Activision asked an employee to "dig up dirt" on Call of Duty developers, Jason West and Vince Zampella.
By JOHNATHAN GREY CARTER 17 MAY 2012

According to a court document obtained by the Los Angeles Times, Activision's former IT chief, Thomas Fenady, testified that he was asked by Activision's in-house lawyer, George Rose, to hack Zampella and West's voicemail, email and computers in what he called "Operation Icebreaker."

Fenady testified that the aim of the operation was to build a case for firing West and Zampella; either because they were planning on jumping ship to EA, or because Activision owed them royalty money, depending on which side of the drawn-out court battle between the two parties you believe. Rose testified that the operation was formed as part of "contingency planning" about the Modern Warfare developers' future with the company. Told not to "worry about the repercussions of [his] actions," Fenady tried to hire an outside company, InGuardians, to perform the task, but the company apparently couldn't get past the "legal hurdles" the operation presented. Stymied, Fenady approached Activision's Facilities department with a cunning plan. If they could stage a "fake fumigation" and a "mock fire drill," Zampella and West would be pulled away from their computers long enough for someone, who I like to imagine would be dressed as a ninja, to copy the contents of their hard drives. Fenady's plan never reached fruition, and Activision and its attorneys refused to comment on his testimony.

Read more here –>escapistmagazine.com

AMD touts 12-hour battery life and big performance gains with Piledriver CPU core
By Chris Martin MAY 16, 2012

AMD has announced its second-generation "Trinity" Accelerated Processing Units. The A-Series APUs are aimed at laptops, PCs, and embedded hardware. AMD's latest processors will come in dual- and quad-core variations and go toe-to-toe with Intel's third-generation Ivy Bridge Core chips. 

AMD touts a "ground up" improvement compared to the previous generation with double the performance per watt. Eyeing the Ultrabook market, the firm quotes up to 12 hours of battery life for notebooks by way of the power-optimized "Piledriver" CPU core. Like Ivy Bridge, there is also a focus on graphics performance. The Trinity chips will have Radeon HD 7000-Series graphics giving an improvement of up to 56 percent on the previous generation. "Our second-generation AMD A-Series APU is a major step forward in every performance and power dimension, allowing users to enjoy a stunning experience without having to give up the things that matter to them most. This experience doesn't stop at mainstream notebooks. It carries over into affordable ultrathin form factors featuring the latest in AMD Radeon graphics," said Chris Cloran, corporate vice president at AMD.

Read more here –>infoworld.com

By Chloe Albanesius May 16, 2012

Approximately 40 percent of the Android-based smartphones sold during the first quarter were produced by Samsung, according to new stats from Gartner. No other vendor nabbed more than 10 percent of the global market. Overall, some 81 million Android-based smartphones were sold during the quarter for 56.1 percent of the market, up from 36.4 percent during the same time period last year. 

Apple's iOS came in second place with 22.9 percent of the market, up from 16.9 percent last year. Symbian held on in third place with 8.9 percent, but that was a drop from 27.7 percent last year. RIM also took a dip, from 13 percent in 2011 to 6.9 percent in the first quarter. Samsung's bada platform bested Microsoft, with 2.7 percent to 1.9 percent, respectively. In terms of overall cell phone sales, Samsung topped Nokia with 86.6 million units shipped and 20.7 percent of the market, a 25.9 percent year-over-year increase. Nokia sold 83.1 million for 19.8 percent of the market, down from 25.1 percent last year. Apple landed at number three thanks to sales of its iPhone 4S. Cupertino sold 33.1 million smartphones during the quarter for 7.9 percent of the cell phone market, up from 3.9 percent last year. Gartner said Apple sales were particularly strong in China, where it sold more than 5 million units to become the company's second-biggest market after the U.S. RIM sold 9.9 million handsets in the first quarter, with its global share dropping over the last year from 3 percent to 2.4 percent. "RIM desperately needs to deliver winning BB10 products to retain users and stay competitive," Anshul Gupta, principal research analyst at Gartner, said in a statement. "This will be very challenging, because BB10 lacks strong developer support, and a new BB10 device will only be available in the fourth quarter of 2012."

Read more here –>pcmag.com

Nvidia’s new Kepler GPU integrates hardware virtualization
By Loyd Case, May 16, 2012

Virtual machines is one way enterprise IT departments addresses the issue of security when users want to use their own platforms. Virtualized solutions like Citrix and VMWare allow users to run approved applications. These applications run in a server in the local or internet cloud.

However, some power users, including heavy users of graphics and design applications need access to more robust graphics than most virtual solutions provide. The latest versions have allowed high performance GPUs to be virtualized, but it was an expensive solution, since each user still needed a dedicated GPU. The latest Kepler GPU line from Nvidia, which is the heart of the GTX 680 graphics card, contains hardware virtualization hooks, including a hardware memory management unit capable of translating virtual addresses. But just the hooks alone don’t make a solution, so Nvidia is including a software based GPU hypervisor and manageability tools. The entire package is called Nvidia VGX, and will also include boards running four modest GPUs with just 192 cores each, which can be installed in enterprise servers. The VGX Hypervisor integrates into commercial hypervisors, like Citrix XenServer. When users are running graphics intensive applications off the server, the right amount of GPU resources can be virtually allocated. It’s a more cost effective solution than providing a graphics card per user.

Read more here –>pcworld.com

When Apple, Google, and Microsoft all hold developer events in San Francisco in June, you'll get a peek at what's next for smartphones. Here's what might pop up.
By Eric Zeman May 12, 2012

June is going to be a big month for iOS, Windows Phone, and Android. The progenitors of these three platforms–Apple, Microsoft, and Google, respectively–each have scheduled developer events in San Francisco throughout the month. None of the companies has tipped its hand on what to expect, but we have a pretty good idea.

Typically, these events are spread out. Microsoft typically holds its MIXX developer conference in February or March, and Google I/O is usually in April or May. This year all these events are scheduled back-to-back between June 11 and June 28. Apple's Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) is set for June 11-15 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. Microsoft's event, the Windows Phone Developer Summit, is scheduled for June 20 and 21. A location has yet to be announced, though it will likely be at Moscone. Last, Google I/O is taking place at Moscone June 27-29. In other words, we'll learn about changes to iOS, Windows Phone, and Android in an action-packed, 17-day timeframe. It's going to be fun.

Read more here –>informationweek.com

By Leo Kelion May 15,2012

Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) has launched its new Trinity processor family boasting "twice the performance per watt" of its earlier Llano chips. Like Intel's rival Ivy Bridge release, the update includes up to four CPU (central processing unit) cores and a single GPU (graphics processing unit). 

AMD claims its product offers gamers a superior experience. The first computers using the chips go on sale in June, with the US launch of a Hewlett Packard "Sleekbook". AMD's focus on low power requirements reflects manufacturers' desire to offer thinner laptops and slimmer all-in-one desktop models. Trinity can be set to run off as low as 17 watts, half the minimum amount possible using Llano. The move should also allow traditional-sized laptops to run off their batteries for longer. The firm says systems could last up to 12 hours, although the figure cannot be verified until models utilising the chips are released. Recycled power: While Intel has shifted to a new manufacturing process – radically changing the design of its transistors – to make gains, AMD has opted for an alternative innovation. The "Piledriver" architecture of its CPU cores introduces an energy-saving technique called "resonant clock mesh technology" which allows it to "recycle" some of the energy consumed as it carries out calculations. "Over the past decade, several test chips successfully demonstrated a variety of resonant clocking implementations," AMD's chief technology officer Steve Scott told the BBC.

Read more here –>bbc.co.uk

By Alexandra Chang May 15, 2012

While other ultrabook manufacturers strive to mimic the aluminum casing of Apple’s MacBook Air, Lenovo is sticking to its timeless ThinkPad design, but updating it to be thinner and lighter. The company on Tuesday unveiled its new 14-inch ThinkPad X1 Carbon, an updated X1 ultrabook made with carbon fiber underpinnings.

Lenovo’s latest ultrabook has a bigger screen than its predecessor, the 13-inch X1, but is actually lighter thanks to its carbon fiber “roll cage” — the skeletal chassis into which the notebook’s components are inserted. The X1 Carbon weighs 3 pounds compared to the 3.8 pounds of the X1. This also makes the ThinkPad X1 Carbon the lightest 14-inch, business-class ultrabook around, Lenovo says. The ThinkPad X1 Carbon comes with built-in 3G connectivity, a 1600×900 screen, Dolby Home Theater v4, a 720p HD camera with face-tracking capabilities, and a backlit keyboard. It’ll pack Intel’s third-generation Ivy Bridge processors. When we reviewed the ThinkPad X1, one of our biggest complaints concerned the notebook’s battery life — it lasted a meager 2 hours and 44 minutes in our testing. Unfortunately, Lenovo hasn’t yet released any battery-life stats for the X1 Carbon, but we’re hoping that it does better than the X1. The company did note that it will make a “Rapid Charge” battery option available to users, which will charge the battery to 80 percent in half an hour.

Read more here –>wired.com

Biggest launch in nearly a decade
By Iain Thomson 10th May 2012

Intel is planning its biggest marketing campaign since the launch of Centrino in 2003 in an attempt to make Ultrabook laptops and tablet-hybrids more attractive to buyers. Speaking at Intel's investor briefing day, Kirk Skaugen, Chipzilla's recent replacement to head its PC Client group, promised 110 reference designs for Ultrabooks by the end of the year, and 20 of those involve systems that can be used as a tablet, either by folding the system or with a detachable screen that doubles as a fondleslab, with one concept model showing a half-sized touch panel built into a laptop shell. Intel has also assigned $300m for the creation of an Ultrabook ecosystem – and this isn’t money going to directly to subsidize the systems but to encourage new and existing companies to develop hardware and software for the platform, with thinner screens a high priority. Chipzilla is also going to be setting up special Ultrabook shopping areas within retail outlets to push the platform. Customers can get a hands-on session with the new systems and presumably get a serious sales pitch as well.

Read more here –>theregister.co.uk

By Matt Rosoff, May 10, 2012

There's a ridiculous dust-up going on today over Microsoft's plans for Internet Explorer and other Web browsers on Windows tablets. Mozilla started it this morning. 
The complaint: on ARM-based tablets running the next version of Windows, only Internet Explorer will be allowed to run in the classic desktop mode that looks like traditional Windows. Other browsers will be forced to run in the new "Metro" interface, which was designed for touch screens. Mozilla general counsel Harvey Anderson said this move "reduces competition and chills innovation." Google chimed in a few hours later, telling CNET, "We share the concerns Mozilla has raised regarding the Windows 8 environment restricting user choice and innovation." What nonsense.

Read more here –>sfgate.com

By EDDIE WRENN May 10 2012

First we had the keyboard and mouse. Then smartphones popularised the touchscreen movement, and then hardware like the Xbox's Kinect system made gesture controls feel like second-nature. 

Now we are getting ready to enter the world of thought-control, with headsets that can read our minds now available for as little as £300, and the software to turn our dreams into actions starting to take shape. Kevin Brown, senior inventor at IBM, works to bridge the gap between emerging technology and the practical applications they can offer society. Already he is working hard to make everyday tasks easier through mind control, using headsets such as the commercially-available Emotiv Systems headset. The Emotiv headset retails for $299 and can simply be plugged into any recent Windows machine to begin working, with apps and games – including Angry Birds – being adapted by enthusiasts to run with simple mind controls.

Read more here –>dailymail.co.uk