reprints – Page 55 – Tech Today w/ Ken May

Acer CEO resigns on the back of $446 million quarterly loss

Soon-to-not-be CEO J.T. Wang. Acer Acer has issued a statement this morning reporting that Acer CEO J.T. Wang has resigned following news of the company’s significant $446 million loss during the third quarter of 2013. Wang will continue in his role as Acer’s chairman for another seven months, but he will be handing over the CEO reins to Acer President Jim Wong at the start of 2014. Acer’s financial beatdown was announced last Tuesday along with the rest of its Q3 results. It’s the second quarter in a row of losses for the PC OEM; Q2 in August ended with a $11.4 million loss where many analysts had expected at least some profit. According to GigaOm , an additional (Chinese) statement issued by Acer blames “the gross margin impact of gearing up for the Windows 8.1 sell-in and the related management of inventory.” As Microsoft Editor Peter Bright showed yesterday , though, Windows 8.1 hasn’t necessarily exploded out of the gate, and tying significant amounts of money up around the operating system’s launch doesn’t appear to have served Acer very well. Most OEMs see sales dips in Q2 and Q3 before the holiday-saddled Q4 pushes sales back up, but Acer’s numbers paint a particularly dismal picture: the company saw a 35 percent drop in sales from the same quarter last year. Read 1 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Acer CEO resigns on the back of $446 million quarterly loss

New Kepler analysis finds many Earth-like planets; total 3,500 exoplanets

Sun-like stars are bright enough that their habitable zones are pushed close to the edge of where Kepler is able to detect planets. NASA Although NASA’s Kepler probe has entered a semi-retirement , discoveries from the data it collected continue. Scientists are currently gathered to discuss these results, and they held a press conference today to announce the latest haul. As of today, the Kepler team is adding 833 new exoplanet candidates to its existing haul, bringing the total up to over 3,500. So far, 90 percent of the candidates that have been checked have turned out to be real. The number of planets in the habitable zone has gone up to over 100. In conjunction with the press conference, PNAS is releasing a paper that performs an independent analysis of Sun-like stars. This finds that over 20 percent of these host a planet less than two times the size of Earth’s radius. Within Kepler’s field of view, 10 of them receive an amount of light similar to that reaching Earth. A status update Kepler spots planets by watching them transit in front of their host star. This creates a characteristically square-shaped dip in the amount of light reaching Earth. This method of detection, however, isn’t considered definitive. The sightings are considered candidates and need to be confirmed by another method. Read 10 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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New Kepler analysis finds many Earth-like planets; total 3,500 exoplanets

New HIV antibodies show potential

The structure of an antibody latched on to a protein found on the surface of HIV. NIAID/National Institutes of Health The dream of an HIV vaccine has been thwarted again and again because the virus evolves so rapidly that the immune system can’t keep up. But the results from a new trial in monkeys suggest that certain antibodies have a powerful enough therapeutic effect that they may warrant clinical trials. Many researchers had given up on antibodies, which are used by the immune system to identify the signature proteins on the outside of invading cells, targeting them for destruction. The HIV virus changes so rapidly that any antibodies that target the virus only work for a little while—the virus stays one step ahead while the immune system struggles to play catch-up. But researchers discovered antibodies that target the converse part of the virus’s structure—the features that are critical to its function and don’t change much over time. These antibodies were discovered in HIV-infected people whose immune systems seemed to keep most strains of HIV in check. Read 6 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Mysterious Google barge is a massive showroom, “party deck”

Google’s four-story shipping-container product marketing paradise. KPIX5 The mysterious Google barge discovered floating in San Francisco Bay will be used as a party space and showroom just for Google’s Glass and “other gadgets,” according to sources speaking to KPIX5 in San Francisco. The boat will be stationed near Google’s campus in Mountain View, CA and will host “invitation-only clients.” The existence of Google’s watercraft—one on the West Coast and one on the East Coast in Portland, ME—has been a topic of discussion over the past week. The barges are held under an LLC called By And Large, apparently a reference to Pixar’s “ Buy n Large ” of WALL·E, which is itself a reference to the phrase “by and large.” It is not uncommon for high-profile companies like Google to take cover under an LLC to prepare a secret project. Google filed a patent in 2009 for a floating data center, leading outlets like CNET and AllThingsD to believe that the structures might be Google’s first attempt at realizing this idea. The second theory was that the barges were going to be retail presences for Google Glass as the date of the product’s commercial launch nears. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Mysterious Google barge is a massive showroom, “party deck”

Google officially announces the Nexus 5 and Android 4.4 KitKat

After a million and one leaks , the Nexus 5 has finally been announced . There’s not too many surprises on the hardware front: the device packs a 4.95-inch 1080p IPS LCD, a 2.26 GHz Snapdragon 800 processor, 2GB of RAM, an 8MP camera, and a 2300 mAh battery. The Nexus 5 is made by LG and internally seems very similar to the G2 (aside from a smaller battery and camera). Most importantly, the Nexus 5 ships with a new version of Android: KitKat, version 4.4. KitKat brings across the board memory improvements, a new full screen mode, smart dialer, and a refreshed home screen experience. Specs at a glance: Nexus 5 Screen 1920×1080 4.95″ (445 ppi) IPS touchscreen OS Android 4.4 “KitKat” CPU 2.3GHz quad-core Snapdragon 800 RAM 2GB GPU Adreno 330 Storage 16GB or 32GB Ports Micro USB, headphones Camera 8MP rear camera with OIS, 1.3MP front camera Size 137.84 x 69.17 x 8.59mm Weight 130g Battery 2300 mAh Starting price $350, contract free Other perks wireless charging, NFC The Nexus 5 has the distinction of being the first Nexus device with LTE. Verizon’s CDMA network is out of the question, but it is compatible with AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile LTE bands. Like the Nexus 4, Qi wireless charging is included, but the premium-yet-delicate glass back of the N4 has been swapped out in favor of a plastic backing. The matte back along with the horizontal “NEXUS” lettering make the Nexus 5 look like a mini Nexus 7. The rear camera sensor, while seemingly normally sized, has a massive outer lens attached to it. Like the G2, the camera is equipped with optical image stabilization, but the G2 didn’t require the huge outer lens the way the Nexus 5 does. Read 3 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Google officially announces the Nexus 5 and Android 4.4 KitKat

iPad Air’s A7 chip is identical to the iPhone’s, just faster

The iPhone 5S (shown above, in system board phone) and the iPad Air share the exact same SoC. That doesn’t mean there aren’t differences. iFixit When Apple announced its new iPad Air and Retina iPad mini in San Francisco last week, one of the most surprising revelations was that the tablets would both be powered by the same Apple A7 chip used by the iPhone 5S. Since the third-generation iPad was released in early 2012, the vastly different display resolutions of the phones and tablets (1136×640 for iPhones, 2048×1536 for iPads) meant that different chips were needed. Smaller chips like the A5 and A6 were used to meet the power requirements of the phones, while the A5X and A6X picked up more powerful GPUs and wider memory interfaces to drive the tablets’ larger displays. Early reviews of the iPad Air were posted last night, and as usual Anand Shimpi of AnandTech had the most detailed information to share about the tablet’s innards. The short version? For the first time since the iPad 2 and iPhone 4S shared the A5 SoC back in 2011, the flagship iPhones and iPads are using the same silicon. Making the numbers add up Let’s begin with Apple’s performance promises. Apple said that the A7 in the iPhone 5S could often double the CPU and GPU performance of the A6 in the iPhone 5, and our review bore these observations out. Apple also said that the A7 in new iPad Air and the Retina iPad mini could deliver roughly double the CPU and GPU performance of the A6X in the fourth-generation iPad. And yet, the A6X offers roughly twice the GPU power of the A6—our biggest question coming out of the iPad announcement last week was just how all of these statements could be true if the iPhone and iPad were using the same chip. Read 8 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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iPad Air’s A7 chip is identical to the iPhone’s, just faster

Review: Tesla Motors all-electric Model S is fast—but is it a good car?

This is the first of two pieces we’re publishing on the all-electric Tesla Model S. The other is a video that documents our journey from Houston to Austin and back in the car, and it can be viewed right here . My videographer Steve uttered a single strained curse as inertia’s invisible hand pushed us back into the leather with enough force to knock the camera mount out of alignment. The Tesla’s acceleration was instant, ludicrous, neck-snapping—more appropriate for a roller-coaster than a car. The camera’s point of view was now skewed sideways from this morning’s careful alignment, but Steve didn’t reach for it because we had just gone from 70 miles per hour to north of 100, and we were still going strong. I should have slowed down, because I-10 out west of Houston is the natural habitat of humorless state troopers, but I didn’t. The breathtakingly flat torque curve of the Model S begs to be explored. The pedal under my right foot was just pure magic . No shifting of gears or howling engine here—the only sound was the ever-increasing rush of air as we hurtled toward the car’s 130 mph limiter. And as we accelerated, my prejudices about electric cars were forcibly rearranged. Read 104 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Review: Tesla Motors all-electric Model S is fast—but is it a good car?

Hackers compromise official PHP website, infect visitors with malware (updated)

Wikipedia Maintainers of the open-source PHP programming language have locked down the php.net website after discovering two of its servers were hacked to host malicious code designed to surreptitiously install malware on visitors’ computers. The compromise was discovered Thursday morning by Google’s safe browsing service , which helps the Chrome, Firefox, and Safari browsers automatically block sites that serve drive-by exploits. Traces of the malicious JavaScript code served to some php.net visitors were captured and posted to Hacker News here and, in the form of a pcap file , to a Barracuda Networks blog post here . The attacks started Tuesday and lasted through Thursday morning, PHP officials wrote in a statement posted late that evening . Eventually, the site was moved to a new set of servers, PHP officials wrote in an earlier statement . There’s no evidence that any of the code they maintain has been altered, they added. Encrypted HTTPS access to php.net websites is temporarily unavailable until a new secure sockets layer certificate is issued and installed. The old certificate was revoked out of concern the intruders may have accessed the private encryption key. User passwords will be reset in the coming days. At time of writing, there was no indication of any further compromise. Read 8 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Hackers compromise official PHP website, infect visitors with malware (updated)

OS X Mavericks comes out today—and it’s free

Hang ten and get gnarly, dudes. OS X 10.9 Mavericks is here. Named for a totally tubular surf spot in California, the latest Apple desktop operating system will be thundering our way today. Like Lion and Mountain Lion before it, it will be available in the Mac App Store. Upgraders can download the software for no cost. The release was announced as part of Apple’s October 22 press event at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco, CA. The new operating system brings a lot of under the hood changes, including a fix for OS X multi-monitor support. Another hotly anticipated feature is Finder Tabs, which takes a page from tabbed Web browser behavior and should allow users more flexibility when managing files. Visually, the new operating system has banished some of the more despised skeuomorphic elements that have crept onto the desktop over time. Apple’s PR images show that things like iCal’s leather stitching have been excised, leaving many applications less “touchable” but also less visually cluttered. Efficient resource usage is also a major theme in the updated operating system. Apple’s computer sales are dominated by portables, and Mavericks includes a great number of named features built to reduce the amount of power a Mac consumes and keep it running longer. In fact, Apple says that merely by installing Mavericks, Haswell-equipped Mac portables like the Macbook Air will gain at least an extra hour of battery life. Additionally, Mavericks gets a little smarter about memory management, compressing applications in memory and dynamically allocating memory to the GPU based on performance requirements. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

$2,999 Mac Pro to go on sale in December in all its Dalek-resembling glory

Mac Pro buyers to Apple: Shut up and take my money! Comedy Central The long gap between releases of Apple’s most powerful computer—the Mac Pro—is finally about to come to an end. The company today announced that the first major upgrade of the Pro since August 2010 will be released in December. The entry-level model will cost $2,999 with 3.7GHz quad-core Xeon processors, 12GB of DRAM, dual AMD FirePro D300 graphics chips with 2GB VRAM each, and 256GB of SSD. Mac users with heavy processing needs, such as graphics professionals , were disappointed when Apple didn’t refresh the stagnating platform last year. CEO Tim Cook promised that great news for Mac Pro users would come sometime in 2013 , and it did in June when Apple unveiled a Mac Pro with a smaller design and upgraded internals. At the time, Apple said only that it would be ” coming later this year ,” and the company didn’t announce the official ship date until today. Read 9 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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$2,999 Mac Pro to go on sale in December in all its Dalek-resembling glory