We covered Project Stream in a more detailed news post recently, so this is a short update. The test period is active as of the time of testing, and will remain so through January 15, 2019. Selected entrants now get a bonus incentive of retaining a copy of Assassin's Creed Odyssey, with all progress from the test retained, even after the stream test is done. Indeed, users (who are limited to the USA as of the test period) with a minimum of an hour of game play will see the game added to their Uplay account on file and this should prompt more of the testers (which you can still apply to be, from everything we have seen) to try out Google's take on game streaming over the internet. Yours truly happens to be one who applied, was selected, and played all of five minutes thus far, but be on the lookout for another post early next year with impressions galore on how it goes.

EA's Executive VP of Strategic Growth Matt Bilbey said in an interview to gamesindustry.biz that he expects game streaming to be an unavoidable fact of our lives, replacing traditional consoles and gaming-specific devices with smartphone-based solutions or Smart TV apps. Matt Bilbey spoke on how scaling bandwidth and latency is paramount to this streaming future, and likely one of the reasons streaming services up to now have struggled for acceptance - and even survival.

"(...) today, that [bandwidth and latency issues] is still a challenge. But I think over the next year to two years, that barrier will drop. Not for everyone, but for a lot of people. Bandwidth capabilities will go up so the business model around streaming a game becomes more viable. If you buy into a streaming solution and the experience is laggy half the time, you're going to stop and not do it again, which is the challenge some of the companies previously had. I think there's now a solution where we can deliver on the promise, and we're working with a lot of the companies who create the server infrastructure, and there are a lot of innovative solutions from a lot of big companies we're working with that will actually allow us to bring this to life."

Elgato, a leading provider of hardware and software for content creators, today announced Stream Deck Mini, a brand-new addition to its line-up of streaming and video production tools. A miniaturized version of the ground-breaking Elgato Stream Deck live content tool, Stream Deck Mini offers six fully-customizable LCD keys, allowing creators to easily switch scenes, launch media, control chat, configure an unlimited number of actions, and more. The ideal addition for streamers and video producers who want to get serious about their content and community, Stream Deck Mini makes it simple to create quality content at the push of a button.

"When Stream Deck launched just over a year ago, it gave content creators access to a level of tactile control that was traditionally exclusive to mainstream entertainment broadcasters" said Julian Fest, VP & General Manager of Elgato. "Stream Deck Mini is every inch a Stream Deck. It keeps all the same functionality, in a smaller form factor, and at a more attainable price."

The Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG), an international committee headed by an EPFL professor, has just unveiled JPEG XS. A new time of higher amounts of content consumption - and the ways we consume it - requires a new way to send its data. With this new format, the image-compression process uses less energy, and higher-quality images can be sent with low latency over broadband networks like 5G. JPEG XS will have applications in areas such as virtual reality, augmented reality, space imagery, self-driving cars and professional movie editing.

Headed by Touradj Ebrahimi, a professor in EPFL's School of Engineering (STI), the JPEG XS format was essentially designed to stream live video and VR - it's not a replacement to JPEG, and file-sizes will actually end up being slightly bigger. The big push with this format is lower compression and decompression latency, as well as energy efficiency of the decompression process itself. The fact that it's open source and has a universal HDR coding format also means that its uptake should be relatively high.

Creative Technology Ltd announced the Sound Blaster K3+ today. The compact and portable mixer is targeted at today's generation of online influencers and content creators, such as musicians, podcasters, live streamers, vloggers, and more. The K3+ captures the goodness of its predecessor, the Sound Blaster K3, while being enhanced further with additional features. Like its predecessor, Sound Blaster K3+ was developed in part by a number of broadcasters, singers, musicians, and audio engineers. Their feedback has allowed Creative to understand various recording needs, and has resulted in a practical, professional recording interface that boasts incredible connectivity options.

"We're proud to be part of that amazing journey in helping people to express themselves through the content they create," said Low Long Chye, General Manager of Creative. "The Sound Blaster K3+ is a full-fledged portable mixer with a wealth of features that allow any budding musician, comedian, live-streaming gamer or vlogger to customize their content and broadcast in amazing quality. And because it's so compact and easily powered via USB, they can broadcast live from almost anywhere with just a mobile phone, the book-sized K3+, and a USB powerbank."

Expanding beyond its highly-acclaimed strengths in video capture and playout, Magewell will take the wraps off the company's first standalone, hardware-based streaming encoder in booth SU6324 at the 2018 NAB Show. Making live streaming production remarkably simple even for non-professional users, the new Ultra Stream HDMI enables customers to record or stream high-quality video from a variety of sources with one click using on-device buttons or an intuitive, accompanying smartphone app.

Magewell's capture products are renowned for outstanding ease of use, and the Ultra Stream HDMI continues this tradition. Designed for users who want to stream but may have very little technical knowledge, the encoder is ideal for everyone from church volunteers, teachers and gamers to corporate marketers and live event organizers.

Following the recent release of EK-CoolStream SE 140 and EK-CoolStream SE 280 slim radiators, EK Water Blocks the market leader in high-end liquid cooling for PC products is releasing two new slim radiators. EK-CoolStream SE 420 and EK-CoolStream SE 560 will complete the slim radiator lineup in the 140mm fan format where high-performance and high-compatibility thin radiators are needed. With case manufacturers putting more and more emphasis on the 140mm fan form factor, these new CoolStream SE radiators will surely set an example in their category.

While most radiators on the market overhang on the side, and are actually bigger than the fans they use, these two new radiators are champions of compatibility in their class. Measuring exactly 140mm in width (the same as the classic 140mm fan) and being only 28mm thick, they will surely fit where some other radiators can't.

The liquid cooled version of AMD's latest graphics card meant for the "pioneering crowd" of prosumers has been made available over at SabrePC. It sports the exact same GPU you'd find on the air-cooled version, featuring all the same 4096 Stream Processors and 16 GB of HBM2 memory. The only differences are, and you guessed it, the higher cooling capacity afforded by the AIO solution, and the therefore increased TDP from the 300 W of the air-cooled version to a eyebrow-raising 375 W. That increase in TDP must come partially from the employed cooling solution, but also from an (for now, anecdotal) ability for the card to more easily sustain higher clocks, closer to its AMD-rated 1,630 MHz peak core clock.

You can nab one right now in that rather striking gold and blue color scheme, and have it shipped to you in 24H. Hit the source link for the SabrePC page.

Videocardz is running a story where some of their sources have seemingly confirmed the Radeon RX Vega model's codenames according to the particular GPU that's being run, with some juicy extra tidbits for your consumption pleasure. Naturally, as Videocardz themselves put it, codenames be codenames, and are always subject to change.

However, what is arguably more interesting is the supposed segregation between models. Apparently, the RX Vega XTX is the same GPU that ticks inside AMD's Vega Frontier Edition, only with a reference water cooling solution attached to it. They report that the board should pull in 375 W of power, with the GPU pulling in 300 W of those. The Vega XT will reportedly be a more mundane air-cooled version of the graphics card, as are the until-now launched Frontier Edition versions of it (with a reduced 285 W board power, with the ASIC now pulling 220 of those watts.) The most interesting point, though, is the Vega XL. Videocardz is reporting that this will be a cut-down version of the Vega XTX and Vega XT's 4096 Stream Processors, down to 3584 Stream Processors, and that it will be sold exclusively in custom variants designed by AMD's AIB partners. Board power and ASIC power are the same as the Vega XT version, though, which seems strange, considering the not insignificant cut down in graphics processing resources. It is unclear as of yet the amount of HBM 2 memory the AIB-exclusive Vega XL will carry, but the Vega XTX and Vega XT should both deliver 8 GB of it.

Valve announces a number of product and technologies at this week's Game Developers Conference (GDC) in San Francisco. "We continue to see very strong growth in PC Gaming, with Steam growing 50% in the last 12 months," said Gabe Newell, Valve's president. "With these announcements we hope that we are helping build on that momentum."

Steam Machines, Windows PCs, Macs, and Linux PCs will be able to take advantage of a new product announced at GDC called Steam Link. Designed to extend your Steam experience to any room in the house, Steam Link allows you to stream all your Steam content from any PC or Steam Machine on the same home network. Supporting 1080p at 60Hz with low latency, Steam Link will be available this November for $49.99, and available with a Steam Controller for an additional $49.99 in the US (worldwide pricing to be released closer to launch).

The Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA) announced the release of the DisplayPort 1.3 audio / video (A/V) standard. An update to the widely used DisplayPort 1.2a standard, this latest version increases the maximum link bandwidth to 32.4 Gbps, with each of four lanes running at a link rate of 8.1 Gbps/lane-a 50% increase from the previous version of the DisplayPort standard. Allowing for transport overhead, DisplayPort's 32.4 Gbps combined link rate delivers 25.92 Gbps of uncompressed video data.

The increased bandwidth enables higher resolution monitors, including recently announced 5K monitors (with pixel resolutions of 5120 x 2880) using a single DisplayPort cable without the use of compression. It will also enable higher resolutions when driving multiple monitors through a single connection using DisplayPort's Multi-Stream feature, such as the use of two 4K UHD monitors, each with a pixel resolution of 3840 x 2160, when using VESA Coordinated Video Timing.

MSI, global leader and manufacturer of gaming hardware and solutions, announces a full lineup of gaming products featuring XSplit Gamecaster by SplitmediaLabs.

SplitmediaLabs Limited is an innovative software company specializing in the development of multimedia applications and technology. "We have worked with MSI to optimize XSplit Gamecaster for use with a wide range of next generation MSI gaming hardware, making it easier than ever for gamers to live stream their gameplay to Twitch or record and upload it directly to YouTube," says CEO of SplitmediaLabs, Henrik Levring.

People looking forward to the big "Steambox" announcement were met by an anticlimax. Valve announced its own operating system for PC gamers, which turns any PC into a "Steambox." Simply named Steam OS, the operating system is a highly modified Debian Linux stripped to bare, with all its non-essentials tossed out, and proprietary multimedia CODECs added, along with fonts, runtime environments, and in-built drivers for popular GPU, sound card, and gaming-peripheral brands. In essence, there's everything in the operating system for PC gamers, and then some.

Steam diversified from distributing PC games to non-gaming PC software, and Valve plans to take that further by doing groundwork for its very own living room content-delivery platform to compete with the likes of Xbox One. Since Steam OS can be deployed onto x86-based PCs as tiny as an Intel NUC, it stands more than a half chance. Its baby-steps are taken with In-home Streaming, a feature that lets you stream content off a PC or Mac in your house. You can share games in your account with others in your family, and close friends, using the recently-announced Family Sharing feature. You get content-blocking features and restricted-accounts. You also get media-player software that lets you organize and play back music and videos in most open- and proprietary formats. You should be able to install popular web-browsers like Google Chrome. Steam OS is competitively priced against Windows 8.1 and OS X 10.9, at $0. Did we tell you that some of its icons look like companion cubes? Just kidding.

With the official GeForce GTX 760 launch imminent, leaked specs, benchmark scores and pics are to be expected. That is precisely what we are looking at today, a card branded Xenon JetStream, sporting the familiar Palit aesthetics, apparently Xenon being a Palit sub-brand for the South Korean market. The images, specs and scores come from the ChipHell boards, where they were posted by forum member Charlie.

The card itself is very small, apparently a non-reference design, making use of an over-sized dual fan cooler, known to us from various GTX 600 generation cards, sold by Palit under the JetStream moniker. The GPU specs confirm the previous leaks, boasting 1152 CUDA cores, 96 TMUs and 32 ROPs. This particular card comes factory overclocked, with the base clock set at 1072 MHz and the boost clock 65 Mhz higher, at 1137 MHz. The GDDR5 memory, 2 GB on this model, comes with a slight overclock as well, 1550 Mhz precisely (6200 Mhz effective speed). Performance wise, the card did slightly better than a stock GTX 670, so keeping in mind the lower stock clocks of the reference GTX 760 card, we can expect it to perform slightly worse than a stock GTX 670.

Synology today released the official version of DiskStation Manager (DSM) 4.2. "Synology has once again pushed the possibilities of NAS servers to new dimensions by releasing DSM 4.2," said Vic Hsu, CEO of Synology Inc. "It helps businesses achieve agility as well as productivity in big data storage, and reshapes users' multimedia experience with a suite of advanced features." DSM 4.2 delivers:

DSM 4.2 features LUN Snapshot and Clone to provide up to 256 snapshots per LUN and near-instant duplication of virtual copies of a LUN, with no impact on system performance and minimal extra storage space. Synology High Availability (SHA) now supports more DiskStation/RackStation, and together with Global hot spare disks, ensures business continuity across enterprise and SMB environments. Two-step verification reinforces security with a pre-defined password and a one-time six-digit code.

The Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA) today announced the rapid growth of certified DisplayPort products during 2012. Over the last twelve months, the number of certified DisplayPort products increased by 80 percent, further establishing the DisplayPort ecosystem as planned by the personal computer industry to increase display and system performance.

During 2012, DisplayPort certifications have increased across all device categories and have expanded into new categories. Certification in computer monitors has grown 95 percent, projectors 100 percent, and graphics cards 18 percent, and there was a 20 percent increase in cable products. New categories experiencing certification growth include handheld devices, notebooks and adaptors. With the introduction of MyDP (Mobility DisplayPort) the DisplayPort ecosystem has been further extended into the tablet and smartphone market.

DTS, Inc. (Nasdaq: DTSI), a leader in high-definition audio solutions, today announced that it has entered into an agreement with ASUSTEK COMPUTER, INC (TSE: 2347), a top global producer of computers and consumer technology, to license its DTS Play-Fi technology for integration within ASUS' line-up of Windows-based products. Already a leader in the development and manufacturing of Windows-based computing solutions, ASUS will now offer integrated whole-home Wi-Fi audio streaming as part of its product portfolio. With DTS Play-Fi technology, ASUS products will enable consumers to stream lossless, high-quality audio from almost any audio source on a PC to their DTS Play-Fi-enabled home audio systems over a standard Wi-Fi network. It also gives users full control of the home speaker network-allowing users to set up, link, and stream audio to one speaker system or multiple speaker systems throughout the home at once.

"Our goal with DTS Play-Fi is to partner with global brands to make whole-home wireless audio streaming a standard feature that consumers everywhere can enjoy, especially now with the proliferation of online and cloud-based music choices available on PCs and tablets," said Brian Towne, executive vice president and chief operating officer, DTS. "ASUS' market position and technology leadership are well established, and we could not be more pleased to have them as a licensee in the Windows PC arena, to extend the music listening experience from its powerful PC platforms into the home with DTS Play-Fi technology."

DTS, Inc., a leader in high-definition audio solutions, today announced its new DTS Play-Fi driver for Windows PCs. DTS Play-Fi is now compatible with the world's leading desktop and portable PC operating system, as well as the vast and growing Android portable device ecosystem. Using the simple, downloadable Windows applet, consumers can stream lossless, high-quality audio from almost any audio source on a PC to a DTS Play-Fi-enabled home audio system over a standard Wi-Fi network.

In addition, DTS is adding Internet radio to the list of streaming service options that can be implemented by OEM partners for use within their proprietary DTS Play-Fi apps. Internet radio gives users access to news, sports, music and talk radio programming, as well as popular podcasts from thousands of Internet radio stations around the globe. Phorus, a subsidiary of DTS and the makers of the PS1 tablet top speaker system and PR1 receiver, is the first DTS Play-Fi-enabled product provider to offer Internet radio as a feature within its version of the DTS Play-Fi app.

Japanese Cooling expert Scythe expands the recently announced GlideStream fan series by new 140 mm models. Similar to 120 mm models, Glide Stream 140 mm fans stand for further development of the award winning Scythe Slip Stream 140 fans. With a smaller center hub and bigger fan blades optimum airflow at low operation noise are accomplished. In addition new grooved blade design has been used to further improve the aerodynamics to reduce air resistance.

To further reduce the noise level new anti-vibration feature has been implemented which is one of the key-feature of the Scythe GlideStream series. All four mounting holes of the GlideStream 140 mm fans are equipped with a rubber pad-inlay. Transfer of vibrations from the operating fan to the PC Chassis or CPU Cooler can be significantly reduced thanks to the new rubber pad-inlays.

HP today announced four new consumer all-in-one (AiO) PCs, including two additions to the HP ENVY line that feature the latest touch-technology innovation in a small footprint, one-cord solution.

"The clean look of an all-in-one PC and the ease of one-cord set-up are key reasons customers turn to HP," said James Mouton, senior vice president and general manager, Personal Computer Global Business Unit, HP. "The Spectre design is art as well as a powerful entertainment hub. Across our rich line of all-in-ones, we continue to drive value and differentiation that have earned us sales of more than 5 million all-in-ones."

Western Digital, the world's leader in external storage solutions and maker of the popular WD TV media player family, today unveils its first line of wireless home networking products, designed specifically to accelerate movies, video and gaming, delivering a premium high-definition entertainment experience. With the My Net family of powerful and easy-to-use home networking products, WD debuts its exclusive FasTrack technology that instantly detects entertainment traffic on the network and fast-forwards it to gaming consoles, media players, smart TVs, tablets, smartphones, computers and other Wi-Fi connected devices.

Club 3D proudly presents the Club 3D Radeon HD 7870 Eyefinity 6 graphics card, the world's first Radeon HD 7000 series graphics card to feature 6 mini DisplayPort outputs, and harnesses the power to unleash incredible scalability, productivity and immersive HD gaming performance, making it the definitve solution for those who refuse to compromise.

Get ready for the future with 28nm GPU technology, Graphics Core Next Architecture, AMD App Acceleration and support for Ultra HD 4096p resolutions and PCI Express 3.0. If you expect above average performance of your Graphics card, Club 3D CoolStream High Performance Cooling Technology is just the kind of high performance that you have been looking for.

LG Electronics (LG) announced the beta opening of LG Cloud service on May 1 with the aim of providing seamless connectivity and streaming access to all digital content across various electronic devices. Although cloud is today's hottest IT buzzwords, LG Cloud is the first that allows users to manage and consume all types of content on "three screens" which includes Android smartphones, PCs and smart TVs (including but not limited to CINEMA 3D models) without a separate set-top box.

To use the service, users need to download the LG Cloud app from Google Play or LG SmartWorld app store from their Android smartphones, LG SmartWorld store from their LG Smart TVs or the LG Cloud website from their PCs or laptops. LG's Cloud service automatically synchronizes smartphone content with the cloud server and the user's PC and TV. Photos and videos taken with the smartphone can be viewed and streamed to the PC or TV almost instantaneously. Videos edited on a PC can be uploaded to LG Cloud for viewing seconds later on a smartphone. Unlike other cloud services, there's very little waiting or lag time since the content is streamed to the TV, PC or smartphone, not downloaded first.

Fans of high-quality PC components are aware of the Japanese brand name Scythe for a long period of time. Scythe is especially famous for high performance CPU coolers and super silent fans among pc enthusiasts. Its Katana series is one of the oldest series, which now receives a major upgrade. Throughout the Katana series its tilted fin and heatsink design was sustained and was a key design-element. Fourth generation of Katana CPU cooler keeps the tilted design in the new and modern fin structure, which increases the overall performance of the aluminum heatsink.

Another advantage of the new design is the option of mounting an additional fan to improve performance or reduce the total fan speed as well as noise level. Supplied fan is able to operate at a speed range between 300 and 2.500 rpm. Hence allows users to utilize the Katana 4 CPU coolers fan speed for silent or preferment operation for overclocked CPUs. Total height of Katana 4 equals to the predecessors 143 mm, which enables a high compatibility to almost every PC case throughout the market. Furthermore total of 3 heatpipes are being adopted from the predecessor. To assure fast heat transfer a copper base plate is being used which is nickel-plated in addition.

Hauppauge Digital, Inc. has announced 'StreamEez', a high definition video streamer designed for organisations who want a simple to use, high quality video streamer to broadcast live events on the Internet.

The StreamEez 'box' connects to an HD video camera using either HDMI or Component Video, compresses the camera's video using a built-in high quality H.264 encoder into a form which is compatible with many common streaming video sites such as Ustream and Justin.TV. StreamEez then connects to a laptop computer over USB. The computer has the Hauppauge StreamEez control application installed, which makes a connection to the streaming Internet web site.