Tag: gadgets

Facebook says renewables will power 50% of its data centers by 2018

Facebook is stepping up its commitment to renewable energy today. While announcing a new data center in Fort Worth (above), which happens to be entirely powered by wind energy, the social network also set a new goal of having 50 percent of its data centers relying on renewables by the end of 2018. That follows an earlier self-imposed goal to have 25 percent of its data centers powered by clean energy come the end of this year. Naturally, Facebook plans to have all of its operations powered by renewable energy eventually. It’s also working together with Greenpeace — which took today’s announcement as a chance to shame Amazon for its data center energy usage — to ensure that it’s exploring new energy options properly. Facebook teamed up with Citi Energy, Starwood Energy, and Alterra Power to bring a 17, 000 acre wind farm online for its new Fort Worth data hub, which should deliver around 200 MW of energy to Texas. Facebook plans to get that new data center online by the end of 2016. Filed under: Networking , Internet , Facebook Comments Source: Facebook

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Facebook says renewables will power 50% of its data centers by 2018

This magic exoskeleton for industrial workers is the future—we know, we wore one

RICHMOND, Calif.—Wearing Ekso Bionics ’ forthcoming exoskeleton for construction and industrial workers is probably the closest that I will ever come to having a real physical superpower. Through the magic of gravity and amazing industrial and mechanical design, a 40-pound industrial tool that I was holding became totally weightless. After just a few minutes, I quickly figured out that if I let the tool go it would fly off into space, as if gravity had no effect on it at all. The Ekso Works suit is slated to hit the market in 2016 in the “tens of thousands of dollars” range. (One financial analyst, Jeffrey Cohen, believes it will cost about $12,000.) Read 36 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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This magic exoskeleton for industrial workers is the future—we know, we wore one

A Look At The Tech That Could Mean We Never Have To Charge Our Phones Again

 Technology that can wirelessly power our devices on the go could change our world. Imagine never having to plug in your cell phone again, or technology that continuously keeps your electronic car battery running. According to Energous Corporation, that day is just around the corner. Energous’ WattUp is a wireless charger for electronic devices. It can charge your cell phone and… Read More

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A Look At The Tech That Could Mean We Never Have To Charge Our Phones Again

AMD unveils R9 Fury X, Fury, and Nano graphics cards

25 more images in gallery There’s not one, not two, but three brand new high-end graphics cards on the way from AMD. As rumoured, AMD is dropping the numerical branding and is instead grouping its top cards under the “Fury” banner. All are based on its new Fiji chip, which is a tweaked version of the company’s long-standing GCN architecture, and—as expected—all will come equipped with 4GB of stacked, on-package high bandwidth memory (HBM). The flagship is the $649 R9 Fury X, which launches on June 24. At that price, it is pitched directly against Nvidia’s GTX 980 Ti . It features 4096 stream processors—a huge jump over the 2816 stream processors found in the R9 290X—”up to” 1050MHz core clock, 256 texture units, 64 ROPs, HBM memory with 512 GB/s of bandwidth, a 67.2 GP/s pixel fill rate, and a six-phase VRM (voltage regulator module), which AMD claims is ideal for overclocking the card. We don’t yet have UK pricing, but it’ll probably be around £550. Despite using two 8-pin power connectors, the Fury X’s power consumption isn’t as high as some feared: the TDP is 275W, just a tad higher than the R9 290X’s, although it’s worth bearing in mind that in real-world usage, the R9 290X was much closer to 300W. The Fury X supports up to 375W of power for overclocking. Read 7 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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AMD unveils R9 Fury X, Fury, and Nano graphics cards

EA at E3: Star Wars Battlefront, Mirror’s Edge reboot, and new IP Unravel

23 more images in gallery LOS ANGELES—At its pre-E3 presentation, EA revealed an orgy of games, though there only appeared to be one truly original IP: an adorable puzzle-platformer called Unravel . Throughout the 90-minute presentation, a few games stood out. Need For Speed , powered by Frostbite 3, looks truly sensational. In the words of an EA exec, “Frostbite will make you question whether it’s real, or in-game,” and we have to admit, there was one sequence that really did look like live-action actors, despite the fact that it was apparently “pre-alpha footage.” Need For Speed is arriving on November 3. EA also announced a new expansion for the free-to-play MMO Star Wars: The Old Republic , dubbed Knights of the Fallen Empire . It’s due on October 27 and will be free to subscribers. Read 8 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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EA at E3: Star Wars Battlefront, Mirror’s Edge reboot, and new IP Unravel

Hands-on with YouTube Gaming—Google built itself a Twitch Killer

NEW YORK—YouTube Gaming is coming! YouTube’s Twitch Killer was announced on Friday , so we stopped by the YouTube Space in Manhattan to try out a pre-release version of the service. (And we took a  ton of screenshots, see below.) YouTube says the service will launch “this summer”—it’s kind of “this summer” right now— and sure enough, the version we tried out seemed 99% finished. We spent most of our time with the desktop website, and we weren’t even on a developer sandbox—it was just the live gaming.youtube.com site with a properly-flagged account. Let’s get started! The Interface Ron Amadeo An open live stream, complete with chat. It’s Twitch! Note the “-1:43” tooltip: you can rewind the stream! 3 more images in gallery In its blog post, YouTube neglected to show the most important screenshot: the live streaming video page, so that was the first place we explored. The live video page is an all-dark interface with a large video player and a tabbed interface to the right. The tabs house chat, the typical YouTube related videos list (which should be great for discovery), and a description tab. Read 27 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Hands-on with YouTube Gaming—Google built itself a Twitch Killer

Thunderbolt 3 Uses Reversible USB Type-C And Could Be The Ultimate Port

 Intel has revealed all about its new Thunderbolt 3 specification at this year’s Computex conference, and it could be the port that best serves Apple’s single I/O vision of the MacBook’s future: Thunderbolt 3 uses a reversible USB-C connector, and includes USB 3.1 support, as well as increasing data transfer speed over Thunderbolt 2 by 100 percent to 40Gbps, and supporting use… Read More

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Thunderbolt 3 Uses Reversible USB Type-C And Could Be The Ultimate Port

Tattoos Found To Interfere With Apple Watch Sensors

An anonymous reader writes: A number of early Apple Watch adopters have complained that their tattoos cause interference with many of the new product’s key features. According to multiple tattooed sources, inked wrists and hands can disrupt communication with the wearable’s sensors installed in the underside of the device leading to malfunction. Owners of Apple Watch have taken to social media to voice their frustration using the hashtag #tattoogate and sharing their disappointment over the newly discovered Apple flaw. One user reported that the Watch’s lock system did not disable as it should when the device was placed on a decorated area of skin – forcing those affected to constantly enter their security pins. A further source suggested that notification alerts would fail to ‘ping’ as they are supposed to, and that heart rate monitoring differed significantly between tattooed and non-tattooed wrist readings. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Tattoos Found To Interfere With Apple Watch Sensors

A Portable Washing Machine That Doesn’t Need a Drop of Electricity

If camping seems like fun but you’d prefer if roughing it wasn’t so rough, the Drumi from Yirego is a compact portable washing machine that can clean around six or seven garments without the need for a power outlet, a generator, or even a sunny day to feed a solar panel. Read more…

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A Portable Washing Machine That Doesn’t Need a Drop of Electricity