Adobe DItches Flash For Mobile

In what you could call a backend bombshell, Adobe this week revealed plans to ditch Flash for mobile devices, and instead focus on HTML5 and Adobe AIR.

Who cares?

For one, “those [people] whose job it is to market and sell Android tablets,” writes AllThingsD. “Flash support has been one of the key vantages that aspiring iPad competitors have used to tout their devices.”

“Adobe will have a PR nightmare on its hands trying to convince its three million Flash developers to scrap projects in Flash and move to HTML5,” notes ReadWriteWeb, citing comments from Carlos Icaza, a early director and engineer of Flash at Adobe.

Not lost on anyone, “The annunciation comes after Apple boldly chose not to support Flash on the iPhone in 2007, citing concerns about the technology’s performance,” writes VentureBeat. “Now it seems Steve Jobs was right all along.”

CNN goes so far as to ask if Steve Job killed -- or is killing -- Flash.

So, what’s in store for Flash?

Well, “Adobe's conclusion to stop Flash Player development for mobile browsers will likely be repeated for browsers on the desktop, just not anytime soon,” writes PCWorld, citing analysts.

Indeed, “they're not getting out the Flash business," Ray Valdes, an analyst with Gartner, said of Adobe "But clearly they see that the future is HTML5."

Likewise, “as the Web moves more toward an HTML-oriented approach for multimedia content, perhaps the need for mobile Flash access leave diminish,” Computerworld concedes. “Right now, though, there's still plenty of content that is Flash-based out there.” mediapost.com

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The Asus Zenbook: a steely marvel with an appalling trackpad

arstechnica.com

Adopting the runaway success of the slim and powerful MacBook Air, PC manufacturers have finally arrived on the scene with their own blade-thin models. The Asus Zenbook is one of the first compelling "ultrabooks" and certainly the most striking, with a brushed metal body and clean lines.

While we found the performance of the Zenbook to comprise unfaltering, it does fall short in a few areas like screen and sound quality (the 11-inch Core i7 we tested is also cheaper than the MacBook Air). But in one key respect it absolutely fall down hard: the trackpad is fickle and barely functional, to the point that using the Zenbook as a primary traveling work machine caused us a good deal of frustration.

Asus "The Body" Zenbook

The Zenbook is made almost alone of brushed or anodized aluminum, with a few darker accents of metal and plastic (the frame around the screen and the surface in which the keyboard is inlaid are both dark plastic). The computer vents heat under the screen through slots in the hinge, which is also entirely metal. While Apple's MacBook Air uses a strip of plastic in the hinge to help the computer better pick up WiFi signals, we didn't notice any signal problems with the Zenbooks.

Edges and corners of the Zenbook are sharp, altho the body is low-profile enough that we didn't have a problem with the edges digging into our wrists. The underside of the computer is slightly curved, and the computer can get pretty warm on the underside during moderate to heavy use. The area near the vents under the screen gets near-scalding hot while editing images.

The underside of the Zenbook has four rubbery feet all but a quarter of an inch high. When we received our loaner review unit, we found these feet were uneven, and placing the computer on a flat surface meant it wobbled when weight was placed on the lower right corner. We are certain we were not the first hands to touch this review unit out of the box, but none of the feet had sustained any significant wear-in fact, the foot that the computer wobbles onto is the only one that doesn't show any wear. At the end of our time with the Zenbook, the other three feet seemed to have worn in enough that the wobble was less pronounced.

Other than the feet, the feel of the Zenbook is quite hardy. No parts of the notebook squeak or creak or flex, and it felt like the expensive machine it is when I used it (so long as the heel of my right palm on the palmrest didn't rock it).

Whenever I would open the Zenbook, it was a toss-up whether the screen would lift smoothly away from the rest of the computer or would have to be prised apart like an oyster. If the hinge had comprised loosened up earlier in the day and we had opened and closed the computer a few times, it was easier to open and the bottom half would remain stable on a surface. If it had been a day or two since the computer was opened, we'd have to work a fingernail under the nub along the top edge to pry it open.

Once open, the body of the Zenbook is equilibrated relative to the weight of the screen. We could tip the display all the way back without the computer tipping with it. The profile of the computer is thin, measuring 9 millimeters at its thickest point and weighing only 2.43 lbs, thinner but heavier than the same size MacBook Air. The computer comes with a brown nylon and leather sleeve that snaps closed, which makes it easy to just throw in a bag and go. We hope you like brown envelope-style cases.

Only a handful of ports are on the Zenbook: a DC ability jack, USB 3.0, and micro-HDMI on the right, and USB 2.0, miniVGA, and headphone jack on the left, and included in the box are a USB-to-Ethernet adapter and a miniVGA-to-VGA adapter. The ports are sufficiently spaced and we had no issue plugging things in next to one another. arstechnica.com

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Toyota recalls 420,000 vehicles in U.S. to fix crankshaft pulley

latimes.com

Reporting from Seoul—
In a different corporate sputter for beleaguered Japanese automaker Toyota Motor Corp., the company said it was recalling more than 420,000 vehicles in the U.S. in connection with potential steering problems.

The safety recall to replace the crankshaft pulley on the V-6 engine affects 283,200 Toyota and 137,000 Lexus vehicles in the U.S., the company said. Worldwide it covers 550,000 cars.

There have been no reports of accidents or injuries related to the problems, Toyota said in a news release from its American headquarters in Torrance.

If not corrected, the external ring of the crankshaft pulley may become misaligned with the inner ring, causing noise or a warning signal to light up. The belt for the power steering pump may become detached from the pulley, making it suddenly more difficult to turn the driving wheel, the release said.

Since September 2009, Toyota has issued recalls covering more than 13 million vehicles in the U.S. With the company facing hundreds of lawsuits, safety experts and industry analysts argue that quality problems could haunt the world's largest automaker for years to come, affecting its reputation and bottom line.

In February, Toyota announced that it would recall 2.17 million vehicles to correct mechanistic defects that could cause them to accelerate out of control.

The latest recall includes these Toyota models: the 2004 and 2005 Camry, Highlander, Sienna and Solara; the 2004 Avalon; and the 2006 Highlander HV. The affected Lexus models are the 2004 and 2005 ES 330 and RX 330 and the 2006 RX 400h, the company said.

Starting in January, the company will mail owners a notification to make an appointee with an authorized dealer to have their cars inspected after a sufficient number of alternate parts have been produced, Toyota said.

Meanwhile, consumers who detect any abnormal dissonances are asked to make an appointment to have the vehicle inspected, the release said. latimes.com

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Asus Transformer Prime Is the First Quad-Core Android Tablet

Android tablets are old news, I know, but Asus’ Eee Pad Transformer Prime hopes to get your attention again with its quad-core Nvidia Tegra 3 chip.

The Transformer Prime, which got a quick tease end month, now has a December launch window—Asus still isn’t committing to an actual release date—and a price of $499 with 32 GB of storage, or $599 with 64 GB.


As you would anticipate, the Transformer Prime is a spec-boosted sequel to the original Eee Pad Transformer, which launched last spring. It’s thinner and lighter than its predecessor at 0.33 inches thick and 1.29 pounds, and it has an 8-megapixel rear-facing camera, compared to 5 megapixels on the old model.

But the star of the show is that quad-core Tegra 3 chip, which boasts better power consumption—Asus says the Transformer Prime lasts 12 hours on a charge—and hopefully better performance with it is 12-core graphics processor. Some app developers are already working to optimize their software for the Tegra 3, including Rockstar Games, which is porting Grand Theft Auto III to Android tablets and the iPad.

Like Asus’ original Eee Pad Transformer, the Prime has an optional $149 keyboard and trackpad that docks with the tablet to form a laptop—hence the name. The Transformer Prime’s dock adds another six hours of battery life, and includes a full-sized USB port and an SD card slot.

For software, the Transformer Prime runs Android 3.2, but not for long; Asus promises to upgrade the tablet to Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) later in December. The upgrade will bring new features like built-in photo editing, better speech-to-text and a system-wide spell checker.

No other hardware makers accept indicated that they are working on quad-core tablets for this holiday season, so the Transformer Prime could be your best choice if you’ve got $500 in tablet money to burn and are intent on not purchasing an iPad. techland.time.com

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ARM's new GPU chip design aims to boost mobile graphics

bbc.co.uk

The Mali-T658 offers up to 10 times the performance of its predecessor.

It paves the way for faster games and other more complex software on smartphones and tablet computers.

ARM hopes to expand its share of a rapidly-growing market. Demand for its mobile GPU designs lags behind that for its central processing units (CPUs).

The most high-profile use of its GPU to date is in Samsung's award winning Galaxy 2 handsets. They apply chips based on the T658's older brother, the Mali-400 MP.

A recent review by the influential website AnandTech rated the 400 MP the fastest GPU available in a smartphone today.

ARM says manufacturers are likely to have its new design in use in around two years.

"It all comes down to user experience," said Jem Davies at ARM's Media Processing Division.

"Faster graphics performance with snappier, more responsive user interfaces, more immersive game play and a whole range of new applications which are being enabled by the capabilities of GPU computing."
Calculations

GPU cores offer specialised processing capabilities that bolster up the power of the main CPU.

A GPU's key function is to accept all the polygon co-ordinates described by a piece of graphics software and work out how to draw, colour and shade them. It then uses this information to determine what colour each pixel of the screen should be as the image changes dozens of times every second.
Samsung Galaxy S2 Samsung's Galaxy S2 smartphone uses a previous ARM-based graphics processing unit

The more powerful the GPU, the more contingent is possible. Top of the range games can require millions of polygons on screen at the same time to create 3D-like environments.

To maximise performance, manufacturers can link several GPUs together.

ARM's previous design admitted up to four cores to be connected.

The Mali-T658 doubles the maximum to eight, with each core bidding double the arithmetic capability of its forerunner.

"It's all about power," said Mr Davies.

"The idea is that when the full performance is required, you power up all by those cores. But having a multi-core architecture means that when the performance needs are lower, we can power some of those cores down."

This allows ARM to play to one of its strengths - it is reputation for lower energy consumption.
Console quality graphics

The firm claims the new technology will offer battery-powered mobile handsets roughly the same graphics performance as Sony's Playstation 3 console.

However, its rival imaginativeness Technologies has made similar assertions about its upcoming PowerVR designs. Like ARM, the firm is headquartered in the UK. Its current architecture is used by Apple in its iPhone and iPad products.
Continue reading the main story
“Start Quote

    More immersive game play and a whole range of new applications... are being enabled by the capabilities of GPU computing”

End Quote Jem Davies ARM Holdings

California-based NVIDIA and Qualcomm also talk up their GeForce and Adreno technologies.

But whatever the firms' claims, buyer expectations are hard to beat.

"You have cinema, you have high definition, you have hugely complex CGI movies on HD screens in your lounge," said Ian Smythe, director of marketing at ARM's Media Processing division.

"You anticipate this high quality experience from every screen that you look at. And so the user experience has to be of that sort of quality.

"Reproducing a CGI movie - which is generated on a server farm where it takes a day to render a frame with 50,000 processors - being able to reproduce that in a mobile experience is clearly a challenge."
Speech recognition

GPUs are particularly good at what are termed "parallisable" tasks - processes that can be broken down into several parts and run simultaneously because the outcome of any one computing does not determine the input of another.

This is particularly suited for applications offering augmented reality, allowing users to overlay graphical information over live images of whatever their devices' cameras are facing.

Other potential uses include image processing, pattern matching and speech recognition.

Challenger among the GPU designers is helping drive computing power to new heights, making possible processes unthinkable on previous generations of handsets.

However, developers need to code their software to take advantage of the graphics processors if they are to make the most of the accelerated performance on offer.

That is a challenge when different devices use different designs.

"At the moment many of the speech recognition applications that are out there are solely relying on the CPU," said Mr Davies.

"Very few are taking advantage of the speedup of the GPU - and that's clearly an area of growth for us." bbc.co.uk

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New iOS 5.0.1 Update ‘Nothing Short of Amazing’

wired.com

Good news if you’re one of the iOS 5 users who suffers from crippled battery life: Most early reports are showing that iOS 5.0.1 fixes the problem completely.

“Frankly the difference is nothing brusk of amazing,” said Wired reader Donald Kuntzman, who downloaded the update on his Verizon iPhone 4. “To go almost an entire day without a change in the meter reading seems unbelievable. Where before I could almost watch the battery drain, now it doesn’t move at all.”

Kuntzman noticed that the battery aliveness on his iPhone degraded after the iOS 5 upgrade. He needed to charge his phone once a day, and always worried it would die before he had a chance to recharge it. He could practically “watch the battery drain,” but since the update, his battery level doesn’t seem to drop at all.

Sam Bertolet tweeted to @GadgetLab that his previous fifteen percent battery loss per hour has been reduced to 4 to 5 percent with the update. Another reader tweeted that he only needs to charge every other day, as opposed to every day. Others like Khoi Pham “definitely noticed the battery life improvement” in the Beta 2 update.

Yesterday, reports surfaced that select iOS users comprised getting an early upgrade to iOS 5.0.1 to fix a number of iOS 5-related issues such as battery problems, Siri issues (for Australian 4S owners), and buggy iCloud documents. On Nov. 2, Apple confirmed that it had identified some bugs related to iOS 5, and said it would be delivering a fix in coming weeks.

But it looks like the fix Is not working for everybody. A few users have not seen any improvement with iOS 5.0.1 at this time. Gareth Evans tweeted that he saw no difference; he’s still getting six hours of usage on standby and four and a half when it’s being used. One user even reported worse battery life with the update, but that unlucky individual seems to be an outlier.

Wired has reached out to Apple to find out particulars of the 5.0.1 update, and will keep you updated as we find out more information. In the meantime, if you have a iOS 5.0.1 update story to share, please hit my e-mail link at the top of this article and describe what you’re experiencing. wired.com

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Seven Accused Of Infecting Computers With Malware In More than 100 Countries

Federal prosecutors accept charged seven people who allegedly ran a massive online-advertising fraud scheme and used malicious software to infect at least 4 million computers in more than 100 countries.

Six people from Estonia and another individual from Russia allegedly used the malicious software, or "malware," to hijack Web searches and drive traffic to other websites in order to generate "pay per click" income. In some cases, the software, known as DNSChanger, would replace advertising on popular websites with other ads when viewed from an infected computer.

The scheme, which ran between 2007 and 2011, allegedly infected computers when victims visited certain websites or downloaded software to view videos online, according to the indictment. More than 500,000 computers comprised infected in the U.S., including computers used by U.S. government agencies, such as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

"We believe this criminal case is the first of it is kind and it arises from a cyber infestation of the first order," said Preet Bharara, the U.S. Attorney in Manhattan.

Six people are in detention in Estonia. A seventh person, a Russian man, is at large. Prosecutors plan to extradite the individuals from Estonia, Mr. Bharara said.

The two-year investigating began after NASA uncovered that 130 of its computers had been infected, said Paul Martin, NASA's inspector general.

However, there's no indication at this point that any space or scientific projects were impacted, he said.

U.S. prosecutors are assaying at least $14 million in forfeiture in the case, according to the 27-count indictment. The charges include engaging in conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to commit computer intrusion, wire fraud and money laundering. The wire fraud and money laundering counts carry terms of up to 30 years in prison.

Federal agents, admitting the Federal Bureau of Investigation, early Wednesday seized servers and IP addresses allegedly used by the defendants, Mr. Bharara said.

According to the indictment, the spyware would direct a computer user's Internet searches to a "rogue" server operated by the defendants, including servers in New York and Chicago. Then, if the user tried to reach a popular website, such as Apple Inc.'s iTunes store or Netflix.com, they would be directed to another website, such as one purporting to sell Apple software, according to the indictment.

Also, the malware allegedly would replace ads on popular websites, such as Amazon.com, ESPN.com or WSJ.com, with other ads when viewed from an infected computer, according to the indictment.

The defendants, who claimed to be given legitimate online advertising firms, allegedly received payments each time computers clicked on the links or the advertisements, according to the indictment.

The malware also allegedly was designed to disenable anti-virus software on infected computers and prevented virus updates, according to the indictment. online.wsj.com

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