.

Netflix 4K on Windows PCs require the DRM platform PlayReady 3.0. This straight away limits users to use Windows 10, as PlayReady 3.0 was just introduced in to the OS in the recent Anniversary Update. This also forces users to use Microsoft's little used Edge browser, as it's the only browser that supports PlayReady 3.0 at the moment (Netflix's own Windows app doesn't work either). 

PlayReady 3.0 is also a hardware based DRM, meaning that only hardware that supports the new DRM standard will work with Netflix 4K. This then limits users to latest Intel 'Kaby Lake' processors, the only Intel processors to currently support PlayReady 3.0. Nvidia's latest 10-series graphics cards support PlayReady 3.0, but is currently not compatible with Netflix/Microsoft's implementation (this may change with a software update in the future).

PCs that don't meet all of these requirements will be prevented from playing Netflix in 4K, even if the hardware is powerful enough to do so.

It's also worth noting that it's not Netflix that's putting these requirements into play, but rather rights-holders such as Hollywood studios that force Netflix to adopt these hardline requirements on DRM.

Apart from DRM requirements, there is also a performance advantage of using the latest 'Kaby Lake' processors for Netflix 4K. These latest CPUs are the only ones capable of providing hardware accelerated decoding support for 10-bit HEVC, the video encoding format that Netflix 4K uses. The previous generation Intel CPUs only support accelerated 8-bit decoding.

Users not keen on jumping through these DRM hoops are advised to use a $99 Chromecast Ultra device with their 4K monitor to get your Netflix 4K fix.

[via Ars Technica]

My Passport Studio 2TB Portable HDD Launched By Western Digital

Portable hard drive is officially reaching its new limit at 2TB when Western Digital launch their new My Passport Studio. This new portable HDD is also officially the world’s largest HDD storage for Mac OS X in portable mode that come with dual FireWire 800 and single USB 2.0 interface. This Western Digital My Passport […]

Portable hard drive is officially reaching its new limit at 2TB when Western Digital launch their new My Passport Studio. This new portable HDD is also officially the world’s largest HDD storage for Mac OS X in portable mode that come with dual FireWire 800 and single USB 2.0 interface. This Western Digital My Passport […]

Japan plans 130-petaflop China-beating number-crunching supercomputer

Sadly, name of supercomputing monster is the boring “AI Bridging Cloud Infrastructure.”

Enlarge (credit: Argonne National Laboratory)

Japan is reportedly planning to build a 130-petaflop supercomputer costing $173 million (£131 million) that is due for completion next year.

Satoshi Sekiguchi, a director-general at Japan's ‎National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, where the computer will be built, told Reuters: "As far as we know, there is nothing out there that is as fast."

According to the Top 500 site listing the world's fastest computers, the current number-crunching champ is China's 93-petaflop Sunway TaihuLight, followed by its Tianhe-2, coming in at 34 petaflops. Japan's most powerful system at the moment is a 13.5 petaflop machine. Overall, Japan has the fourth-largest number of supercomputers in the Top 500 listing, after the US, China, and Germany.

Read 7 remaining paragraphs | Comments

No Man’s Sky devs end months of silence, release Foundation Update [Updated]

Apparent wave of patches to come; developer addresses “intense, dramatic” fan outcry.

No Man's Sky Foundation Update details

Update, November 27: A promised update to No Man's Sky has arrived—and perhaps earlier than expected. The vague promise of the patch's arrival "this week" turned into "this weekend" thanks to the patch's launch on PlayStation 4 on Sunday. (The NMS 1.1 patch will be coming to PC players at a later date.)

A six-minute video from Hello Games, posted above, explains what players can expect. Though the update had been teased primarily as a "base-building" update, it also includes two new default modes: survival and creative. The former jacks up difficulty and forces players to scrounge even more for survival-related items, while the latter turns the difficulty way down to let players explore at an even more leisurely pase.

And, yes, players can now use resources to build bases on a planet's surface, which can be filled with resource growth pods, alien helpers, and inventory storage units. Even better, players can now create and maintain a giant flying frigate, which works pretty much exactly like a surface base but can also travel from space system to space system.

Read 8 remaining paragraphs | Comments

The Tempest review: Real-time digital avatar brews storm in a teacup

Intel, Imaginarium, and RSC deserve applause but live motion-capture challenges remain.

Enlarge (credit: Intel Corporation)

The Tempest is on at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon, England and runs until January 21. It will transfer to London's Barbican Theatre in the summer of 2017. Tickets are on sale now.

On paper, the idea of bringing William Shakespeare's The Tempest into the 21st century by using live-action performance capture technology to thrill theatregoers in the bard's backyard is an exciting and daring move. In reality, Intel's collaboration with Imaginarium Studios and the Royal Shakespeare Company is a little underwhelming.

Ariel—the sprite at the centre of The Tempest, played here with poise and determination by Mark Quartley—is the obvious choice to render as a digital character on the stage. Quartley, zipped up in a skintight, superhero-like jumpsuit, is described by the team behind the production as the puppeteer. Depending on how the ship wreak-strewn stage is lit, flesh-toned sensors can be seen through his motion-capture costume, showing the audience the very modern-day puppeteer's strings. The person driving the tech—arguably the puppeteer's puppeteer—is completely hidden from view, however, as they wrestle with a computer that is appropriately dubbed Big Beast.

Read 9 remaining paragraphs | Comments

Videolan launches VLC 360 preview (with support for 360-degree previews)

A new preview build of VLC 3.0 brings support for 360-degree videos to the popular open source, cross-platform media player.
You can download the VLC 360 preview for Windows or Mac, and the source code can be compiled for Linux-based operating systems….

Videolan launches VLC 360 preview (with support for 360-degree previews)

A new preview build of VLC 3.0 brings support for 360-degree videos to the popular open source, cross-platform media player.

You can download the VLC 360 preview for Windows or Mac, and the source code can be compiled for Linux-based operating systems. The developers plan to add support for Android, iOS, and Xbox One soon, and support for virtual reality headsets including the HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, OSVR, and Google Daydream is expected sometime in 2017.

Continue reading Videolan launches VLC 360 preview (with support for 360-degree previews) at Liliputing.

Court Freezes Megaupload’s MPAA and RIAA Lawsuits

A federal court in Virginia has granted Megaupload’s request to place the cases filed by the music and movie companies on hold until April next year, while the criminal case remains pending. Meanwhile, Megaupload is working hard to ensure that critical evidence on decaying hard drives is preserved.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

megaupload-logoMegaupload was shutdown nearly half a decade ago, but all this time there has been little progress on the legal front.

Last December a New Zealand District Court judge ruled that Kim Dotcom and his colleagues can be extradited to the United States to face criminal charges, a decision that was appealed earlier this year.

While all parties await the outcome of this appeal, the criminal case in the United States remains pending. The same goes for the civil cases launched by the MPAA and RIAA in 2014.

Fearing that these might influence the criminal proceedings, Megaupload’s legal team previously managed to put these civil actions on hold, and this week another extension was granted.

U.S. District Court Judge Liam O’Grady granted Megaupload’s request to stay both lawsuits until April next year. The music and movie companies didn’t oppose the motion.

The downside of yet another delay is that the evidence remains at risk of being destroyed. Much of the Megaupload data is stored on hard drives, which according to hosting provider Cogent, are not in the best shape.

A few months ago Cogent warned that sixteen of them have actually become unreadable, which is a grave concern since they contain crucial information. Thus far this situation hasn’t been addressed, but some progress has been made.

“Counsel have met and conferred and are negotiating a preservation order regarding the Cogent Data, and they anticipate reaching an agreement and presenting a consent motion and stipulated preservation order to the Court for entry,” Megaupload informed the court.

“However, until such a preservation order is entered, the parties each reserve their rights to file motions seeking preservation of the Cogent Data on appropriate terms and conditions.”

Judge Liam O’Grady agreed with this request. In his order this week he notes that if the negotiations fail, any party may seek relief to ensure that the evidence remains intact.

For now, however, the waiting continues.

The order of U.S. District Court Judge Liam O’Grady is available here (pdf). A copy of Megaupload’s request can be found here (pdf).

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

Tablet maker Chuwi enters the laptop, mini PC markets

Tablet maker Chuwi enters the laptop, mini PC markets

Chinese device maker Chuwi is probably best known for its inexpensive tablets, but the company recently launched its first laptop, and now Chuwi is getting into the tiny desktop PC space as well.

The Chuwi Hibox Hero mini PC and Chuwi LapBook 15.6 inch notebook are both inexpensive computers powered by Intel Atom x5-Z8350 Cherry Trail processors.

The Hibox Hero features 4GB of RAM and 64GB of eMMC storage, dual-band 802.11b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0, and Gigabit Ethernet, making it a little more powerful than some devices in its class… but not exactly a unique offering.

Continue reading Tablet maker Chuwi enters the laptop, mini PC markets at Liliputing.

Tablet maker Chuwi enters the laptop, mini PC markets

Chinese device maker Chuwi is probably best known for its inexpensive tablets, but the company recently launched its first laptop, and now Chuwi is getting into the tiny desktop PC space as well.

The Chuwi Hibox Hero mini PC and Chuwi LapBook 15.6 inch notebook are both inexpensive computers powered by Intel Atom x5-Z8350 Cherry Trail processors.

The Hibox Hero features 4GB of RAM and 64GB of eMMC storage, dual-band 802.11b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0, and Gigabit Ethernet, making it a little more powerful than some devices in its class… but not exactly a unique offering.

Continue reading Tablet maker Chuwi enters the laptop, mini PC markets at Liliputing.