T-Mobile won’t throttle P2P users but will try to change their behaviors
You know the report that said T-Mobile would be throttling those who abuse their 4G LTE network for peer-to-peer file sharing and wrongful tethering? It appears that this is not exactly the case and that T-Mobile wants to, instead, reach out to help these people change. And, as far as there only being a select few… Read more »
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Samsung Galaxy Note 4 specs leaked with 4GB RAM, QHD display
As many of you know, the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 is expected to be announced at the upcoming IFA event on September 3rd in Berlin. Apparently Indonesian company Erafone thought it would generate news by posting what appears to be the upcoming spec sheet of the new Note 4 on its website earlier today. Not that… Read more »
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Parrot AR Drone 2.0 Elite Edition A Redesigned Toy
Thanks to the Android OS we here at AndroidSPIN get to play with quite a few toys here and there. Some of these devices blow our mind while others just fall short, thankfully the Parrot AR Drone 2.0 is mind dynamite, oh yeah I went there. I got to review the Parrot AR Drone 2.0 for AndroidSPIN and after playing around with this fun little toy I am happy to say the Parrot AR Drone 2.0 met all my expectations, well almost all of them. Let me show you what I mean in this review of the Parrot AR Drone 2.0. Elite Edition.
What’s In The Box:
- Parrot AR Drone 2.0
- Outdoor Hull
- Indoor Hull
- Battery
- Wall Charger
- Assorted Wall Outlet Plugs
- Infrared Stickers (For AR Drone Game)
Features:
Android Control App:
This is the main reason I wanted to test out the AR Drone 2.0. I wanted to see how well it would perform with the Android OS and see if there would be any issues when using the device outside. The Android app has a pretty functional design although I did get some force close pop ups here and there. The one thing I would definitely change is the placement of the emergency-landing button. When there was a real emergency it sucked having to reach across my Note 3 screen to hit that little button. Hiccups aside, the app controlled the drone beautifully. The thing I enjoyed the most was the settings section of the app, why you may ask? Well I enjoyed it because of what you can enable in the settings. The first setting is the option to enable the Drone flip. This is after all the coolest thing to do with the AR Drone so it was nice of Parrot to make it so easy to do. All you have to do is go into settings and choose what direction you want the flip to go (left, right, forward, backward). Then head back to the main screen and double tap; voila you just flipped your AR Drone in midair. This, for me, was the coolest thing about the Android app.
I did not really find myself using the direct video feed from the Parrot Drone 2.0 on my phone simply because it sucks when it comes to actually controlling the AR Parrot Drone. The camera has a limited view (forward facing) so you can’t really see what is behind or on the side of the drone. That paired with a small testing area made for some pretty nasty accidents. It a bit difficult to focus on the live video feed when having to a playful dog. The Parrot app also has a neat little feature in which you can upload your video directly to YouTube, which is a nice little bonus. Again, this something I did not use more than once.
Built-In Camera:
Now this was one of the reasons that I really wanted to test out the Parrot 2.0 drone, the built-in camera. This camera is pretty small but it can record at 720p, downside is that if you record at this rate battery life disappears pretty damn quickly. The video is pretty smooth when recording and well the camera video quality is passable but not amazing. Still it was a lot of fun getting a bird’s eye view. There is also a down facing camera but the quality is about the same quality video you would get with an old school flip phone video camera so I did not find myself using it as much.
Battery Life:
If you want to have decent battery life with the Parrot AR Drone 2.0 Elite I suggest you purchase the 1500 mAh extended battery. Maybe purchase 3. I know that time really flew by (get it J) when I was using the Drone. Seems like I had just turned it on and the low battery warning was already flashing. That is the one big downside to the Elite 2.0, battery life. If you want to use this over a long period of time make sure you get extra batteries, the 1000 mAh battery that’s included is not enough. I was only able to get about 5-7 minutes of flight time with the standard battery. When I used the camera at full resolution the number dropped down to about 4-5 minutes, tops.
Wall Charger:
When I initially received the Elite Edition Drone I had an issue with the wall charger. The battery was not receiving a charge from it and if it did it was barely trickling in. Due to this issue I had to wait for Parrot to send me a replacement charger for this review. The new charger worked perfectly, I was able to charge the battery in a few hours. Parrot also includes different plugs for their wall charger, so international customers you can rest easy.
Distance:
The Parrot AR Drone 2.0 Elite Edition got some great distance when controlled with my Note 3. Even the gyro controls performed well for me. The one thing I did not like was how high the Parrot Drone could go. Now don’t get me wrong this is obviously something we all want, height, but the issue wasn’t that it couldn’t go up high enough, no, the problem was that it went so high that I lost my connection to the drone. I got it up to about 120 feet and that’s when I lost the wireless connection. The Drone just hovered in place while I ran around looking for a way to get close enough to the drone to re-establish my connection. Sure enough I did not have to do any of that as a pretty big gust of wind came in and pushed the Drone into a tree branch causing some damage to the indoor hull and propellers. This loss of connection is a big problem.
I would have loved to see Parrot put in some sort of fail safe in which when the connection is lost the Drone flies back to the last known location of the controlling Android device and lands. That would be a much-welcomed feature. No one wants to have his or her $300 drone just hover in mid-air without any control until the battery dies. That is not a good feeling, trust me on that.
Conclusion:
The Elite AR Parrot Drone 2.0 is a great toy and the fact that it works with your mobile device is a great bonus. With that said it is still a toy, a very expensive toy to boot. It is a lot of fun when you first start playing with it but after a while you start to realize that the limitations (short battery life and connection loss) really keep you from doing too much with it. To me, this is a toy that I have to play with inside or in a very big field where I can easily go recover the drone should something happen. The $300 price tag is pretty steep for this device but if you were looking for your first drone, I would say look no further than the AR Parrot Elite 2.0 Drone. It is a beginner’s drone and you can learn a lot from it.
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The post Parrot AR Drone 2.0 Elite Edition A Redesigned Toy appeared first on AndroidSPIN.
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PlayStation’s push for indie games is epitomized by ‘The Tomorrow Children’
“It’s important to me to be able to express what I want to express.” These words come from Dylan Cuthbert, “Game Designer/Programmer/Anything” at Q Games, as he explains how his team came up with the back story for The Tomorrow Children. The forthcoming title is — by Cuthbert’s own admission — a little bit “out there;” a mix of Minecraft-esque collaborative building, social economics and a Soviet Union-themed post-apocalyptic dystopia. It’s definitely a little on the fringe. Multiplayer shooters and herculean protagonists have their place, but, as Cutbert alludes to in his gambit above, it’s probably not here. Indie doesn’t mean small though, and The Tomorrow Children, I learn, is an example of how companies like Q Games can keep to their own script (or lack of), and still benefit from the considerable support afforded by a partnership with Sony.
Earlier, during a preview session for The Tomorrow Children, the game is described as a “Marxism simulator.” The backstory? An experiment to unite all human consciousness went terribly wrong, destroying society. Over the following decades the few survivors try to rebuild humanity. Your role is to venture out into “the void” (the empty space left by the experiment,) and build a new world. Oh, there are also giant creatures to contend with that you kill and mine for materials. Y’know, all that usual stuff.
The off-beat storyline is accompanied by equally expressive artwork. Cuthbert tells me it’s inspired by sources as diverse as (among other things) old Czech puppetry, and the 1960s British drama The Prisoner. The result is cinematic, in a vintage French art house kind of way. Cuthbert is keen to point out that a lot of these decisions weren’t planned up front (as would be required by a AAA studio,) and that one of the main privileges of being independent is being able to, basically, do what you want.
But there’s a paradox. The Tomorrow Children is an indie title in spirit, but Sony is financially involved with the project. So, how does this reconcile with Q Games’ approach to game making? According to Cuthbert, it’s not only not a problem, it’s for the greater benefit of (his company’s) indie games.
“I think it doesn’t matter what size the game is [financially], as long as it’s an expression of the creator… and it hasn’t been meddled with… We just really enjoyed creating the technology [for the game], and obviously to create that technology we needed a bigger project to kinda buoy it up.”
“From the start, Sony was positive, said start experimenting and they were hands off. They just let us do anything we wanted basically.” And the result speaks for itself. How many other blockbuster titles have you opening Matryoshka dolls to collect DNA to rebuild your population? “In this game we’ve explored more ‘different’ ideas than we ever have before” says Cuthbert. Suggesting that despite dealing with suits doesn’t have to mean compromises. So, perhaps money and indie spirit aren’t so mutually exclusive after all?
The Tomorrow Children will be available in the coming months on PlayStation 4.
Filed under: Gaming, Software, Sony
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YouTube refreshes television app for set-top boxes, game consoles and smart TVs
If you use YouTube’s app on your TV, get ready for a new UI (finally!). The app has a much cleaner look now, in line with Google’s Material Design, and includes features that you’re used to seeing on your computer, smartphone and tablet, such as a guide that pops up on the left side, latest videos from your subscriptions and curated channels. The refreshed interface should pop up soon — it’s available now with Xbox One, and Google plans to roll it out to other devices within the next few weeks.
Filed under: Home Entertainment, Software, HD, Google
Source: YouTube
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Humble Bundle finally has the Android app it deserves
As great as Humble Bundle is at bringing content to your devices on the cheap, it’s worth pointing out that its Android app has been a bit lackluster — at least until today. Even though the application wasn’t completely terrible per se, there’s no doubt its looks and functionality could benefit from a makeover. The good news is there’s a new Humble Bundle app on Google Play, featuring a redesigned, cleaner user interface and some novel tools for fans of the service to use. In addition to the fresh, more intuitive design, the app now lets you sideload APKs with more ease and, for the first time, download e-books and music directly to it. It’s also easier to keep track of your purchases, including old and new, which is definitely a good thing if you often get in on the Humble deals. Let us know in the comments below if you’re liking the new app so far.
Filed under: Portable Audio/Video, Internet, Software, HD, Mobile, Google
Via: Android Police
Source: Google Play
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Activision’s dipping its toe into indie gaming with ‘Geometry Wars 3: Dimensions’
Activision creates and publishes a small group of blockbuster video games aimed at mainstream consumers. The world’s largest game publishing company handles some of gaming’s most culturally impactful titles: the Call of Duty franchise, this year’s Destiny, and the entire Blizzard catalog. This week at Gamescom 2014, Activision announced its first smaller effort in many years with Geometry Wars 3: Dimensions. As the name implies, Dimensions is the third entry in the Geometry Wars franchise — a beloved series that debuted as a minigame within the first Xbox console’s Project Gotham Racing 2. People like it so much in that completely unrelated game that it spawned into its own series.
Sadly, the studio behind the originals (Bizarre Creations) was shuttered after a commercial flop with the critically-lauded racer Blur. Some of the folks from Bizarre are back on Dimensions, now part of a new studio named Lucid. But this isn’t the return of Activision’s expanded portfolio, says Activision CEO Eric Hirshberg.
“I wouldn’t read too much into it in terms of a sea change in our business strategy,” Hirshberg told us in an interview. “It’s a passion project, a skunkworks project that we’re excited about, but it doesn’t signal an overall shift in our approach to the business.”
So, no, the move to re-launch Sierra as a label within Activision — while neato — is not part of a bigger push into the burgeoning indie game movement. Hirshberg also pointed out that some of his company’s tentpole franchises, such as the mega-popular kid’s series Skylanders, started out as “small, scrappy” projects rather than intended from the jump as the monsters they’ve become.
Activision’s taking a cautious approach with the new initiative, even. Hirshberg stressed that his company isn’t “taking our eye off the ball” of the prize: blockbuster games aimed at mainstream folks. For now, Hirshberg said Geometry Wars 3: Dimensions is “a cool passion project to hopefully make some gamers happy and do something we think is cool.” As far as we’re concerned, as long as there’s more Geometry Wars to play, everyone wins.
Filed under: Gaming, Software, HD, Sony, Microsoft
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HTC announces extremely limited HTC One M8 Phunk Studio Edition
HTC on Thursday announced a very limited edition of its HTC One M8 smartphone. Called the Phunk Studio Edition, it will be offered in a run of only 64 devices and launch on August 14 as part of a campaign. Phunk, a Singapore-based “contemporary art and design collective”, is slated to celebrate its 20th anniversary… Read more »
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Apple Meets With Thai Officials to Discuss ‘iPhone 6’ Approval Disclosure
According to a report from Thailand’s Thai Rath newspaper [Google Translate], Apple has already met with officials at the country’s National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) to discuss the recent disclosure that two iPhone 6 models have been approved by the government agency for import into the Asian country.
NBTC secretary Takorn Tantasith earlier this week released the approval information on two “iPhone 6″ models A1586 and A1524, reportedly in accordance with guidelines that require the public announcement of approved hardware. The declaration, which he also broadcast on Twitter, contained only the product name and model numbers, but no other details about the iPhone 6 handsets. As noted by several observers, the iPhone 6 approval was the first time a specific device was named in a Tweet by the NBTC secretary, making it an obvious deviation from usual practice.
4.7 and 5.5-inch iPhone 6 mockups compared to iPhone 5s
Apple is unsurprisingly upset with this public notification, claiming the disclosure released confidential information about its upcoming handset. The NBTC secretary countered Apple’s assertion, arguing that that these announcements do not reveal confidential product details and are meant to protect consumers. He said Apple would be within its rights to penalize Thailand for this leak by canceling its plans to release the iPhone in Thailand later this year, but he stands by his decision to disclose the approval. Translation by a MacRumors reader:
The Secretary General said that everything is done according to the protocol and on August 8 the NTBC has approved the two phone models. He insisted that all that was disclosed is not considered a trade secret and Apple only requested for the specification to remain a secret. As for the specs, the NBTC did not disclose anything.
Apple requested a meeting with NBTC officials to discuss the situation, with Apple emphasizing that the new device may not necessarily be called “iPhone 6″ but otherwise resolving the matter.
Mr. Takorn said that representatives from Apple South Asia from the Singapore HQ arrived to “have a chat” with him and clarified that the 2 phone models may not use the name “iPhone 6” to market and the company want to make sure that the NBTC understands this fact. Apple in Singapore will also explain the situation to Apple in the US about this matter. Apple also reassured the NBTC that this “leak” has no effect in Apple’s plan to launch and sell the iPhone in Thailand.
Rumors suggest Apple is working on two iPhone models for release in the upcoming months. The next generation handset is expected to be unveiled during a September 9 press event with a 4.7-inch model slated to go on sale shortly after the announcement. A larger 5.5-inch model may debut alongside the smaller model or up to a few months later.
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This tattooed HTC One M8 is the company’s latest Limited Edition
Of the many phone makers in the world, HTC is one of the best (if not the best) at churning out Limited Edition collector’s items that focus on unique design and features. The latest in a long series of such products (most of which are highlighted in the gallery below) is a collaborative effort with Singapore-based design collective Phunk Studios, in which the group made a specially designed HTC One M8 with its own unique packaging. Only 64 of them were created (32 in gold, 32 in silver), and they’re being used as a sneak preview of the collective’s upcoming Wonderment exhibition. As you might expect, these unique devices won’t be for sale, but HTC will be providing Engadget with one of them to give away to a lucky reader. That giveaway will take place in the coming weeks, so keep an eye out for it!
Filed under: Cellphones, Wireless, Mobile, HTC
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AIVAnet 