This Plan To End Smartphone Obsolescence With Lego-Like Block Components Is Mindboggling

Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/phonebloks-2013-9

When smartphones crap out, it's all too often that they end up in a landfill and they stick around for a few centuries and make friends with the rest of our garbage.

Dave Hakkens sees things a different way, however. He notes that when a smartphone kicks the bucket, it's usually just a single component that needs to be fixed. What if there were a device that were part Android and part Legos, literally enabling you to build a custom phone from prefabricated parts to meet your needs. Instead of colorful plastic bricks, however, you're recombining GPS, Wi-Fi, battery, and other smartphone components until you have the phone that's right for you.

This is all still just an idea (though the site touts a September 16 launch), but you can see how far ahead Hakkens is thinking. For people who don't care about on-device storage, they can get set up with a bigger battery. For photobugs, they can attach a higher-quality camera

If you're interested and want to help make this phone a reality, you can learn more here. Check out the video below to get the whole picture.

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This Gaming PC Is Smaller Than a Controller But Still Packs a Punch

Source: http://gizmodo.com/this-gaming-pc-is-smaller-than-a-controller-but-still-p-1291326222

There are plenty of gaming PCs designed to replace consoles, but if you're short on space that normally means accepting something underpowered like the Ouya. But this little guy, called the Gigabyte Brix II, is both powerful and petite.

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DisplayLink's adaptor streams 4K content over USB 2.0 and 3.0 (eyes-on)

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/09/10/displaylink-4k-video-over-usb/

DisplayLink's been wringing all kinds of connectivity out of our computer's USB ports for years, turning one connection into many. It should come as no surprise, then, that the company's using its considerable compression expertise to send high-resolution 4K video through that very same pipe. Ideally, the system shoots video over USB 3.0, while still giving users the full connectivity options of any compatible DisplayLink device -- but it can also function using USB 2.0, though the dynamically compensating data compression at work may cause some frames to drop.

We chatted with Displaylink's Director of Marketing, Andy Davis, about the feature and he informed us that the new 4K capability comes courtesy of a chip design first revealed back at CES that, while upping the max resolution of transmitted video, has no trouble driving multiple displays. In theory,the number of 4K screens the chip can drive is only limited by the graphics drivers and video decoding capabilities of the computer it's connected to. And, the new architecture also enables wireless streaming of 4K video using 802.11ad and can stream 1080p video over 802.11ac (4K over 802.11ac is in the works). We got to see a brief demo of the technology in action, and the video played back flawlessly over USB 3.0 for the few minutes we saw it work. Using 2.0, we noticed a slight flicker once or twice during playback, but the feed was still quite watchable. All in all, its a nice addition to the DisplayLink feature set. Now if they'd just let us know when we'll actually see it implemented in something we can buy.

Filed under: Displays, Misc, HD

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Exynos 5 Octa demos 8 cores working at once and other feats of CPU strength (video)

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/09/11/exynos-5-octa-demos-8-cores-working-at-once-gpu-assist-and-ener/

Just in case yesterday's news that Samsung is ready to enable new features on its Exynos 5 Octa chips wasn't clear, ARM has published a few demo videos to show what it can do. All three are embedded after the break, and the first one highlights how the Exynos 5 Octa 5420 can activate some or all of its 8 cores to maximize responsiveness while launching and using Quickoffice. As you can see above in the screenshot, all eight cores are activated while launching the app, then unused ones switch off for more efficiency. Another video shows how it runs Angry Birds Rio on just the four Cortex-A7 "LITTLE" side of the CPU, rarely activating any of their more power-hungry A15 friends. The last demo video shows how its Mali-T628 GPU activates to process images faster and more efficiently than the CPU alone can.

Filed under: Cellphones, Tablets, Mobile, Samsung

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Article: How Wi-Fi Direct Works As A Gateway To The Internet Of Things

Wi-Fi Direct is an emerging wireless standard that allows you to create a create a connection between any two devices without going through a wireless router. Want to create a Wi-Fi hotspot, connect your computer or smartphone to your printer or stream movies from your tablet to your television? ...

http://readwrite.com/2013/09/10/what-is-wi-fi-direct

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