Here is something new in Windows Server 2012 that I have not seen much discussion of yet: Windows Server backup now has native support for Hyper-V:
What this means is that:
Cheers,
Ben
Vizio's Co-Star hub is still one of the cheapest points of entry into the Google TV world, so it's comforting to see the set-top box getting an update -- albeit somewhat behind Google's own pace. The previously promised release mostly focuses on giving it the third-generation Google TV interface, including the mini-guide, YouTube pairing and (through a future Android app update) voice-guided search. Viewers on the prowl for more content get a few additional perks through new apps for M-Go and Vudu video streaming, as well as a truly native Amazon Instant Video app. Should Vizio's tiny media center inhabit your living room, you can expect the upgrade to arrive over the air within the next few weeks.
Filed under: Home Entertainment, HD, Google, Amazon
Source: Vizio
In this post I’ll discuss how you can optimize performance, cost, flexibility, and resiliency when building a Windows 8 storage solution. Windows 8 provides two new storage capabilities that enable optimized storage solutions based on these considerations: Storage Spaces and File History. I won’t get into the details of File History in this post, but you can read my complete write-up here. In this post I’ll use my recent video editing PC overhaul as a case study for how to build a cost-efficient high performance storage solution on Windows 8.
The 8 drives used in “VIDEO2” a PC that I recently rebuilt
As a creative professional, I depend on high-performance hardware and apps to get my work done. When working with apps like Adobe After Effects and Adobe Premiere Pro, the storage demands are staggering. A typical 1080p uncompressed After Effects animation render can easily occupy 100GB of disk space or more. Working with video is also very demanding for storage. For some projects, I’ll store 10 or more video clips at several Gigabytes each, and then output several renders in different formats. These apps also use “Scratch Disks” to store project data that can’t be stored in RAM when previewing, rendering, and for other similar tasks. Scratch disks need to have super-fast I/O to keep up with the demands of these dynamic tasks. Of course, all of my project, media, documents and other files need to be backed up. I want to minimize the risk of losing data and I want my system to have excellent performance fundamentals.
Before I discuss how I implemented my Windows 8 storage solution, let’s first take a look at the factors that influenced this design.
Here are the considerations that I have for a complete storage solution on my PC:
To frame the design discussion, I’ll use an app that represents an “extreme scenario” for storage as a use-case. Let’s consider how Adobe Premiere Pro CS6 uses storage when launching, editing, and rendering files:
Adobe documentation provides helpful guidelines for system hardware configuration when running programs like Premiere Pro CS6 and After Effects CS6. From these guidelines and with knowledge about Windows storage technology, I created the following storage plan for my high performance PC:
Video editing file interactions shown at a high level using Premiere Pro CS6 as an example
After landing on this high-level storage layout plan, I did some thinking considering the following:
Here are the simplified high-level requirements and parameters for each logical storage device:
Logical storage devices (rows) and corresponding storage requirements (columns)
From this high-level planning exercise, I felt prepared for hardware selection and storage configuration in Windows 8. I’ll summarize here how I implemented each logical storage device.
System Storage
As I evaluated the Windows/apps logical storage device, the primary concern was performance. This storage device needed to handle both random reads/writes and sequential reads/writes really fast. Resiliency was not a primary concern since I knew I could easily reinstall Windows and my apps in the event of a hardware issue. The solution was relatively simple: this logical storage device would be a straight-up SSD drive.
A 240GB SSD was selected for OS and apps
Scratch
The app scratch drive would need to offer high performance for both random and sequential reads/writes. This scratch storage would not need any form of resiliency since the files stored would all be temp files. An SSD would be a great option for this logical storage device, but I didn’t have an extra SSD on hand. What I ended up using was the two Western Digital 10,000 RPM drives that I had been running in RAID configuration in the Windows 7 incarnation of the PC known as “VIDEO2”. This time I would use these drives differently. Windows 8 Storage Spaces would offer RAID-like performance, but would be much easier to setup. I created the scratch Storage Space, and did not use resiliency so as to optimize write performance.
With just a few clicks the scratch Storage Space was configured and ready for use
The creation of this scratch Storage Space would be a test of sorts, and some simple tests with Adobe Premiere Pro CS6 would tell me quickly whether this scratch Space was going to offer adequate performance when previewing and rendering. If there were any issues, I knew it would be super-easy to delete this Storage Space, and I could then repurpose these drives and obtain an SSD for scratch storage. You have to read the rest of the article to find out what happens. Naming this Storage Space “Scratch Space” made it easy to find from other apps when configuring storage options.
Project Files (Bulk Storage)
For project files there were a few considerations. First, I needed a large extensible space to store a lot of really big files. Second, I absolutely needed a form of resiliency to ensure these files would never be vulnerable to hardware failure. Third, this space would need to keep up with the sequential read demands from various apps (Premiere Pro CS6 for the use case presented in this post). The solution was to create a Storage Space with two-way mirrored resiliency. This would offer RAID-like performance, resiliency, and extensibility. With Storage Spaces you can easily add storage at any time, so it’s a great way to implement a single storage repository for large quantities of data. I was excited about the idea that I wouldn’t have to split up my files between drives, all of my important data could live on this single extensible Storage Space.
Creating the Storage Space for bulk file storage
With this bulk Storage Space, I would always have redundant copies of my data. This would change my strategy for backups. Bulk backups would now be a mitigation for a fire, flood, and other natural disasters. Using File History to protect my primary documents would give me a history for my data and offer another form of protection. Finally, SkyDrive would add another form of redundancy for my files. I was feeling good knowing that my data would be safer than ever.
I chose to use a total of four inexpensive Seagate Barracuda 7200 RPM drives for larger logical storage devices
Just like with my scratch Storage Space, I would need to perform some simple tests to confirm that sequential reads wouldn’t be a bottleneck for video editing performance with this bulk storage Space. With RAID-like read performance for this multi-drive setup, I wasn’t too worried.
Utility and Renders
The final logical storage device was targeted at utility and storage of output renders. Since these files would be stored temporarily, this logical storage device would not need any kind of resiliency. The main concern for this space would be sequential write performance. I chose to go with the simple solution of dedicating a single Seagate Barracuda 2TB drive for this space.
Here’s an updated diagram that shows the entire storage solution as implemented on VIDEO2:
This storage implementation was quick and easy to setup, but I was really wondering how it would perform!
Here’s how I defined my “minimum bar” when using Adobe Premiere Pro CS6:
Output render performance was also a consideration, but this was second to preview performance since it has no impact on the editing experience.
What I found was that the entire system (hardware and software) met these criteria with no issues whatsoever. I used FRAPS to check my preview performance both with 1080p HD files, and with 4K REDCODE RAW files. In both cases I had some effects applied that I use frequently: brightness/contrast adjustment, sharpening, and the “fast color corrector”.
Premiere Pro CS6 previewing a 30fps AVCHD file at 100% magnification and full quality
Premiere Pro CS6 previewing a 24fps 4K REDCODE RAW file at 25% magnification and 1/4 quality
These quick tests confirmed that I would have more than acceptable editing workflow for both 1080p files and 4K files on VIDEO2 wen running Adobe Premiere Pro CS6.
This was great, but I was curious to know if this setup was going to perform better from a storage perspective than an all-on-one-SSD storage setup that would represent a simple “default” storage scenario.
As a storage test, I rendered a 4-minute uncompressed AVI clip with two storage configurations:
What I found was that my optimized storage solution performed better than an all-on-SSD configuration. Here are the results of my quick test:
SUCCESS! My storage overhaul for VIDEO2 is a huge improvement over the storage setup I had been running before the overhaul. Now I don’t need to worry about losing data at any time- I have mirrored resiliency. When I need more storage (it’s not if, but when) I can easily add more drives to my bulk Storage Space. With File History I can selectively store a history for files that are important to me. This system also boots super-fast, and launches apps super-fast. Finally, this storage setup didn’t break the bank.
I’m happy.
Want to know more about Storage Spaces in Windows 8? Here’s a great Storage Spaces FAQ that provides a lot of great insights and information.
Stay up to date, follow me on Twitter!
Since the storage sizes on smartphones haven't quite caught up with that Drobo NAS in your home office, packing all of your media onto a 32GB iPhone is an impossible task. Worry not; we're going to show you how to set up a streaming environment so you can have all your jams at your fingertips on the go. The good news is there are tons of solutions out there to choose from: XBMC, MythTV and Windows Media Center just to name a few. We decided on Plex Media Server due to the broad range of devices and services it supports. On top of that, Plex allows you to share your server with friends and access your media from anywhere via the myPLEX platform. Catch us after the break to learn how to get started.
If you've ever found yourself stuck in the only corner of a hotel room where the WiFi actually works, then Satechi may be able to get you back to the desk. Its Multifunction Mini-Router not only gives you a private, 300 Mbps WiFi access point from a hotel's wired internet, but functions as a repeater that can distribute a weak wireless signal elsewhere in the room, too. It also works as a standard home router, of course, and even has a bridge mode which lets you take an existing WiFi network and re-transmit it with a different name (and security), useful for combo networks like those in a cafe, for instance. Finally, the client mode lets you plug the Satechi box into a wired device like a Smart TV or set top box to give it WiFi capability -- letting you dodge the hefty freight of proprietary WiFi dongles often not included with such devices. That's a lot of functionality for $40, but if we had you at "WiFi repeater," check the PR and video after the break.
Filed under: Peripherals, Internet
Source: Satechi
OUYA and NVIDIA have a kind of love thing going on right now. The $99 Android-powered game console designed by Yves Béhar's fuseproject is powered by NVIDIA's Tegra 3 -- this much we already know. What we didn't know is that the folks at OUYA are working directly with a team of folks at NVIDIA on the project, and that NVIDIA is helping the company to max out its Tegra 3 processor for use on a console rather than a mobile (no battery dependency means the little chip can go much further than usual).
"The partner that we've worked the most with, that is incredibly supportive of developers, NVIDIA, they have multiple people on their team dedicated to our account," OUYA CEO Julie Uhrman told us in a recent interview. She was responding to a question regarding partnerships the company's forged to make OUYA a reality, such as the aforementioned involvement with Béhar's fuseproject studio. Despite the OUYA running Google's mobile OS, Uhrman said, "We haven't worked very much with Google." As for NVIDIA, however, the American chipmaker is going all in, helping the OUYA to be the, "best Tegra 3 device on the market," according to Uhrman.
That praise isn't all one-sided, of course; NVIDIA had praise to heap as well. "We have a dedicated team working with OUYA to ensure that Tegra 3's performance is being maximized. They've been amazing to work with," NVIDIA senior VP of Content and Technology Tony Tamasi told us. "The rich catalog of optimized and differentiated TegraZone games -- along with the work being done with developers -- ensures a flourishing ecosystem is in place and continues to grow." That support is unlikely to end with this year's OUYA. Uhrman said her company's console, unlike the big three console manufacturers, will launch anew annually, following the mobile model. And that model means beefier internals, such as NVIDIA's Tegra 4, announced just over a month ago at CES. In so many words, we very much expect NVIDIA and OUYA's lovefest to continue.
Filed under: Gaming, HD, NVIDIA
One of the most frequently asked questions by Blurb book makers is, “How do I ensure that color reproduction in my book will match what I see on my screen?” The answer is both simple and complicated.
Let’s get the complicated bit out of the way: What you see on your screen can’t and won’t exactly match what you see on the printed page. Why not? Well, your screen is backlit and the pages of your book won’t be. (Okay, ebook pages are. We get that, but we’re talking about printed pages here.)
Secondly, your brightly backlit screen displays images in the RGB (Red, Green, Blue) color-space. Once you submit your files for a printed piece, like a book, those images are printed on paper in the CMYK (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black) color-space. In effect, you’re working on your images in one medium and submitting them for use in another.
So, given that, how can you be sure the images you see on your screen match as closely as possible with those printed in your book? Easy. Calibrate your monitor.
This single step will reduce a ton of frustration and lessen the chance that your images will print “too dark.” And calibrating your monitor is neither hard nor expensive to do. Color calibration kits cost about $100- $150. Any one will do and all are definitely worth that investment in terms of time savings and potential book reprint costs.
The kits are comprised of easy-to-use software packages that usually include an installable application and a colorimeter. Simply run the color calibration software, and it will guide you through the steps of attaching the colorimeter properly to your specific monitor. Results are then saved and you are all set to go.
For more information on color management, take a look at our online Color Management Resource Center.
The post The First Step to Great Color Images in Your Blurb Book appeared first on Blurberati Blog.
The Hubble Space Telescope is easily the most famous of NASA's Great Observatories program. Though the telescope had a troubled start, a much-publicized repair mission corrected its vision problems and paved the way for it to produce some of the most stunning images ever recorded. A large number of images have been assembled at the Hubble Heritage Image Gallery for viewing, and Ars has selected thirty of the nicest for presentation below.
This image, which captures the spiral galaxy M-106, is a composite of data obtained by Hubble and observatories. M-106 is between 22 and 25 million light years from Earth.
30 more images in gallery
Read on Ars Technica | Comments
It's been a year and change since BlueStacks announced a Windows 8 version of its App Player, which let you run most of your Android apps on the then-beta OS. Now the company has announced the official version, tweaked to play nicely with Redmond's own Surface Pro and sporting a fresh, custom-built charm menu and start screen tile. You'll now be able to run apps in "true" touch-enabled full-screen mode using your Win 8 tablet's tilt/motion sensors, and everything will work faster, too. CEO Rosen Sharma also touted the release as a way for developers to bypass Microsoft's "onerous" submission process to get Android apps onto the x86 Surface Pro, and you can't argue with the price -- it's free, and available for download now. For more, head after the fold.
Filed under: Cellphones, Desktops, Laptops, Tablets
Source: BlueStacks
Feel that? If you're an audio purist, the sensation of your wallet tingling is probably a familiar experience. This time, you have Meridian to thank, which is aiming to help you get the most from your nice headphones. The company just debuted the Explorer: a portable, USB-powered DAC and headphone amplifier that's priced at $299. Like all external DACs, the unit promises better sound quality than typical onboard solutions can deliver, and as a high-end touch, the Explorer offers asynchronous USB audio for greater timing precision and reduced jitter. Alongside the 3.5mm amplified headphone output, you'll also find another 3.5mm jack that supports both analog and mini Toslink connections. Each Explorer is built in the UK and measures approximately 4.0 x 1.25 x 0.7 inches. Perhaps most importantly, though, its design doesn't reek of something that was cobbled together in the garage.
Filed under: Home Entertainment
Source: Meridian Audio
Jay Graham is a professional photographer and avid Blurb book maker. He’s also a Lightroom evangelist. Read on for Jay’s top three tips for making books with Adobe® Photoshop® Lightroom® 4.
By the way, in case you didn’t know, first-time LR4 book makers receive 20% off, so why wait?
And don’t forget to sign up for our free LR4 and Blurb books webinar on February 28 at 10 a.m. PST. Space is limited, so sign up today.
Without further adieu, here are Jay’s tips:
1. Sequence your book.
It can be daunting to create a book. Where to begin? Once you’ve created a “collection” of photos for your book (we’ll go over how to do this in the webinar), view them in grid mode in the “Library” module. This will make it easier for you to create a sequence for your book. It’s easy to modify your sequence later if you’d like, but this will get you started in the right direction.
2. Put your captions with your images.
Once you have your collection of photos sequenced, enter the captions for each image in the Library module. This will keep your captions with your images so even if you move the images around later, the caption will stay with its respective image.
3. Set up your book preferences before you start your book.
How you set your preferences is, of course, up to you. I like to check the option to “fill” the template rather than “fit” the template. This may seem counter-intuitive, but many times I’m pleasantly surprised by the crop it creates and it helps me see my images in new ways. Another benefit: It maximizes the photo size in the template, allowing you to get a bigger image on the page.
One more thing: You can always adjust the crop. It’s just a place to start.
For more information and a deeper dive into book making with LR4, be sure to sign up for the webinar.
The post Three Top Tips for Making Blurb Books with Lightroom 4 appeared first on Blurberati Blog.
Users of the Plex media server and its suite of client apps can expect an all-new app for Android soon, rebuilt two years after its debut for a vastly improved UI and feature set. While musing about the progress of Android as a platform for users and developers alike -- a good read if you'd like a peek behind the curtain to find out more about multiplatform coding life -- a Plex blog post details everything that's added in the new version, and one major thing taken away: compatibility with any Android OS before 3.2 (retained to keep working with Google TV.) According to the devs, almost 90 percent of users are on at least Ice Cream Sandwich, and focusing on newer platforms means support for newer features like Cloud Messaging, lock screen music player controls and global search integration.
As revealed in a preview video (embedded after the break) the new "Kepler" build also lets it act as a media server, so any media stored on your Android device can be played back on other Plex clients. The company says it set out to make the "most beautiful Android app, period" -- PlexPass subscribers can get a taste of the beta when it launches in Google Play later this week, all others will need to wait until after the test period.
Filed under: Home Entertainment, Software, HD, Mobile
Source: Plex
The Nexus 4 Wireless Charger is finally available for purchase through the Google Play store for $59.99, almost three months after the handset’s initial launch. The orb-shaped charger works similar to other wireless charging docks by utilizing the Qi inductive power charging standard.
However, unlike handsets such as the Nokia Lumia 920, the Nexus 4 does not lay flat on the device to charge. Rather, it sits at an angle. This is made possible by strategically placed magnets inside both the dock and the Nexus 4 that secure the handset to the device. Once it’s docked, the Nexus 4 goes into Daydream mode and can display photos, aggregated information from applications like Google Currents, a clock, or various "screensavers." This feature is currently only available in Android 4.2 Jelly Bean.
Though the charging station is available for purchase today, the Google Play store notes it will "ship soon."
Read on Ars Technica | Comments
Microsoft isn't acknowledging the development, or even the existence, of the Xbox 360's successor (codenamed "Durango"), but that isn't stopping potential details from leaking out of Redmond. The latest report comes via console overview documents (known as "white papers") provided to Kotaku by the same source who provided information on the next PlayStation (codenamed "Orbis"), and it spells out some things we've yet to hear. Namely, the console will ship with a new version of Microsoft's motion-sensing camera controller, Kinect, and that the device, "must be plugged in and calibrated for the console to even function," the piece says. The new Kinect -- which we've heard of in the past -- is said to capture up to six people at once, and an alleged image demonstrating the difference between new and old versions of the camera puts much higher specs on said device (1920x1080 color resolution, more trackable joints, improved depth resolution, etc.).
The new console is also reported to employ multitasking, enabling multiple games or apps to run concurrently, similar to mobile phones and tablets; how many apps that could mean is unclear, if true. Sony's PlayStation Vita already employs such functionality, making the claim all the less far-fetched.
The piece also states supposedly final retail hardware specs for Microsoft's next game console, including a 64-bit D3D11.x 800MHz GPU, an 8-core x64 1.6GHz 4MB L2 CPU, 8GB DDR3 RAM, 500GB of on-board memory, USB 3.0, HDMI-out, and an optical drive for 50GB discs. For its part, Microsoft's staying mum -- "We do not comment on rumors or speculation. We are always thinking about what is next for our platform, but we don't have anything further to share at this time," a Microsoft spokesperson told us -- and Sony's the only game in town with even an event scheduled in the near future.
[Photo credit: Kotaku]
Filed under: Gaming, HD, Microsoft
Source: Kotaku
Infomercials are notoriously tough to take seriously. Anyone with minor computer familiarity can sniff out the "MALWARE IS COMING NOW" 3am appeals. And even though something like the Slap Chop works, its autotune remix tends to be more famous than the actual product.
The newest infomercial to go viral, however, appears to have a surprising level of credibility. Take a look at Ultra Ever Dry, a "revolutionary super hydrophobic coating that repels water and refined oils using nanotechnology." The demonstration video is nearing 500,000 views in a little more than two weeks, and it already received attention from The Daily Mail, i09, and NPR (where it was written up by Radiolab's Robert Krulwich no less).
As any fan of the old PitchMen series knows, a good infomercial relies heavily on a wow-inspiring demo. Ultra Ever Dry is no different, with a series of coated vs. uncoated demos showing everything from concrete to oils unable to penetrate a layer of Ultra Ever Dry. Below, you can see some before-and-after screen grabs of gardening gloves with mud or a side-by-side of a funnel and paint (Another favorite: a piece of glass is framed with a perimeter coating of the substance and beads of green test liquid flow quickly to the center.)
Read 5 remaining paragraphs | Comments
Jeremiah Grossman is widely considered to be one of the world's most talented ethical hackers, but even his ninja-like prowess wasn't enough to recover a forgotten password used to encrypt sensitive work documents contained on his MacBook Pro.
After fiddling with a freely available password cracking program, the CTO of Whitehat Security soon realized that its plodding speed—about one password guess per second—meant it would likely take him decades of tries before he arrived at the right one. That's when he called in the big guns, namely Solar Designer and other principals behind the free John the Ripper (JtR) password cracker as well as Jeremi Gosney, a password security expert at Stricture Consulting Group. (Ars has chronicled Gosney's cracking prowess in articles here and here.)
"Collectively, these guys are amongst the world's foremost experts in password cracking," Grossman wrote in a blog post describing the odyssey unlocking the crucial files. "If they can't help, no one can. No joking around, they immediately dove right in."
Read 4 remaining paragraphs | Comments
Digital will last forever without degradation if you store it digitally (not on a physical medium like a CD or DVD.) I put all the digital copies on my computer, and use Carbonite.com to keep a secure, off-site backup.
My next project is to scan all the documents I care about (old certificates, letters, programs, etc.) so I have a digital copy of them. Paper fades over time and can get lost, stolen, burned in a fire, or ruined in a flood. Digital copies can last forever. (Keep a safe, off-site backup.)
The Church’s Family History Department offers free scanning of journals and other documents. They have 3 brand new book scanners available for anyone to use free of charge. They do a great job and are very easy to use and do not require you to cut the binding of the diary. The PDF scan can be saved directly to a USB drive.
Once I get all my documents in digital form, I will insert them into my digital life history. For ideas on creating a digital life history, see “Keep a Journal.”
There will be a new OUYA next year, and the year after that, unlike the traditional game console model, where new hardware ships in five- to seven-year generational increments. "Our strategy is very much similar to the mobile strategy," OUYA CEO Julie Uhrman told us in an interview this afternoon, following her DICE 2013 speech. "There will be a new OUYA every year. There will be an OUYA 2 and an OUYA 3," she added. One potentially featuring the recently revealed Tegra 4, perhaps, rather than the Tegra 3 powering the first units? It sure sounds like it. "We'll take advantage of faster, better processors, take advantage of prices falling. So if we can get more than 8GB of Flash in our box, we will," she explained.
But don't fret, nervous game buyer. Uhrman assured us that "all the games will be backward compatible" going forward. When pushed on how this will work, she said, "The games will be tied to you, the gamer," (like Steam is now) rather than tying your game licenses to the hardware you purchased (like, say, Nintendo's Wii U).
The first OUYA, set to launch for Kickstarter backers this March and at retail in June, comes with a quad-core A9 Tegra 3 that's been maxed out to 1.6GHz. Uhrman pointed out that, because of OUYA's home console form factor (which plugs into a wall, rather than relying on a tiny battery), the console will be, "the best Tegra 3 device on the market." It also doesn't hurt that OUYA's working directly with the Tegra 3's manufacturer, NVIDIA. She said that NVIDIA has a group of folks dedicated solely to getting the chip driving the OUYA to run at its highest capacity ever. We'll find out what that means when we get our hands on the console later this year. Should you like to hear more from Julie Uhrman ahead of that launch, she'll be speaking at Engadget's Expand event this March. Grab your tickets right here!
Filed under: Gaming, HD, NVIDIA
