‘Steve Jobs’ Releases in Select Theaters as First Full Scene Debuts Online
The much-anticipated Steve Jobs film today releases in select theaters across the United States, following its debut at a few film festivals throughout September and October. To coincide with the film’s release, on its YouTube channel Universal Pictures has published a handful of new TV spots, inside looks, and the first full clip from the movie. In the scene, Seth Rogen as Steve Wozniak confronts Michael Fassbender’s Steve Jobs over the impending launch of the NeXT Computer.
Alongside the scene, Universal shared four new TV spots for the movie that have been promoting its release over the past few weeks, most of them centering around Rolling Stone’s four-star review of the film. The company also shared “a look inside” the newly released film, including short interview clips with its cast and crew that focus on writer Aaron Sorkin and director Danny Boyle.
The first impressions of the film at festivals in Telluride and New York have been largely positive, centering on Fassbender’s performance and the risky, yet rewarding liberties that Sorkin takes with certain aspects of Jobs’ life. Currently, the film sits at a 91 percent fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, with 50 fresh reviews to 5 rotten.
Steve Jobs launches today in select theaters in New York and Los Angeles and will see a slow rollout to more select theaters in places like Toronto and Boston on October 16. The actual, wide release is set for closer to the end of the month on October 23.
Apple’s iPhone 6s and 6s Plus are now available SIM-free
Apple is now selling unlocked versions of the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus, giving you options if you’d rather not be tied to a contract or want a handset that works in other countries. The downside, of course, is that you’ll pay the full retail price without those carrier subsidies — starting at $649 for the (controversial) 16GB iPhone 6s at Apple Stores or online. In addition, Apple has started rolling out its latest iPhones in 36 new countries, including Mexico, Russia, Taiwan and Spain. They’re now available in 48 nations, and will hit about 80 more by the end of the year.
Via: 9 to 5 Mac
Source: Apple
ICYMI: Smart measuring leggings, 3D-printed Adidas and more
Today on In Case You Missed It: LikeAGlove’s new smart leggings that measure your body, then match you to the perfectly-fitted pair of jeans just went on pre-sale for $40. A new camera that reminds us of Lytro because of post-photo focusing abilities uses spider eyes as inspiration for its rig of 16 lenses with different focal lengths. But, it’ll cost you at least $1,300. So soak that in for awhile. Meanwhile Adidas wants to 3D-print midsoles that are designed specifically for customer’s foot contours.
And just because it’s Space Week, we are briefly touching on the news that NASA found blue skies and frozen water on Pluto, while giving you a way to get calm again in case that news simply reminds you that Pluto isn’t technically a planet anymore. Total jerk move, right?
If you come across any interesting videos, we’d love to see them. Just tweet us with the #ICYMI hashtag @engadget or @mskerryd.
ICYMI: Smart measuring leggings, 3D-printed Adidas and more
Today on In Case You Missed It: LikeAGlove’s new smart leggings that measure your body, then match you to the perfectly-fitted pair of jeans just went on pre-sale for $40. A new camera that reminds us of Lytro because of post-photo focusing abilities uses spider eyes as inspiration for its rig of 16 lenses with different focal lengths. But, it’ll cost you at least $1,300. So soak that in for awhile. Meanwhile Adidas wants to 3D-print midsoles that are designed specifically for customer’s foot contours.
And just because it’s Space Week, we are briefly touching on the news that NASA found blue skies and frozen water on Pluto, while giving you a way to get calm again in case that news simply reminds you that Pluto isn’t technically a planet anymore. Total jerk move, right?
If you come across any interesting videos, we’d love to see them. Just tweet us with the #ICYMI hashtag @engadget or @mskerryd.
A robot made me (marginally) better at ping pong
We’re back for a rematch. The ping-pong robot has had an upgrade or two, and in Rocky-style, your rival is now your trainer. Yep, the newest demo from Omron (a company better know for its healthcare products), aims to help you play it at table tennis. The entire table has been upgraded into a display, showing the predicted path of the ball, and even where the meatsack player should be hitting it. Slideshow-327648
To handle the additional task of where the ball goes once the robot hits it, it involves more processing power — and thus a new computer behind it all. (Appearance-wise, the robot looks just as eerily spooky as last time). It’s meant to be a showcase of the company’s skills in automation: the robot seems to return more shots than last time (clever girl), and the “training wheels” easy option is a welcome addition. There’s a degree of pressure playing ping-pong against a robot in front of a crowd of trade show attendees — it’s a good warm up. We’re hoping the next model brings one important upgrade: smacktalk.
The US government won’t force backdoor access, but still wants it
Here’s some good news: the government has decided not to push for a law that would force tech companies to include backdoors in their software. The move means that your encrypted communications from services like WhatsApp and iMessage, will remain unreadable to law enforcement officials. That said, it’s not the win for privacy and freedom that you might hope it to be, since officials are still going to be ringing up CEOs to quell their resistance. The Washington Post quotes one spokesperson saying that the National Security Council is “actively engaged” with these firms to “ensure they understand” the risks that come from encrypted dick pics. This is probably the right time to remind everyone that, when asked, the FBI’s director James Comedy couldn’t name a single investigation that was hindered by encrypted data.
@JimmyChalk @evacide Worst case scenario is silent capitulation from the companies. The Administration is now publicly counting on it.
— Nate Cardozo (@ncardozo) October 9, 2015
The EFF is similarly cynical about the news, describing it as a “partial victory” for privacy campaigners across the land. The organization feels that the government will now spend much more time and effort to pressure companies like Apple and Google to include secret backdoors — from behind closed doors. That’s why it’s throwing its weight behind the Save Crypto movement, which is looking to raise 100,000 signatures on the White House’s online petitions site. The movement is backed by plenty of high-profile names in the tech industry, including the CEA, Mozilla and Twitter. And, if that isn’t enough to sway the administration’s mind, perhaps they should consult with a former director of the NSA — who said only a couple of months ago that adding backdoors would make America more vunlerable to a cyberattack.
[Image Credit: Getty]
Source: EFF, Washington Post, Save Crypto
Heat and your phone: Experiment time!
A
t long last, the generation of the problematic Snapdragon 810 powered devices seems to be drifting off on the horizon. We’ve already heard multiple rumors about the 820 and what devices it could end up powering, but today we’re going to be focusing on what’s already here, namely the 810 and 808.
As overheating is one of the characteristics so prominent in these chipsets, we decided to set up an experiment to see just how heat really affects the performance of a phone. This is obviously not a very scientific experiment, but it nevertheless paints an accurate picture of what happens when the CPU is a bit too hard at work. This is also not focused on the 810: It is tested on the G4 with the Snapdragon 808, giving a better overall picture on what happens with a device under heat.
Firstly, we began heating up the G4. With the screen brightness on 100%, we gave it the hairdryer treatment. No, this is not cheating: We want to see what happens with extreme heat, not how the chipset handles strenuous tasks, remember? (Albeit a bit exaggerated). The phone hit 133°F (56°C) in a few minutes, and was a too hot to comfortably handle.
Now, to get some idea of the performance, we ran the Antutu benchmark. For those of you that aren’t sure what that is, it is an application designed to measure your device’s speed, and gives you a total score based on the test outcome.
A few minutes passed, and we were given a score of 24,246.
Considering that the score of a G4 at normal temperature is around 49,000 (and the G2 comes in at 33,300), the heat had a massive visible impact on how well the phone performed. The device was slower and was dropping frame rates heavily. In other words, the heat totally ruined not only the synthetic benchmark, but also real life performance.
It should be mentioned that thermal throttling most likely also took a knock to the CPU. While heat can naturally stymie performance, software would’ve kicked in that told the phone to switch off some cores (the G4 has 6 cores) and limited the speed of the remaining cores. This was all the fuss about the 810 as well: OEMs were forced to deliberately slow down your phone.
Heat also degrades and damages components within your device, which is the reason throttling happens. This happens with all electronics.
During this time, the battery had 11% swiped off (in less than seven minutes) and the camera was only showing a black screen, a testament of the other side effects that can plague your phone under extreme temperatures. While it’s likely that your phone won’t reach 133°F by itself (at least, we hope), this does give an overall impression of what happens inside your beloved Android.
Then, I let it cool down itself for twenty minutes. As I was intending to send it to the freezer, I didn’t want to experience a case of spontaneous glass breakage which occurs when glass (the screen, in this case) shatters due to sudden temperature changes. Fortunately this was unlikely, and I placed it in a plastic bag before situating it in the depths of my freezer.
Another twenty-five minutes had passed before I promptly removed it and began testing again. Trying not to touch it with my warm hands, the temperature registered at 35ºF (1.6ºC). Running the application resulted in a score of 51,707, more than double the previous score, and slightly higher than the average score which was not stipulated as an exact number.
The frame rate was also significantly higher, coming in with an average of 32 fps as compared to the overheating 17 fps. This was displayed on Antutu while testing graphics.
However, there was very little gain with colder temperatures if you can recognize that the score was a bit more than that of standard room temperature. I suppose if we really want to see a boost, some liquid Nitrogen will be required, but we don’t quite want a shattered phone.
And that concludes our test, at least with the G4. We can clearly see that heat made a huge impact on the total performance, while coldness of the same extent only made marginal differences. We can only hope that this is not again the subject of topic as the new chipsets await their entrance.
The post Heat and your phone: Experiment time! appeared first on AndroidGuys.
The DMV is publishing self-driving car accident reports
The California DMV has released the reports for a full year’s worth of self-driving car accidents. From the accounts in the paperwork none of the eight accidents involving Google’s cars can be blamed on autonomous technology. In fact, six out of eight of the accidents were drivers rear-ending one of the company’s retrofitted Lexus RX450h SUVs, half of those while the robotic vehicle was stationary. It’s worth noting that all the accounts come from Google, which is required by law to file documents within ten days of a collision.
Google began publishing accident reports (with the exact language as used in the DMV paperwork) in May of this year, so the events detailed by the DMV are all known. Only one other company, Delphi Automotive, has had a car involved in an accident in the past year, and that was while the vehicle was being driven by a handler, rather than a machine. However, there are no less than ten companies testing self-driving vehicles in the state, and Apple is at least considering entering the fray. The DMV’s willingness to publish full reports means that Apple and any other company testing vehicles needs to be prepared for Google-like public transparency while working on their self-driving projects.
Source: California DMV
First Nexus 4 Android 6.0 Marshmallow ROM already up
Nexus 4 owners were probably disappointed to discover that their smartphone is missing out on Android 6.0 Marshmallow updates from Google this week. However, the custom ROM community has stepped up once again and already has a working version of Marshmallow for Mako, with more options on the way too.
Dmitry Grinberg appears to be the first with a working AOSP ROM uploaded on his site, complete with instructions on how to put together a build yourself, should you so wish. There are also some installation instructions for the files down in the comments section of the page, which are certainly worth a read if you are new to this type of thing.
Google Plus user Aldrin Holmes also looks to have his own Marshmallow ROM for the Nexus 4 very nearly ready for release. At last check in the ROM is around 80 percent done, with a zip file on the way shortly. Although there is no confirmed ETA.
Of course, you will need to find your own copy of GAPPS if you want the full Android experience, which includes the essential Google services such as the Play Store. After a little searching around, early testers don’t appear to be having consistent success with various files floating around online right now, so it might be worth waiting for a confirmed solution to appear before diving into Marshmallow on the Nexus 4.
What to expect: A tour of Android 6.0 Marshmallow
Although Google may not be supporting Marshmallow on the Nexus 4, there is a good chance that the development community will have users covered with a stable alternative very soon.
You can buy the OnePlus 2 without an invite during the Open Sale on October 12
One of the most common complaints about the smartphone manufacturer, OnePlus, is that you have to wait for an invite before you can actually buy one of its handsets. It hasn’t been helped that its latest device, the OnePlus 2, has been in short supply, the global rollout of invites has experienced delays, resulting in yet more frustration. It will come as good news then, to learn that OnePlus is holding an Open Sale on October 12, where you can snag a OnePlus 2 without needing an invite. As you might expect, though, with this being OnePlus, things aren’t quite as simple as it might seem.
The Open Sale will be open for a one-hour period, covering four time zones, and there’s a maximum of 2 handsets per order. OnePlus do state that you can place as many orders as you like, though.
Open Sale times:
- Asia: 12-1pm HKT
- Europe: 12-1pm CEST
- North America: 12-1pm PDT, 3-4pm ET
- India: 12-1pm IST, visit the OnePlus page on Amazon.in and add the device to your basket
Shipping times are fluid, in that the sooner you place an order, the sooner it will be shipped, but OnePlus warns that order processing times could differ due to the demand. Finally, if you place an order for the OnePlus 2 during the Open Sale, and subsequently receive an invite, you can cancel the order to use the invite, thereby avoiding the wait.
Will you be placing your order for a OnePlus 2 during the Open Sale despite the alleged missing features? Let us know in the comments.
Source: OnePlus
Come comment on this article: You can buy the OnePlus 2 without an invite during the Open Sale on October 12
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