Items tagged with video
Technically, Yahoo already has a YouTube-ish video service called Screen (show of hands, who knew that actually existed?), but the company is rumored to be hatching a plan to create a true YouTube competitor. According to Re/code’s sources, CEO Marissa Mayer wants a much bigger web video presence, and to do so, Yahoo is trying to poach some of YouTube’s biggest stars with the promise of--what else--more money. For starters, they’d get a better advertising revenue deal than the 45% cut that YouTube takes and/or get guaranteed ad rates for videos, but they’ll also get the ability to sell their own ads and have the opportunity for marketing in prime Internet real estate,...
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In this episode of HotHardware's Two And A Half Geeks, Marco, Dave and Iyaz talk about Intel's hot new SSD 730 Series solid state drives, Intel's Ivytown Xeon E7 v2 server processors and Merrifield and Moorefield processors for smartphones, as well as the LG G Flex, hands-on with Samsung's Galaxy S 5, the GeForce GTX 750 Ti and details of our next giveaway where you could win a new custom small form factor gaming PC! Show Notes: 01:45 - Intel SSD 730 Series: Enthusiast Class Storage 05:27 - Intel Announces Ivytown Servers For The Enterprise 07:24 - Intel Debuts Merrifield and Moorefield Designs at MWC 13:09 - NVIDIA GeForce GTX 750 Ti Maxwell GPU Review 20:27 - Android Curveball: LG G Flex Review...
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The mid-range graphics card market has seen a lot of action as of late, with an infusion of new products and the discontinuation of popular previous-gen products. Last week it was AMD’s turn to announce a new card—the $150 Radeon R7 265—and with its arrival also came a price cut on the Radeon R7 260X, which can now be had for as low as $129, though the MSRP has been reduced to $119. Today is NVIDIA’s turn to introduce a new mid-range graphics card. But unlike AMD’s re-brand and soft-launch, NVIDIA is at the ready with a brand-new GPU architecture and cards should be hitting store shelves immediately. The new GeForce GTX 750 Ti and GeForce GTX 750 are the first...
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The mid-range graphics card market has seen a lot of action as of late, with an infusion of new products and the discontinuation of popular previous-gen products. Last week it was AMD’s turn to announce a new card—the $150 Radeon R7 265—and with its arrival also came a price cut on the Radeon R7 260X, which can now be had for as low as $129, though the MSRP has been reduced to $119. Today is NVIDIA’s turn to introduce a new mid-range graphics card. But unlike AMD’s re-brand and soft-launch, NVIDIA is at the ready with a brand-new GPU architecture and cards should be hitting store shelves immediately. The new GeForce GTX 750 Ti and GeForce GTX 750 are the first...
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Not all ISPs are built alike, a fact that's been proven time and time again ever since the broadband era began. But today, that matters more than ever. We're streaming video, music, and in some cases, even games. We need reliable Internet, and we need an ISP that's willing to deliver that. Finding a good ISP isn't too difficult nowadays, what with the vast amount of information online, and not to mention services like Speedtest.net. But, another source of information can never hurt, right? Especially when that source is Google, which sends mind-boggling amounts of bandwidth to millions of people every single day. The service responsible for the biggest chunk of Google's bandwidth output is YouTube,...
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There will be lots of exciting products and technologies being shown off at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas next month (stay tuned -- we'll have lots of coverage), some of which is spilling out to the media ahead of time. Such is the case with YouTube, which announced plans to showcase 4K ultra high-definition (UHD) content at the convention, but with a new codec. YouTube will demonstrate 4K streaming video using the new royalty free VP9 codec. If that sounds familiar, it's because Google has been hard at work developing VP9 as alternative option to the H.265 codec that powers most of today's 4K video. Image Source: Flickr (riques) Skeptics will point out that Google has already...
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For every great, long-lasting startup that goes on to revolutionize the world, there are hundreds -- if not thousands -- that never make it beyond the drawing board. In today's world, however, simply "making it" once isn't good enough. Particularly in the rough-and-tumble technology sector, companies have to continue proving themselves time and time again, or else they risk losing all of the ground they've gained to incoming rivals. If you need proof, just look at the market share numbers for Nokia and BlackBerry from 8 years ago, and compare them to now. Similarly, Dell has found itself at the bottom of the pile in recent years. While the name and brand is still one that is recognized, it's...
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Believe it or not, the year is just about over, which means that it's time to look back at some of 2013's most well-known songs, moments, memes, etc. Yahoo has already issued some of its most popular searches in 2013, and now YouTube has assembled a mash-up video that glances back at some of the moments that made this year memorable. From "Thrift Shop," to "What Does The Fox Say?," to "Get Lucky," to Jimmy Fallon, to Cookie Monster, it's a rewind worth watching. Have a look and see what pops out to you....
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If you're a Roku user looking on at your Chromecast-owning brethren in envy, we have good news for you. PlayOn today made its PlayCast channel available in the Roku channel store. Using the PlayCast app, Roku users can stream online videos to TVs and mobile devices, in essence giving the Roku crowd the Chromecast-like ability to send virtually any video from a PC browser to a Roku-connected TV. "PlayCast is the last piece of the puzzle needed to give Roku devices functionality comparable to Chromecast," said Jeff Lawrence, CEO, MediaMall Technologies. "With PlayOn and PlayCast, Roku users can now watch nearly any online video on their TV. Even YouTube videos can be cast to the TV with PlayCast."...
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Although the Internet is a deep and wide resource for learning how to do everything from playing licks on a slide guitar to how to fix your dishwasher to the best makeup tips and so on, Google is taking Internet-based help a step further with the introduction of Helpouts, which Google developed based on its Hangouts technology. It’s hard to summarize what Helpouts is exactly in one sentence, because what most people are going to think is “help video”, but that sells the new service far too short--and that’s not quite accurate, either. Instead of pulling up a video of someone demonstrating how to do something, you can actually have a one-to-one video chat with an expert...
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It only makes sense, really. Netflix has taken over the content world in many ways, even going so far as to fund original programming of its own and buck the usual trend by making entire seasons available at once. That journey has led it to an enviable position, but to date, getting to Netflix still requires something that many American households don't simply have by default. You either need a computer, a tablet, a game console, or a standalone set-top box. We're guessing that executives within Netflix have been asking themselves this question for a long while: "What would happen if Netflix access was built straight into an everyday DVR?" According to a new Wall Street Journal report, that's...
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Microsoft's Corporate VP of Surface, Panos Panay had his work cut out for him at the company's Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2 launch event on Monday. Microsoft needed compelling product demos to showcase their new hardware against the current backdrop of stiff competition of alternative platforms and products from Google and Apple. So, obviously, the first thing they did was call upon their old friend Intel way back at the design stage, empowering their Surface Pro 2 slate with a dual-core Haswell 4th generation Core i5-4200U processor. The Surface 2 Pro is essentially a hybrid tablet-notebook device, weighing in at 2 lbs. with a 10.6-inch full HD display and starting at $899 with 64GB of...
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Internet Explorer 11 is being packed into and rolled out with Windows 8.1, though you can already check out a pre-release version in the Windows 8.1 Developer Preview as well as on Windows 7. Should you do that, you'll discover that IE11 is capable of plug-in free audio and video streaming based on the latest HTML5 code, which Microsoft claims allows the browser to achieve "Professional Quality Video," or video that's equally suited for home use as it is for premium TV shows and movies. "With Professional Quality Video, streams start promptly and play smoothly," Microsoft stated in a blog post. "The best video quality possible with your device and network is automatically selected, and premium...
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Call it a year delayed or fashionably late, either way we now have an official HDMI Version 2.0 specification. It's the first HDMI specification to be developed by the HDMI Forum and it offers a significant increase in bandwidth (up to 18Gbps, compared to 10Gbps for HDMI 1.4) so that it can support features like the emerging 4K video standard at up to 60fps. In addition to offering up support for 4K video, which is 4 times the resolution of Full HD 1080p, HDMI 2.0 supports 32 audio channels and dynamic auto lip-sync, and adds extensions to CEC, HDMI Forum said. HDMI 2.0 has enough bandwidth to drive 4K displays at 60fps. Shown above is the Asus PQ321 Ultra HD 4K monitor. "The introduction of...
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Facebook said that it would enable Instagram to remain independent, and that it wouldn't ever cross any lines that would impact the user experience. Keeping true to that promise, Instagram itself (and not parent company Facebook) has just made a big acquisition: Luma. It's a video sharing app that almost no one has heard of... until now. Luma was previously known as Midnox, and while sharing was one of its features, video stabilization was the other. It's likely that Instagram executives are more interested in the latter. Luma will indeed be shutting down soon, as its employees focus all of their energy on bettering Instagram. Luma's iOS app has already been removed from the App Store, and existing...
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Barnes & Noble may be scaling back its NOOK hardware business as Amazon, Apple and Google eat up whatever remains of the tablet market, but that doesn't mean that it's ditching the brand entirely. The company has just launched a suite of free NOOK Video Apps for iOS, Android and Roku devices. The apps enable customers to watch movies and TV shows from NOOK Video instantly on a wide variety of mobile devices, and moreover, customers with the NOOK Tablet and NOOK Color will now have access to NOOK Video through a specially designed app that will automatically appear in customers’ lockers starting today. Streaming video seems to be all of the rage these days, and now that B&N is joining...
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You may not typically associate cutting-edge science and motion research with the company responsible for creating the most famous mouse couple in the world, but Disney Research has a tendency to shine on the technology front every now and again. Recently, the arm published a video detailing a new interactive, tactile experience in free air. The project is being titled Aireal, and it's described as a "new low cost, highly scalable haptic technology that delivers expressive tactile sensations in mid air." Essentially, it enables users to feel virtual objects, experience dynamically varying textures and receive feedback on full body gestures, all without requiring the user to wear a physical device....
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It was starting to feel like the saga that wouldn't end, and honestly, like Hulu was puffing itself up way, way too much. Now, after much discussion, it appears that Hulu's owners will retain that ownership, and a sale won't be on the table. While the likes of Yahoo! were rumored to have placed bids on the video delivery service, a press release this week confirmed that 21st Century Fox, NBCUniversal and The Walt Disney Company will be maintaining their stakes in Hulu. Sorry, bidders! Together, the three owners will place a cash infusion of $750 million into Hulu in order to propel future growth. Launched in 2008, Hulu is now a leading aggregator of premium online television content from over...
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Something's brewing at Facebook, and as we reported last week, the social networking service is planning a launch event for June 20, 2013. Early speculation suggested the big reveal would be a news reader, which would fill a ginormous void left by the shuttering of Google Reader. However, sources say Facebook has something else up its sleeve. According to TechCrunch, Facebook is likely to unveil a new video shooting and sharing feature to Instagram. Similar to Twitter's Vine service, Instagram videos would be short clips between 5 second and 10 seconds long. While nothing has yet been confirmed, if this happens, you can probably expect a collection of filters, too. Before you get your hopes up,...
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Three cheers for democracy! The voting public has done their duty, and now Amazon is making known which of its original series will remain on the air. After a month or so of broadcasting via Amazon Instant, five pilots were chosen as the top-rated, and only those five will see production beyond the initial pilot episode. It was a highly unique tactic; Amazon funded and developed a number of new programs, and then aired them exclusively to Prime members for viewing. Then, it asked those viewers to vote on which they enjoyed the most. Comedy pilots Alpha House and Betas, along with kids pilots Annebots, Creative Galaxy and Tumbleaf, have been given the greenlight to begin production on a full series...
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Remember what it was like to be the cool kid in class? Or, perhaps you remember wishing you were the cool kid in class? Either way, it seems that Hulu knows exactly what it's like to be in high demand. The video streaming service has been the token streaming service up for acquisition over the past year or so, and while a lot of rumors have surfaced, the company has yet to be swooped up. But, of course, that may be changing soon. Yahoo has been on an unprecedented spending spree, forking out $30 million for Summly, $1.1 billion for Tumblr, and countless other smaller purchases in 2013. So, when we hear that Yahoo may be in the running to buy up Hulu, it sure makes sense. Yahoo seems to be attempting...
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Well, well -- the fight for the living room continues. With Microsoft marketing the Xbox One not as a game console, but as an "all-in-one" living room product, it's clear that consumer companies are intently interested in claiming the eyeballs of those plopped down in front of the television. Google TV was Google's own effort to accomplish that, but it never really went anywhere. That said, there's always time for a second chance, and LG is looking to make that happen. A new Korea Times report suggests that LG Electronics could see its TV sales rise due to integration with Google TV. Presently, it's the only major TV maker that is shipping HDTVs with Google TV built-in. “LG is currently...
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