Just two months following the release of its new Excite tablets, Toshiba has unveiled its summer lineup of ultrabooks, featuring three new devices.
Expected to hit shelves by June/July for under $1,000 is the updated Portege Z935 and the new low-cost Satellite U845. However, it’s Toshiba’s super widescreen Satellite U845W drawing the initial buzz.
Set for a July 15 release at $1,000 and up, the U845W runs the latest Intel Core processors and touts a 500GB hard drive, up to 8GB of RAM, a 1792 x 768 display, and a 32GB or 256GB solid-state drive.
“Instead of a standard widescreen, Toshiba has built this guy with an extremely widescreen, with a full 21:9 aspect ratio; the world’s first laptop with a screen wide enough to fully display a fully widescreen film,” reports Digital Trends. “We found watching movie trailers and other video to be quite enjoyable on the 14.4-inch super widescreen, which has large speakers on either side, which provide louder sound than I’ve ever heard from a laptop.”
The Satellite U845W includes an Ethernet port, SD card slot, HDMI port and three USB 3.0 ports.
“Toshiba is also positioning this as a multitasker’s dream laptop,” notes the post. “New software lets you easily create Window layouts and snap windows into new formations and grids. We’re not sure why Windows doesn’t already have these features, but we like them.”
At the Society for Information Display’s Display Week show in Boston this week, Corning unveiled Willow Glass — a strong and flexible glass that the company plans to use for OLED and LCD displays in smartphones and other wireless devices.
Corning claims the new technology will enable devices that are lighter, thinner and possibly less expensive to manufacture.
“Corning expects Willow Glass will eventually lead substrates to be manufactured ‘roll-to-roll’ instead of ‘sheet-to-sheet’ — similar to how newspapers are printed,” explains Engadget.
The cousin to Corning’s Gorilla Glass, the new ultra-thin glass can withstand heat up to 930 degrees Fahrenheit, and could potentially lead to the production of curved displays that could be wrapped around a device or structure.
“Corning Willow Glass is formulated to perform exceptionally well for electronic components such as touch sensors, as well as leveraging glass’s natural hermetic properties as a seal for OLED displays and other moisture and oxygen-sensitive technologies,” notes the press release.
In addition to CE devices such as smartphones and tablets, the technology may be used for other applications including solar cells and lighting.
The Engadget post includes the Corning press release and a brief video demo.
The International Telecommunications Union has agreed to a new draft recommendation on tech details for Ultra High Definition Television (UHDTV).
Interestingly, the ITU has agreed on a draft recommendation for two resolutions — 3840 x 2160 and 7680 x 4320.
“The resolutions will be called 4K and 8K,” reports SlashGear. “The 4K standard will have a resolution of 8-megapixels with the 8K version getting 32-megapixels.”
There is no timetable for the commercial release of UHDTV, but the post suggests it may not take too long, considering the recent decline of global TV sales and slow adoption of 3D TV.
“However, it could take much longer for broadcasters to adopt higher-resolution programming,” notes SlashGear. “The first place to see higher-resolution images would likely be from movies on Blu-ray or other formats.”
According to a recent press release from the Advanced Television Systems Committee, the organization has “announced the approval of the ATSC NRT (Non-Real-Time) Content Delivery standard, a backwards-compatible enhancement to digital TV broadcasting that provides a framework for the delivery of a broad range of exciting new services. The new ATSC NRT standard is designated as A/103.”
Delivery of non-real-time services via A/103 will “allow broadcasters to deliver file-based content, including programs and clips, information for emergency alerts and even commercial applications such as digital signage.”
The new broadcast standard will support terrestrial transmission and mobile DTV receivers.
“ATSC’s new NRT standard gives broadcasters the capability to deliver all types of file-based content to consumers,” explains ATSC President Mark Richer. “Using broadcast television, programmers will be able to send content that a viewer may watch at their convenience.”
The release cites several anticipated applications for NRT services including: “Push Video-On-Demand (content ranging from short-form video clips to feature length movies); news, information and weather services; personalized TV channels; music distribution; [and] reference information on a wide range of topics.”
“This will make broadcast more competitive with satellite, cable and Internet services,” notes ETCentric staffer Phil Lelyveld.
Early reviews for Microsoft’s Windows 8 are trickling in, and Business Insider notes they are so far “extremely negative.” Will Windows 8 become the next Vista?
“In my time with Windows 8, I’ve felt almost totally at sea — confused, paralyzed, angry, and ultimately resigned to the pain of having to alter the way I do most of my work,” writes Farhad Manjoo for Slate.
“Windows 8 looks to me to be an unmitigated disaster that could decidedly hurt the company and its future… The real problem is that it is both unusable and annoying,” notes John Dvorak for Marketwatch.
“I still think it’s needlessly confusing and hard to use… I’ve spoken to other people who have been testing Windows 8 for months,” adds analyst Matt Rosoff. “A lot of them found it puzzling like I did, and it’s getting worse, not better, with each beta update.”
If consumers agree with these evaluations, they may just put off upgrading their systems or switch to a Mac or iPad. The article notes that this could be disastrous for Microsoft and possibly mark the beginning of the end for Windows dominance.
“It’s dangerous to predict the decline of Windows. People have been doing it for years and it’s amounted to nothing. Microsoft is a powerful, resilient company,” comments Business Insider. “However, if ever there was a time when it was ready to fall, that time is now. Apple is at the top of its game. And, if the critics are even half-right, Microsoft is at the bottom of its game.”
Netflix upgraded its iOS app last week by improving upon some existing functionality and adding new features.
The streaming video service has updated the iPhone and iPad software by enlarging the scrub bar to make it easier to navigate through videos, enlarging the volume controls, and adding icons for switching between language choices.
Additionally, a “do not share” option is now available in the player for Facebook users who want to keep their video choices private.
CNET highlights the scrub bar update: “The bar itself is bigger and better, letting you more easily navigate to any section of your video. Thumbnails now appear above your finger on the scrub bar so you can travel to a specific scene of your favorite TV show or movie. You can also rewind 10 seconds at a time.”
According to the Netflix blog, the same features will soon be available for Android users.
Sony has announced its new home cinema projector that offers super high-definition at 4096 x 2160 image resolution.
“The VPL-WV1000ES is the first 4K resolution projector designed for home theaters,” reports Electronista. “The new projector displays not only the ultra-high definition 4K format, but also upscales SD and HD content to 4K resolution.”
The $26,000 projector touts brightness of 2,000 ANSI-lumens and 1,000,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio with a 330W bulb promising 2,000-2,500 hours of life.
It features a 2.1x motorized zoom and can display images from 60 to 300 diagonal inches.
“The projector also supports 3D content, although it relies upon active-shutter 3D glasses, requiring USB-chargeable 3D glasses,” notes the article. “It comes with two HDMI ports, component input, a mini D-sub port, and an Ethernet port.”
Developers are building on top of Pinterest in an effort to feed consumer and brand needs and monetize the site’s growing popularity.
The interest has sparked competitors such as Fancy (iOS app with “buy now” functionality that recently reached one million users) and third party applications including ShopMyPins (simple bookmarklet that enables users to shop online when they see something they like on Pinterest).
Related services include PinShoppr, Pinerly and Curalate (the latter two offer analytics for brands).
“The whole conversation revolving around Pinterest and Pinterest-types and their ability to turn this new, visual, viral thing people have taken to at an astounding rate into a viable e-commerce model doesn’t end at proprietary applications though,” notes Digital Trends. “Third party developers are well aware that there’s an opportunity for them to be a part of this Web evolution as well.”
Should Pinterest be creating its own new features? “I think Pinterest is kind of going through a similar thing that Twitter went through when they were growing explosively and I really think they are focusing on the right thing,” responds Apu Gupta, Curalate CEO and co-founder. “You have to make sure the wheels stay on the bus before you do other things.”
Reports indicate that users can expect to see Facebook integrated into the upcoming iOS 6 — an announcement likely to be officially made by Apple during the upcoming WWDC, slated for June 11-15 in San Francisco.
It was only a matter of time, according to The Verge, which notes that “both iOS 4 and Apple’s much-maligned Ping music/social network service both were hinted to have Facebook integration in early versions, only to have the final product released without it.”
“Twitter will still very much be a part of the new iOS (presumably named ‘iOS 6’ and codenamed ‘Sundance’), and that company will be holding sessions at WWDC to chat more about the continued partnership (including the integration into the forthcoming OS X Mountain Lion),” reports TechCrunch.
“Facebook integration will be very important for iOS — tons of apps use Facebook for sign-ups and authentication (many use Facebook as the only way to do this, to the dismay of some),” adds TechCrunch. “Apple was undoubtedly watching this activity and realized that it was time to formally bring Facebook on board.”
Mobile devices using iOS can wirelessly share photos with Web-connected devices through the new Photobeamer app from Scalado.
The 99-cent app can transmit to game consoles, smart TVs, PCs and tablets (as long as the browser is pointed to the Photobeamer home page).
“Having given it a quick test, we’d say it’s definitely up to regular domestic challenges where you just want to display a few photos rather than perhaps videos or presentation slides, and where there’s no need to print or store shared images,” notes Engadget.
“You can swipe left and right between different pictures in your gallery, and also choose whether you want those images to be fitted to the recipient display or resized to fill it,” adds the post.
Some 1,700 software developers are turning to NeuroSky’s MindWave Mobile headset as a controlling interface for video games and other applications.
The $129 headset claims to be sensitive to brain waves and can wirelessly beam digital information derived from the brain to computers and other devices.
“So far the headsets are confined to mostly digital interfaces — videogames and movies whose plots can be altered with the mind — although in some cases real-world objects have been used, like a pair of catlike ears that move depending on a person’s mood,” reports the Wall Street Journal.
“All of the companies vying to emerge in the brain-wave market are using electroencephalograph, or EEG, technology, which measures the brain’s electrical impulses in the forehead and has long been used to diagnose epilepsy and other brain disorders,” notes the article. “The headsets contain a sensor that detects various mental states, and a chip converts the signals from analog format to digital so they can travel wirelessly to a computer.”
“There is going to be a whole ecosystem of new players, and NeuroSky is very well-positioned to be like the Intel of this new industry,” suggests Alvaro Fernandez, chief executive of consultancy SharpBrains.
The company faces competition from San Francisco-based Emotiv Systems and its $300 multi-sensor headset.
Cineastes are turning to a relatively new business model for their collections: DVDs and Blu-ray discs via MOD (“manufactured-on-demand”).
“MOD discs can be purchased only online — from Amazon and more specialized websites — and they are not available for rent through services like Netflix,” notes the Wall Street Journal.
“The leader in MOD in every respect is Warner Brothers, which has led the charge since this technology’s commercial debut three years ago,” explains the article. “Warner not only oversees the biggest catalog — more than 1,000 titles to date sold under the Warner Archive label — but also runs a robust retail operation via its website (www.wbshop.com).”
MOD titles are also currently available from Sony, MGM and Universal.
The article cites an array of hard-to-find and lesser known films: “Viewers may find other titles that interest them more, but that’s the sport of it. MOD allows us to discover new adventures in cinema two ways — by building on what we already cherish and by taking chances with the utterly unfamiliar. And now a vast trove of both lies before us.”
Samsung launched new computers this week based on Google’s Chrome operating system, including a lightweight laptop and versatile new desktop machine.
Additionally, Google has announced “enhancements to Chrome OS and Google Apps, including tight integration with Google Drive and the ability to edit Google Docs documents offline,” reports PCWorld.
The $449-549 Chromebook Series 5 550 laptop has an Intel Celeron 867 dual-core processor, 4GB of RAM and 12.1-inch display (1280×800). The Samsung Chromebox Series 3 desktop features an Intel Celeron B840 dual-core processor, 4GB of RAM and built-in Wi-Fi.
“Coming later will be a tight integration with the Google Drive cloud storage service, as well as the ability to edit Google Docs documents when the machine is offline,” notes the article. “When available, this Google Docs offline editing feature will be available to all Google Docs users, not just people who buy these new Samsung machines.”
The computers feature an apps-centric user interface with simplified app launcher, a more sophisticated media player, native photo editor and enhanced video streaming options for services such as Netflix and YouTube.
The new version of Google’s Chrome operating system features improved support for online video and word processing services, intended to drive sales of Chromebook computers.
The new release comes a few months ahead of Microsoft’s Windows 8 touch-based OS.
“The system is impressive, and designed to work seamlessly with Google products like Android phones and the (still-underwhelming) Google Plus social network,” reports The New York Times. “It is also clearly pointed at Microsoft, just as Microsoft is preparing to introduce Windows 8, one of the biggest changes to its operating system ever.”
“People participate in ecosystems,” says Sundar Pichai, head of the Chrome project at Google. “If you are a Chrome browser user, an Android user and a Gmail user, a Chromebook is a more natural experience than a Windows 8.”
Chromebooks require an Internet connection for access to most applications. “By default you will be able to get the last 100 documents you were working on,” adds Pichai. “When you go back online, it will resynch with your files and update everything.”
Samsung is introducing Chrome-based laptops and desktop computers this week.
Executives from major broadband and media companies such as Disney, Netflix and AT&T were given seats this week on the FCC’s new Open Internet Advisory Committee.
The newly-formed advisory panel is tasked with helping the FCC administer its Net neutrality plan.
The controversial order (adopted in 2010 and facing a court challenge by Verizon), requires service providers to offer equal access speeds to rival services and prohibit them from favoring their own content.
“While the committee does not include some of the most vocal opponents of Net neutrality, some of the companies represented are publicly ambivalent about the FCC’s order, including AT&T,” notes Hillicon Valley.
Harvard Law professor Jonathan Zittrain will chair the committee and MIT research specialist David Clark will serve as co-chair.
Additional companies and organizations with a panel presence include Comcast, Cisco, Alcatel-Lucent, the Writers Guild of America and the National Urban League.
Just two months following the release of its new Excite tablets, Toshiba has unveiled its summer lineup of ultrabooks, featuring three new devices.
