H.265, the successor to the highly popular H.264 video codec, used for over 80 percent of all the online video, has been approved by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), allowing it to be used for the creation of video content that is significantly smaller in size than what we have today.

Known also as High Efficiency Video Coded, H.265 allows file sizes that can be around half as much as the current H.264 encoded videos while maintaining the video quality. This allows content providers to supply much smaller files with the same quality, thus reducing the time required to download or stream the video. Read more »

Apple started seeding out iOS 6.1 Beta 5 to registered iOS developers over the weekend. The update comes over a month after the last update was released to developers.

Along with the usual bug fixes and performance improvements, this new version of iOS also includes an interesting tidbit of information that a lot of people have been looking forward to; a mention of a 128GB version of an iOS device. Read more »

We have been seeing a lot of leaked images of the BlackBerry Z10 over the past month, including some official looking press images. Now we have some new cases for the yet-to-be-announced device, already up for pre-order by a British online retailer.

Above you can see the leather swivel holster, leather pocket case and a transform hard shell case cover. There is also a flip shell case cover (not pictured here). The prices range from £14.99 for the pocket case to £18.99 for the swivel holster. Read more »

Looks like someone at Gameloft left their scanner on again and out comes another clone of a popular game. Called the Blitz Brigade, Gameloft has now turned to Valve’s highly popular Team Fortress 2 as a source of inspiration for their next game.

The company has released a trailer for this game, which, although does not show any in-game footage, does show two teams of red and blue color battling it out over a large open map. It also shows just how similar the game looks to Team Fortress 2, including the game characters. Read more »

Apple’s stock continued to take hits even after the company posted a record breaking financial result for Q1, 2013. The drop in the stock’s price was so severe that it resulted in Exxon Mobil surpassing Apple’s market cap value, to become the most valuable Wall street company once again.

Apple’s market cap is currently at 413.06B against that of Exxon’s 418.23B. Apple, held the leader position since August 2011, but now it had to give it back to the petrol giant. Read more »

Starting today, BestBuy has a great deal on the current-gen MacBook Airs. You can buy them for $200 off Apple’s regular retail price.

I’ve never seen Apple products get such a deep discount – the prices are lower than those of Apple’s refurbished stock of MacBook Airs. I don’t know about you, but I had to double check that it’s not Black Friday all over again. Read more »

Google’s YouTube Capture for iOS got an update today, which brings the oft-requested 1080p video uploads. Until now YouTube Capture was limiting the uploads to 720p resolution.

The new version of YouTube Capture for iOS also allows you to share videos straight to Facebook, Twitter and Google+ with a single tap. Read more »

Creators of the BitTorrent open source protocol have launched their own cloud storage service called BitTorrent Sync and it is rather unsurprisingly, based on the same protocol.

The service comes with its own application allowing users to store and sync folders to multiple devices. Interestingly, the service offers unlimited amount of storage making it a match made in heaven for large teams who collaborate on large files. Read more »

Nokia has updated the map data, which is used on its navigation apps – such as Nokia Maps and Nokia Drive for Windows Phone, as well as the here.com web service.

The update includes three new regions, more detailed coverage in some of the previously supported areas as well as new or amended roads in various countries worldwide. Read more »

OUYA, the Kickstarter-funded gaming console for Android, has changed its controller design after the company received valuable feedback from the developers who got their units.

OUYA has changed the directional pad of the controller (D-Pad), which was a flat “disc” earlier. Read more »

It seems yesterday’s photos of the Galaxy Note 8.0 are the real deal. A newly leaked image shows the slate with its emblematic S-Pen standing alongside its Note II sibling.

The Galaxy Note 8.0 is expected to be announced at the MWC next month in Barcelona and will be powered by the same hardware as the Galaxy Note 10.1. Read more »

Microsoft had an interesting final quarter for 2012 – the three months period that saw the launches of both Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8. As a result, the company is reporting record revenues but also a slight decline in operating income.

Sales of Windows saw a 24% increase from the year ago quarter, but the Windows 8 launch is behind the Windows 7 launch, which boosted sales by 76%. Even Vista brought a 65% jump in sales, though in terms of monetary value the Windows 8 launch brought in more cash (Vista replaced 5 year old XP, while Windows 7 is still relatively recent). Read more »

Skype for Android, one of the popular applications for voice and video calls has been updated with portrait calling allowing the users to use the portrait orientation when making a call.

The latest update will improve the user experience when making video calls on tablets like Nexus 7, which was awkward earlier. Read more »

Twitter has announced a new service called Vine, which lets you share short looping videos on Twitter. The videos can be up to 6 seconds long with sound and loop automatically on the website like an animated GIF.

To capture one of these videos, you will need to download the Vine application, which currently is only available for the iPhone and the iPod touch. The app is very similar to the Instagram app, but instead of square images you see square video clips on your timeline. Read more »

Ebay, one of the popular eStores is offering great discounts on popular gadgets on a daily basis. Today, the store has a bunch of Apple products along with few other products from popular brands on sale with possibly the best deals you could find around.

Today’s deals offer unlocked 16 GB iPhone 5 for a discounted price of $624. Read more »