HTC Unveils the Flyer. It Can Play Crysis.
...thanks to OnLive.
HTC makes a good number of Android phones, so it only makes sense that the company would also be taking part in the Android tablet market. As expected, HTC announced the Flyer tablet, which runs an all-new HTC Sense – not on Honeycomb like many of the other Android tablets – but rather on Gingerbread (2.3 or 2.4).
Another big difference between the Flyer and the rest is that it uses stylus/pen interaction on top of natural touch. HTC also announced HTC Watch, a new connected video service that will debut on HTC Flyer tablet, and will collaborate with OnLive, Inc. to launch the first cloud-based mobile gaming service on a tablet. Does that mean that the Flyer can play Crysis? Yes, it can.
"Clearly, smartphones have transformed our lives but as we observed how people use smartphones, computers and other technologies, we saw an opportunity to create a tablet experience that is different, more personal and productive," said Peter Chou, CEO of HTC Corporation. "We are progressing down a path as an industry when people will no longer be in a single device paradigm, but have multiple wireless devices for different needs; this is the direction we are moving."
In terms of physical traits, the HTC Flyer is encased in an aluminum unibody with a seven-inch display, 1.5GHz single core processor and high-speed HSPA+ wireless capabilities. HTC says that it chose a speedy single core over slower dual cores because Android currently doesn't support multithreading outside of the browser.
While stylus interaction has fallen to the wayside due to capacitive touch, HTC is hoping to bring it back with what it calls Scribe Technology. Such features include Timemark, which enables you to capture the audio of a meeting in line with your written notes, so tapping on a word in your notes instantly takes you to that exact place in time in the audio recording of the meeting. Notes are also integrated with the calendar so when there is an appointment reminder you are automatically prompted with an opportunity to begin a new note or in the case of recurring meetings, to continue where the last meeting left off. Evernote users will be pleased to learn that that it is all integrated into HTC's software.
HTC Flyer will be available to customers globally during Q2 2011.
HTC Flyer Specifications
Processor
1.5GHz
Platform
Bluetooth® 3.0 with A2DP for wireless stereo headsets Wi-Fi®: IEEE 802.11 b/g/n 3.5 mm stereo audio jack Micro-USB (12-pin micro-USB 2.0)
5 megapixel colour camera with auto focus
1.3 megapixel front camera
Memory
AndroidTM with HTC SenseTM
Internal storage: 32 GB RAM: 1 GB Micro SD memory card extension (SD 2.0 compatible) The actual available internal storage may differ depending on the software configuration of your device
Camera
Dimensions (LxWxT)
Audio supported formats
Playback: .aac, .amr, .ogg, .m4a, .mid, .mp3, .wav, .wma (Windows Media Audio 9) Recording: .amr, .aac
Video supported formats
Weight Display
195.4 x 122 x 13.2 mm Around 415 grams with battery
7 inch touch-sensitive TFT screen with 1024 X 600
resolution
Playback: .3gp, .3g2, .mp4, .wmv (Windows Media Video 9), .avi (MP4 ASP and MP3), .xvid (MP4 ASP and MP3) Recording: .3gp
Rechargeable battery Capacity: 4000 mAh Standby time: Up to 820 ~1470 hours Video Playback: Up to 4 hours All subject to network and device usage
Network
GPS Sensors
HSPA/WCDMA: 900/AWS/2100 MHz Upload speed of up to 5.76 Mbps and download speed of up to 14.4 Mbps Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE: 850/900/1800/1900 MHz Band frequency, HSPA availability, and data speed are operator dependent
Internal GPS antenna
Ambient light sensor G-Sensor Digital compass
AC adapter
Voltage range/frequency: 100 ~ 240V AC, 50/60 Hz DC output: 9V and 1.67A
Please note: Specifications are subject to change without prior notice
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Sweetness, the idea of parallel gaming (cloud-gaming), using a mobile device to control a desktop to play a game has come to actuality!!
If they can account for the latency issues for cloud gaming on a portable device, then this will be the best thing since the George Forman grill.
lol cheap shot by adding the onLive part. =) It is a great idea though.
HTC sure has come a long way from their bug-ridden Touch Diamond's - I am quite impressed. One one hand - Superb design. Great processor. Promising battery life (hopefully around the 10 hr mark). On the other hand - Honeycomb would have made more sense given that it is a tablet, and to really knock the ball out of the park HTC would have needed nvidia tegra graphics. OnLive is a nice touch, but more gimmicky than practical - unless you're tethered to an ethernet port you're not going to get the bandwidth to really make use of it.
What's a crysis?
=P
Most misleading title ever. Ever.
It's just not the same as having the power to completely render it yourself. This is more related to desktop gaming PCs, but it's just so much better having all that rendering power humming beside you while you play than having someone else do the work for you and then stream it to your computer.
Not even the servers that OnLive use for games can support Crysis. Jokes.
But can it play Cry-
Oh wait... =P
But seriously? You probably wouldn't even manage 5 FPS on that thing, if you actually DID decide to play Crysis on it? Kinda pointless to have OnLive on this sort of device anyways, with the slower speeds of the network...
Can it play Crysis 2? Lol at the title.
can you honest call it "playing" with the amount of lag on OnLive
& if OnLive sells OnLive@HomeArcade, you can buy/rent games to run on you gaming rig & play it on your tablet at home, even if your Internet isn't that good. ;-)
You will hit your data cap in about 2 days tops!
Most misleading title ever. Ever.
agreed
Saying IT can play crysis - No! You can let a real computer/server render it and the stream it with the price of alot of added latency - yes! So the "it can play crysis" is nothing more than the phoone is displaying a video stream and allow it to send controls to the onlive servers. But i guess onlive has its uses when the power of the device it works with is poor.
How about a review of gfx quality/latency of the onlive service, it would be interesting for alot of peeps =)
If they can account for the latency issues for cloud gaming on a portable device, then this will be the best thing since the George Forman grill.
Have you even used On-live yet? Because I have no issues and it's great. Maybe upgrade your connection or set bandwidth settings for certain ports on you router. Onlive is the future, It's crazy fast and easy to use. No more stupid long loading screens and discs to lose and scratch!
I don't care for Crysis on tablets
But the tablet and it's functionalities looks amazing. Do want one
Have you even used On-live yet? Because I have no issues and it's great. Maybe upgrade your connection or set bandwidth settings for certain ports on you router. Onlive is the future, It's crazy fast and easy to use. No more stupid long loading screens and discs to lose and scratch!
Got a 100/100 mbit connection, still runs poorly compared to anything running on my computers locally. Likely you play chess or other turn based games and are satisfied! *Many* people aren't satisfied because of the latency's involved that are unavoidable.
First you stream video.
That have to be rendered on server, compressed on server with lost quality AND adds latency and finally it have to be sent and decompressed on your side (more latency) thats just the video stream alone!
Controls in multi player games.
You send the ingame commands like movement ect to the onlive servers who then sends it to the game server that processes it sends the new userstate back to the onlive servers wich processes it and renders the next frame (se video above). Whats most amusig is that the onlive servers games report the latency from the onlive to the game server not the actual latency for the user (game-onlive-server-onlive-extra compressions-decompression latency-gamer).
So you say that a computer to server and back is not faster than the above? Sorry I have to say this but some loud people seriously need education before speaking up about matters they don't fully grasp!
Sure onlive could be a possible future and has its uses even today when you run on a poor mans gaming computer but don't for a second try to convince the less educated people that its the best option today because its simply just a marketing statement based on the above - weak computer with a high bandwidth connection and most peeps that can afford the better connections sure as hell can afford a good computer voiding the main targets for the onlive.
I think download content is the future like steam! Even publishers have even spoke up against onlive and they use to be cautious. Main reason - it don't allow them to let their players experience their games as they want and that should tell just about any uneducated where their trust lies!
Now that looks like an oversized phone. But it looks good.
Android doesn't support multithreading outside the browser? Ouch. Then that pretty much renders all the new dual core tablets and phones running on Android kinda pointless (until they address the issue in the next releases)
HTC didn't put honeycomb on it because they don't have sense ui ready for it. They said something like that. However, they haven't said anything about a posible update.
I just commented the other day on an article where some one claimed you'd never be able to run OnLive on a phone. I said it's completely possible and that if you can run netflix you can run onlive. Sure, it's not a phone but pretty close. The only issue would be network speed. To that I suggest people use WiFi in thier houses (or other WiFi hotspots) instead of wireless (phone) networks which typically have slower speeds.
Kinda cool news.
"I just commented the other day on an article where some one claimed you'd never be able to run OnLive on a phone. I said it's completely possible and that if you can run netflix you can run onlive. Sure, it's not a phone but pretty close. The only issue would be network speed. To that I suggest people use WiFi in thier houses (or other WiFi hotspots) instead of wireless (phone) networks which typically have slower speeds."
Uh, netflix buffers like 10-20 seconds worth of video before it begins playing. Sorry but I dont think I'll be able to play FPS's with 10-20 SECONDS of lag lol.
"I just commented the other day on an article where some one claimed you'd never be able to run OnLive on a phone. I said it's completely possible and that if you can run netflix you can run onlive. Sure, it's not a phone but pretty close. The only issue would be network speed. To that I suggest people use WiFi in thier houses (or other WiFi hotspots) instead of wireless (phone) networks which typically have slower speeds."Uh, netflix buffers like 10-20 seconds worth of video before it begins playing. Sorry but I dont think I'll be able to play FPS's with 10-20 SECONDS of lag lol.
The reason Netfilx buffers for 10-20 seconds, is because it downloads the video in advance, so if there is any interruption in the connection, or slow down it will still be able to play the movie without interruption, this has little to do with latency whiling streaming an FPS. There may be a 100ms delay, or so but that would affect performance minimally.
I still am highly doubtful over the concept of "cloud gaming." As many people have mentioned, ASIDE from the bandwidth/video compression issues is the one of latency: and that's something that cannot simply be ironed out. With some games, this can be forgivable. (for instance, I can foresee cloud-based MMOs becoming popular) However, for an FPS, this essentially makes the game unplayable: you MIGHT be able to hang on in single-player campaigns, albeit with greater difficulty. But let's ask us this: who buys an FPS for single-player anymore? It's all about the multiplayer, and in there, the lag induced by cloud gaming (which'd be ~200ms minimum) would guarantee you're going to get creamed. Couple that with a touchscreen as your only input, and it'll be a surprise should you ever pass a KDR of zero.
Still, bandwidth issues are a major concern, especially on a portable device: like pretty much every other friggin' smartphone out today, the Flyer appears to be using a combination of an ARM Cortex CPU with a PowerVR SGX 500-series GPU. These are liked because they're flexible, can be packaged to fit with virtually any other hardware, and they draw little juice. However they are NOT powerful in the least. Rendering 1024x600 video on it can be done, but it would involve bitrate restrictions: it wouldn't look as pretty as 1024x600 on a PC could. (i.e, it'll have the resolution, but quality will suffer)
And, of course, components that weak entirely rule out any possibility of the tablet running Crysis on its own.
There may be a 100ms delay, or so but that would affect performance minimally.
There's two things wrong here. For one, in an FPS, 100ms means a lag of 6 frames. Given the nature of an FPS, that means the equivalent of getting 10fps, in terms of the player's capability of responding: the game becomes largely unplayable. (in both cases you get a 100ms processing-to-visuals lag)
Secondly, you mention how NetFlix BUFFERS to smooth out any hiccups... What about a hiccup in the video stream of the game? You're dead if that happens. Since it's real-time, there's NO buffering that can be done, or anything at all that can be done to compensate.
I want one. Now if it could dual boot win7 it would be perfect.
Is there any word on if the stylus will be pressure sensitive? As an artist I'd be interested in getting a tablet that I can use for sketching. The lack of pressure sensitivity on the iPad makes it a no go for me... and the fact it's an apple too.
Is there any word on if the stylus will be pressure sensitive? As an artist I'd be interested in getting a tablet that I can use for sketching. The lack of pressure sensitivity on the iPad makes it a no go for me... and the fact it's an apple too.
I'd say chances are slim: there's no real money in that, since only artists need pressure sensitivity. Also, such touchscreens seem to cost a lot more, or are either considered a far more premium market, hence why such visual tablets tend to run into the thousands of dollars.
More like it can stream Crysis...
+100