Hardware

One person's funny can be another person's annoying, tasteless, intrusive and even scary.

In the case of one Ohio family, it can be all of the above.

Microsoft's Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2 tablets may be selling better than their first generation counterparts, but revenues from the Windows RT and 8.1 devices are still not making up for the amount of money the company is spending on its PC hardware products.

AMD has unveiled the latest generation of its accelerated processing unit (APU) chips for laptops and tablet devices, aimed at delivering greater performance per watt and integrating a dedicated ARM-based security processor for the first time.

The 2014 update of AMD's mobile APU chips comprises two products, codenamed Beema and Mullins, which are aimed at the mainstream and low-power segments, respectively.

As expected, Apple on Monday released faster versions of its MacBook Air lineup, with the 11-inch and 13-inch thin-and-lights getting 100MHz speed boosts compared to outgoing models, as well as a price reduction of $100.

Each base model MacBook Air comes with a dual-core 1.4GHz Core i5 with Turbo Boost up to 2.70GHz, while the upgraded version boasts a 1.7GHz Core i7 with Turbo Boost up to 3.3GHz. The speed increases represent a 100MHz bump from the respective outgoing versions.

After a supposed "leak" and comparison video, a case purportedly built for Apple's iPhone 6 has been tested against a current generation iPod touch with surprising similarities including near-exact thickness and correct volume control placement.

PayPal was left fighting a rear-guard action last night after it emerged the fingerprint scanner seen on the Samsung Galaxy 5 smartphone can easily be bypassed.

Germany's Security Research Labs says the spoofing system allows access to a user's PayPal account, which is an important issue since a key feature of the scanner is one-step access to the PayPal money payment system - effectively replacing the user's ID and password with a fingerprint swipe.

Today, for one day only, Google Glass goes on sale to everyone in the U.S. Everyone, that is, with an extra $1,500 to spare and a desire to become a guinea pig in a hotly contested social experiment. It’s not a stretch to say that this little test, the first that hasn’t been geared to the already converted, could steer what Google ultimately decides to do with the entire project.

Solid state drives are frequently referred to as the best upgrade you can make to your PC. Trading off disk space for speed is an increasingly popular option, but just like USB sticks and SD memory cards, SSDs can only be written to a limited number of times.

This presents some interesting problems, particularly when it comes to erasing data (and doing so securely). Tools like Darik’s Boot and Nuke are not only ineffective, their write-intensive nature can vastly reduce performance and shorten SSD drive life.

Amazon.com Inc. AMZN -1.70% is preparing to release a smartphone in the second half of this year, according to people briefed on the company's plans, part of a broad push into hardware that would pit it against Apple Inc. AAPL -0.74% and Samsung Electronics Co. 005930.SE +0.29%

L33tdawg: Considering I've had my Fuelband replaced I think 4 times already and the fact that Nike still hasn't fixed a DGAPING XSS vuln for 2 years, I would say it's time to look for something else... 

Will your Nike FuelBand soon be a collector's item?