Intel chip gives new hope for Windows 8 tablets

Dell Latitude 10: Expect Windows Blue tablets -- packing quad-core Bay Trail processors -- that are as slim or slimmer than the Windows 8 variety.

(Credit: Microsoft)

Analysts are upbeat about Intel's new mobile chip design due later this year. That could mean a much-needed boost for Windows 8 tablets -- where many of those chips will land.

Imagine this: an ultraslim, light tablet with roughly twice the performance of any Atom-basedWindows 8 tablet on the market now. (And that's the full version of Windows, not Windows RT.)

That could happen in the second half of this year.

So think of Windows Blue (or Windows 8.1) products similar to Samsung's 0.38-inch thick ATIV Smart PC 500T Tablet or Dell's 0.4-inch thick Latitude 10 with new Intel quad-core "Bay Trail" processors based on the overhauled Atom micro-architecture.

And smaller tablets, like Acer's rumored 8-inch tablet, should ultimately benefit too.

That can only be seen as good news for Windows 8 tablets, which haven't exactly been taking the market by storm.

Here's a sampling of analysts' comments on the new Atom Silvermont micro-architecture -- announced Monday -- that will power Bay Trail chips: 

• Citi Research's Glen Yeung: Better than ARM? "We suspect that Intel's Silvermont [micro-architecture] will provide better performance metrics than even ARM's vaunted Cortex A15...Expected to appear in tablets in [the second half 2013] and smartphones in [the first half 2014], Silvermont also has the distinction of being the first mobile chips (from any vendor) to benefit from tri-gate [3D] transistors...And like ARM's Cortex A15 core, Silvermont is a fully out-of-order architecture, a feature heretofore not present in Atom solutions...We view Silvermont as the basic building block for Intel's future mobile architectures." 
• RBC Capital Markets' Doug Freedman: More balanced and responsive systems."Intel has stated improved performance per watt, with Silvermont operating at 3x peak performance or at same performance at 5x lower power vs. current Atom core...Intel highlighted a more efficient out-of-order execution pipeline that drives a more balanced and responsive system...Intel's architecture allows for fast switching between high [performance] and low [performance] states...however, we acknowledge that Intel is battling market skepticism in low-power vs. ARM." 
• Anandtech's Anand Shimpi: 2x performance claims valid. "First of all, based on what I've seen and heard from third parties working on Baytrail designs -- the performance claims of being 2x the speed of Clovertrail (current Atom) are valid. Compared to the two [ARM] Cortex A15 designs I've tested (Exynos 5250, dual-core A15 @ 1.7GHz and Exynos 5410 quad-core A15 @ 1.6GHz), quad-core Silvermont also comes out way ahead. Intel's claims of a 60 percent performance advantage, at minimum, compared to the quad-core competition seems spot on based on the numbers I've seen. Power is the only area that I can't validate based on what I've seen already. (No one has given me a Baytrail tablet to measure power on.) Given what we know about Silvermont's architecture and the gains offered by Intel's 22nm process, I do expect this core to do better on power than what we've seen thus far from ARM's Cortex A15." 

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Unlike Adobe, Microsoft won't abandon packaged software

Microsoft Office 365 launch at New York's Bryant Park in January.

(Credit: Microsoft)

A day after Adobe Systems killed its Creative Suite software, moving instead to a Web-based subscription service, Microsoft said it would not follow suit with its Office suite of productivity applications--at least not yet.

In a blog post Tuesday, Office spokesman Clint Patterson said that Microsoft, like Adobe,believes in the future of software-as-a-service, in part because the applications can be always up-to-date, and because subscribers can use the applications across a range of devices.

How much time? Patterson wrote that "within a decade," Microsoft's customers will subscribe to its Web services. That echoes comments Office president Kurt DelBenemade in an interview with CNET in January."However, unlike Adobe, we think people's shift from packaged software to subscription services will take time," Patterson wrote.

"In the meantime, we are committed to offering choice--premier software sold as a package and powerful services sold as a subscription," Patterson wrote.

That said, Microsoft is adding a handful of new features to Office Web Apps, the Web-based companion program to the Office suite that let customers create, collaborate and review content. In a separate blog post Tuesday, Amanda Lefebvre, a technical product marketing manager for Office Web Apps, wrote that the program will now work on the Andriod mobile operating system through Chrome browser support. Office Web Apps already works on iPads.

Microsoft is also tweaking its real-time co-authoring function in Office Web Apps, adding each users' presence, so that the various authors of a document can see who is working on it at any given time. And edits to the documents will happen in real-time so that collaborators can see other users' work as it's being done without having to refresh the document.

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Will paid YouTube channels be another nail in cable's coffin?

YouTube, which boasts one billion unique monthly users, is now exploring paid subscription models. CNET's Sumi Das looks at the reasons for and against charging YouTube viewers for content they've grown accustomed to watching for free.

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Senate passes Internet sales tax bill

The U.S. Senate on Monday approved a controversial bill by more than a 2-to-1 margin that would allow states to levy taxes on Internet purchases.

The Marketplace Fairness Act, which would allow states to require online vendors to collect sales and use tax on certain out-of-state purchases, was approved in a bipartisan vote of 69 to 27. The bill, which already has the support of President Obama, will now move on to the House of Representatives.

If approved, the bill would overturn a 1992 Supreme Court ruling that found out-of-state retailers generally don't have to collect taxes unless they have a sufficient business presence. The bill, officially known as S.743, does include an exception for businesses that make under $1 million a year in revenue.

Backers of the bill, including Walmart, Macy's, and Best Buy, argue that online retailers often do not collect sales taxes at checkout and thus enjoy an unfair competitive advantage over the big-box stores. The Marketplace Fairness Coalition, a group of companies supporting the legislation, says the act would "level the playing field."

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ORBX streaming tech could revolutionize computing

SAN FRANCISCO -- First-person shooter games don't appeal to Brendan Eich, Mozilla's chief technology guru and the guy who created JavaScript nearly two decades ago. He doesn't let his kids play them, either, he says. But he was so excited on Friday about showing off the potential of a new browser codec called ORBX.js at Autodesk's One Market Street offices here that he began playing Epic's Unreal Tournament 3 "Sanctuary" level in a room of 20 or so witnesses.

As Eich maneuvered somewhat awkwardly through the onslaught of opponents, Jules Urbach, CEO and founder of OTOY, Mozilla's partner in creating the new HTML5 codec, explained what we were seeing. "The app is running 600 miles away, but it's running [here] at full stream," he said.

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Can Facebook lead to psychosis? One study says so

(Credit: Chris Matyszczyk/CNET)

Sometimes, normal humans take a liking to clinical terms and adopt them.

You go out on a date, and when your friends ask how it went you reply: "Oh, she's psychotic." Or perhaps: "He's delusional."

The justifications for such adjectives being used might be simple.

In the former case, the lady might have asked, just as the main course plates were cleared away, where the gentleman thought the relationship was going. This was after having described the details of her previous 17 relationships.

In the latter case, the gentleman might have talked about himself throughout the meal and offered mathematical details about his mental and physical prowess.

However, when these words are used in a clinical context, they have more precise definitions.

Which is why I have been moved to contemplation on hearing news of research from Israel. It declared that Facebook and its ilk can move the vulnerable (which might mean anyone) in the direction of psychosis and delusion.

Doctor Uri Nitzan of Tel Aviv University's Sackler Faculty of Medicine and the Shalvata Mental Health Care Center decided, along with his colleagues, to look at his own patients in the context of their online relationships.

He wondered whether psychopathologies might be related to activities on Facebook and in chat rooms.

As the Daily Mail reports, the researchers discovered that the patients -- who all were experiencing "loneliness or vulnerability due to the loss of or separation from a loved one" -- suffered from further negative effects the more they "socialized" online.

The Mail quoted Dr. Nitzan as saying: "In each case, a connection was found between the gradual development and exacerbation of psychotic symptoms, including delusions, anxiety, confusion, and intensified use of computer communications." (At the get-go, the patients in the study all had "relative inexperience with technology.")

One patient even came to believe that the person she was in contact with online was constantly trying to touch her physically.

It seems to have been the sheer limitlessness of the Web that drove them toward psychological malaise.Some might argue that, by virtue of their initial loneliness, these people were more vulnerable to such delusions. However, none had apparently revealed any psychotic or delusional symptoms before beginning to Facebook away.

As Dr. Nitzan said: "Some of the problematic features of the Internet relate to issues of geographical and spatial distortion, the absence of nonverbal cues, and the tendency to idealize the person with whom someone is communicating, becoming intimate without ever meeting face-to-face."

It wouldn't be hard to imagine that the minds of the apparently healthy also begin to experience something of this distortion.

I fancy that few haven't, at some time or another, obsessively refreshed a site or logged on to it hundreds of times a day, in the hope that some particular form of communication will come their way.

Dr. Nitzan talked of a "break with reality" created by the likes of Facebook.

However, as the site has become the ubiquitous means of communication, this supposed break with reality is the new reality.

I have a feeling that what is now described as psychotic and delusional will soon be seen as the normal state of human affairs.

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LG, Google at work on new Nexus handset -- report

LG's Nexus 4

(Credit: Josh Miller/CNET)

LG and Google are partnering up on a new Nexus handset, according to a new report.

Google and LG executives met recently to discuss a host of topics, including the development of a new Nexus handset, the Korea Times reported, citing people who claim to have knowledge of the matter. LG worked with Google on the Nexus 4, which has proven to be one of the more popular Android handsets on the market.

That follows a rumor that surfaced in March claiming Google was evaluating devices from a few vendors for the Nexus 5. The leader at that time, according to the report, was an LG device code-named "Megalodon." The device was rumored to boast a 5.2-inch screen, and 2.3GHz Snapdragon processor, 3GB of RAM, and a 16-megapixel rear-facing camera.Each year, Google places its special Nexus branding on certain devices. The company has used it for devices from other vendors in addition to LG. According to the Korea Times, however, the search giant will again rely on LG to deliver a Nexus handset.

CNET has contacted both LG and Google for comment on the report. We will update this story when we have more information.

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Apple counting up to 50 billion App Store downloads

(Credit: CNET)

Apple once again is counting up to its next digital sales benchmark.

This time it's to 50 billion downloads on the App Store, its digital software store that launched in 2008, and currently has about 793 million downloads to go.

Similar to previous contests, the person who downloads the 50 billionth app gets $10,000 in App Store credit. The company is also doling out $500 gift cards to the 50 people who buy an app immediately afterwards.

Apple's last big contest for the App Store was for the 25 billion benchmark last March. Chunli Fu, a customer from Qingdao, China was winner, and nabbed a $10,000 gift card and a trip to one of Apple's stores to pick it up. More recently, Apple paid out a 10,000 Euro iTunes gift card for the 25th billion song sold on iTunes back in February.

Along with the giveaway, Apple's listed its top 25 all-time paid and free applications on both the iPhone and iPad. Rovio's Angry Birds and Facebook top that list on the iPhone, while Apple's Pages and Microsoft's Skype hold that spot on the iPad.

For last year's contest, it took people 15 days to download approximately 700 million apps, and both the number of iOS devices and the library Apps have increased since then. As of January, Apple said it has sold more than 500 million iOS devices, up from 365 million at the end of last March. It's also currently up to 850,000 iOS apps as opposed to the figure of around 600,000 apps from last April.

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Larger-screen iPhone to launch in 2014 -- analyst

Apple launched the larger-screen iPhone 5 last year, but the company isn't done upping smartphone display sizes, according to one analyst.

Jefferies analyst Peter Misek wrote in a note to investors recently that he believes Apple's iPhone 6 will launch next year with a larger screen. According to the Canada-based Financial Post, which obtained a copy of the note, Misek didn't say exactly how big the screen size will be but said this year's launch -- the iPhone 5S -- will come with the same 4-inch display as its predecessor.

Still, customers will need to wait until next summer for that iPhone 6 to launch, Misek claims. The iPhone 5S, which he believes will hit store shelves in the next few months, will attempt to attract customers by delivering a better processor, an improved camera, and color options beyond the current black-and-white models.It would make sense that Apple would consider launching an iPhone with a larger screen. The company's chief competitor, Samsung, is selling a Galaxy S4 that comes with a 5-inch screen -- a major difference compared with the iPhone 5.

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A boy and his atom

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IBM Research says it is serious about inspiring interest in science. And its latest effort may well achieve that goal.

Several of the company's scientists recently put the finishing touches on "A Boy and His Atom," which has been certified by the Guinness World Records as the world's smallest-ever stop-motion film.

The project involved shooting 250 frames of a story built around a boy who goes on a playful journey involving dancing, bouncing on a trampoline, and playing catch. The noteworthy part? The film was made at the atomic level, using precisely-placed atoms that were manipulated over several days to tell the story.

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