Athena
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Amazon has acquired Facebook's satellite internet team
Amazon has acquired Facebook's internet satellite team, marking a big step in its race with SpaceX's Starlink.
Intel explains Project Athena laptops, promises nine hours of battery life
It's been five months since Intel teased its Project Athena program, and until now, all we really knew was that it'd be similar to the Ultrabook scheme, which paved the way for slim yet efficient premium laptops. With just three weeks to go until Computex, arguably the biggest PC event in the world, Intel shed more light on what it thinks a Project Athena laptop will offer, and how it's helping build them.
Facebook hopes to launch an internet satellite in early 2019
Facebook has cooperated on internet satellite initiatives (with less-than-ideal results), but there's been precious little word of plans to make its own satellite beyond high-level promises. Now, however, there's something tangible. Both publicly disclosed FCC emails and a direct confirmation to Wired have revealed that Facebook aims to launch an internally developed satellite, Athena, sometime in early 2019. A spokesperson didn't share details, but the shell organization Facebook used to keep filings hidden (PointView Tech LLC) talked about offering broadband to "unserved and underserved" areas with a low Earth orbit satellite on a "limited duration" mission.
Lockheed Martin's laser can stop a truck from over a mile away
Lasers have staggering range, can attack land or air-based targets and are dirt-cheap to fire, making them ideal for a military with one eye on the budget. Now, Lockheed Martin has worked out that the technology could also be used for stopping a car without resorting to lethal force. The company has been testing out a new fiber-optic laser, called ATHENA, which was able to burn through the engine manifold of a truck that was over a mile away.
Google experimenting with major redesign of Chrome OS
Google has made attempts in the past to unify the design of its various properties with varying degrees of success. Material Design, which is major part of the upcoming Android L release, may be its most coherent effort to date. The new look is expected to touch every corner of Google's catalog, and Chrome OS will be part of that revamp. A screen shot posted by Chromium evangelist François Beaufort on Google+ shows the very early fruits of Athena, an effort to "bring a new kind of user experience" to Mountain View's desktop OS. The image shows windows with minimal controls and decoration in a stacked card view, similar to the app switcher revealed as part of the next Android update. There's also what appears to be a launcher bar with a search field at the bottom of the screen. While the redesign is clearly in the very early stages, you can see the important elements of Material Design at work. Everything is flat and paper like, but exists in a three-dimensional space, complete with less-than-subtle drop shadows. You can compile a copy of Chromium OS yourself to give Athena a test run, but we'd hold out for a more complete version.
SMITE wises up with Athena
How many gods are left in the universal pantheon for Hi-Rez Studios to exploit for SMITE? We guess at least one more because the team has patched in Athena, goddess of wisdom. Athena is a melee tank who uses a bit of magic to help her allies and herself out in a fight. While she primarily relies on shield and spear, her passive ability gives her a ranged attack after using a skill. She also can dash up to (and through) enemies, taunt with a shockwave, summon ghost soldiers to form a shield wall, and teleport to an ally while protecting that ally from 50% of damage for a short time. You can check out the Athena reveal, including her lore and abilities, in the video after the break!
ZTE teases 6.2mm-thick 'Athena,' crams in 720p IPS display and Cortex-A15 chip
Never mind Huawei's 6.68mm-thick Ascend P1 S or Oppo's 6.65mm-thick Finder, because the record's about to be beaten yet again by another Chinese manufacturer. Codenamed "Athena," this mysterious ZTE phone's been getting a fair bit of attention on Sina Weibo with its 6.2mm slimness claim, all thanks to a keen terminal device strategy director from the company. While Mr. Lu hasn't delved into specifics, what we know so far is that Athena will feature a 720p display, Cortex-A15 chip (a source of ours said it will be multi-core) and up to 64GB of internal storage, as well as a "Miflavor UI" -- something that we've already previewed on the Era at MWC -- to go on top of Android 4.0. Lu also hinted that there will be several color options, but we're more than happy to nab that black kevlar edition in the above shot (and someone should tell Motorola to take a look at this). Two more pictures after the break to keep you busy for the time being.
Rise and Shiny recap: Mytheon
Each week Rise and Shiny asks you to download and try a different free-to-play, indie or unusual game, chosen by me, Beau Hindman. Some of the games will be far out of your gaming comfort zone, and some will pleasantly surprise you. We will meet each Tuesday and Friday night at 9 p.m. EDT (8 p.m. CDT time) followed by this column the Sunday after. I welcome any suggestions for games, either in the comments or at beau@massively.com. I'm a simple man. I need a strong cup of coffee in the morning, walks with my two dogs, a kiss from my wife -- and giants. Lots of giants. Mytheon is a perfect game for a simple man like me. It installs easily and the controls are basic. It is by no means perfect, but I am not sure that it is trying to be. Like me, it's simple. It wants you to control miniature armies of centaurs, cyclopses and skeletons, and it wants you to kill things while controlling that army. See? Simple.
EVE blogger unveils Project Athena, a collection of fictional ship manuals
Few things impress me about EVE Online's community more than the incredible videos, artwork and fiction created by players. For the role-playing and fiction-writing communities, the game's continually-updated prime fiction acts as a canvas onto which new stories can be blended. Long-time EVE blogger Kirith Kodachi over at Inner Sanctum of the Ninveah has been an avid fiction-writer and contributor to EVE Tribune, producing several articles based on in-character technical overviews of EVE ships. Over the past two years, Kirith has been teaming up with artists and volunteer writers to collaborate on creating a more comprehensive collection of these articles. Written in the style of fictional ship manuals and presented as technical briefings interspersed with historical information, the completed project (dubbed "Project Athena") features full articles on 23 ships and their Tech 2 counterparts. Although the historical information and technical specifications have been invented by Kirith and his contributors, he's done his best to stick as closely as possible to the official EVE prime fiction. At 64 MB, the huge PDF file isn't a small download, but for role-players or fans of EVE fiction it's definitely worth a look.
Wonderland Online patches up to version 4.0 with The Cursed Palace
Free to play 2-D fantasy MMO Wonderland Online has recently update with a brand new version, adding in new quests, a drastic change to the current storyline, and the ability to hold instances in their game. With all of these additions comes their new 13 dungeons, the wings of the Cursed Palace.The former Hell Generals of the evil King Howert (now deceased as of this patch) have captured Apollo, the Sun God, forcing the world into eternal darkness. Players will have to pass the tests of the Cursed Palace, a place that only Hercules had survived before, to reclaim Apollo and bring light back to the world. If you haven't noticed, this entire patch has a very Greek theme to it, introducing the Greek Polis area, which is a combination of all of the old Greek city-states, and the Hanging Gardens of Babylon in addition to the Cursed Palace.For the full look at the 2-D MMO's large patch, check out their dedicated site to the update on the main Wonderland Online home page.
Misplaced wings no sweat for DARPA's new aircraft control system
One of the problems -- outside of the obvious -- with a significantly damaged aircraft is that pilots often overreact and add to the situation. In other words, when a plane gets nailed by something like a missile, the person at the wheel panics. DARPA and Athena's Damage Tolerance and Autonomous Landing Solution adds a full flight automation and backup system that uses a plane's internal inertial navigation system and GPS systems to land safely by automatically adjusting to the new configuration -- a physics computation that a human is in no condition to deal with during such a crisis. In a recent unmanned flight test, Rockwell Collins showed off the tech with a scaled-model F-18 in which nearly half a wing is blown off and then landing the plane safely. Hit the read link to watch the strangely calming video.[Thanks, jr]
T-Mobile Germany rolls deep with 16GB version of MDA Ameo
That mighty beast of a smartphone, HTC's Athena -- known better as the Advantage in retail trim -- is getting a modest upgrade in its MDA Ameo guise on T-Mobile Germany. The big news is the bump in the Ameo's hard drive from 8GB to 16GB (would be nice if that was an SSD, but you can't win 'em all) while other changes include a "modified arrangement" of the keyboard (their words, not ours) and the inclusion of Office Mobile 6.1. It'll run €459 (about $675) when it hits in April. And no, we're pretty sure the 16GB hard drive and rearranged keyboard don't make it any less awkward in the hand.[Via the::unwired]
HTC Advantage now available, $899 at retail
HTC today announced official US availability of its mobile monster (and we do mean "monster"), the Advantage. Known alternately as the Athena and X7501, the sucker rocks pretty much every feature one could want in a pocketable device: 256MB of onboard ROM, 128MB of RAM, 8GB hard drive, HSDPA 850 / 1900 alongside quadband GSM, WiFi, Bluetooth 2.0, 3 megapixel autofocus cam, integrated GPS, and an incredible 5 inches of VGA display madness sitting atop Windows Mobile 6 Professional. Coming in at a hefty 134 x 98 x 16mm (20mm with keyboard attached), the term "svelte" doesn't exactly apply here -- but for folks who think power trumps pocketability, this may just be their soulmate. Find it now at CompUSA and Amazon for a buck under $900.
Official TyTn WM6 update loosed by HTC, others on the way
We're not sure why HTC waited longer than virtually all of its carrier partners to unleash a Windows Mobile 6 upgrade for its own-branded Hermes, the TyTn, but no bother -- the point is it's now available, so there's really no good excuse for anyone with Hermes hardware to still be rocking old-skool WM5 at this point. Meanwhile, users of the P3300 (Artemis), S620 (Excalibur), and Advantage should all get their hookups this month if everything goes according to plan. Wasn't it, like, an eternity ago now that T-Mobile rocked WM6 on the Dash? Better late than never, we suppose.[Via the::unwired]
Virtually Overlooked: Athena
Welcome to our weekly feature, Virtually Overlooked, wherein we talk about games that aren't on the Virtual Console yet, but should be. Call it a retro-speculative.SNK's Athena should have been one of the coolest NES games available. It had a huge variety of equippable weapons, armor, and accessories, and it featured a female protagonist, a distinction shared with its contemporary, Metroid, and not much else. It didn't work out, but let's not let that minor quibble stop us from appreciating it! Any SNK game that didn't cost $300 is at least worth a look.
Tons of Doki Doki Majo Shinpan screens
We've just updated our gallery of screenshots and art from SNK's Doki Doki Majo Shinpan. As is the norm for this game, there's a lot of weird stuff to enjoy.We'd like to point out the character seen here, who is a retro game freak and therefore totally not a witch so leave her alone. Oh, wait ... is that Athena? Hmm. Either she is a witch and she uses awful games as weapons, or she's proudly displaying a copy of Athena and something is terribly wrong with her. In either case, should you encounter this character in the game, just put your DS on the ground and run away from it until you pass out.There's also a boy witch, apparently. Good to know SNK is providing equal opportunity for everyone, regardless of sex or sexual orientation, to be uncomfortable. Gotta grope 'em all!%Gallery-3277%
T-Mobile Wing / HTC Herald shows up in FCC
As expected any day now, the T-Mobile "Wing" (aka HTC Herald or P4350) has shown up on the FCC (this time in full glory), and also as expected, it's definitely due for US release. Besides the requisite MyFaves support, don't expect any surprises: it'll have Bluetooth, WiFi, and EDGE data (which is fine enough for T-Mo's 2.5G network). Fingers crossed this will launch soon and on time, and with Windows Mobile 6, to boot.[Via Phone Scoop, thanks Kashif and Mario]
Hands-on with the HTC Advantage
So we happened to get our hands on an HTC Advantage last week, and damn is this thing ready to rumble. The keyboard (which we just weren't that fond of) snaps into place from a good inch away, and feels more like an industrial magnet than something you'd find on a consumer device. The VGA screen is fantastically large and bright, and played back full-res video without a hiccup. It even has an idle mode with a couple mini-widgets and an email ticker when the keyboard is magnetically latched onto the body to protect the screen (that VueFLO nav, we think). Check out the gallery to get a better sense of what you're in for, but be warned: this is a machine by and for handheld computing enthusiasts and cellphone nerds. So even though HTC wants you to replace your laptop with an Advantage for short trips, it's still a beast of a connected PDA at heart.%Gallery-2240%
HTC Advantage coming to US... under the HTC brand
Another from HTC we saw coming, but that's still a pleasant surprise: HTC's Advantage (codename Athena) will in fact be making it Stateside! Noice, but even better, HTC will be releasing the Advantage (now camera-free) under its own brand. In other words, the little ODM we all watched grow up in the last couple of years has finally broken free of designing handsets for others and the perpetual carrier rebadges, and is officially launching devices under its own brand in the US. Perhaps they finally have the cachet to play the game outside of the normal carrier / device ecosystem (or, equally likely, no US carrier was brave enough to sell the Advantage), but either way users can look forward to: 5-inch VGA touch display Tri-band UMTS / HSDPA, quad-band GSM / GPRS / EDGE WiFi, Bluetooth 2.0 GPS navigation 8GB drive, 256MB flash memory, 128MB RAM miniSD card slot, HTC VueFLO nav 3.5mm audio jack Coming this summer -- hard price and date not yet established.
HTC Athena spotted with Dopod U1000 trimmings
Naturally, HTC and T-Mobile aren't going to be able to keep this little (er, not-so-little) Athena gem to themselves. Dopod is getting in on the action, with its subtly branded U1000, which carries an alarming NT 39,990 pricetag -- about $1,215, compared to T-Mobile's 500 euro price, roughly $646 -- and of course all the standard Athena specs like the 5-inch VGA screen, 3.5G, 3 megapixel camera, 8GB drive and 624MHz Xscale processor. Oh, and just in case you're keeping track, the 5.5 / 4.5 hours of GSM / UMTS talk time quoted here is a bit more conservative than the initial 6 hours we were hearing from HTC. Peep a couple more angles after the break.
