Gaming 28 - Revisiting the Village
Posted on 21st Jun 2011 at 12:00 by Podcast with 19 comments
Posted on 21st Jun 2011 at 12:00 by Podcast with 19 comments
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/bit-tech/blog/~3/vhMM5ybvrjg/
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Chinese solar-panel manufacturer Suntech Power has developed a new process for making silicon wafers for solar cells that could cut the cost of solar power by 10 to 20 percent.
The most efficient silicon solar cells use wafers consisting of a single crystal of silicon. When made by the new process, these high-quality "monocrystalline" wafers cost about the same as lower-quality multicrystalline wafers, or potentially half as much as monocrystalline wafers made by conventional processes. (Wafer cost is only part of the cost of solar power, which is why a process that may cost half as much only reduces the overall cost by 10 to 20 percent.)
The idea underlying the process was patented more than 20 years ago but never commercially developed by the patent owners. The patents expired about three years ago, and several companies?JA Solar, LDK Solar, and Renesola, in addition to Suntech?recently announced that they had succeeded in making the process work.
Stuart Wenham, Suntech's CTO, described the advance at a solar conference this week in Seattle, and said the company has already started selling solar panels made using the process.
This news may spell trouble for businesses in the United States and elsewhere hoping to commercialize new thin-film solar technologies. In theory, thin-film technology is cheaper per watt than silicon technology. But its makers have found it hard to compete with Chinese makers of conventional silicon solar panels, which have steadily cut costs in part by improving manufacturing techniques and in part because government support has allowed them to scale up production quickly.
Making high-quality monocrystalline wafers ordinarily involves heating silicon to over 1,400 ° C (higher than its melting point), and then dipping a seed crystal into the melt. An ingot from which the wafers will be cut is formed by gradually pulling the seed up as the silicon crystallizes around it. This happens over the course of one to two days, during which time the pool of silicon must be kept hot?which takes a lot of energy. Both the energy consumption and the slow rate of production make the process expensive. Making multicrystalline ingots is faster and less energy-intensive?the silicon is melted and then cooled. There is no need to keep the silicon hot, saving energy, but cells made from these materials are much less efficient.
Source: http://feeds.technologyreview.com/click.phdo?i=42b2b0365e59c982ff8b298fd098806b
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When shopping for a new laptop one of the main factors to consider is size. Whether you want a gaming powerhouse that will only move from your desk occasionally, something that hits the sweet spot between performance and portability, or simply the thinnest and lightest you can find regardless of the compromise in power and disk space.
Your preference will likely vary depending if it's going to be your primary machine or not. For example, a 11-inch netbook might be all you need for occasionally going online and taking on short trips, knowing that a powerful desktop and large monitor await at your desk when it's time for more serious computing tasks. For me 13-inch has turned out to be the sweet spot, as it gives me enough screen real estate to get some work done but it's still easy to carry around.

What about you: What's the ideal laptop size? You can cast your vote on the poll below but we'd also like to read your thoughts in the comments. Is portability more important than power for you when it comes to laptops? By the way, that monster up there is the Maingear Titan 17 we're currently testing next to the ThinkPad X1 we reviewed last month.
What's the ideal laptop size?online survey
Source: http://www.techspot.com/news/44418-weekend-open-forum-whats-your-ideal-laptop-size.html
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Posted on 26th Jun 2011 at 10:44 by David Hing with 1 comments
The mechanics of Hard Lines are simple. With simple directional strokes of your finger, you steer a line around the screen towards randomly spawning markers, accruing points while avoiding other lines that enter from the sides of the screen.
Slick and neatly designed, Hard Lines is clearly influenced by the Light Cycles from Tron, yet it doesn't limit itself to that one style of play; there are several variations. In some modes, you gain points by getting opposing lines to crash into you or the walls; in others you race against the clock, or just try to last for as long as possible. There are also some good bonuses, such as the occasional power up that enables you to crash through any other competing lines without killing yourself.
Aside from this, though, the balancing is beautiful and the game manages to be both punishing and forgiving at once. Each line is only a single pixel wide, for example, but you only need to pass near an item on the screen to collect it, avoiding any frustrating situations where you might end up circling it forever. Not only this, but the very narrow nature of your line means the game can afford to throw a lot of competing lines at you at any one time. In particular, the Gauntlet mode continually spawns large numbers of other lines rapidly, resulting in an intense session that's highly satisfying when it goes your way.
Verdict: Hard Lines is a well designed, easily controlled, multifaceted version of Snake with enough new material and creativity behind it to stop it being called a straightforward clone.
Hard Lines is available from the AppStore for 59p / 99c.
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/bit-tech/blog/~3/AtnThqURR0c/
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Posted on 15th Jun 2011 at 07:41 by Podcast with 8 comments
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/bit-tech/blog/~3/twVcw9pIGrE/
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Chinese solar-panel manufacturer Suntech Power has developed a new process for making silicon wafers for solar cells that could cut the cost of solar power by 10 to 20 percent.
The most efficient silicon solar cells use wafers consisting of a single crystal of silicon. When made by the new process, these high-quality "monocrystalline" wafers cost about the same as lower-quality multicrystalline wafers, or potentially half as much as monocrystalline wafers made by conventional processes. (Wafer cost is only part of the cost of solar power, which is why a process that may cost half as much only reduces the overall cost by 10 to 20 percent.)
The idea underlying the process was patented more than 20 years ago but never commercially developed by the patent owners. The patents expired about three years ago, and several companies?JA Solar, LDK Solar, and Renesola, in addition to Suntech?recently announced that they had succeeded in making the process work.
Stuart Wenham, Suntech's CTO, described the advance at a solar conference this week in Seattle, and said the company has already started selling solar panels made using the process.
This news may spell trouble for businesses in the United States and elsewhere hoping to commercialize new thin-film solar technologies. In theory, thin-film technology is cheaper per watt than silicon technology. But its makers have found it hard to compete with Chinese makers of conventional silicon solar panels, which have steadily cut costs in part by improving manufacturing techniques and in part because government support has allowed them to scale up production quickly.
Making high-quality monocrystalline wafers ordinarily involves heating silicon to over 1,400 ° C (higher than its melting point), and then dipping a seed crystal into the melt. An ingot from which the wafers will be cut is formed by gradually pulling the seed up as the silicon crystallizes around it. This happens over the course of one to two days, during which time the pool of silicon must be kept hot?which takes a lot of energy. Both the energy consumption and the slow rate of production make the process expensive. Making multicrystalline ingots is faster and less energy-intensive?the silicon is melted and then cooled. There is no need to keep the silicon hot, saving energy, but cells made from these materials are much less efficient.
Source: http://feeds.technologyreview.com/click.phdo?i=42b2b0365e59c982ff8b298fd098806b
freddie mitchell simon chipmunk lebron james twitter jimmer fredette thomas tew rum issaquah school district the game tv show lasso of truth terrence j most popular thanksgiving side dish
When shopping for a new laptop one of the main factors to consider is size. Whether you want a gaming powerhouse that will only move from your desk occasionally, something that hits the sweet spot between performance and portability, or simply the thinnest and lightest you can find regardless of the compromise in power and disk space.
Your preference will likely vary depending if it's going to be your primary machine or not. For example, a 11-inch netbook might be all you need for occasionally going online and taking on short trips, knowing that a powerful desktop and large monitor await at your desk when it's time for more serious computing tasks. For me 13-inch has turned out to be the sweet spot, as it gives me enough screen real estate to get some work done but it's still easy to carry around.

What about you: What's the ideal laptop size? You can cast your vote on the poll below but we'd also like to read your thoughts in the comments. Is portability more important than power for you when it comes to laptops? By the way, that monster up there is the Maingear Titan 17 we're currently testing next to the ThinkPad X1 we reviewed last month.
What's the ideal laptop size?online survey
Source: http://www.techspot.com/news/44418-weekend-open-forum-whats-your-ideal-laptop-size.html
freddie mitchell simon chipmunk lebron james twitter jimmer fredette thomas tew rum issaquah school district the game tv show lasso of truth terrence j most popular thanksgiving side dish
Posted on 21st Jun 2011 at 12:00 by Podcast with 19 comments
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/bit-tech/blog/~3/vhMM5ybvrjg/
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Rockstar hackers LulzSec go out on a high Love them or loathe them, LulzSec, the mysterious group of hackers who got near-celebrity status with their showy cyber attacks on PBS, Sony and the CIA, have called it a day. Saturday marked 50 days since the group started causing mayhem online. Back in early May when LulzSec first announced via Twitter that it had hacked into a database of Fox.com and published user details, hardly anyone had heard of them. Forbes
Apple may make more profit selling one Mac than HP does from 7 PCs Apple has a tall order ahead of it if the company ever plans to challenge some of its larger rivals in personal computer market in terms of volume shipments, but the profit the Mac maker currently takes home from the sale of each system may already be enough to spook its competition. AppleInsider
New tool ports Xbox 360 games to iOS, Web and soon Android, OS X ExEn is a port of XNA to Silverlight and iOS (and an Android version is in the works). It?s licensed under MS-PL (open source) so you can start using it in your games right away, for free! See the included Documentation directory for information on getting started. Andrew Russell
Citi hackers made $2.7 million Citigroup suffered about US$2.7 million in losses after hackers found a way to steal credit card numbers from its website and post fraudulent charges. Citi acknowledged the breach earlier this month, saying hackers had accessed more than 360,000 Citi credit card accounts of U.S. customers. Computerworld
Seagate announces hard drives for tablets Thursday Seagate officially launched its new Momentus Thin line of HDDs in conjunction with the introduction of the upcoming ARCHOS 80 G9 8-inch tablet and the ARCHOS 101 G9 10.1-inch tablet, both of which will feature a Momentus Thin drive. Tom's Hardware
ISP-imposed censorship coming to Australia next month Two of Australia?s biggest ISPs (and telcos), Telstra and Optus, will commence ?voluntary? censorship of 500 websites to defend against ?child abuse?, even though the child abusers moved off the standard web a long time ago... Censorship in America
High tech investors slam Hollywood, blast Internet censorship bill The battle lines over online copyright enforcement sharpened on Thursday when dozens of prominent high-tech entrepreneurs and investors signed a letter urging members of Congress to reject the PROTECT IP Act. Ars Technica
VIA confirms development of server microprocessors, technologies VIA Technologies confirmed development of server-class microprocessors and supporting technologies. The firm, which once was the globe's largest supplier of chipsets, intends to address low-power servers initially. X-bit labs
Guild Wars 2: Changing the game ArenaNet's sequel to Guild Wars is not simply a prettier version of the original. Gone is the heavy instancing of explorable combat areas. In Guild Wars 2, the quest zones are open and filled with players. You can jump. You can swim and fight underwater. IGN
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The PCI Special Interest Group has revealed plans to develop an external version of PCI Express to rival the likes of eSATA, USB 3.0, and Intel?s new Thunderbolt interconnect. The standard would be based on PCIe 3.0 technology, which will offer potential transfer speeds of up to 32Gbps, a significant boost from the PCIe 2.1 spec that's widely used today in PCs (internally) for connecting graphics cards, sound cards, and even solid-state drives.
Thunderbolt currently offers 10Gbps transfers, but Intel says it can scale up to 100Gbps in the future. With those speeds, USB 3.0 is already looking outdated, but then again it's the only standard gaining some traction.
Previously known as Light Peak, Thunderbolt was launched back in February using copper cabling instead of fiber optics as initially planned, and so far only Apple has adopted it for its latest MacBook Pro and iMac refreshes. Meanwhile, eSATA has seen a mild adoption in notebooks but its use is more limited compared both Thunderbolt and USB.
The initial proposal for external PCI Express 3.0 suggests using copper wires, with a maximum transfer distance of 3 meters, and the ability to support up to 20W of power delivery. That's double the 10W of power provided by Thunderbolt, and would be enough for external hard drives and other devices to run without the need for a separate power source -- though external graphics cards would certainly need one.
PCIe cables will be faster, cheaper, and thinner than Thunderbolt, but less functional, since the latter can be daisy-chained and carry DisplayPort data while external PCI Express cannot. The proposed standard is still in its early stages and won't be commercialized until at least mid-2013, so there's plenty of time for USB and Thunderbolt to battle it out.
Source: http://www.techspot.com/news/44408-pci-sig-proposes-external-pcie-cable-standard.html
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