NVIDIA: there's nothing 'Ultra' about Ivy Bridge Ultrabooks unless you add Kepler

NVIDIA: there's nothing 'Ultra' about Ivy Bridge Ultrabooks, unless you add Kepler

This is a vaguely awkward message for NVIDIA to be putting out. On one hand, the company is best buddies with Intel and is hoping to see its next-gen GPUs bundled with a large portion of the Ivy Bridge notebooks that will ship this year. But to reach that target, it must risk irking Chipzilla by emphasizing the limitations of Ivy Bridge's integrated graphics. That's exactly what happened at a recent presentation, when NVIDIA told us there'll be "nothing Ultra" about the performance of a regular Ivy Bridge Ultrabook because the integrated HD 4000 graphics will only handle around 43 percent of current games. By contrast, if you add in a GeForce GT 640M you'll find that 100 percent of current games are playable with frame rates over 30fps and high detail settings, including Battlefield 3, Batman: Arkham City, Crysis 2 and many others. If you leave the lightweight Ultrabook spec behind and combine Ivy Bridge with a GT 670M GPU then you can go even higher -- as we just discovered in our review of the MSI's GT70 gaming laptop. Fortunately, Intel was pretty magnanimous about HD 4000 when it briefed us, and readily accepted that enthusiasts will still want discrete graphics, so we don't imagine the slide above will cause too many hurt feelings.

NVIDIA: there's nothing 'Ultra' about Ivy Bridge Ultrabooks unless you add Kepler originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 23 Apr 2012 12:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Levon Helm and The Band: a rock parable of fame, betrayal, and redemption

Levon Helm of The Band found an unlikely path back to fame after decades of disappointment. But by the end, the homespun singer from Turkey Scratch, Ark., had come full circle.

In the eight years preceding his death Thursday, Levon Helm enjoyed the highest distinction that any music veteran could hope for: an audience that remembers.

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Two recent Grammy awards had brought a resurgence of interest in Mr. Helm?s career as the voice and drummer of The Band, one of rock?s most enduring groups. But it was only in 2004, when he began his homespun ?Midnight Ramble? concerts, that he began to reemerge into the public eye following years of health and financial problems, as well as lingering disappointment and resentment surrounding the dissolution of his former band.

Indeed, much of Helm?s story is a parable of rock ?n? roll ? the story of a band fractured by money and fame, leaving its disillusioned members to pick of the pieces of lives that had seemed to promise something more.

In that way, Helm?s musical legacy is not one meticulously groomed by publicists or biographers. It has evolved organically through what he has left behind.

His appeal in The Band and to Bob Dylan, who collaborated with the group during his most fruitful years, has not just been his voice but also his insurgent spirit. After all, the late-1960s marked the transition from presenting pop music as audible candy for teens to a progressive art form. While the Beatles represented a breakthrough in pushing boundaries that were heady and abstract, The Band later represented their American counterpart, which was dangerous, unkempt, and with a profound feel for, and understanding of, blues, gospel, and country.

That understanding came largely from Helm?s biography. The only American in a group of Canadians, he grew up in Turkey Scratch, Ark., as the son of cotton farmers. Many of the references in classic Band songs came from the people he knew and the sounds he heard in his childhood. Blues great Sonny Boy Williamson performed regularly in the area, and traveling minstrel shows and rockabilly bands made frequent stops.

Helm ?couldn?t wait to get out of high school and get off the farm. His dad told him he couldn?t play with bands until he finished high school.? All he was doing was biding his time,? says Anna Lee Amsden, Helm?s lifelong friend and the ?Anna Lee? in the lyrics of ?The Weight,? the group?s classic song. ?Crazy Chester? and ?Carmen,? other familiar characters in the song, were also people Helm knew in town, Ms. Amsden says.

In a statement Friday, Mr. Dylan called Helm "one of the last true great spirits of my or any other generation."

Much of The Band?s identity ? as suggested by its name ? was in being a true collective where no single person stood out. The Band?s 1968 debut, ?Music From Big Pink,? reflected that unity. Despite vocals shared by Helm, Richard Manuel, and Rick Danko, no one singer was identified, and the lyrics weren?t even printed on the jacket. The magic of that music came from a special alchemy among those individuals that could never be achieved separately since.

Yet in what is now a storied pattern from the early days of the music business, camaraderie crumbled amid fame. Robbie Robertson, The Band?s lead guitarist, joined with the band?s management to persuade the others to sign away their individual publishing rights, which in today?s era of multiplatform media are considered the pension plans of the music industry. They ensure artists later income when the songs receive renewed life in movies, television, and beyond.

In his autobiography ?This Wheel?s On Fire,? Helm describes seeing a copy of the 1969 album ?The Band? and noticing he was credited for writing only half of one song, with Mr. Robertson credited on all 12.

?Someone had pencil-whipped us. It was an old tactic: divide and conquer,? he writes.

Things got worse in 1978 when director Martin Scorsese, who collaborated with Robertson on the film ?The Last Waltz,? reinforced what Helm said was a false narrative that Robertson was somehow the band?s auteur.

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Space Shuttle Discovery mounted on 747 for ride to Smithsonian ( video)

The retired Space Shuttle Discovery is now sitting on top of NASA's modified jumbo jet, in preparation for its delivery to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum.

NASA mounted space shuttle Discovery on a jumbo jet Sunday (April 15), in preparation for the retired orbiter's delivery to the Smithsonian. The paired air- and spacecraft are expected to depart Florida for Washington, D.C., on Tuesday morning (April 17), weather permitting.

Skip to next paragraph The Space Shuttle Discovery lifted off for the last time on February 24, 2011.

Discovery's mating to the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft?(SCA), NASA's modified Boeing 747 jetliner, came a day later than the space agency had planned. On Saturday,?wind gusts?at the Kennedy Space Center's Shuttle Landing Facility set the 167,000 pound (75,300 kilogram) Discovery swaying under its lift sling, posing a risk that it could impact the Mate Demate Device (MDD), the gantry-like steel structure used to hoist the shuttle onto the jetliner.

Workers reconvened at 5 a.m. EDT (0900 GMT) on Sunday, to finish retracting the shuttle's landing gear. They then raised the orbiter 60 feet (18 meters) off the ground so that the carrier aircraft could be positioned underneath. Discovery was then lowered onto the jumbo jet's three protruding attach points to achieve a "soft" mating.

Work continued throughout the day Sunday to secure, or "hard" mate, Discovery to the 747, before removing the hoist sling and backing the paired vehicles out of the MDD on Monday morning. [How Space Shuttles Fly on 747 Jets (Photos)]

"Assuming the weather is good, we'll back out [of the Mate-Demate Device] in the morning, That will give a whole day of opportunity for the media, the public, and for our employees to come out and get a good view of Discovery's last time on top of a 747 here at Kennedy Space Center," said Stephanie Stilson, flow director for the transition and retirement for the space shuttle orbiters. [Gallery: Discovery Mated to Jumbo Jet]

Among the space program workers expected to come out and view Discovery on Monday are the members of its 39th and final spaceflight, the six astronauts who flew the STS-133 mission in March 2011.

According to Stilson, who also led the ground processing for Discovery's last 11 missions, seeing it be readied for one last ferry flight was eliciting mixed feelings.

"It's hard not to be happy, because we have achieved another one of our goals," Stilson told collectSPACE.com. "That is how we look at things. We have a job to do, and that is to get?Discovery to the Smithsonian. So this is the next step to get there. So we're very happy because everything has gone well to get to this point."

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Ben Flajnik and Courtney Robertson: "Engaged-Dating"


Controversial lovebirds Ben Flajnik and Courtney Robertson of The Bachelor fame say they are enjoying what they've come to call "engaged dating."

The way this season went, that's as good as one could hope for, if not better.

"We're still getting to know each other and taking it slow," Flajnik told People at a fashion show in New York. "[Things] are working out really well."

Courtney Robertson agrees, but says she still has a lot to learn about Ben.

Ben and Courtney

"It's nice to see him in social settings and with his family," says the model. "He is always the life of the party. He's got this great personality."

While the duo is looking forward to a summer filled with travel plans and wedding invitations, they won't be rushing down the aisle anytime soon.

"We're not even there yet," Ben Flajnik said. Added his fiance, perhaps the most reviled Bachelor contestant ever, "[We're] just enjoying each other."

Things are going swimmingly, though, save for minor hiccups. She's finding out what they don't have in common: He "hates bananas," she says.

But she has won him over with her favorite drink: "She's got me drinking those things," Ben says of the fermented tea-based beverage kombucha.

If that's their biggest problem now, they could prove a lot of us wrong.

What do you think: Will Ben and Courtney last?

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Incase USB Mini Cable Kit Review

When you think of pocket gear, you probably think of multitools or even small flashlights that you can add to your keyring.? You probably don’t think of USB cables, but the USB Cable Kit from Incase is small enough to qualify as pocket gear.? I recently purchased this cable set to keep in my purse, [...]

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Carey Mulligan & Marcus Mumford Marry

Inception actress Carey Mulligan has been preparing to reportedly tie the knot this weekend, according to Radar Online.? The site had dished that Mulligan was getting ready to get hitched to her boyfriend Marcus Mumford,? the front man of the band Mumford and Sons, and now (according to People Magazine) they are now married. The twenty-six year old performer, who just appeared as the love interest of Ryan Gosling in Nicolas Winding Refn’s ?Drive?, traveled? to the English countryside to exchange vows with her longtime rocker boyfriend who she became engaged to late last year in August. “Carey and Marcus are counting down the days till they tie the knot,” an unknown source told the site prior to the couple exchanging vows today.? Adding,? “she is absolutely walking on air and can hardly contain her excitement.? They don’t care that some of their friends think they are rushing things.” The insider says that while some may disagree with the couple’s decision to walk down the alter so soon, the pair are very much in love and are ready to become husband and wife. ?They are madly in love and know they are perfect for each other.? It’s going to be [...]

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NY Tech Day: ?Justify Your Startup?s Existence In 20 Seconds?

Screen shot 2012-04-21 at 11.39.56 AMThe tech scene in NY is growing at such a rapid pace it kind of blows my mind. New York Tech Day was a glowing example of that growth, with 160 startups pitching and over 3,500 attendees. We couldn't help but attend ourselves, and what we saw was more than exciting.

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