3D

Mashable: Get ready, folks with no sense of direction; Google Maps 5.0 app for Android is looking to make your life a lot easier with 3D graphics, more accurate orientation and the ability to function offline. According to Gizmodo, the app — which was demoed at D: Dive Into Mobile conference in San Francisco — is much faster than the previous iteration and renders in real time. 3D buildings are visible at street-level view, which lets you tilt the image and check out your virtual surroundings. The map will also adjust as you move, dictated by the compass, or you can rotate the map yourself if you want to check out various views. ...

Google Earth 6 doesn’t have too many new features. You can now use Street View just like in Google Maps by dragging the pegman icon. “To view street-level imagery for a specific location, zoom into an area at an altitude of approximately 500km. You will see a pegman icon appear at the top right below the navigation controls. Click and drag the icon across the 3D viewer. A blue border will appear around roads that have street-level imagery available,” explains Google. ...

BetaNews: Mozilla Wednesday released a significant update to the beta of its Firefox 4 browser. The update adds a new JavaScript JIT compiler, going by the name of JägerMonkey, and improves the browser’s support for hardware acceleration, OpenType fonts, and WebGL 3D graphics (the technology used to create an HTML5 version of Quake II back in April.) Additionally, the latest beta includes a stable add-ons API, so developers can finally update their add-ons to Firefox 4. ...

Chinese website eNet has filled in some missing information – notably TDP and TMU count. The TDP of GeForce GTX 580 is at 244W, slightly lower than the GeForce GTX 480. The texture fillrate had been viewed by many as one of the bottlenecks for GF100, and eNet reports that GF110 effectively doubles the TMU count to 128 TMUs. Apart from this substantial improvement in TMU, the GF110 is a “full revision” and fixed version of GF100. ...

Windows 7 might be selling like hotcakes but that’s only going to make it even harder for Microsoft to top. When asked about the riskiest product bet that the software giant is currently developing, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer answered “the next release of Windows” without so much as a second of hesitation. Unfortunately, his interviewers don’t ask him for an explanation, so we’ll have to speculate as to why he chose Windows and not something else like Windows Phone, Xbox Kinect, or Bing. ...

The New Acrobat X is finally here! What can it do for education? Here is a quick list of new and improved features: New user interface The Interface tool pane brings top user needs out front Customizable Tool Bar Tools Pane reveals most useful tools to improve productivity Tools and Tasks are easier to access HUD display provides more real estate for viewing __ Amazing document repurposing New export options allow for Word and Excel options including headers, footers, and worksheets New scanning engine improves accuracy and file size Efficient tagging and reflow ensure viewing and access on a variety of screens __ ...

Just last week NVidia distributed a beta version of their Forceware drivers 260.89. The main feature was support for their recently launched GeForce GT 430, and although a few other improvements were mentioned there was nothing really outstanding. This time around the company offers the final release of these drivers with pretty much the same improvements, plus support for playing back Blu-ray 3D discs when connecting your GPU to a 3D TV through HDMI. ...

While NVidia’s big news may have been its upcoming budget-range GeForce GT 430 1GB cards which leaked out earlier this month, it seems that the company has been hiding another secret: the GeForce GT 440 range. Quietly detailed on the company’s website, the NVidia GeForce GT 440 range of cards is designed to offer OEMs a DirectX 11-compatible card for adding in to their mid-range machines. According to the reference specifications, the GT440 cards feature a 594MHz graphics clock, 1,189MHz processor clock, and either 800 or 900MHz memory clock, along with 144 CUDA cores. Interestingly, NVidia will be offering at least two different models: a budget-friendly version featuring 1.5GB of GDDR3, or a high-end model with 3GB of GDDR3. ...

I received a recommendation to check out Club Cooee. It takes the internet chat room to the next level in 3D rooms. You can run Club Cooee like a regular application or keep it always on top so you can do other tasks and see friends chatting in rooms at the same time. You may also customize your room to your own taste and liking. Options include changing furniture, adding items or even adding your favorite videos, pictures, and music to play in the background. You can actually customize everything in the application, but it will require Cooee Points or Cooee Cash. Verifying your email allows you to earn $300, which covered everything I wanted to customize. ...

“What would people most like to see in 3D? Probably a naked lady.” Those are the words of Playboy founder Hugh Hefner, whose magazine will soon include a centerfold playmate photographed naked and in 3D. The 3D centerfold will appear in the June issue, which hits newsstands this Friday with 3D glasses included. The subject of the photos is 51st Playmate of the Year Hope Dworaczyk. Consider this a grab for attention more than anything; Playboy editorial director Jimmy Jellinek was quoted by MSNBC saying, “In today’s print environment you have to create newsstand events.” The environment he’s talking about is one in which Playboy circulation has dropped almost 60% in just four years. ...