Raspberry Pi turns 2 years old, here is a video to celebrate it

When Raspberry Pi was launched in 29th February 2012, it inspired many people out there to do projects. I have seen people running XBMC on it, removing the use of a smart TV and others made a music server which was great. The Raspberry Pi units have been sold over 2.5 million. That's a great number if you ask me.

Raspberry Pi guy, Matt Timmons-Brown made a video highlighting several successful project build to celebrate its second birthday. Some of the coolest Pi powered projects shown in the video are robots, Lego Computing clusters, arcade cabinets, drones and much more. Check out the video below.

Switched On Tech Design

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Microsoft may release a free version of Windows 8.1

To increase Windows 8.1s number of users Microsoft may release a free version of Windows 8.1. Reliable sources said to The Verge that the company is experimenting a build of Windows 8.1 with "Bing" which bundles with key Microsoft apps and services. ZDnet reported some Windows 8.1 with Bing details this week.

The Windows 8.1 with Bing is said to be a free or low-cost upgrade fr Windows 7 users. Upgrade offers are focused on increasing the number of Windows 8.1 users. The Bing version of Windows 8.1 might be also offered to PC makers as a part of  cutting the license price to under $250. The sources didn't say how much Microsoft is committed to this plan. It is also an initiative to push and monetize Microsoft's cloud services and app Microsoft see Bing as monetization landmine. The company is also said to consider low-cost or free versions of Windows Phone and seems to be working towards merging Windows RT and Windows Phone as a single platform for ARM-based chip sets. 

Bing-powered apps are bundled to Windows 8.1 and the leaked version of the OS does not seem to prove any significant changes. The company is expected to further detail the Windows 8.1 Spring update during its Build developer conference in April. More details about the merging of Windows RT and Windows Phone is also expected to be shared at the Build conference.

Source: The Verge

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Report shows Chinese gamers spend more time on PC than mobile gaming

A Study report from china's GPC (page translated through Google translate) shows that there has been a boom for the gaming industry since the last 12 months giving an amount of  $13 billion to the gaming industry which shows a 40% increase compared to the last years revenue. Even though growth in market maybe a common thing but it might be surprising that Chinese players tend to spend more time in PC

Chinese game market is worth 83.17 billion Yuan

games than just tapping into mobiles in these modern decade of smartphones.

Most of this year’s revenue, 64.5% or about $8.7 billion, was generated through client-based PC games. Browser games took in a comparatively low $2 billion, while mobile games earned just $1.8 billion. Social games–which many developers depend on to spread the word about their products–earned less than $1 billion. Gamers in China states that they have very hard access to internet gaming in mobiles when compared to that of  PC games, this particularly set a loss of about 80% of the revenue.

Gaming companies are trying to take back their lose by figuring  out mistakes and focusing more on fixing them. Companies like Tencent have released apps like WeChat giving highly anticipated gaming platform. Developers are busy trying cope up with challenges distributing and monetizing mobile games in order to take advantage of China's rapidly growing smartphones penetration.

Even though Chinese developers are contracted by foreign companies like Electronic Arts, Gameloft and Glu, domestic game companies seems to be dominating a bigger revenue-$7.8 billion to be exact, or a 30% increase year over year.

Via: TechCrunch
Source: GPC

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