| Super Bowl internet debut breaks records, disappoints some viewers Feb 9th 2012, 15:11 Not sure what this says about the state of streaming video online, but while the first live internet stream of the Super Bowl was watched by a record 2.1 million unique viewers, it didn't receive glowing reviews. The best indicator, though, is that the engagement for the three (plus) hour event was only 39 minutes. We think the folks over at Streaming Media got it right when they called it the Super Bowl Streaming Fail. It was bad enough that only Verizon Wireless customers could watch it on anything other than a laptop, but even those who could see it were left searching for a TV once they saw the quality. Big sports fans who might've been checking it out for the additional commentary and camera angles were also left wanting more, as the stream was plagued with lag. This meant that the other angle you were in search of was as much as a minute behind the big screen. Ultimately, we're sure everyone's glad the Super Bowl was extended to the smaller screens, but one thing sure seems true, broadcasting an event like this to millions of people is unlikely to ever be replaced by unicast internet streams. Super Bowl internet debut breaks records, disappoints some viewers originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 09 Feb 2012 11:11:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink |  NFL Communications | Email this | Comments | | Intel teaches Haswell the core values of teamwork, optimism Feb 9th 2012, 14:43 Sure you can make wild, individualistic boasts about having a 22nm fabrication process and three different GPUs, but that stuff counts for nothing without the magic of cooperation. The Amish know that and so does Intel, which is why its forthcoming Haswell cores will support Transactional Synchronization Extensions (TSX) -- a new instruction set designed to allow cores to work together more closely without hammering each others' fingers. TSX takes greater responsibility for the division of labor between cores at the hardware level, relieving the software programmer of some of this burdensome duty and hopefully allowing for finer-grained threading as a result. The system also relies on inherent optimism, with each core assuming that the others have handled their part of the work successfully. Inevitably, there'll be occasions when this happy belief gets splintered and a bad job has to be started again from scratch, but on average things should get done quicker and leave more energy for the barn dance. Intel teaches Haswell the core values of teamwork, optimism originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 09 Feb 2012 10:43:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink  ExtremeTech | Intel | Email this | Comments | | Canon EOS-1D X and Nikon D4 ISO 204,800 shooting hands-on (video) Feb 9th 2012, 14:10 With mirrorless cameras offering high-resolution APS-C sensors and consecutive shooting speeds of up to 10 frames-per-second, what's left to make a $6,000 full-frame DSLR a compelling purchase, especially for amateur photographers? Low-light performance, for one -- the Canon EOS-1D X and Nikon D4 are both capable of capturing images at up to ISO 204,800, letting you snap sharp photos in even the dimmest of lighting conditions. The benefits of a top sensitivity of ISO 204,800 are significant -- jumping from one ISO to the next doubles your shutter speed. So an exposure of f/2.8 at 1/2 second at ISO 400 becomes 1/4th at ISO 800, 1/15th at ISO 3200, 1/60th at ISO 12,800, 1/250th at ISO 51,200 and a whopping 1/1000th at ISO 204,800 -- fast enough to freeze a speeding car. Both Canon and Nikon have yet to allow us to take away samples shot with the 1D X or D4 -- the companies even taped CF card slots shut to prevent show attendees from slipping their own card in -- but we were still able to get a fairly good idea of high-ISO performance from reviewing images on the built-in LCDs. At the cameras' top sensitivity of ISO 204,800, noise was visible even during a full image preview. Zooming into the image revealed significant noise, as expected. However, within each camera's native range of ISO 100 to 25,600, noise was barely an issue at all. Both cameras are still pre-production samples at this point, so we'll need to wait for production models to make their way out before we can capture our own samples, but based on what we saw when reviewing ISO 204,800 images on the built-in LCDs, that incredible top-ISO setting may actually be usable. Scroll on through the gallery below to preview some top sensitivity shots on the Canon EOS-1D X (camera poster) and the Nikon D4 (Japanese model), and join us past the break for an even closer look in our video hands-on. Continue reading Canon EOS-1D X and Nikon D4 ISO 204,800 shooting hands-on (video) Canon EOS-1D X and Nikon D4 ISO 204,800 shooting hands-on (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 09 Feb 2012 10:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink | | Email this | Comments | |
