AfterDawn: Tech news

Latest news

AfterDawn: News

AfterDawn's 14th birthday

Written by Petteri Pyyny @ 10 Jun 2013 3:22

AfterDawn's 14th birthday Yet another year has passed. Hobby-project-gone-mad has evolved to a company with 20+ employees, online presence in four different language areas.

Upcoming year - our 15th - will bring updated, modernized site layout, responsive design and bunch of other improvements to all of our global sites. And yes, forums will get major improvements during the next 12 months, too.

As always, on our birthday, I want to thank all of our employees, moderators and users for all these years. Great times -- and I expect more great years to follow. Thank you, without you guys, this site wouldn't exist.

-Petteri Pyyny
AfterDawn Oy


P.S. For the "this gets asked every year" question: here's the oldest screenshot of our site that we know of, from Summer of 1999:

AfterDawn v1




AfterDawn: News

WWDC: Apple finally announces iTunes Radio streaming service

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 10 Jun 2013 2:58

WWDC: Apple finally announces iTunes Radio streaming service After a busy WWDC keynote, Apple has finally confirmed the worst kept secret in the world, its iTunes Radio streaming music service.

The service will directly compete with Pandora, Spotify, Google Play All Access and Rdio in offering unlimited music.

iTunes Radio is free with ads, and if you're an iTunes Match subscriber, it's completely free, which should give it leverage against other services that charge a monthly fee. iTunes Match is $25 per year and converts all your existing music to iTunes AAC copies.

The new service is built into iOS 7, iTunes on OS X, and AppleTV, so almost all Apple fans will have access. The service has millions of tracks from Sony Music, Warner Music and Universal Music.




AfterDawn: News

WWDC: The new Mac Pros have incredible specs, will be built in U.S.

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 10 Jun 2013 2:32

WWDC: The new Mac Pros have incredible specs, will be built in U.S. Apple has shown off a prototype of their upcoming refreshed Mac Pro desktop.

The device uses a cylinder design and will include high-end specs and be built in the U.S. Apple exec Phil Schiller also brought a little fury, yelling "Can't innovate anymore, my ass," before showing off the device.

First, the desktop is 1/8th the volume of the previous model of the Pro, hiding 4 USB ports, Gigabit ethernet, HDMI out, 6 Lightning 2.0 ports and more in a tiny frame.

Under the hood is a monster 12-core, 256-bit Intel Xeon processor with 1,866MHz DDR3 RAM and a purported 60GBps performance. The Mac Pro also ships with dual AMD FirePro GPUs, which supports three 4K monitors.

Read more...


AfterDawn: News

E3: Xbox One Day One Edition launching in November for $499

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 10 Jun 2013 2:10

E3: Xbox One Day One Edition launching in November for $499 Microsoft has finally unveiled the price of their "Day One Edition" of the Xbox One console.

Launching in November (no specific date given), the console will cost $500 for U.S. gamers and £429 in the UK.

The console will be available in 21 markets on launch date. It is unclear what the euro price will be.




AfterDawn: News

E3 Xbox Keynote: "We are moving to real money," says Microsoft, killing off MS Points system

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 10 Jun 2013 1:58

E3 Xbox Keynote: "We are moving to real money," says Microsoft, killing off MS Points system Microsoft, to great applause, has announced it will be killing off the Microsoft Points system currently used to purchase games and other content via Xbox Live.

All digital purchases will now use real currency, rather than the points, with exec Marc Whitten adding triumphantly that "We're moving to real money."

Additionally, USD will not be the only currency as users in a few countries will be able to use their own local currency. It is unclear which countries will have that ability.

MS Points had been often critiqued due to the fact that you could only buy certain round numbers, but many games cost odd numbers, leaving you with a small amount of extra points that were unusable.




AfterDawn: News

WWDC: Apple shows off new Safari with better performance than Chrome, Firefox

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 10 Jun 2013 1:48

WWDC: Apple shows off new Safari with better performance than Chrome, Firefox Apple has used WWDC to unveil updates to their Safari browser.

The company says there is a new sidebar that displays your reading list and also adds shared links from your friends and follows on places like Twitter and LinkedIn.

In terms of performance, Apple says JavaScript has been improved so majorly that the browser now beats Chrome, IE and Firefox (using SunSpider benchmarks).

Using JS bench, Safari also now beats Chrome.

In regards to energy usage, Safari now uses less energy than Chrome and easily demolishes Firefox.

Additonally, Apple has introduced iCloud keychain, which remembers your website logins, credit card numbers and personal details. It's encrypted and requires you to remember a single password/security code.






AfterDawn: News

WWDC: Apple unveils Mac OS X 10.9 Mavericks

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 10 Jun 2013 1:33

WWDC: Apple unveils Mac OS X 10.9 Mavericks Apple has unveiled their latest operating system for Macs, OS X 10.9 Mavericks.

The company noted that they named the last nine OSX releases after cats, but have now run out of cat names. The company will now use places in California that inspire them, and the Mavericks surfing area appears to be first.

Apple says the release will have improved features for power users, better battery life and much better responsiveness.

First, the new OS will have "Finder Tabs" with their own location and own view mode. Second, when you save a document you can now tag it, making it much easier to search for in the finder sidebar.

In 10.9, you can also access your menus across multiple displays, a big plus for developers.




AfterDawn: News

WWDC: Apple boasts App Store figures

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 10 Jun 2013 1:16

WWDC: Apple boasts App Store figures Speaking during their WWDC event today, Apple CEO Tim Cook took time to boast figures for the App Store.

Celebrating its fifth birthday next month, Cook says there are now 575 million accounts, more than any store on the Internet.

Customers have now downloaded 50 billion apps, and Apple has paid out $10 billion to developers.

$5 billion of that was in the last year, more than 300 percent more than Android, Windows Phone and BlackBerry combined, says the exec.




AfterDawn: News

E3 Xbox Keynote: Microsoft shows off new slimmer Xbox 360, available now

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 10 Jun 2013 1:02

E3 Xbox Keynote: Microsoft shows off new slimmer Xbox 360, available now After teasing that they would be making Xbox 360 announcements before moving on to the Xbox One, Microsoft has not disappointed.

During their E3 keynote, the company unveiled a smaller and supposedly quieter model of the hardware, available today in the U.S.

The console has a glossy and matte design like the Xbox One and Xbox Gold users can get free games each month and "hundreds of upcoming games" including GTA V and Metal Gear Solid V.




AfterDawn: News

E3 Xbox One Keynote: Xbox Live Gold members to get free games

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 10 Jun 2013 12:53

E3 Xbox One Keynote: Xbox Live Gold members to get free games During their E3 keynote today, Microsoft has promised to make your existing Xbox Live Gold membership better.

Starting on July 1st, Gold members will get two free game downloads per month, "yours to keep."

The first two games are Assassin's Creed 2 and Halo 3, and the company promises tons and tons of more games.

(Pic via Verge)




AfterDawn: News

Google to buy Waze for $1.3 billion, stealing from Apple and Facebook

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 10 Jun 2013 11:51

Google to buy Waze for $1.3 billion, stealing from Apple and Facebook After weeks and weeks of speculation, it seems that Israeli mapping startup Waze will be getting sold.

Google is said to be purchasing the company for $1.3 billion, higher than Facebook's original reported bid of $1.1 billion.

Waze specializes in satellite navigation for mobile devices, and uses members' smartphones to generate maps and traffic data. More importantly, Waze collects user's traveling speed and direction, which is extremely valuable data if monetized correctly. Google Maps and other popular mapping apps do not include such data.

The company currently has 47 million users, with 12 percent coming from the U.S. It also has particularly strong penetration in Brazil and its home country.




AfterDawn: News

So it turns out that Lumia with Windows Phone Blue on it was left on a bus by a Microsoft employee

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 10 Jun 2013 11:24

So it turns out that Lumia with Windows Phone Blue on it was left on a bus by a Microsoft employee Last week we reported on screenshot leaks for the upcoming Windows Phone Blue operating system. The screenshots came via a Lumia 920 that had been purchased on eBay by a young Windows Phone fan in Seattle.

It appears that there is much more to the story, says Verge,as Microsoft has quietly retrieved the phone back.

An employee lost the phone on a bus, and whoever picked it up sold it to Jeremiah Wong, who told his story to the source. "The phone in the pictures looked different. Mainly the Start Screen had the feedback hub, also etching on the back that read MSFT." Wong figured the device was a developer kit due to the special etching on the screen, but it was more than that.

After posting his phone number inadvertently in one of the screenshots, Wong was contacted by Microsoft's legal team who asked him to remove the photos from his Flickr account, which he did. Microsoft then reimbursed him for the phone and sent a replacement Lumia 920. "I was incredibly surprised at the lack of intimidation and even more surprised at their accommodation," says Wong.

Read more...


AfterDawn: News

Apple to live stream WWDC, as long as you are using an Apple product

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 10 Jun 2013 10:36

Apple to live stream WWDC, as long as you are using an Apple product Apple has confirmed today that it will be live streaming its WWDC event today, but there is a catch.

To be able to view the stream you must be using an Apple product.

For hardware, you can stream via your Apple TV. On the software side, you must use Safari 4 or 5 on Macs or iOS, or QuickTime 7 or higher if you are on a Windows device.

The company will unveil iOS 7 today, but they may also have some extra surprises. We will have a full report after the show, which begins at 1PM EST.

Check the stream here: Apple events




AfterDawn: News

The first screenshots of Windows Phone Blue leak

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 08 Jun 2013 4:12

The first screenshots of Windows Phone Blue leak Microsoft's upcoming update to their Windows Phone mobile operating system, codenamed Blue, has been outed in some very early screenshots.

The OS will soon include a notification center, an updated calendar interface, and better sorting abilities for apps and lists.

Screenshots came via a strange source, a Reddit user who purchased a Lumia 920 on eBay. The phone had some sort of internal build, identified as 12084.WPMAIN(wpbldlab).20130509-1407. The name shows a date of May 9th, 2013, so the build is not too old.

Multitasking improvements are in the build, as well, including the ability to close multiple apps in the multitasking view. Microsoft also has test applications that start with a lower case "z", such as zBattinfo.

The Verge says it has been able to confirm that the screenshots are legit.

Some of the pics here:

Read more...


AfterDawn: News

Microsoft denies it pays rep managers to post positively about the Xbox One on Reddit

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 08 Jun 2013 3:30

Microsoft denies it pays rep managers to post positively about the Xbox One on Reddit Earlier this week, a poster with the name "mistysilver" made a large post on Reddit claiming that "reputation managers" were being paid by the software giant Microsoft to post positively about the upcoming Xbox One console.

The post said Microsoft employees were voting down any negative comments and voting up or adding pro-Xbox One comments across the popular social news site. In the post, (which has since been taken down), Silver introduced himself by saying "I work for a marketing firm in Redmond that has a contract with Microsoft. I can't say specifically which division, but suffice to say we are not involved with the Xbox." While at Microsoft, the poster says he saw an employee "mass-downvoting a ton of posts and comments, and he kept switching to other tabs to make posts and comments of his own. I couldn't make out exactly what he was posting, but I presumed he was doing RM (reputation management) and asked my boss about it later. According to my boss, MS have[sic] just brought in a huge sweep of SMM managers to handle reputation management for the Xbox One."

Read more...



  Newer entries Older entries  

News archive