January 2011

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PSP2: Sony NGP hands-on (Sony NGP)

28 January 2011 12:15 AM

With Sony’s unveiling of the new NGP (Next Generation Portable) console, the battle for dominance in the handheld market is about to heat up. Tom Hoggins reports from Tokyo.

NPG meets NGP: With their Next Generation Portable Sony have redrawn the battlelines in the handheld console war.

Sony’s NGP will cost somewhere between “affordable” and $599, according to PlayStation execs. The latest SCE honcho to comment on the handheld’s potential price point is Shu Yoshida, president of worldwide studios.

“From the very beginning of the project – since 2008 – pricing was one of the considerations that we had,” he told Game Informer.”

“Hopefully when we announce the price, people will see the proper value,” he added. “It’s not going to be $599.”

Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter told us earlier today that he believes PSP2 could sell for $250/£200, while Lazard Capital Markets’ Colin Sebastian is anticipating a $299 “or higher” price point.

* Price (approximately)
– $250/£250 or maybe around the £279 area.

* Release (approximately)
– 1-4 months before Christmas ’11 (a long way to go!)

* Battery life (approximately) – more below (bottom)
– 4-6 hrs

* CPU
– ARM CortexTM-A9 core (4 core)

* GPU
– SGX543MP4+

* External Dimensions
– Approx. 182.0 x 18.6 x 83.5mm (width x height x depth) (tentative, excludes largest projection)

* Screen
– 5 inches (16:9), 960 x 544, Approx. 16 million colors, OLED

* Touch screen
-Multi-touch screen (capacitive type)
-Rear touch pad
– Multi-touch pad (capacitive type)

* Cameras
– Front camera, Rear camera

* Sound
– Built-in stereo speakers
– Built-in microphone

* Sensors
– Six-axis motion sensing system (three-axis gyroscope, three-axis accelerometer), Three-axis electronic compass

* Location
– Built-in GPS
– Wi-Fi location service support

* Keys / Switches
– PS button
– Power button
– Directional buttons (Up/Down/Right/Left)

* Action buttons (Triangle, Circle, Cross, Square)
– Shoulder buttons (Right/Left)
– Right stick, Left stick
– START button, SELECT button
– Volume buttons (+/-)

* Wireless communications
– Mobile network connectivity (3G)

** IEEE 802.11b/g/n (n = 1×1)(Wi-Fi) (Infrastructure mode/Ad-hoc mode)

* Bluetooth
– 2.1+EDR ?A2DP/AVRCP/HSP?

Sony officially announced the device first thing this morning, confirming that it has two touch-screens on the front and back of the device, two thumbsticks and a five inch OLED screen.

NGP (or PSP2) will have a battery life of between four and six hours, if Sony hits its target. SCE Worldwide Studios boss Shuhei Yoshida told Kotaku that the new portable’s battery life target is the same as that of the existing PSP-3000 model. If achieved, it’ll also be comparable to the battery life of Nintendo’s upcoming 3DS, which has been pegged at three to five hours.

Sony officially announced NGP during a special PlayStation event in Tokyo this morning.

Photos;

Photos by ComputerAndVideoGames.

Leave your feedback and review in the comments below!

Apple App Store Ready To Hit 10 Billion Downloads

14 January 2011 7:00 PM

It won’t be long before Apple App store customers help the company reach the 10 billion programs downloaded level, as is shown by the company’s own giant app download counter (pictured above).

To put the 10 billion mark into perspective at the end of September 2009 the company sat at 2 billion apps downloaded, by January 2010 they were at 3 billion and then through 2010 their numbers more than tripled.

Download sales have been of course helped by not just the Apple iPhone series of devices but also the Apple iPod Touch and the very quick success of the Apple iPad.

The 10 billionth person to download an app from the store will receive a $10,000 iTunes Gift Card, even if the 10 billionth mobile application is a free one to procure.

You can find the rules for the $10,000 prize by clicking here.

EastEnders: Work with Comic Relief. (Spoiler)

10 January 2011 12:03 AM

Please Note; this post is a EastEnders spoiler; if you don’t want to know details of future storylines you may decide it’s best to stop reading!

As part of an upcoming storyline EastEnders is working alongside Comic Relief to tackle a problem that is faced by young women in the UK today – sexual exploitation.

Over the coming weeks, with her stepmother Bianca absent and with no-one else around, Whitney’s life takes a downward spiral. Alone and and vulnerable she falls for the charms of an unscrupulous man who ultimately sexually exploits her for his own financial gain.

In line with it’s long tradition of tackling social issues, EastEnders has been working alongside Comic Relief since last year to devise a storyline that explores a growing problem that faces many young women in the UK. The issue is one that the charity has been working on for a number of years, both in terms of funding projects that help those who have been subjected to this devastating experience and raising awareness of the issue.

The storyline will culminate in a special ten minute episode which is being featured as part of Comic Relief’s Night of TV on Friday 18th March.

Gilly Green, Head of UK Grants at Comic Relief, said:
“It is vital that we continue to alert young people to the dangers if we are to stop them being exploited and the opportunity to work with EastEnders will make a huge audience aware of this issue. We have been working with the Eastenders script writers and some of the young women from projects we support to ensure the story reflects the reality of young people caught up in sexual exploitation.”

Kevin Cahill, Chief Executive of Comic Relief, said:
“We have worked over many years with EastEnders in all kinds of ways. It’s been a real pleasure this year to work together on a piece of serious drama, in the best traditions of public service, which will highlight an important issue and also, because it occurs on the night of Comic Relief, actually help raise crucial funds to help young women caught up in it.”

source: Official EastEnders Blog

43 Million People Became Single on Facebook Last Year

4 January 2011 5:06 PM

43,869,800 people changed their relationship status to “single” on Facebook in 2010. But just 28,460,516 people changed their status to “in a relationship.” So, there are like 15 million Facebook users out there for the taking.

Facebook users uploaded more than 2.7 million photographs, shared 1 million links and “liked” 7.6 million pages every 20 minutes in 2010, according to the company. Among other data the social network is releasing: Lady Gaga was the most-liked celebrity on Facebook with 24.7 million likes, beating out Eminem with 23.7 million and Barack Obama, who had 17.2 million.

The numbers also offer a snapshot into Facebook users’ love lives in 2010. Some 43,869,800 people changed their relationship status to single during the year while 3,025,791 changed it to “it’s complicated.” Another 28,460,516 changed their status to “in a relationship” 5,974,574 to engaged and 36,774,801 to “married.”

Meanwhile, here’s a look at Facebook activity from a randomly chosen 20 minutes:

– Shared links: 1,000,000
— Tagged photos: 1,323,000
— Event invites sent out: 1,484,000
—- Wall posts: 1,587,000
—– Status updates: 1,851,000
—— Friend requests accepted: 1,972,000
——– Photos uploaded: 2,716,000
——— Comments: 10,208,000
———- Messages: 4,632,000
———– Likes: 7,657,000

Have your say in the comments below!