Shield
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'Acoustic cloak' could shield submarines with a cone of silence
We've seen some overly elaborate invisibility cloaks in our day, but Duke engineers have shown that lo-fi may be best for audio. After much refinement, they've developed a shield that can hide objects from sound waves thanks to a highly engineered pyramid shape and carefully placed holes. The stacked layers retard sound coming from any angle, so that it appears to have bounced off a flat wall when picked up by a detector (see the video after the break). Though it's still early days, such materials could one day protect ships from sonar or improve concert hall acoustics, for instance. It's also got the pyramid power thing going on -- so maybe it could also keep your razor sharp.
NVIDIA certifies PCs and routers that can stream games to its Shield handheld
If you've ever tried to stream a game from a PC (or PS4) to a mobile device over WiFi, then you'll know the bandwidth requirements can be quite fussy. Attempt to remote play in high definition at 60 frames per second, as NVIDIA promises with its Shield handheld and recently upgraded GameStream service, and things start to get seriously pinnikity. So, to help you pick the right hardware to go with your Shield (which is now going for $250 at Amazon, by the way), NVIDIA has started a certification program to label PCs and routers that are GameStream-ready. Expect to see the green logo on pre-built machines from the likes of Digital Storm and Maingear that have the necessary GeForce GTX graphical guts, as well as a number of dual-band and wireless-AC routers from ASUS, Buffalo, D-Link and Netgear. (You'll find a full and current list of certified products over at the source link). Compatible routers will also support streaming from the cloud, via NVIDIA's alternative GRID service, although of course you'll also need a steady 10Mbps broadband connection before you even think about trying that.
NVIDIA GRID cloud gaming service now in open beta for Shield owners in Northern California
NVIDIA Shield owners who downloaded a new software update a couple days ago not only received the ability to stream PC games over 1080p, but were also given the keys to try out NVIDIA's GRID cloud gaming service before anyone else. Similar to Gaikai and Onlive, GRID essentially lets you play games that are hosted on NVIDIA's servers rather than your home PC. Well, that service is finally out in open beta to Shield owners -- as long as they live in Northern California. NVIDIA's testing this out with just its San Jose servers for now, and you'll need a GameStream-ready 5GHz WiFi router, a minimum of 10Mbps download speed and a sub-40ms ping time to have a decent gaming experience. Those outside of the area can give it a go as well of course, as long as they're able to meet those bandwidth requirements -- the GRID beta app will run a network test to see if your connection passes muster. If you've already downloaded that aforementioned software update, you should already have the app, but you can download it separately from the Google Play Store as well.
NVIDIA's Shield now streams PC games to your TV in 1080p, has new control mapping capabilities
It was just over a month ago when NVIDIA's handheld, Shield, got the ability to stream Android games to TVs at 1080p resolution via Console Mode. Today, it can now do the same for PC games thanks to a software update that also brings improvements to 720p streaming mode and its Gamepad Mapper feature, too. Of course, the Gamestream technology that powers Shield streaming officially supports a limited number of games at the moment, with Batman: Arkham Origins, Borderlands 2 and Assasin's Creed IV: Black Flag among the highlights. In all, 63 games are currently available to stream in full HD, with more titles scheduled to be added every week. With Gamepad Mapper, users can now map motion controls to physical ones. So, instead of tilting your handheld from side to side in the games designed to do so, you can map those gyro inputs to the Shield's thumbsticks instead. And, to better let folks know of all the custom control possibilities, NVIDIA is rolling out a community beta feature that lets folks share and rate different control map profiles. Lastly, if you have a Shield and live in Northern California, you can now get in on NVIDIA's GRID beta. For folks who aren't familiar, GRID is NVIDIA's cloud gaming technology, similar to Gaikai and OnLive. So, folks with a sub-40ms ping time to NVIDIA's San Jose, Calif., servers and a minimum 10 Mbps connection through a GameStream-ready router can get exclusive access to the service's library of games on their Shield. Looks like Christmas came early, folks, so head on down to the source for the info needed to grab all the goodies.
Nvidia Shield update adds Console Mode, improved PC streaming
The Nvidia Shield just became a much more attractive gaming device, thanks to a new, "massive" update. Most notably, the update enables the Shield's "Console Mode," which allows players to link a Bluetooth controller to the Shield to play games on the nearest television, much like traditional gaming machines. Nvidia would obviously prefer you use the official Shield controller to play games in Console Mode, but given the ubiquity of Bluetooth it should now be possible to connect a wide range of controllers to the Shield (including Sony's DualShock 3). Alongside Console Mode, Nvidia also improved Android support in the Shield. "Hundreds" of Android games are now playable on Nvidia's machine, and the company even went to the trouble of designing a utility dubbed "Gamepad Mapper" which allows for use of traditional controllers in Android games originally designed for a touchscreen interface. Streaming games from a PC to the Shield has also been improved, with "50 of the best PC games" now supported. To further tempt users, Nvidia has also unveiled a promotion in which those who purchase "select GeForce GTX graphics cards" alongside a Shield will receive a $100 discount on the computer/console hybrid as well as free PC copies of Assassin's Creed IV Black Flag, Batman: Arkham Origins and Splinter Cell: Blacklist. Full details on this promotion and this morning's update are available on the Shield website.
NVIDIA Shield update brings Android 4.3, Console Mode and official Gamestream support
NVIDIA promised that we'd see big upgrades to its Shield gaming system today, and it's delivering them in spades. A just-launched Android 4.3 update introduces Console Mode, which lets players steer a TV-connected Shield through a Bluetooth gamepad; NVIDIA supplies a button mapping utility that adds hardware controls to games which expect touch input. The release also takes Gamestream out of beta, providing official PC-to-Shield streaming for more than 50 titles. A few interface-level tweaks come with the new OS, including actionable notifications, restricted profiles and the option of moving app files to an SD card. The update should be rolling out now, but gamers who don't yet have a Shield now have an extra incentive to pick one up. NVIDIA is lopping $100 off the system's price as part of a bundle that includes a GeForce GTX graphics card as well as copies of Assassin's Creed 4, Batman: Arkham Origins and Splinter Cell: Blacklist.
Weekly Roundup: Surface 2 review, McLaren P1 'hypercar,' Google's Project Shield and more!
You might say the week is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workweek, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Weekly Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past seven days -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.
NVIDIA's got a Shield 2 in the works with a next-gen Tegra heart, and why G-Sync is a big deal
At least according to NVIDIA CEO Jen-Hsun Huang. NVIDIA employees filled Montreal Marriott's Salle de Bal 1,000-person capacity basement ballroom late last week, where Huang announced a hat-trick of major news for the company -- Gamestream, G-Sync, and the new GTX 780 Ti GPU -- to raucous applause. The highlight of the three, and the one that Huang emphasized by flying in a trio of game industry legends, is G-Sync. The module will arrive built into gaming monitors starting early next year, and it aims to solve the issues of tearing, stutter, and lag. The aforementioned trio of legends -- Oculus' John Carmack, Epic's Tim Sweeney, and EA DICE's Johan Andersson -- vouched for G-Sync, but we were lucky enough to grab Huang for a quick followup interview post-presentation. Beyond discussing last week's big announcements, Huang spoke to Project Logan (aka: the next Tegra chip) and NVIDIA Shield 2 (which may be coming sooner than you'd think); Huang told us he'd love to see Logan powering the next version of Shield as representative hardware ahead of anything else. Head below the break for the full video.
Refresh Roundup: week of August 12th, 2013
Your smartphone and / or tablet is just begging for an update. From time to time, these mobile devices are blessed with maintenance refreshes, bug fixes, custom ROMs and anything in between, and so many of them are floating around that it's easy for a sizable chunk to get lost in the mix. To make sure they don't escape without notice, we've gathered every possible update, hack, and other miscellaneous tomfoolery we could find during the last week and crammed them into one convenient roundup. If you find something available for your device, please give us a shout at tips at engadget dawt com and let us know. Enjoy!
NVIDIA Shield now has open source software support
We loved NVIDIA Shield's bone stock Jelly Bean OS in our review, but if you're not a huge fan, NVIDIA's now offering a way to dig in and customize your Shield's OS even more. NVIDIA's made the Shield's software open source as of today, making the OS all the easier to customize. You'll of course have to root your device and, ya know, have an idea of what you're doing in the guts of a computer. NVIDIA warns new owners as much, saying, "To be sure, this is double-diamond stuff. If you're not a coder or already set up with an Android development environment you should skip downloading these tools." The company's blog post also notes that rooting your Shield or adding a bootloader will potentially void your device's warranty, so hacker beware! Should the associated tasks and NVIDIA's warnings not scare you off, the software is available right here. Our review video of the Shield is just below, in case you missed it last week.
Weekly Roundup: Moto X preview, Nexus 7 review, Chromecast review, and more!
You might say the week is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workweek, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Weekly Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past seven days -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.
Editor's Letter: Made in the USA... sort of
Motorola has been doing its best to build some buzz around the Moto X, which launched this week. As a smartphone, the X is decidedly middle-of-the-road. It boasts specs and a design similar to the Droid models Motorola announced last week. Available later this month at $199 on-contract from most major US carriers, the X's biggest claim to fame -- other than swappable backplates, including one made of wood -- is the fact that it's assembled in the US, in a 500,000-square-foot factory in Fort Worth, Texas. Yes, that's "assembled." Despite widespread reports that the X is being made in the US, most of its components, from its display to those backplates, are produced in factories around the world, and workers in Texas will assemble the phones. Does it really matter where your smartphone is made? If your main concern is domestic job creation, it might. A 2012 survey by Boston Consulting Group found that over 80 percent of Americans are willing to pay more for products that are made in the US instead of China, mainly because they want to keep jobs in the country. Interestingly, the same survey found that 60 percent of Chinese consumers would pay a premium for US-made products, apparently based on the belief that the US produces higher-quality products. When it comes to smartphones, that's an idea that's difficult to put to the test; there are none currently manufactured in the United States, and that's not about to change with the launch of the X.
NVIDIA Shield teardown dives deep inside the massive handheld
The folks at iFixit are braver souls than us, taking on NVIDIA's tank-like new gaming handheld, the Shield, in a teardown. Shield's cavernous shell houses a mess of multicolored parts, and hilariously reveals its Batman mask-esque properties when freed of said parts. Though it certainly doesn't look like an easy process, the repair site offers a six out of 10 rating; it specifically cites the battery and screen as being tricky to replace. NVIDIA's Shield was a big surprise at this year's Consumer Electronics Show -- CEO Jen-Hsun Huang showed up with the device on-stage during his company's press briefing, where he used it to demonstrate the just unveiled Tegra 4 processor. We finally got our hands on the final retail version earlier this month and you can find the full review right here. Consumers can also finally purchase the $300 handheld as of yesterday.
The Daily Roundup for 07.31.2013
You might say the day is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workday, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Daily Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past 24 hours -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.
Shield from Nvidia review
If necessity is the mother of invention, then the Nvidia Shield is a parentless enigma. The Shield is an interesting marriage of analog and touch-based tech, a $300 device with a clamshell design housing a "retinal" display – a 720p multi-touch OLED – all on top of a hefty dual-analog control setup beneath it. It's an impressive piece of technology, one that can stream PC games, play Android games and output anything to a TV via mini-HDMI. The Shield accomplishes a great number of tasks but, outside of PC game streaming, it doesn't fill a need that isn't already being fulfilled elsewhere by cheaper devices.%Gallery-188227%
NVIDIA Shield review (update: video!)
More Info Hands-on with NVIDIA Shield NVIDIA Shield now $300 NVIDIA Shield ships July 31st NVIDIA Shield is a truly strange device. It combines an eight-button console-size gamepad with dual analog sticks, and a 5-inch "multi-touch, retinal" screen. It runs stock Android 4.2.1. It touts wireless PC game streaming as its main selling point. It plays Android games, it plays PC games, it does the Twitter and the Gmail, et cetera. With Shield, NVIDIA is aiming to be the Swiss Army Knife of handheld game consoles. It slices! It dices! ShamWOW! It also costs $300, weighs nearly 1.5 pounds and takes up quite a bit of bag space. Its main selling point -- PC game streaming -- is dependent on the user already owning a PC with a relatively fancy ($140) NVIDIA GeForce GTX 650 GPU or better. Let's be honest, though: you already know this stuff, right? If you're reading this review, you either already own all the necessary gear and wanna know if this is a worthwhile peripheral for your PC, or you're morbidly curious about NVIDIA's (admittedly bizarre) console experiment. Let's all head below and try to find satisfaction. Update: We've added our full review video below -- please excuse the lateness! We ran into some technical glitches on our end, but we seem to have conquered them. Enjoy!%Gallery-195041%
Nvidia Shield shipping on July 31 to hands near you
Nvidia's Android-powered handheld gaming system Shield will ship July 31, Nvidia announced. The system was originally expected to launch June 27, but shipment was pushed back to July due to a mechanical issue found during the console's QA process. Our hands-on time with the Shield found some similarities to the Xbox 360 controller, with a little more bulk than a PlayStation Vita, thanks in no small part to its 5-inch, multi-touch, 720p display. %Gallery-188227%
NVIDIA's Shield now $300, arrives on June 27th (video)
Even before hitting store shelves, NVIDIA's Shield is shedding $50 from its original $350 asking price -- the little Android portable gaming console will cost $300 when it arrives at retail on June 27th. NVIDIA revealed both the new, lower price and release date today in a blog post which cited gamers asking for a lower price as the reason for the change. "We've heard from thousands of gamers that if the price was $299, we'd have a home run," the post reads. As such, the company's aiming for "a home run" with the new price point -- despite $300 being $50 more than a new PlayStation Vita, and just $100 short of a new PlayStation 4. Folks who pre-ordered aren't out of luck, they'll just be charged $300 when their unit ships rather than $350. As for where you can pick a Shield up outside of NVIDIA's official website ... well, we're waiting on word from the company on supported retailers. We've dropped the video of our hands-on with the final Shield just below, should you wish to relive those memories with us. Update: NVIDIA tells us that Newegg, GameStop, Micro Center and Canada Computers will all have Shield on the 27th.
Nyko reveals new accessories for Xbox One, PS4 and NVIDIA Shield
Now that we know mostly everything about the Xbox One and PlayStation 4, it's about time for peripheral makers to start showcasing their planned gear for these next-gen consoles. As such, Nyko's taken to this year's E3 to announce a few products meant to be used alongside Microsoft and Sony's recently announced entertainment boxes -- there's a Smart Clip, a Charge Base and a Headset Adaptor (Xbox One-only). Meanwhile, Nyko also took the time to unveil a little something for the NVIDIA Shield, including a dock that doubles as a charging station, a couple of sleek traveling cases and a kit which provides power to the unorthodox handheld while on the go or at home. Nyko didn't dive into much of the availability (or pricing) specifics, but the trend seems to be that the add-ons will be available later this year. Follow all of our E3 2013 coverage at our event hub.%Gallery-191072%
The Weekly Roundup for 05.13.2013
You might say the week is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workweek, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Weekly Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past seven days -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.
