HTC EVO Shift 4G headed for a January 9th launch at $150, according to RadioShack leak

HTC's worst kept secret (this side of the Thunderbolt) has popped up online again, this time as part of some RadioShack promo materials, which list its price, launch date, 4G capabilities, and screen size. Earlier indications had this Android slider launching on January 9th at a $150 price point with a two-year contract and now, lo and behold, both data points seem to have been confirmed. $450 is the price for the EVO Shift 4G sans any carrier obligations, though you'll probably want to stick with Sprint to make use of that WiMAX radio contained within. Bring on 2011 already!

HTC EVO Shift 4G headed for a January 9th launch at $150, according to RadioShack leak originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 29 Dec 2010 08:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Skype Reveals A Bug In Its Windows Client Was What Crashed Its System

After suffering a massive outage last week, Skype CIO Lars Rabbe has now detailed what went wrong.

One of the root causes? A bug in the Skype for Windows client (version 5.0.0152).

Rabbe kicks off by explaining that a cluster of support servers responsible for offline instant messaging became overheated on Wednesday, December 22.

A number of Skype clients subsequently started receiving delayed responses from said overloaded servers, which weren’t properly processed by the Windows client in question. This ultimately caused the affected version to malfunction.

Initially, users of Skype’s newer and older Windows software, as well as those using the service on Mac, iPhone and their television sets, were unaffected.

Nevertheless, the whole system collapsed as the faulty version of the Windows client, 5.0.0.152, is by far the most popular – Rabbe says 50% of all Skype users globally were running it, and the crashes caused approximately 40% of those clients to fail.

The clients included roughly a third of all publicly available supernodes, which also failed as a result of this issue.

From the blog post:

A supernode is important to the P2P network because it takes on additional responsibilities compared to regular nodes, acting like a directory, supporting other Skype clients and establishing connections between them by creating local clusters of several hundred peer nodes per each supernode.

Once a supernode has failed, even when restarted, it takes some time to become available as a resource to the P2P network again. As a result, the P2P network was left with 25–30% fewer supernodes than normal. This caused a disproportionate load on the remaining available supernodes.

Rabbe goes on to explain a lot of people who experienced crashing Windows clients started rebooting the software, which caused a huge increase in the load on Skype’s P2P cloud network. He adds that traffic to the supernodes was about 100 times what would normally be expected at the time of day the failure occurred.

A perfect storm in the P2P clouds, so to speak.

To learn how Skype supported the recovery of its supernode network, and what they’ll be doing to prevent this from happening again, I suggest you go read the full blog post.

And major kudos to the company for being so prolific in explaining what happened.

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Skype

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LVX System launches visible light communication in the US, finally

Ever wonder what happened to LEDs as a WiFi alternative? Well, wonder no more, because visible light communication is here -- in the municipal offices of St. Cloud Minnesota, at least. Starting tomorrow, LVX System, a Minnesota start-up, is installing the first of a series of LED fixtures that will use flashing lights to connect office workers to the internet, while saving big on the electric bill. The fixtures also function as regular overhead lights, using 36 watts of energy where 100 watts were once necessary. The setup consists of clusters of LEDs that switch on and off thousands of times per second at intervals undetectable to the human eye. The flashes emit binary code data -- off equals zero and on equals one -- that is received by special patented modems. Lights on these modems then transmit data back to the fixtures, and voila, you've got internet. According to LVX, light-powered networks are far less crowded and far more secure than their predecessors. Unfortunately, LVX's current incarnation transmits data at about 3Mbps -- a mere pittance compared to standard WiFi or Ethernet. Then again, 3Mbps is certainly fast enough for a city employee to perform really important tasks like keeping track of their favorite gadget blog, so we'll take it.


[Thanks, Andrew]

LVX System launches visible light communication in the US, finally originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 29 Dec 2010 05:48:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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MSI reveals mad Sandy Bridge motherboard with eight PCIe slots, eight USB 3.0 ports, and three BIOS chips

Straighten up and salute the Big Bang Marshal, MSI's attempt at redefining the term "overkill." This XL-ATX board packs a total of eight PCI Express lanes (though it only has the bandwidth to simultaneously feed four x16s or eight x8s -- relevant if you're crazy enough to think about using more than four GPUs), three separate BIOS chips, extra 8-pin and 6-pin 12V power intakes, and a thoroughly excessive set of power regulation components. The less extremely minded among you will appreciate having a full array of eight USB 3.0 ports on the back, though we can't get over the measly four DIMM slots on offer. Word is that features might change before the Marshal goes to market in the first quarter of next year, so let's hope more room for your RAM sticks is among the tweaks between now and then.

Continue reading MSI reveals mad Sandy Bridge motherboard with eight PCIe slots, eight USB 3.0 ports, and three BIOS chips

MSI reveals mad Sandy Bridge motherboard with eight PCIe slots, eight USB 3.0 ports, and three BIOS chips originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 29 Dec 2010 06:26:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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LG's LW6500 Cinema 3D TV is certified flicker-free, launching at CES

Oh LG, you infernal tease. Instead of politely revealing its full set of plans for CES 2011, the Korean company keeps gently peeling away the layers of ignorance, with today marking its pre-announcement of a new Cinema 3D TV set. The LW6500 opts for passive 3D glasses, in place of the currently popular active shutter goggles, which has garnered it a couple of industry certifications to say that its 3D is guaranteed, definitely, totally flicker-free. Aside from that, you get a neat brightness booster to ensure that switching on the third dimension doesn't dim the picture unduly, while the rest of the specs and extras on this 200Hz panel seem mostly unremarkable. We'll be casting our eyeballs over it at CES next week, which will be followed, we're told, by a rollout in select markets shortly thereafter.

Continue reading LG's LW6500 Cinema 3D TV is certified flicker-free, launching at CES

LG's LW6500 Cinema 3D TV is certified flicker-free, launching at CES originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 29 Dec 2010 07:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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