WiFi is about to get a speed boost due to a new frequency band. The new band will function at 60GHz compared to the traditional 2.4GHz and 5GHz that the current wireless connections use. The new faster band could see a speed increase of at least 10 times when compared to 802.11n networks.

‘Today’s Wi-Fi speeds are measured in the low hundreds of megabits per second, says Edgar Figueroa, executive director of the Wi-Fi Alliance.The 60-GHz band allows for significant boost in performance, so we are talking about speeds in the gigabits per second range.

Right now the limit on 802.11n is around 150MBps. A switch over to 60GHz could see speeds of between 1GBps and 6GBps in optimal conditions. This would allow for more data to be shifted between devices such as multiple HD channels without the image quality being lowered. [Read more…]

The Nintendo 3DS will be launching later this year from what we understand. Not much information has been revealed about the device other than it using a glasses-free 3D screen. We are hearing rumours today that indicate the 3D functions of the device will have a 3D off switch allowing users to easily switch between 3D and 2D when needed.

This information does tie in with the rumoured screen technology being used for the device. From what we understand, the Nintendo 3DS will use the parallax barrier technology from Sharp that allows 3D to be achieved without glasses. This same technology can easily be switched from 2D to 3D by simply cutting current to the parallax barrier. [Read more…]

Apple [AAPL] has filed a trademark for the term “iTunes Live” which is making a number of people speculate that this could be the live music service that has been rumoured previously.

The image above isn’t a mock up either and was actually found along with the filing. The following details were also filed…

International Class 035: Online retail store services in the field of entertainment featuring prerecorded musical, audio and audiovisual content

International Class 041: Entertainment services, namely, arranging and conducting of concerts and live musical performances

[Read more…]

After a number of years of looking almost the same, Google [GOOG] has made a change to how their search results pages look.

The differences include a new left sidebar that provides quick links to tools to help users refine their search more easily as well as a few cosmetic changes to the fonts and logo as well as the Goooooooooogle found at the bottom of each page where you switch page numbers.

The new left-hand navigation column ads features that refine your query such as being able to bring shopping results to the forefront or push them further back to make them less relevant. [Read more…]

Skype are adding a new feature to their VoIP video chat system that will allow up to 5 video calls to conference together.

The new group video chat system will move in to a public Beta starting next week and will allow users to more easily speak in groups over video allowing families to connect for example, or allow businesses to meet remotely.

When in beta the video group chat service will be free although when it comes out of beta in the next few months, Skype are planning on charging users to utilise the service. [Read more…]

Google [GOOG] tend to be quite creative when it comes to launching new versions of products or even new products. Rather than using the traditional javascript speed tests and other various methods that we normally see to measure the speed of a browser, Google went ahead and set up a number of tests that put up a potato vs Chrome to see which of the two was the quickest.

The hardware used for the test included a MacBook Pro with Windows installed, a 24 inch ASUS monitor, a 15 MBps internet connection and a Phantom v640 high speed camera that can capture up to 2700 frames per second at a resolution of 1920 x 1080.

“Why does allrecipes.com in the potato gun sequence appear at once, and not the text first and images second? And why does it appear to render from bottom of the screen to the top?”

Chrome sends the rendered page to the video card buffer all at once, which is why allrecipes.com appears at once, and not with the text first and images second. Chrome actually paints the page from top to bottom, but to eliminate a shadow from the driver board, we had to flip the monitor upside down and set the system preferences in Windows to rotate everything 180 degrees, resulting in the page appearing to render from bottom to top.

[Read more…]

When Google [GOOG] launched GMail in the UK a trademark was infringed forcing Google to call the service Google Mail. For those who adopted the service early in the UK, they managed to get an @gmail.com account, but since about 2005 all UK GMail addresses actually end in @googlemail.com.

After a 5 year dispute the tradmark issues are now resolved (someway or another in an undisclosed financial agreement) and users in the UK can now use @gmail.com for their email address. [Read more…]

LightPeak is a technology being built by Intel that allows data to be transmitted at speeds up to 10GB/s over fibre optic connections.

A demo was recently run that showed a laptop sending a couple of HD streams over a LightPeak connection to a nearby HDTV. On the laptop side a USB adapter cable was used that paired the optical connections to a regular cable due to the lack of optical LightPeak ports on HDTVs.

By using a small 12mm square chip the device can convert electrical signals in to light pulses with current speeds reaching around 10GB/s although Intel intend to dramatically improve this over the coming years. 10GB/s refers to the simultaneous bi-directional transmission rate which is quite impressive. [Read more…]

Over the past couple of weeks, Google [GOOG] has slowly rolled out a new video player on YouTube. The new video player has a different look and also brings a few handy features to give more in depth analysis of the video being watched.

The layout is different in that the red progress bar is now slightly transparent and runs just under the video. Below that is a section where the play button, volume control and other buttons can be found.

New features also include the ability to right click on the video which pops up a menu where you can select various options such as a broadband speed test, video details, debug information and more. [Read more…]

Google [GOOG] could be launching a new version of Android called Dragonpoint.

This information comes from information found over at Bloomberg that says…

“Sony, aiming to win back share lost to Samsung Electronics Co. and LG Electronics Inc., would use Intel and Google to help produce televisions and Blu-ray DVD players with Internet access. Intel, whose processors run 80 percent of personal computers, wants to get its chips into new areas, including mobile phones and consumer electronics…

…Intel is contributing a customized version of its Atom chip that will run a new version of Google’s Android operating system called Dragonpoint.”

[Read more…]

Google [GOOG] has made an update to the mobile image search feature on devices such as the iPhone running OS 3.0 and above and Android 2.1 devices. The new image search functions now run quicker and are easier to use than previously.

The new system allows for 16 thumbnails to be displayed on a single page in either portrait or landscape mode. When clicking a thumbnail of an image the thumbnail is then loaded on an individual page where you can scroll through thumbs by swiping left and right across the screen. Information about the image including the origin URL are included as well as buttons to take you back to the results, or to load a larger image if available. [Read more…]

Palm has been up for sale for a few weeks now with speculation about HTC and other various mobile phone companies buying it.

We hear now that HP are to buy Palm. HP confirmed that they are paying $1.2 billion for the company which works out at $5.70/share and 23% higher than Palm’s stock price yesterday.

Purchasing Palm would get HP more in to the mobile arena and allow the company to develop and carry on building the webOS platform. [Read more…]