http://img.gawkerassets.com/img/18o8kek1xfsbrjpg/ku-xlarge.jpg

Few routers utilize their full potential out of the box because their firmware limits their functionality. Thanks to an open-source project called DD-WRT, you can unlock your router’s potential to broadcast a stronger signal, manage network traffic, remotely access all your home computers, and a whole lot more. Here’s how to install it, set it up, and supercharge your network.

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from Lifehacker

http://lifehacker.com/how-to-supercharge-your-router-with-dd-wrt-508138224

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Because Samsung isn’t already prepping enough new variants of the wildly popular Galaxy S4, a new “Galaxy S4 Mega” is reportedly under development as well and has been confirmed by Samsung. The Galaxy S4 mini, Galaxy S4 Active, Galaxy S4 Zoom and Galaxy S4 Google Edition with stock Android Jelly Bean are all expected to debut in the coming weeks and months, and now a phablet version of the S4 looks like it has been confirmed in a recent update to Samsung’s WatchOn TV app discovered by SamMobile. No other details have been provided, but unless this was a typo — and it doesn’t appear to be, since the update also references two other unannounced Galaxy S4 variants — we should see this phone-tablet hybrid announced in the coming weeks. A screenshot of the update follows below.

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from BGR

http://bgr.com/2013/05/20/samsung-galaxy-s4-mega-leak-watchon/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TheBoyGeniusReport+%28BGR+%7C+Boy+Genius+Report%29

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Students at Loras College in Dubuque, Iowa, say a lightning strike is most likely to blame for completely stripping the bark off an on-campus tree.

One student says he and others heard a “loud bang and crack,” and went outside to see what had happened, only to encounter an all-natural streaker.

Another witness to this incredible phenomenon posted a daylight photo of the scene to Reddit, prompting many amateur scientists to offer explanations for the incident — “the water just under the surface was converted to steam” — and lament the imminent demise of the naked tree unless someone does something soon.

[H/T: HyperVocal, photos via Reddit]

from Gawker

http://gawker.com/what-a-tree-looks-like-after-being-stripped-naked-by-na-508884997

http://www.blogcdn.com/www.engadget.com/media/2013/05/siii4.2.2.jpg

Samsung didn’t stray far from its comfort zone when designing the Galaxy S 4, and now a leaked build of Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean for the S III makes it even harder to distinguish the older flagship from the newer one. The folks at SamMobile got their mitts on a test firmware build and, better yet, have combed through it to see what’s new. As you may know, the S 4 ships with 4.2.2 under a TouchWiz layer, so it’s not surprising to hear most of the features new to this S III build are on the S 4 already: an updated version of S Voice, more lock screen options / unlock effects, new display modes, a redesigned settings interface, voice control, and more. SamMobile has put together a video walkthrough of the build (embedded below), and you’ll find an expanded changelog and software screenshots at the source link. Apparently, the firmware “works perfectly,” so if you’d rather not wait through the (often lengthy) carrier approval process, you can download it for your S III right now (flashing required, of course).

Filed under: Cellphones, Software, Mobile, Samsung, Google

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Via: Sammy Hub

Source: SamMobile

from Engadget RSS Feed

http://www.engadget.com/2013/05/20/galaxy-s-iii-android-4.2.2-firmware-leak/?utm_medium=feed&utm_source=feedburner&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+weblogsinc%2Fengadget+%28Engadget%29

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Seamless and GrubHub, two nearly identical online food-ordering companies whose business model consists of providing a service that is already available for free, announced Monday that they would be merging into one giant online food-ordering hydra. The new company, which has not yet settled on a name, will enable and promote social anxiety in 500 U.S. cities by eliminating the traumatic element of “human verbal interaction” from pizza delivery. The co-founder and CEO of GrubHub will serve as the CEO of the new Sterling Cooper Draper Seamless Grubhub. The CEO of Seamless will serve as president. If your cat dies, the new organization will probably start a twitter fight with you about it.

Yesterday my cat died.

His name was Houdini because I thought a black cat should have a magical name. We adopted him from the Humane Society when I was 11. My family always said he was lucky because when he was very young, he was hit (and badly injured) by a car, and subsequently disappeared for three days. I suppose you could also say he was unlucky, because when he was very young, he was hit by a car, and subsequently disappeared for three days. A late night emergency surgery left him with a slightly off-kilter gait, but he remained agile and affectionate for the next thirteen years.

Last night, I mentioned his death on Twitter to @Seamless. @Seamless and I had already been chatting because I was trying to game them out of a $7 friend-referral fee. (If you invite a friend to join Seamless using a unique referral code, you can get a $7 coupon. I was trying to get the coupon retroactively, without the code. I didn’t particularly expect my petition to be successful, but I had 20 minutes to kill before Mad Men started and they had $7 coups to give away.)

I told @Seamless I was dying and that the only thing that could save me was $7, which wasn’t true.

Then I mentioned that my cat had died a few hours prior, which was true. In retrospect, I see how this could read as a lie.

@seamless Don’t want 2 put you in an awk position but my cat died today (RIP Houdini) so please be sensitive to that & don’t burn me on this

— Caity Weaver (@caityweaver) May 20, 2013

Upon hearing this news, @Seamless did an irreverent little dance on the grave of my cat (which, incidentally, was dug by my mom yesterday in the backyard of our home in Pennsylvania).

@caityweaver RIP Houdini . Was it his dying wish that you get a $7 coupon?

— Seamless (@Seamless) May 20, 2013

I expressed my surprise at this.

@seamless HOLY FUCKING BALLS ARE YOU REALLY MAKING A JOKE ABOUT MY DEAD CAT RIGHT NOW

— Caity Weaver (@caityweaver) May 20, 2013

And @Seamless continued to dance, a wild, dizzy tarantella.

@caityweaver Yeah, did you like it?

— Seamless (@Seamless) May 20, 2013

This…upset me.

@seamless No, I didn’t like it.

— Caity Weaver (@caityweaver) May 20, 2013

@seamless MY MOM CALLED ME ON.THE PHONE CRYING EARLIER AND HELD HIM WHILE HE DIED

— Caity Weaver (@caityweaver) May 20, 2013

@seamless HIS DYING WISH WAS PROBABLY NOT TO BE IN PAIN. THAT WOULD BE MY GUESS.

— Caity Weaver (@caityweaver) May 20, 2013

@seamless PENULTIMATE DYING WISH: NOT TO BECOME A PUNCHLINE FOR AN INTERNET FOOD ORDERING COMPANY ON THEIR CORPORATE TWITTER ACCOUNT

— Caity Weaver (@caityweaver) May 20, 2013

@seamless RIP HOUDINI. HE DIED AS HE LIVED. HATING SEAMLESS.

— Caity Weaver (@caityweaver) May 20, 2013

But @Seamless, was in too deep to ever stop making jokes about my dead cat. It had, by this point, ceased to be a popular internet food ordering company. Its revised mission statement read simply: The dead cat — make fun of it.

@caityweaver That’s an oddly specific penultimate dying wish for a cat to have imho

— Seamless (@Seamless) May 20, 2013

@caityweaver Sorry. Not all of our jokes are purrfect. Our thoughts and prayers are with you right meow in this trying time.

— Seamless (@Seamless) May 20, 2013

@Seamless was being a dick.

@seamless MY. CAT. DIED. STOP BEING A DICK.

— Caity Weaver (@caityweaver) May 20, 2013

A few minutes after the exchange concluded, I received a DM from @Seamless inviting me to reply with my email address because “You deserve a $7 discount for putting up with me ”

I declined.

@seamless I would rather you build a time machine, travel back, and un-make fun of my cat’s death. Put your $7 toward funding the research.

— Caity Weaver (@caityweaver) May 20, 2013

Congrats to Seamless and GrubHub, two companies that POSSIBLY (I mean, I don’t know — we have no way of knowing — but it seems incredibly likely) serve chopped up dead cats inside the carne asada tacos you order from them, on their merger.

Update: Before writing this post, I sent an email to Seamless to let them know that my cat REALLY DID DIE yesterday. I’ve just received a kind apology (“We here at Seamless are deeply sorry for your loss”) and an offer of two free meals. Hopefully this lavishly catered memorial buffet will fill the cat-shaped hole in my heart.

To contact the author of this post, email caity@gawker.com.

[Shutterstock/photo by Jim Cooke.]

from Gawker

http://gawker.com/seamless-made-fun-of-my-dead-cat-and-now-its-merging-w-508860196

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Do you have videos stored on your PC and want to view them on your tablet or other Android device without the hassle of copying and possibly converting them? Well look no further. I too wanted this and I set out to find out how to Read more »

Author information

The post How to Stream Videos From Your Home PC to your Android: an Odyssey appeared first on freewaregenius.com.

from freewaregenius.com

http://www.freewaregenius.com/how-to-stream-videos-from-your-home-pc-to-your-android-an-odyssey/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Freewaregeniuscom+%28freewaregenius.com%29

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As AT&T comes under the gun for blocking Google’s new video chat app Hangouts on its cellular network, the company is today hoping to put a better spin on the news by offering a new statement detailing its changing position on support for pre-loaded video chat apps. During the second half of 2013, AT&T says it will begin to enable pre-loaded video chat applications over cellular for all its customers, regardless of the customer’s data plan.

This is a change from the carrier’s current position, which requires that customers pay for AT&T’s Mobile Share or Tiered plans, or soon, unlimited subscriptions (with LTE devices), in order to use pre-loaded video chat apps, like Apple’s FaceTime, for example, or those from Samsung and BlackBerry.

Here’s the revised statement, sent to us this afternoon by AT&T communications, as an update to an earlier inquiry on the block:

“For video chat apps that come pre-loaded on devices, we currently give all OS and device makers the ability for those apps to work over cellular for our customers who are on Mobile Share or Tiered plans. Apple, Samsung and Blackberry have chosen to enable this for their pre-loaded video chat apps. And by mid-June, we’ll have enabled those apps over cellular for our unlimited plan customers who have LTE devices from those three manufacturers.

“Throughout the second half of this year, we plan to enable pre-loaded video chat apps over cellular for all our customers, regardless of data plan or device; that work is expected to be complete by yearend.

“Today, all of our customers can use any mobile video chat app that they download from the Internet, such as Skype.”

From the sounds of it, that means Google won’t have to first “enable” (ask for permission?) in order for Hangouts to work. Even though it’s a pre-loaded app, it will just begin working regardless of the customer’s current data plan.

The problem AT&T had with Hangouts, presumably, is that the app replaces the Google Talk application that shipped by default on Android devices. That means the app is “pre-loaded,” and for pre-loaded applications to run over AT&T’s cellular network, the OS or device maker involved had to first work with AT&T on the matter, per AT&T policy.

And from the statement AT&T released last week, it seems that perhaps Google did not do so:

“All AT&T Mobility customers can use any video chat app over cellular that is not pre-loaded on their device, but which they download from the Internet. For video chat apps that come pre-loaded on devices, we offer all OS and device makers the ability for those apps to work over cellular for our customers who are on Mobile Share, Tiered and soon Unlimited plan customers who have LTE devices. It’s up to each OS and device makers to enable their systems to allow pre-loaded video chat apps to work over cellular for our customers on those plans.” [Emphasis mine]

The situation is not necessarily one of bandwidth concerns at this point, since Apple’s FaceTime is already enabled for MobileShare and Tiered customers following a similar controversy. At the time of its launch, Sprint and Verizon enabled FaceTime, and AT&T rolled out access only to select customers following net neutrality complaints.

In Apple’s case, the company left FaceTime support up to carrier discretion, and apparently Google did the same. And as is par for the course, the app is reportedly working just fine on Verizon, just not on AT&T right now.

That will continue to be the case until later this year when the change is made, though no exact date was given.

from TechCrunch

http://techcrunch.com/2013/05/20/att-will-begin-enabling-pre-loaded-video-chat-apps-like-hangouts-for-those-on-any-data-plan-later-this-year/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Techcrunch+%28TechCrunch%29

http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/arstechnica/index?i=SCdwe8dadY8:50cynth3RAQ:V_sGLiPBpWU

Read on Ars Technica | Comments

from Ars Technica

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/05/galaxy-s-iii-may-get-an-s-4-style-makeover/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+arstechnica%2Findex+%28Ars+Technica+-+All+content%29

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At this years Intel International Science and Engineering Fair a surprising invention from one teen student stunned the crowd, yet only came in second place. What would that be? A new way to recharge a cellphone battery completely in only 20-30 seconds. Sounds amazing right? 18-year-old Eesha Khare from Saratoga California, came in second place with this invention of a supercapacitor that can charge a battery real quick.

The news has been spreading this afternoon like a wildfire, and has many in the tech industry quite interested. So much in fact, that Eesha Khare even mentioned Google’s reached out to her for more details. While we don’t have anything further on that development, we’d love for Google to add her to the team and bring the first truly rapid charging smartphone to market. We’re getting ahead of ourselves though.

This bit of technology has landed Khare a runner-up prize of $50,000 USD in scholarship funds which she’ll use to attend Harvard University. This is where she aims to continue her ground-breaking research on the project. Her technology will not only be able to be utilized by the small batteries of smartphones, but in electric cars and many other applications.

Back to Intel’s event, the full list of winners is available for those interested. Looks like her technology won more than a few categories. Reason being is her technology as it sits right now is able to last for roughly 10,000 recharge cycles. Current battery tech is lucky to remain durable past 1,000.

Khare goes on to mention the technology is currently powering things like LED’s with ease, so obviously a full smartphone would take tons more research, but is very doable. The system in which she is using is flexible, durable, and can be added to clothing, fabric, flexible displays and more. Get ready for this to be in our upcoming Google Glass, wearable technology like smart watches, and much more.

This is still in the very early stages, but a breakthrough in battery technology has been needed for a long time. Hopefully this is one that will stick, and come to consumer products relatively quick.

SOURCE: SlashGear

from Android Community

http://androidcommunity.com/student-wins-science-fair-with-30-second-phone-battery-charger-20130520/

http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/gamelife/2013/05/ps4_vid_f.png

In this new teaser video, you can see the PlayStation 4. Sort of. Not really.

from Game|Life

http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2013/05/playstation-4-video/