NVIDIA plans to license its Kepler graphics technology to companies for use in phones, tablets, and other devices. Kepler is the graphics processor core used in the company’s GeForce processors as well as upcoming Tegra chips for mobile devices.

The company also plans to license its visual computing portfolio, which would let other companies develop their own graphics chips using NVIDIA’s technology.

NVIDIA won’t be the only company taking this approach. Imagination licenses its PowerVR graphics technology to chip makers that want to use it, and ARM’s entire business model is based on licensing its designs. ARM doesn’t make its own hardware, the company just licenses its CPU and GPU desings to companies that want to build their own chips.

But it is a different approach for NVIDIA. While it wouldn’t be the first time NVIDIA licensed its technology (Sony licenses an NVIDIA GPU for the PlayStation 3, and Intel is another customer), for the most part if you want a smartphone or tablet with NVIDIA graphics, you need to buy a device with an NVIDIA Tegra processor.

Soon, that might not be the case.

The move makes sense for NVIDIA, as the company continues to transition from a business primarily focused on desktop and notebook computers to one that places an emphasis on the growing mobile smart device space.

NVIDIA to license Kepler GPU technology to other companies is a post from: Liliputing

On July 1st, Google will shut down its web-based RSS reader. For the past half decade, Google Reader has pretty much dominated the RSS reader space, but since Google announced plans to kill the service a few months ago, a number of companies have been promising to step up to the plate.

We’ve had a little renaissance in RSS apps, with Feedly developing its own feed syncing service, NewsBlur improving its design and infrastructure, and new solutions such as CommaFeed and Digg Reader entering the space.

While I’ll miss Google Reader, we may actually be entering a new age of RSS readers now that the elephant is leaving the room. I guess we’ll find soon enough whether anyone not running a 1-person shop can actually make a successful business out of an online feed reader. Google never charged for Reader and it’s not clear if the company ever made a dime on the service.

If you’re a Google Reader user, how do you plan to get your fix starting July 1st?

Here’s a roundup of tech news from around the web.

• What tech-savvy users are using for RSS now that Google Reader’s demise is imminent
  Google Reader will shut down at the end of the month. A poll at Hacker News shows what some of the most tech savvy folks around are using as replacements. Feedly and NewsBlur seem to be popular choices. [Hacker News]
• Humble Bundle 6: Pay what you want for 7 Mac, Windows, Linux, and Android games
  There’s a new Humble Bundle, and this time you can get up to 7 games. Most titles will run on Windows, Mac, Linux, or Google Android, although you have to pay more than the average price to unlock a few titles, including Broken Sword. Right now that average price is still less than $5 though! [Humble Bundle]
• Oppo Find 7 smartphone with Snapdragon 800 coming this fall?
  Chinese phone maker Oppo’s Find 5 is a relatively popular, well-built smartphone that can hold its own against models from better-known brands. Now there’s a rumor going around that the company is working on a new model with a 4000mAh battery, a Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 CPU, and a 5 inch, 1080p display. [Android Authority]
• Sony Xperia Z finally headed to the US, thanks to T-Mobile
  Sony introduced the Xperia Z flagship smartphone in January, but so far it hasn’t been available in the US. That’ll change in the next few weeks when T-Mobile starts to offer the 5 inch, water-resistant smartphone. [The Verge]
• Skype Video Messaging comes out of beta, brings video voicemail to all
  Skype now lets you record a video message if you call someone who isn’t available to chat in real-time. It’s voicemail… for video, and it’s available in Skype’s desktop apps, as well as the latest Android, iOS, and BlackBerry apps. Oddly, Windows Phone support isn’t ready to go just yet. [Skype]

You can keep up on the latest news by following Liliputing on Facebook, Google+ and Twitter.

Lilbits (6-18-2013): Google Readerpocalypse approaches is a post from: Liliputing

PlayJam has announced that the first GameStick Android gaming devices will ship in August. That’s a month behind the latest schedule, but the company still plans to ship units first to backers of the GameStick Kickstarter campaign and collect user feedback about the user interface before shipping the retail units to other customers.

The GameStick device is a small stick that you can plug into the HDMI port on a television in order to run Android-based games on a big screen. It also comes with a wireless game controller, and there’s a slot in the controller itself that you can use to store the GameStick when it’s not plugged into your TV.

There’s also an optional dock which adds USB ports, an Ethernet jack, and power.

Under the hood, the stick has an Amlogic AM8726-MX processor, 1GB of RAM, 8GB of storage, WIFi, Bluetooth, and Android Jelly Bean software as well as a custom user interface designed to make it easy to find, download, and play games on a TV.

Along with news of the 1-month delay, PlayJam is starting to show off the final production hardware including the game controllers and the sticks themselves.

GameStick pushed back a month, first units should ship in August is a post from: Liliputing

Device maker JXD offers a range of Android tablets that look like handheld gaming consoles, and which tend to have the physical buttons to match. The company recently launched an updated version of the JXD S5110 (which looks a lot like a Sony PSP), featuring a new dual-core processor.

The new JXD S5110b is available from AliExpress for around $87 and up, or you can snag one from AHappyDeal for $81.

The handheld Android gaming device features a 1.5 GHz AMlogic MX-S dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 processor, 1GB of RAM, and 8GB of storage, plus a microSD card for extra storage space.

It has a 5 inch, 800 x 480 pixel capacitive touchscreen display with support for 5-point multitouch and the JXD S5110b runs Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.

There are analog sticks on the right and left sides of the screen, start and select buttons, a D-pad, and four physical buttons on the right as well as shoulder buttons.

JXD says the system can also emulate classic gaming devices including the PlayStation 1, Nintendo 64 and GameBoy Advance. You can also map the hardware buttons to work with many Android games — and to be honest, while this sort of system is perfect for emulation, many modern Android games feature better graphics than classic console titles.

On the other hand, classic games often offer more hours of game play, better story lines, and all the other things you’d expect from titles that originally sold for dozens of dollars instead of just a few bucks at most.

The 800 x 480 pixel display also doesn’t seem like that big a disadvantage when you consider that most games you’d run in an emulator were essentially designed to run on televisions that had roughly VGA quality screens.

You can also connect the JXD S5110b to a TV with an HDMI cable if you want to play on a bigger screen though. It supports 1080p output.

via AndroidPC.es

JXD launches S5110b Android gaming tablet with dual-core Amlogic CPU is a post from: Liliputing

Lenovo is launching its first ThinkPad ultrabook to sport a 15.6 inch display. The Lenovo Thinkpad S531 is a large, business-class ultrabook that weighs about 5 pounds and which has a display that you can fold back 180 degrees.

The large display means the laptop’s bigger than most ultrabooks, and Lenovo’s using the extra space to place a number pad next to the backlit, spill-resistant QWERTY keyboard.

The notebook also has a TrackPoint pointing stick near the center of the keyboard, as well as a trackpad below the space bar.

Around the sides you’ll find 2 USB 3.0 ports, an Ethernet jack, a flash card reader, HDMI port, and a headset jack. The Lenovo ThinkPad S531 has JBL stereo speakers, dual digital array microphones, and a 62.8 Whr cell battery which Lenovo says should offer up to 9 hours of run time. with a full-sized number pad next to the backlit keyboard, Lenovo’s TrackPoint pointing stick,

Lenovo will offer an optional fingerprint reader and support for a ThinkPad OneLink dock which lets you charge the laptop while connecting additional USB, Ethernet, audio, USB, and HDMI ports.

via Engadget

Lenovo unveils ThinkPad S531 15.6 inch ultrabook is a post from: Liliputing

Canonical hopes its Ubuntu Touch software will be ready to ship on smartphones in the coming year. Right now you can download and install a preview build on dozens of Android-powered handsets, but it’ll likely be a while before you can buy a smartphone that comes with the OS from your wireless carrier.

But Canonical announced a new Carrier Advisory Group, which might give us a good idea who some of the first carriers to offer Ubuntu phones will be.

The Carrier Advisory Group for Ubuntu includes wireless carriers around the globe. Members will get early access to information about Ubuntu’s phone plans and details about manufacturers looking to use the operating system. The carriers will also provide feedback to Canonical and help shape the future of the company’s mobile operating system.

Members will also have a “the opportunity to be a launch partner,” which suggests that nobody’s actually committed to offering Ubuntu handsets yet, but they’re expressing interest in the possibility. Or something.

Canonical’s Jono Bacon says the first two launch partners will be members of the group, with the next wave of Ubuntu phones launching 6 months later.

The advisory group will help Canonical plan the future of the platform with input on app stores, payment services, and more. Canonical says it’s also seeking input on topics such as the ability for operators and device makers to differentiate one Ubuntu Touch device from another without leading to platform fragmentation, and the portability of Android and BlackBerry apps to run on Ubuntu.

Initial members of the group include Deutsche Telekom, Everything Everywhere, Korea Telecom, Telecom Italia, LG UPlus, Portugal Telecom, and SK Telecom and an unnamed carrier referred to as “the leading Spanish international carrier.”

Canonical’s decision to provide members of the Carrier Advisory Group with information that’s not publicly available is sure to annoy some folks who’ve been concerned that too much Ubuntu development is now taking place behind closed doors, and that the operating system isn’t the community-driven project it once was.

On the other hand, wireless carriers haven’t exactly made a habit of developing their plans in public, and this might be a necessity of doing business in this space if you don’t want your OS to be relegated to a hobbyist niche.

via muktware

Canonical announces Ubuntu Carrier Advisory Group, first 8 telecom partners is a post from: Liliputing

Ultrabooks tend to have screen sizes ranging from 11.6 inches to 15.6 inches. Those 4 inches can make a big difference, because while all ultrabooks tend to be thinner than 0.9 inches, some models weigh just over 2 pounds while others can weigh more than 5 pounds.

So it’s rather refreshing to see an ultrabook with a big screen and a small weight. The Samsung Series 9 line of ultrabooks are some of the thinnest and lightest around, and the company’s 15.6 inch models weigh just about 3.6 pounds, making them nearly as easy to tote around as a competitor’s 13.3 inch model.

That kind of convenience normally comes with a high price tag, but right now you can pick up a Series 9 ultrabook with a 15.6 inch, 1600 x 900 pixel display, an Intel Core i5 Ivy Bridge CPU and 8GB of RAM for $850.

Here are some of the day’s best deals.

• Samsung Series 9 3.6 pound, 15.6″ ultrabook w/Core i5 for $850 – Rakuten
• Dell Inspiron i14z 14″ ultrabook w/Core i5 for $500 – Newegg
• Lenovo IdeaPad U310 13″ touchscreen ultrabook w/Core i5 for $600 – TigerDirect
• Refurb Lenovo IdeaTab A2107 7″ Android tablet for $77 – Lenovo (coupon: DOORBUSTERS)
• Refurb Samsung Smart PC 500T 11.6″ Windows 8 slate w/Atom Z2760 for $400 – Woot
• Refurb Vizio 8″ Android tablet + folio case for $99 - Woot
• Refurb Nikon Coolpix S9300 16MP camera w/18x optical zoom for $100 – Woot
• Kingsoft Office Suite Professional 2013 for Windows for free – Giveaway of the Day
• CD Albums for $3.99 each + free shipping - Best Buy
• Pay what you want for 7 Windows, Mac, Linux, Android games – Humble Bundle

You can find more bargains in our daily deals section.

Deals of the Day (6-18-2013) is a post from: Liliputing

Microsoft’s Surface RT is a tablet with a 10.6 inch display, an NVIDIA Tegra 3 processor, and Windows RT software. It sells for $499 and up, and the price includes a free copy of Microsoft Office.

But aside from Office and the option of paying extra for a slick keyboard cover, there’s not really much reason to buy a Surface RT instead of an equally-priced iPad or an even cheaper Android tablet at the moment.

Soon Microsoft may sweeten the deal a bit by offering deep discounts to schools that want to pick up Surface RT tablets for use in the classroom. Prices could start as low as $199.

ZDNet reports that a special “Microsoft Surface for education” offer will run through August 31st, 2013. The product brochure has been pulled offline, but ZDNet posted a picture which outlines the pricing:

• 32GB Surface RT tablet for $199 (normally $499)
• 32GB Surface RT tablet + Touch Cover for $249 (normally $599)
• 32GB Surface RT tablet + Type cover for $289 (normally $629)

At those prices, if the Surface RT did nothing but let you surf the web using Internet Explorer and edit Office documents, it might be worth the cost.

There still aren’t nearly as many third party apps available for Windows RT as there are for other mobile platforms including iOS and Android. But Office is a pretty important app, especially in the education and business worlds.

Of course, Microsoft Office is also now available for iOS, but it’s currently optimized for iPhones and not iPads and you’ll need an Office 365 subscription plan in order to use the software.

Microsoft Surface RT tablets coming to schools for $199 (less than half price) is a post from: Liliputing

Huawei’s newest smartphone is one of the world’s thinnest. It measures just 6.18mm thick, or about 0.24 inches and weighs about 4.2 ounces.

The rest of the specs for Huawei’s new flagship phone aren’t exactly earth-shattering, but when you add them up, the Huawei Ascend P6 looks like a pretty decent option.

The handset has a 4.7 inch, 1280 x 720 pixel display, a 1.5 GHz Huawei K3V2 quad-core processor, 2GB of RAM, and 8GB of storage. It runs Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean.

While that’s not a lot of space for apps, media, and other files, the phone does have a microSD card slot which you can use for extra storage space.

The Huawei Ascend P6 has an 8MP rear camera and a 5MP front camera. The phone’s powered by a 2000mAh battery, and Huawei is playing up its “Automated Discontinuous Reception” and “Quick Power” technologies, which it says helps the phone last for about 30 percent longer on a charge than comparable devices.

It’s not clear if the Huawei Ascend P6 will make its way to the United States anytime soon, but it’s likely to hit China and Europe this summer. It’s a 3G phone which should work on HSPA+ networks, but which doesn’t support 4G LTE.

If you’re wondering how Huawei’s new phone stacks up against the competition, the folks at Mobile Geeks have a few videos comparing it with the HTC One and Samsung Galaxy S4 (short version: it’s thinner, but not as powerful).

Huawei introduces Ascend P6 super-thin smartphone is a post from: Liliputing

Google has announced that Chromebooks will soon be available in 6,600 stores around the world. That’s about three times the number of stores that currently offer laptops running Google’s Chrome OS software.

Up until now you’ve been able to buy the devices from Best Buy, Amazon, and the Google Play Store. But soon you’ll be able to pick one up at Staples, Walmart, Tesco, FNAC, Harvey Nroman, and other locations.

Chromebooks are basically laptops that ship with Chrome OS. Most, but not all, also ship with relatively small (but fast) solid stat drives instead of hard drives. This helps them boot and resume from sleep quickly, although most Chromebooks these days are pretty zippy once they’re up and running, since most of the OS runs from RAM instead of from the slower SSD or HDD.

The stores will carry models including the Acer C7, Samsung Series 3, and HP Pavilion 14 with prices as low as $199.

On the one hand, it’s easy to look at Chromebook as little more than cheap laptops that keep the price down by shipping with Google software instead of Windows. On the other hand, once you spend some time with a Chromebook, you start to think about the way you use a computer differently.

Since most Chromebooks resume from sleep just about as fast as you can open the lid, they feel almost like “always-on” devices like a smarpthone or a tablet. I find myself grabbing a Chromebook to do quick tasks like checking or responding to an email that I normally might not bother booting a slower computer for.

And since Chrome OS stores your data, settings, and other files in the cloud, you can easily pick up where you left off on another device — even an Android, Windows, or OS X device if you have the Chrome web browser installed.

A Windows 8 ultrabook offers some of those same features — but usually at a much higher price.

Of course Chromebooks don’t have to be cheap. Google’s Chromebook Pixel with a Core i5 processor, a high-resolution touchscreen display, and one of the best keyboard and trackpad systems around sells for $1300 and up.

As Chromebooks become available in more and more stores, it’s likely that we could see sales of Chrome OS devices pick up. On the other hand, we could also see a lot of customers purchase these devices failing to understand the differences between Chrome OS and Windows, which could lead to a lot of confused, disappointed customers.

Hopefully sales staff (and signage) are up to the task.

Chromebooks will soon be sold in 6600 stores for $199 and up is a post from: Liliputing

Chip maker AMD is starting to provide details about its first ARM-based processors, and while the new chip are more efficient than a typical x86 processor, they’re kind of low-power powerhouses.

In mid-2014 AMD will start shipping ARM-based chips code-named “Seattle,” packing up to 16 ARM Cortex-A57 processor cores.

AMD Seattle chips will be 64-bit processors that come in 8-core, and 16-core versions, and which will run at clock speeds of 2 GHz or higher. The chips support up to 128GB of RAM.

According to AMD, the new chips will offer more performance-per-watt than the company’s Opteron X-series chips for servers.

On the other hand, a 16-core Cortex-A57 processor will likely be way too power-hungry to find its way into a smartphone or tablet anytime soon. They make more sense for server racks, where energy efficiency is important, but battery life isn’t really a factor.

But now that AMD is taking its first steps into ARM-based chip designs, it may not be long before we see the company adopt ARM architecture for future low-power chips aimed at mobile devices. The company has already hinted at that possibility. For now, the company is positioning its x86-based Temash and Kabini chips for notebook and tablets.

via Engadget

AMD’s first ARM-based chips coming to servers in 2014 is a post from: Liliputing

AT&T just announced the official pricing and release date for the LTE version of Samsung’s Galaxy Note 8.0 and it’s a bit of a surprise. The Note 8.0 will cost $399, the same price as the Wi-Fi version, if you sign a two-year contract. That’s an unusual move for AT&T. The carrier usually sells tablets for an unsubsidized price and allows customers to pay for data on a month-to-month basis. Lately AT&T has backed off on that, encouraging customers to sign up for contracts with discounts on tablet prices. The unsubsidized option is likely to be available as well, though I couldn’t confirm the price since the Note isn’t on AT&T’s website yet and might not be until the on sale date: June 21.

Signing a two year contract for a tablet might not be all that appealing. AT&T is hoping customers will be more willing to do so if they also sign  up for phone service. If you buy a Galaxy S4, Galaxy S4 Active, or Galaxy Note II phone, you can get the Note 8.0 for $199. $400 all together for a phone and a tablet is a pretty good deal if AT&T’s service is decent in your area. Just be aware of what you’re getting in to.

The press release doesn’t go into details about plans, but it’s likely that AT&T will want customers who take advantage of this bundle to sign up for a shared plan. If you do, it will cost you $95 per month for 1GB of space between both devices. The next step up is 4GB and that will cost $120 per month. The least you will pay per month with a non-shared plans is $75, and that’s for less than 1GB of data per month between both devices. The data choices on AT&T aren’t the greatest.

Aside from that issue, the Galaxy Note 8.0 is a pretty sweet Android tablet. Getting it for just $200 is pretty tempting, especially if you’re a fan of the S Pen or of smaller tablets. Having speedy mobile data available at all times is especially useful for an 8-inch tablet that is more likely to leave the house than a 10-inch one. Personally, I would hesitate to tie myself to a carrier for a tablet. With mobile hotspot on my phone, my Wi-Fi tablet has the connectivity it needs. I know some people think of that as a hassle, though.

Would you sign a two year contract to get a discount on this (or any) tablet?

AT&T’s Galaxy Note 8.0 will cost $199 with purchase of S4, $399 without is a post from: Liliputing

There are plenty of dual-core Android set top boxes out there that sell for less than $130, so what is it that makes the folks at iPazzPort think the Pearl can command that kind of premium? It’s the rechargeable remote control and built-in charging dock.

iPazzPort has built a number of Bluetooth mini keyboards and pointing devices, but it hasn’t ventured into the set top box market before. It makes sense, then, that its first kick at the can would be designed around the remote control. As you can see, it’s a dual-sided remote with a full QWERTY keyboard and trackpad on the back and a more traditional TV-style layout on the front. Hotkeys provide fast access to apps like Skype and Facebook — as well as Google Play, YouTube, and the Android settings screen. The remote also has a built in microphone and speaker.

That’s all fairly standard stuff. What makes this one different is the charging contacts on the bottom edge. There’s a remote-shaped cutout in the top of the semi-spherical Pearl that lets the remote slide in to charge up its internal 400mAh battery.

As for the Pearl itself, it’s built around a 1.6GHz dual-core Rockchip RK3006 processor. It packs 1GB of RAM, 4GB of storage with micro SD expandability, 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi and Ethernet, two USB 2.0 ports, and an HDMI output. There’s also a built-in webcam — that’s it peeking out from inside the swirling red accent on the front.

Geekbuying has the iPazzPort Pearl in stock for $129.99, but you can find it a few dollars cheaper elsewhere. Over on AliExpress you can score one for about $110.

via CNX Software

iPazzPort Pearl Android STB lets you dock your remote to charge it up is a post from: Liliputing

The Google Reader shutdown is imminent, but don’t fret! The team of engineers at Digg has been slaving away to make sure that Digg Reader will be ready to rock a few days before Google pulls the plug.

Digg’s crack unit consists of just five individuals and has been tasked with building “a web and mobile reading experience that is clean, simple, functional, and fast.”

There’s no question who Digg’s target audience is for its Reader, either. It’s aimed at power users, and that’s obvious from some of the features that have been coded in for the initial launch.

First and foremost, Google sign-in is supported. That should give Digg Reader users a dead simple way to import their feeds — though you can always export your feeds using Takeout if you want to go the manual route for some reason. Digg Reader will also integrate with a number of popular third-party apps such as Instapaper and Pocket, and you’ll be able to share items on Facebook, Twitter, and the like.

Mobile apps are in the works, too. iOS apps will be ready to go for launch day and Android versions will follow in the coming weeks.

Digg’s crew also knows that power users want things like keyboard shortcuts that match up with Vim’s key bindings. It’s that kind of thoughtful touch that could make Digg Reader an instant hit with Google Reader refugees.

Now comes the tricky part. Digg Reader is scheduled for public launch on June 26th. That’s just a few days before Google Reader shuts down, and Digg has already noted that doing RSS aggregation at scale can be a bit tricky. Hopefully Digg’s servers are battened down in the next few days, because there’s little doubt that geeky RSS fans will be waiting to pounce when the doors open.

Digg Reader to launch just days before Google Reader shutdown is a post from: Liliputing

CPU-Z is a popular tool that lets Windows users identify information about their computer’s CPU, memory, motherboard, and more. Now CPU-Z is also available for Android, making it easy to find out everything you ever wanted to know about your device’s hardware, but didn’t know who to ask.

The free tool can tell you the type of processor your phone or tablet has, report the current speed of each CPU core, provide information about the CPU load, and tell you what kind of graphics core your chiphas.

There’s also a System tab that shows your device model name, manufacturer, Android version, kernel version, and more, as well as storage and memory stats and your screen resolution.

Battery information including the amount of juice you have left, and the temperature is also available. And if you scroll over to the Sensors tab, you can even see live information about magnetic fields, orientation, and more.

If you just picked up a new Android device and need to know more about what’s under the hood, CPU-Z might be the sort of app you download and use once or twice. But it can also come in handy if you’re trying to monitor the health of your system over time, so it might be worth keeping installed.

Either way, the app is currently in beta, so there may still be some bugs. But it’ll likely remain free even after the beta period ends, just like the desktop version.

via Android Police

CPU-Z for Android tells you all about your device’s hardware is a post from: Liliputing

Good news, bad news time. The good news is that if you missed out on the big Nook HD and Nook HD+ sale for Father’s Day that had Barnes & Noble’s tablets discounted to $129 and $149, respectively, there is still hope. Today B&N announced that they are extending that sale and did not give an end date. Hooray! Everyone loves an inexpensive tablet that isn’t crappy, and the Nooks fit that bill. Between the solid design, good hardware, and access to the Google Play store these are two of the best low price tablets around.

The Nook HD+ in particular is a really good buy since the 9-inch display has one of the highest resolutions around, is gorgeous, and is perfect for reading magazines and comic books and surfing Flipboard. The HDMI out dongle also turns it into a decent media steamer thanks to the access it gives to your Ultraviolet account, Hulu Plus, Netflix, and more. Not bad for $149.

Now here comes the bad news. This extended sale is already making people murmur about whether or not this indicates a fire sale of a sort. Is Barnes & Noble clearing out inventory because they’re about to shut down the hardware side of the business? Brad has written before about rumors surrounding a sale of Nook Media to Microsoft (yes, they denied the rumors) and what could be in the future — i.e. a focus on the apps themselves while shuttering the hardware business. Those of us who like the Nook tablets and eReaders and ecosystem (that would be me) would be very sad to see all of that go away.

Perhaps not so sad that we won’t go scoop up some inexpensive tablets while we have the opportunity.

Even if this is nothing more than a clearance and a harbinger that a big change is coming to Nook, you should still buy the HD or HD+ if the tablets interest you. Worst case scenario is that down the line B&N stops offering support for them. If you’re the type of person to root a device out of the box, anyway, that might not be as big a deal for you. That’s not going to happen right away, at any rate. (Famous last words, I know. I’m tempting fate.)

You can get the discounted Nooks via Barnes & Noble’s website and physical stores or wherever the tablets are sold, such as Best Buy, Target, and Walmart.

Barnes and Noble extend Nook HD and HD+ discount indefinitely – is this the end? is a post from: Liliputing

If you’re building a mobile platform and you want it to have any chance of success, it’s got to have an app store. Samsung certainly knows that Tizen needs a quality store if it’s actually going to be a viable Android alternative. Back at the 2013 Tizen Developer Conference, the Tizen Store was shown off on stage ahead of its impending launch later this summer.

From what’s demonstrated in the video, there’s nothing particularly unique about the Tizen Store — although at this point if you’ve seen one app store, you’ve pretty much seen them all. There’s a page for promotions like back to school and freebies, sections for popular, newly released, and top grossing apps, and an ever-present store-wide search.  The Tizen Store also features a recommendation system that will suggest apps based on your shopping habits and there’s a curated Tizen Picks section, too.

App detail pages include a written description, ratings, and screenshots. Instead of “install” or “download,” Samsung has opted to label its button “get.” Presumably there’ll also be a congratulatory “App get!” notice once the installation has completed.

The Tizen Store already looks quite polished, and certainly appears to be ready for a summer launch. Several big-name apps are visible in the demo, including Cut The Rope, Vimeo, and Let’s Golf 3. Samsung has already said that the first Tizen phones will be shipping later this year, and it looks like the folks who them will have plenty of apps to choose from when they hit the Store to do some shopping.

via Techblog.gr

Tizen store gets video demo ahead of summer launch is a post from: Liliputing

Android tablets with 13.3 inch displays have been around for a little while. Archos introduced the first FamilyPad tablet back in 2012.

But the Colorfly CT132 is one of the first models with a laptop-sized screen to sport an Allwinner A31 quad-core processor.

The tablet’s available for purchased for around $330 in the US from AliExpress or DealExtreme.

The Colorfly CT132 has an ARM Cortex-A7 quad-core processor with PowerVR SGX 544 graphics, 2GB of RAM, and 16GB of storage. It also has a microSD card slot for extra storage space.

While the screen is bigger than those found on most Android tablets, the display resolution is nothing to write home about. The tablet has a 13.3 inch, 1280 x 800 pixel screen.

Other specs include 802.11b/g/n WiFi, a front-facing 2MP camera and a rear 2MP camera, HDMI, and an 8000mAh battery which Colorfly says should be good for up to 8 hours of use.

The tablet runs Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.

Chinese site Zol has posted a review of the Colorfly CT132, and the reviewer seems satisfied with the tablet’s build quality, but finds the screen to be a bit grainy. That’s not surprising, since the screen has about 113 pixels per inch, while many newer tablets and phones with smaller, full HD screens have much higher pixel densities.

Colorfly also seems to have used a TN display for this tablet rather than an IPS screen, which means the viewing angles are limited — colors and images can be difficult to see if you view the tablet from the wrong angle.

Like most tablets of its size, the Colorfly CT132 might be a bit large to use for some tablet tasks such as surfing the web or reading eBooks. But it could be a good size for watching videos or playing two-player games, where a bigger screen is generally better.

The Colorfly CT132 seems like an interesting addition to the tablet space. But whether it’s worth the $330 asking price or not probably depends on how you plan to use it.

Colorfly CT132 is a 13.3 inch, quad-core Android tablet is a post from: Liliputing

Rockchip’s RK3188 quad-core processor is one of the fastest ARM Cortex-A9 chips on the market. But up until now if you’ve had a tablet, TV stick, or other devices with an RK3188 chip, you’ve probably only been able to run Android on it.

Now you can also run Ubuntu, and possibly other Linux-based operating systems as well.

Earlier this month Rikomagic released Linux source code for the MK802 IV mini PC with an RK3188 chip. Now a handful of people have used that code as a starting point for running Ubuntu Linux on similar devices, including the QC802 and Tronsmart T428.

For the most part, the steps for installing Ubuntu should work on most Android TV boxes with RK3188 chips — and since you’re booting Ubuntu from an SD card, you should be able to do it without affecting the Android software that probably came with your device.

On the other hand, Ubuntu for RK3188 sticks is still pretty rough around the edges. There’s currently no support for WiFi, Bluetooth, or hardware-accelerated graphics. Since different devices have different wireless chips it could take a while before Ubuntu is fully functional on every available device with an RK3188 chip.

Ian Morrison has posted details on getting Ubuntu up and running on an RK3188 box, as well as some performance benchmarks.

More details are available at CNX-Software.

Ubuntu up and running on Android min PCs with RK3188 chips is a post from: Liliputing

About two thirds of the people on the planet don’t have access to the internet. Plenty of people have ideas about how to change that — it’s cheaper to build 3G cellular towers in some parts of the world than to lay new cable or telephone wires, for instance. But Google has another idea: Balloons.

The company is starting a pilot project that involves sending a fleet of balloons about 12 miles up, and using them to beam internet signals to the ground. They’re calling it Project Loon.

Google says the result is a network that provides 3G-like speeds to areas that would otherwise be hard to reach. All you need on the ground is a special antenna attached to your building that lets you connect to the the balloon network.

Getting things to work in the air is a bit more complex. The balloons will move through the air, so Google has to move them up and down through different air streams to control their movement in order to offer continuous internet access on the ground.

Each balloon has a solar panel attached, as well as the technology to let anyone within a 40 kilometer (25 mile) diameter connect to the network.

This weekend Google is rolling out a relatively pilot project in New Zealand. If things work, Project Loon could be the start of something big… it doesn’t solve the problems of getting antennae, computers, phones, and other devices to hard-to-reach areas. But those issues seem trivial when compared with the challenges of building an international internet network capable of blanketing the planet in wireless internet connectivity.

Wired has an inside look at Google’s Project Loon, which has been in development for two years.

Project Loon: Google wants to provide internet access to all… with balloons is a post from: Liliputing