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Is Google Maps on your phone a TomTom killer?

Posted on 9th Nov 2009 at 11:50 by Antony Leather with 13 comments

Antony Leather
I've written a couple of previous blog posts about using my phone as a sat nav, and while CoPilot's updates have turned it into a decent app, it's still not a serious rival for a dedicated GPS.

Google's recent announcement that phones running its Android 2.0 OS will all feature free turn-by-turn GPS navigation, however, is something that threatens to change the sat nav market completely.

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Tags android 2.0, copilot, google, google maps, gps, iphone, sat nav, tomtom

Hardware 8 - Many CPUs, Dream PCs and mobile gaming

Posted on 5th Nov 2009 at 18:17 by Podcast with 9 comments

Podcast
We're back with another Hardware Podcast - so good it's spelled in capitals. Rich, Harry and Clive get together to talk about all the hot (and just power-efficient) hardware of the last fortnight. Tune in to hear what we think of Intel's Atom (clue - it's not very good, is it?) VIA's new Nano processor and news on what Intel's up to.

iTunes Download

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Tags 965, alienware, amd, c3 stepping, cpus, dream pcs, hardware, i7 930, i9, intel, m17x, podcast, processors, six-core, via nano, windows 7

Free Games I Like: Small Worlds

Posted on 5th Nov 2009 at 11:51 by Joe Martin with 12 comments

Joe Martin
This blog post will be, like the game it’s about, small. I don’t really have a huge amount to say about Small Worlds, which was developed for a recent Casual Games Competition with the theme 'Explore', other than that it’s a remarkably elegant and effective piece of pixel-art brilliance.

A game which only ever alludes to having a deeper plot, Small Worlds opens with a single line before jumping to the gameplay – “There is too much noise”.

The gameplay itself is simple. At the start of each of the five levels the viewpoint is zoomed in on you – a small red line with a pale face and zero animation. The aim of each level is then to find the exit, which returns you to a hub level before you move on to the next world. There’s no fighting, no skill trees and no enemies. It’s just a gentle and rather lovely paced matter of exploration.

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Tags art, free games, free games i like, games, games i like, games i own, gaming, independant, indie, jayisgames, pixel, small worlds

Gigabyte TweaKING OC Event: European Final

Posted on 3rd Nov 2009 at 14:55 by Richard Swinburne with 2 comments

Gigabyte TweaKING OC Event

European Final

Manufacturer: Gigabyte

Gigabyte are well known for its overclocking events: the Gigabyte Open Overclocking Championship (GO OC) ran earlier this year and encouraged competitors to overclock their Core i7 CPUs using any means possible, and ran Super Pi 8M and 3DMark 06 for the best scores.

Gigabyte TweaKING OC Event: European Final
18 Teams competed from all around Europe. Click to enlarge

The TweaKING event in Paris is the European leg of this new style of OC tournament. Less emphasis is placed on the quality of CPU and more is placed on the ability of the teams to tweak the memory and motherboard. How? The CPU frequency is capped at 4GHz, meaning the teams had to crank the memory and baseclock on their Lynnfield i5-750 CPUs up as high as possible to achieve the best result.

Gigabyte TweaKING OC Event: European Final
Much time was spent in the BIOS tweaking settings. Click to enlarge

This still puts an emphasis on CPU quality to some degree, but its also brings the motherboard back into play more, which is an angle Gigabyte obviously wants to push. There was no limitation on the OS tweaks allowed too; so WinXP hacks a plenty were rolled out: services were neutered, registry was copiously tweaked and anything deemed excess was cut off.

However, every team had a standard set of hardware to use: nothing extra was allowed, not even an additional fan. Even screwdrivers were provided!

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Tags competiton, gigabyte, overclocking, tweaking

Asus Xtreme Global Summit – highlights from the first round of blogs

Posted on 2nd Nov 2009 at 18:11 by Ben Hardwidge with 8 comments

Ben Hardwidge
Following several weeks of prodding, tweaking and possibly lovingly caressing your fancy new Asus kit from the AX:GS event, it’s now time to reveal your first impressions of the hardware you were awarded.

Yes, the first round of AX:GS blogs is now up in lights, and last week’s posts have been successfully digested by the bit-tech judges. Before we share the highlights with you, though, we would like to thank you for your patience while we’ve been ironing out the gremlins with our, ahem, gremlin iron. Thankfully, most of the problems have now been sorted out, and most of you have access to the blogging area on the Asus Republic of Gamers website, but please drop us a line if you encounter any other issues so that we can get them sorted out.

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Tags asus, axgs, competition, prize, readers, taiwan, xtreme global summit
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