Archive for World
Aug
23
PCI Express 3.0 Specification Formally Delayed Until 2011
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We’ve been enjoying (or just dealing with, depending on perspective) PCI Express 2.0 since early 2007, and it now looks as if we may still be utilizing said protocol come early 2011. Way back in June of ‘08, we began to hear whispers that the next iteration of the technology would be finalized by the end of this year, but now the PCI SIG has formally delayed the release of the specification until the second quarter of 2010. What does that mean for the consumer? Try coping with the fact that you won’t see a PCIe 3.0 product until 2011. As the story goes, the delay was needed in order to “maintain backward compatibility with current PCI Express standards,” and while the technical details of all that may interest some, it’s the awfully unfortunate setback that’s most notable here. But hey, at least all those PCIe 1.0 cards that are still totally relevant will work with your next (next-next?) PC!
Aug
08
Blu-Ray Support Coming With iTunes 9?
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Take this rumor with a fairly large grain of salt and please hold your “bag of hurt” comments until the end. Boy Genius claims he’s got it on word from a “pretty reliable source” that the next big iTunes revision will include better organization options for your iPhone / iPod touch apps, something vague concerning integration with Twitter, Facebook, and Last.fm, and… Blu-ray support. To be fair, the HD disc format wars are all but over at this point, and the most recent Final Cut Pro actually lets you burn video directly to a third-party BD drive, only to have to play the discs on another, non-Mac device.
This is all pretty sketch at the moment, and we doubt the boys in Cupertino will be showing their hands until just after the eleventh hour — let’s not forget, also, that iTunes is also available for Windows which does have other third-party Blu-ray playback software. In possibly related whispers, AppleInsider has offered some none-too-descriptive hints at possible iMac refresh with some improvements catering to the “semi-professional audio / video crowd.” Between this and talk about a tablet, we can’t wait for the next Apple press conference, if only to subside all the rumors for a few months.
Aug
07
Large Hadron Collider To Run At Half-Power Until End Of 2010
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After a series of setbacks, delays, and potential world-ending mishaps, it seems that the scientists at CERN have decided to take it easy with the Large Hadron Collider, and have announced that they plan to operate it at an energy of 3.5 TeV (or trillion electron volts) per beam when they start it up again in November of this year. If that goes well, they’ll then cautiously ramp things up to 5 TeV per beam, before starting to shoot for a full 7 TeV per beam by the end of 2010. So, mark your calendars… while you still can.
Jun
14
Russian Billionaire Floats Above Economy In $350 Million Mega Yacht
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Ironically, even in this economy, the title of world’s largest yacht lasted less than a month, as Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich finally launched his record-setting 557-ft. megayacht “Eclipse” in Hamburg, Germany.
The launch bests the lavish $350 million Dubai that set sail from, yes, Dubai. At 551-ft. in length, the Dubai had been the longest yacht in the world. The Eclipse also cost a cool $350 mil to complete, but it comes with a host of modern extras and a decidedly un-tacky interior so we’re giving it the edge not only on length, but in the taste department as well.
Take for example the missile defense system that allows the crew to jam incoming pirate missiles. Or, perhaps you’ll consider the secret underwater submarine entrance, perfect for James Bond style escapes—just watch out for those underwater knife fights!
Then there’s the two heli-pads, pool with surrounding Havana bars, cinema, library, restaurant, private garden and a 5,000-sq.-ft. master bedroom, the latter of which had me feeling pretty stupid about all the bragging I did last night regarding what I pay for my new “spacious one bedroom apartment.”
Jun
03
10 Largest Diamonds In The World
Posted by: | Comments10. The Millennium Star
Weight: 203.04 carats
The Millennium Star is internally and externally flawless pear-shaped diamond (total of 54 facets). With the weight of 203.04 carats it is the 10th largest diamond in the world. Originally, the rough stone was 777 carats found in the Mbuji-Mayi district of Zaire (Democratic Republic of the Congo) in 1990. After 5 months of studying and planning the cutting of the stone, it was decided to cut the rough diamond into three pieces. The Millennium Star is the outcome of the largest piece. The value of the stone hasn’t been revealed but the Millennium Star was insured for 100 million English pounds, this is believed to be a fraction of its true worth.
9. The Red Cross
Weight: 205.07 carats
The Red Cross is canary yellow cushion-shaped diamond with weight of 205.07 carats. The rough stone weighed 375 carats and was found in Kimberly mines (South Africa) in 1901. The diamond was presented as a gift to the art sale held in London by Christies in 1918, on behalf of the British Red Cross Society and the Order of St. John. Another rare feature is that a Maltese Cross is distinctly visible in the top facet, hence the double appropriateness of its name, the Red Cross Diamond.
May
13
Windows Marketplace for Mobile Now Open to Developers
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Not much has been left to mystery with Microsoft’s Windows Mobile app store—we even know what it’ll look like. Now it has officially opened its doors to developers, and published all the rules.
Microsoft seeded most of the important stuff in advance, and at first glance these new materials don’t contain many surprises. A majority of the official submission guidelines is devoted to making sure Marketplace apps aren’t a pain in the ass: apps can’t make random calls; data requests must be user-approved; uninstallation must be clean and complete; etc. The rules are practical, like the twelve we’ve already seen, and the document softly implies that Microsoft intends to be a little more lenient than Apple. We’ll see!
As far a the developer agreement goes, the $99 annual fee and 70% dev commission still stand, while return and tax details have been laid out in full. Developers are paid when they hit $200 in commissions, which, like most of the others store policies, is somewhere around industry standard.
Sadly, the document doesn’t say when the marketplace will open, which is the only part of this whole saga that anyone cares about anymore. Don’t overestimate your hype, guys.
May
05
Tuvalu Is Sinking,Don’t Buy TV Domains GoDaddy Advice
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According to GoDaddy, you should maybe stop buying .tv domains because Tuvalu, who owns all such domain names, is currently sinking underwater. Once Tuvalu no longer exists as a nation, the domains will also disappear.
Sure, the island nation is slowly falling underwater, but all hope may not be lost yet. Valleywag points us to a USA Today article from 2004, which says there are exceptons—.su domains from the old Soviet Union are still active. But DomainNameWire refutes this, mentioning that factoid came from a VeriSign, a company that handles all domain transactions for Tuvalu, and their reasoning might be skewed. They instead reference an ICANN rule which states that domain names from any defunct country must be phased out.
So who knows what will actually happen when Tuvalu decides to swim with the fishes. But seeing that .tv domains have big time marketing appeal, I’d have trouble believing they’d just nix the domains. Still, I’m no internet domain lawyer—domain squatters, you might want to heed this warning: BEWARE OF SINKING ISLAND.
May
04
NASA Detects Mystery Booming Sound In Deep Space
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Call Dr Arroway, because NASA has detected a deep space sound that defies belief or any explanation. They don’t have a single clue about its origin, according to Alan Kogut from the Goddard Space Center:
The universe really threw us a curve. Instead of the faint signal we hoped to find, here was this booming noise six times louder than anyone had predicted.
According to NASA, “the source of this cosmic radio background remains a mystery”. It’s not primordial stars, it’s not any known radio source, and in fact, the problem here is that there is “not enough radio galaxies to account for the signal”. In other words, nothing in the known cosmos is capable of producing this deafening sound. University of Maryland at College Park’s Dale Fixsen—part of NASA’s ARCADE team— says, that to get this kind of signal, “you’d have to pack [radio galaxies] into the universe like sardines. There wouldn’t be any space left between one galaxy and the next”. So in more scientific terms: They don’t have a flying frak about what the hell this may be.
The sound has been detected by ARCADE, a balloon-borne probe which is chilled to 2.7 degrees above absolute zero. The instrument itself is inside a tank of 500 gallons of liquid helium to reach that temperature, which is the same temperature as the cosmic microwave background radiation. Needless to say, plugging into this completely unexpected and mysterious alien iPod playlist has made scientists at the Goddard Space Flight Center more excited than Jason Chen at the Las Vegas’ Adult Entertainment Expo.
