2 weeks of Dropbox for Business, FREE
With the recent release of comment support, Dropbox now makes it possible for users to communicate with one another when sharing files. Not only does this bring a fun, social element to cloud-based storage but it also facilitates teamwork. In our estimation, Dropbox is the worldwide leader in its niche and is certainly worth your time and consideration if you haven’t tried it out, yet. I’ve been a subscriber for nearly 5 years and haven’t looked back. While it’s an absolute must for individuals, it’s often foolishly overlooked when it comes time to choosing a solution for your business.
This promotion includes 5 TB of space, shared between 5 users, and is completely grow-able. You’ll have administrative controls, unlimited file recovery and the confidence of knowing your data is secure. If you run your own company or are responsible for tech at your office, give this two-week free trial a crack and you’ll see what all the fuss is about.
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Apple TV Shipping Estimate Slips to 1-2 Weeks Ahead of WWDC [iOS Blog]
Apple TV’s shipping estimate slipped to 1-2 weeks on the Apple Online Store in the United States today, less than six weeks before Apple is rumored to announce a new version of the set-top box at WWDC 2015 on June 8-12. The shipping times initially slipped to 1-2 weeks on the Apple Online Store on late Wednesday before the set-top box returned to in stock on Thursday, only to slip to 1-2 weeks again hours later.
A number of Apple products have been given longer shipping estimates in the past few weeks, possibly because of Apple Watch congestion within the company’s supply chain and delivery channels, so this change could be nothing more than a regular fluctuation. But with WWDC set to take place in early June, and a new Apple TV set-top box expected to be announced, the timing of the shipping time slipping is worth noting.
The next-generation Apple TV is rumored to feature Apple’s latest A8 system-on-a-chip and a “dramatic increase” in internal storage, well beyond the 8GB included in the current third-generation set-top box. BuzzFeed reported in March that the new Apple TV will also gain an App Store and Siri for controlling a wide selection of HomeKit-enabled home automation devices through the set-top box.
Apple TV was discounted to $69 in the U.S. in March.
Apple Watch Sport Component Costs Estimated at $83.10, Which Won’t Sit Well With Tim Cook
IHS iSuppli often tears down devices to estimate component costs, and today, the research firm released its report on the Apple Watch, suggesting it has the lowest hardware costs compared to retail price of any Apple product IHS has researched.
The 38mm Apple Watch Sport dissected by IHS was estimated to cost $81.20 when broken down by component. In IHS’ estimation, the most expensive component in the Apple Watch is the display (including OLED and Ion-X cover glass), priced at $20.50, followed by the processor on the S1 chip, priced at $10.20. In addition to component costs, IHS adds an estimated $2.50 for manufacturing costs, bringing its total estimate for the Apple Watch’s raw cost to $83.70. IHS did not give similar cost breakdowns for the stainless steel or gold Apple Watches, both of which have sapphire cover displays and different casing materials.
At $83.70, IHS says the hardware costs of the Apple Watch are “only about 24 percent” of the manufacturer’s suggested retail price of $349, while other Apple product component costs have ranged from 29 to 98 percent, giving the Apple Watch a higher potential profit margin. During Apple’s most recent earnings call, the company announced that Apple Watch profit margins would actually be slimmer than other Apple products, at least during its first quarter of availability.
“It is fairly typical for a first-generation product rollout to have a higher retail price versus hardware cost,” said Kevin Keller, senior principal analyst-materials and cost benchmarking services for IHS Technology. “While retail prices always tend to decrease over time, the ratio for the Apple Watch is lower than what we saw for the iPhone 6 Plus and other new Apple products, and could be of great benefit to Apple’s bottom line if sales match the interest the Apple Watch has generated.”
IHS’ component cost estimations come just three days after Apple CEO Tim Cook declared that component cost breakdowns on Apple products are inaccurate. “There are cost breakdowns around our products that are much different than the reality,” he said. “I’ve never seen one that is anywhere close to being accurate.”
While these types of cost breakdowns look at the potential expense related to each individual component in a device, they do not take into account other possible expenses related to product creation like research and development, advertising, software, or distribution, making them of little practical use for estimating profit margin.
IHS
Android 5.1 to hit HTC One M8 in August
Although the past few months have seen a plethora of smartphone manufacturers pushing the Android 5.0 Lollipop update out to their devices, Google has been busy working on the next minor update to the operating system, Android 5.1. The HTC One M8 was one of the “legacy” devices that received a 5.0 Lollipop update at the end of January. Users were disappointed to learn that HTC did not include the Sense 7 update in that package. HTC’s UK Twitter account has revealed the next update for the device will be coming in August with some of the improvements that users are looking for.
According to HTC UK, the next update for the HTC One M8 will include an update to Android 5.1 and it will include HTC’s Sense 7 UI. Based on some follow-up discussion in the Twitter thread, the Android 5.1 update for the HTC One M9 may hit at the same time, so HTC may be working to get those two devices on the same update schedule.
@JKMcCloskey Hey James, the HTC One M8 will have a Software Update for Android Version 5.1 and Sense 7 in August 2015
— HTC UK (@HTC_UK) April 29, 2015
Come comment on this article: Android 5.1 to hit HTC One M8 in August
Plex Music update hopes to be your “go to” music player
Plex has released an update to their Plex Music platform that they say has been in development for the past six months as part of an effort to become the “go to” music player users will choose. The effort was apparently driven by a desire to get away from iTunes for music listening purposes while acknowledging that Plex Music was not up to the task as a replacement option. That is, until now.
According to Plex, the new update includes a ton of improvements that will make managing and listening to music a lot easier. The development team started with the basics of scanning a user’s library for music. One change that was made was to start scanning newer items first and to download posters and other information while the scan is underway. Plex mentions that these scanning features will also be available for movie titles.
Once music has been scanned, Plex has added powerful tools to manage a library. This includes the ability to manually edit information, the ability to delete whole albums or artists, moving tracks between albums and vice versa, and merging albums. Users will also find they can multi-select tracks so that batch updates to information like genre can be made in one fell swoop.
Users will also find they can add a variety of related assets to their library and associate them with artists, albums or songs. This includes things like music videos, lyrics, interviews and other information. For Plex Pass members, they have integrated with Vevo.
Plex worked on their interface for Plex Music as well, trying to make it more immersive and inviting for users. Part of the improvements include new discovery algorithms to help users rediscover music that may have been buried in their library.
For Plex Pass users, they will find support from Gracenote to help organize a library by applying tags automatically. Plex also licensed a bunch of metadata from Gracenote so users get access to artist bio information, album reviews and high resolution artwork. Like some other services, Plex Pass users will be able to access some smart playlist options based on moods, like “Exuberant” to quickly build a playlist on the fly. Similarly, if a user is listening to a song, with a quick button press they can generate a custom radio station mix.
Below is a short video the Plex team put together to introduce users to the new Plex Music.
Click here to view the embedded video.
source: Plex
Come comment on this article: Plex Music update hopes to be your “go to” music player
NASA’s Messenger probe will crash into Mercury at 3:30pm ET today
It’s been a long and hard road for NASA’s Messenger Probe as it studied the surface of Mercury for the last four years. That journey, however, will come to an end today, after NASA announced that the craft will crash land into the planet at around 3:30pm ET today. The vehicle was the first that managed to make it to Mercury, and has been in service for more than a decade — far longer than administrators had ever expected it to last. In fact, the project was only meant to last for a year, but canny fuel-saving measures managed to quadruple its lifespan.
Messenger was able to make more than a few exciting discoveries, including the fact that there’s ice and organic matter close to the planet’s poles. Now that the gas tanks are finally empty, the hardware will “make a new crater,” 16 meters wide, in the planet’s surface later this afternoon. Unfortunately, there’s no way to view the incident, since the crash will take place on the side of the planet facing away from us. Still, unless you’re likely to get a telling off from your boss, pour a cold one out to the little space probe that could at 3:30pm.
Tomorrow, @MESSENGER2011 adds a crater to Mercury’s scarred face. Look back on the mission: http://t.co/9isHYI9Ycx https://t.co/xqJcgUQ749
– NASA (@NASA) April 29, 2015
[Image credit: NASA/JHU APL/Carnegie Institution of Washington]
Filed under: Transportation, Science, Alt
Source: NASA
Jeff Bezos’ first proper test rocket has successfully launched
Elon Musk may be the most famous tech billionaire with an interest in spaceflight, but he’s certainly not the only one. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos also has a company, Blue Origin, which is doing similar research into reusable craft to get us to-and-from the heavens. The normally secretive outfit has just revealed that its first test vehicle, New Shepard, made arguably its most important, partially successful test flight yesterday. In the experiment, the priapic craft took an (empty) crew capsule to a height of 307,000 feet before releasing it to float gently back to earth.
Unfortunately there was a fault in New Shepard 1’s hydraulic system, and so the company was “unable to recover” the propulsion module — a polite euphemism for crashing into the desert. Thankfully, no-one was injured, and the business is already working on building a second and third New Shepard to continue testing the vertical takeoff, vertical landing vehicle. If successful, then it’s likely that Bezos will look to offer governments a cheaper way of getting satellites, personnel and cargo into orbit, hopefully bringing us all a bit closer to the space taxi NASA’s always been jonesing for.
Filed under: Transportation, Amazon
Via: Reuters
Source: Blue Origin
10 dramatic abstract wallpapers to showcase on your homescreen
We have all been there, at an art show surrounded by marvelous works of art, only to stumble upon an abstract piece and having to pretend that we know what it’s supposed to represent. Then quickly moving on before other realize that we are not as cultured as we previously though. No, never had that happen to you? Yeah…me neither…
Well, even if that has never occurred to you, I am sure we can all agree that abstract art is beautiful, and at times, surreal. With its vibrant colors, flowing shapes, and extreme randomness, abstract is humankind’s way of letting us glimpse into that part of our brain that does not always make sense, but it is as beautiful as every other facet of said brain.
Today I present to you 10 dramatic abstract wallpapers that have been dying to make themselves at home on your mobile devices. These wallpapers come from all over the interwebs and are part of my collection of wallpapers that I have gathered over the years. Due to the fact that they have been collected over such a long period of time, I no longer have the information associated with them to determine their creators. So, if you see a wallpaper that is yours and you would like to be recognized as the artist, please drop me a comment below with proof, as I would love to give it to you.
The post 10 dramatic abstract wallpapers to showcase on your homescreen appeared first on AndroidGuys.
Chrome Dev channel arrives to Android
For Android users that enjoy living on the bleeding edge, Chrome Beta is currently the best way to get all the latest features ahead of the stable channel. But what if you want an even more experimental, cutting-edge experience, performance and stability be damned? That’s where the newly launched Chrome Dev channel for Android comes into play.
While the Dev version of Chrome for Android is intended as a way for web developers to test their sites for compatibility with new features before they roll out to more stable builds, we’re sure that the Dev channel will also be a must-have for power users that like the latest and greatest. Just like the Chrome Dev channel for desktop, Google promises that this version will be updated at least on a once a week basis. It’s also important to note that Chrome Dev can be installed alongside Chrome (stable) or Chrome Beta. That means you can test out the latest features without having to completely give up on a more stable Chrome experience.
To try out Chrome Dev, you’ll want to head on over to Google Play.
Test finds Snapdragon 808 doesn’t heat up as much as the 810
The Snapdragon 810 has been haunted by overheating rumors this year and some have wondered how much this has influenced LG’s decision to opt for a Snapdragon 808 with its new G4. Regardless of the history, testing by ArsTechnica has found that Snapdragon 808 does indeed run cooler than the 810, which shouldn’t be that surprising considering that it is two CPU cores smaller. But this appears to have some important implications for SoC performance.
To keep the tests fair, an initial two-thread performance test which runs for a set time was used to see how these two processors compared running similar workloads. The LG G4 is used to test the Snapdragon 808, while a LG G Flex 2 represents the Snapdragon 810.
The results are quite stunning, the Snapdragon 808 powered LG G4 can keep hitting its peak 1.8GHz clock speed for 6 minutes, before slowing succumbing to throttling down to 1.4GHz after almost 15 minutes. The Snapdragon 810, on the other hand, barely reaches its peak speed before appearing to throttle to around 1.4GHz and then being almost locked to its minimum speed after just three minutes.
Oddly, both processors swing widely between peak and minimum speeds, although this could be something to do with the test and/or the way that the processor handles core loads. Also keep in mind that this is just two devices tested with a single benchmark. We can’t say for certain that almost identical results would be obtained from a Snapdragon 810 powered HTC One M9 or Sony Xperia Z4. Samsung’s Exynos 7420 powered Galaxy S6 doesn’t appear to show any medium term throttling issues.
It’s also well worth pointing out that for regular, undemanding tasks this shouldn’t make a major difference to performance. But if you’re a heavy multi-tasker or gamer, the throttling that appears on the LG G Flex 2 would result in reduced performance over time. You can see a significant reduction in benchmark scores as the handset heats up, which doesn’t appear with the G4.
The results certainly point to a throttling issue with the Snapdragon 810, at least inside the LG G Flex 2, which might partially explain why we felt that the handset was a little sluggish. A complaint that we don’t have with the LG G4. While not all Snapdragon 810 powered handsets will necessarily suffer from throttling to exactly the same extent, there’s not much that different OEMs can do to cool the chip down. This certainly raises more questions and concerns about the 810’s performance as a flagship tier SoC.
Although Qualcomm says that heat had nothing to do with it, perhaps LG has played it smart by opting for the Snapdragon 808 in its new G4?
AIVAnet 