Crytek's CryEngine 3 supports PlayStation 4, surprises no one

Crytek has a reputation for pushing the limits of hardware with CryEngine -- witness the will-it-run-Crysis jokes -- so it's only logical that the company would leap on new consoles with enthusiasm. Sure enough, the company has followed up talk of Xbox One support in CryEngine 3 with word that its extra-pretty engine will also run on the PlayStation 4. Crytek isn't saying which developers will use the code, although cross-platform games make sense when the PS4, Xbox One and PCs share the same basic x86 architecture. We may hear bit more about early partners next week.

Director of National Intelligence declassifies PRISM info to clear up 'inaccuracies'

After details of a government program called PRISM with alleged hooks into the servers of major internet companies became public this week, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper decided it was necessary to reveal even more information. According to his statement, clearing up the "significant misimpressions" and "inaccuracies" requires the release of further classified info, included in a fact sheet listed after the break. So what is PRISM, according to the "Facts on Collection of Information Pursuant to Section 702"?


It is an internal government computer system used to facilitate the government's statutorily authorized collection of foreign intelligence information from electronic communication service providers under court supervision...This authority was created by the Congress and has been widely known and publicly discussed since its inception in 2008.

In short, Section 702 facilitates the targeted acquisition of foreign intelligence information concerning foreign targets located outside the United States under court oversight. Service providers supply information to the Government when they are lawfully required to do so.

The document claims PRISM is not an "undisclosed collection or data mining program." The above passages seemingly align with statements (including one today from Yahoo) from the companies listed claiming that they only respond to inquiries when required to by law. It goes on to offer some details on the process used to identify foreign targets ("Section 702 cannot be used to intentionally target any U.S. citizen, or any other U.S. person, or to intentionally target any person known to be in the United States") and the oversight involved. Specifically mentioned is the involvement of the Executive, Legislative and Judicial branches of the federal government. Additionally, another report from The Guardianexposes more internal documents that contradict the theory that PRISM involves access to "cable intercepts," although that can occur under a different process.

Alt-week 6.8.13: the Tetris printer, micro-vacuums and naked Antarctica Alt

Alt-week takes a look at the best science and alternative tech stories from the last seven days



Printing can take many forms these days, it seems. It's a term we see pulled in another direction this week, but one we think you'll enjoy. Want something a little more tangible? How about advanced Antarctic topology, or gas-detecting microscale vacuum pumps? Yep, this is alt-week.


It's a fact, we're suckers for a bit of video game nostalgia, and this week we've got it in spades. Not only does Taito's classic Space Invaders celebrate 35 years since swallowing its first quarter, Tetris is back in our lives. So, technically, it might have never really left -- but this time it's inception-style nostalgia, thanks to this natty Tetris "printer." Using an algorithm to convert a source image into one-square-sized "pixels," a Tetris playfield recreates the image one line at a time, clearing blocks and rows as needed until the right colors are in place. The code essentially plays the game until it gets the Tetriminos in the right places and the end image -- in this case game characters -- emerges. Watch the video to see it in action, or head to the creator's site to see how it was put together block by block.



You'd be forgiven for thinking the image above came from the Curiosity rover, which is due to hit the road again soon. Actually, it's a detailed map of what Antarctica looks like without all the ice. The new images, created by the British Antarctic Survey, are compiled from decades of measurements, and give us the most intricate view of the continent's topography yet. Three datasets in total were used -- surface elevation, ice thickness and bedrock topography -- to create the imagery, which replaces the previous best collected over 10 years ago. The picture it paints is in stark contrast to the relatively smooth surface we're used to seeing thanks to the permanent layer of snow and ice. Beyond mapping, the work also helps scientists understand how the ice moves around, under its own weight, on top of the base layer of rock. Want to see more? Interactive images and a video presentation over at NASA are available for the curious.



If you thought the trusty Roomba was the pinnacle of vacuum technology, think again. Recent research, funded by DARPA, has resulted in the world's smallest vacuum pumps. In some cases, smaller than a dime. While these micro-suckers might not be much cop at cleaning the den, they do have other, more specialized talents. Most notably, the technology could offer highly sensitive gas sensors that can provide early warnings of chemical attack, and biological pollution. The research was conducted with input from the University of Michigan and Honeywell, with the example you see above being a 24-stage microscale "rough" pump -- where each section serves as either a pump or a valve. Previously, the smallest pump or vacuum technologies were about the size of a deck of cards, making them impractical for use inside complex electronics. With further development, however, these microscale pumps could allow for smaller (and more accurate) laser-cooled atomic clocks. So don't make that impulse purchase just yet.

Seen any other far-out articles that you'd like considered for Alt-week? Working on a project or research that's too cool to keep to yourself? Drop us a line at alt [at] engadget [dot] com.

iPad keyboard case roundup: Logitech Folio vs. Belkin Ultimate vs. ClamCase Pro

Listen, you probably shouldn't be here. The iPad is a pure and carefully honed machine. If its designers wanted you to use some kind of ludicrous hybrid contraption that fused a tablet with a physical keyboard and doubled the weight, they'd have built one for you. But they didn't. So go away and don't come back until you've saved enough money to buy a MacBook Air. (Still here? Good, because we're about to compare three of the latest iPad keyboard cases: the ClamCase Pro, Logitech's Folio and Belkin's Ultimate Keyboard, designed to fit 2nd, 3rd and 4th-gen tablets. Read on for more.)
























A neutral statement of reality: none of the three keyboard cases tested here are particularly amazing to look at. They're just tablet cases, after all, so it's probably best if they retreat into the background as much as possible when they're not in use.

By this criterion, the Belkin Ultimate comes out on top, due to its understated combination of a rigid, matte metallic plate on the outer keyboard side and a soft, black faux-leather feel to the material that covers the iPad itself. There's nothing overwhelmingly premium about it, but the materials come together well and also have the advantage of being significantly lighter than the other two keyboards -- just 421 grams (0.93 pound), compared with the next lightest alternative, Logitech's 630-gram Folio.



Then again, if you compare at the galleries above, you might think it's insane to rank the Belkin above the ClamCase Pro for design. After all, the latter product consists of genuine aluminum, making the keyboard section totally inflexible, and the keys, hinge and rear cover all have a clean, Apple-esque simplicity to them.

So why doesn't it rate first? Because it's so darned big and bulky, that's why: the case weighs 717g (1.6 pounds) on its own, on top of 662g (1.46 pounds) for a 3G iPad 3, resulting in a total of 1.4kg (just over three pounds). AChromebook would be lighter and wouldn't cost much more, so the ClamCase Pro is only relevant to those who are insistent on turning their iPad into their primary computing device.


"A Chromebook would be lighter and wouldn't cost much more."

Bringing up the rear in this first section, we have Logitech's Folio, which somehow contrives to be almost as heavy as the ClamCase Pro while offering even less rigidity than the Belkin. When closed, the Folio looks like a school textbook wrapped up in a black cover of synthetic fabric, and with a thick layer of white rubber in between. The materials are more honest than Belkin's, since nothing is pretending to be something else, but that only disproves the old adage about best policies, because the end result doesn't look like a $100 purchase.
DAILY USE



To their credit, all of these units made it easy to insert the iPad and establish a Bluetooth connection. They all worked similarly in this respect, with the iPad clipping into a housing in the top section, and an on / off toggle and Bluetooth pairing button taking care of the rest. Keeping Bluetooth switched on permanently must have reduced iPad battery life, but we didn't notice a great deal of difference -- we used a 3G iPad hooked up to Vodafone's network in the UK and easily managed a full day of use. (For the record, neither of the metallic cases had any noticeable impact on 3G reception either.)

As for the battery life of the cases themselves, that was never an issue either. In fact, they're all still working fine after around four weeks of use (or around one week of heavy use per keyboard) without having been charged since they were taken out of their boxes. The ClamCase Pro has a nice battery life indicator, accessed by pressing a dedicated function key, which reveals that it still has 50 percent of its juice after all this time.

However, this is where the commonalities come to an end. Each keyboard case has serious strengths and weaknesses, which could make it either a good buy or a terrible one depending on how you plan to use it.
PriceWeightSize (L x W x D)Logitech Keyboard Folio $100 639g 9.6 x 7.88 x 0.85 inches
Belkin Ultimate Keyboard Case $100 411g 9.76 x 7.81 x 0.98 inches
ClamCase Pro $170 680g 9.7 x 7.9 x 0.81 inches


As mentioned, the Belkin wins on weight and is our favorite for general portability. However, it's not our favorite for working on uneven surfaces, like a lap or bed cover, because the magnetic latch that props the iPad up at an angle will fail at the slightest provocation.

The Logitech works in exactly the same way, but it has a slightly stronger magnetic clasp, which we found came undone less frequently. It also offers better protection courtesy of its thick rubber edging, and this soft feel also made it the easiest for inserting / removing the iPad. Logitech offers thinner and lighter cases, if you can do without such a thick protective buffer, but we found this model to be easily the best for rugged use and for children.

Lastly, we come to our overall winner for this section: the ClamCase Pro. It has its flaws -- namely, its obscene weight and rigid plastic on the top half that makes it a chore to take the iPad in or out -- but it's simply more usable in more scenarios. Wherever you can use a laptop, you can use a ClamCase Pro. We found ourselves using the Yoga-style mode too, which makes it possible to eat in front of an iTunes movie without worrying about getting lobster shell on the keyboard.

There's a minor design flaw in this area, which means that if you try to deploy a Yoga pose at the wrong angle, you'll end up muting the iPad because its volume rocker presses against the surface of your table. You have to make sure the angle is steep enough to avoid this, but overall it wasn't a big hold-up.
TYPING



We've saved this bit for last, because for us it seals the deal. The Logitech rules itself out in terms of pure typing comfort because it has the most awkward keyboard by far, with an "A" button that feels like it should be the Caps Lock button. The whole layout seems to have been shunted to the left somehow. You can see this from the photo above, compared to the more normal layout of the ClamCase Pro. This awkwardness makes the Logitech hard to get used to, and it resulted in way too many mis-hits even after a week of use.

The Belkin was a lot easier to type on, allowing us to get up to 52 words per minute (wpm) while hunched over the iPad on our lap -- although, as pointed out earlier, the case always feels like it's about to collapse in this scenario. Still, it's comfortable enough to use on a flat-ish surface, and 50 wpm isn't bad at all.
wpm (desk)wpm (lap)Logitech Keyboard Folio 44 46
Belkin Ultimate Keyboard Case 50 52
ClamCase Pro 55 58
iPad touchscreen 28 29
Surface Pro Type Cover 42 N/A
Retina MBP 15-inch (2012) 62 58


If 50 wpm isn't bad, then what's good? Obviously, the figures above have no meaning in absolute terms, since they reflect this author's typing speed as much as anything else, but in relative terms they reveal a lot. They tally closely with perceived levels of typing comfort while also proving that all these keyboards deliver on the central promise of beating touchscreen typing. In a broader context, typing on a big MacBook Pro is about as smooth as it gets on any sort of mobile device, and the fact that the ClamCase Pro was able to match that speed -- 58 wpm on a wobbly, bony human surface -- marks out that case as the winner of this section.
WRAP-UP



We may as well just come out with it: the ClamCase Pro was our all-round pick of the bunch. It wins mainly because it excels at allowing fast touch-typing regardless of whether there's a flat surface to rest it on, but also because it looks good and the invertible hinge allows it to work well as a stand. These advantages make it just about worth the $170 price tag for someone who already owns an iPad and who's starting out with the premise that it must be their default device for productivity. However, anyone who prioritizes portability over fast typing may find that the Belkin is their best bet. The Logitech can't be dismissed either: it offers superior protection and is excellent if your iPad will ever be handled by a kid. In any case, theyall deliver vast improvements over the stock touchscreen keyboard, and the success of these products strengthens the whole notion of the hybrid or detachable device -- something Apple has so far ruled out, but which it probably ought to reconsider.