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Share the Genius

As many of you probably know, the end of this week marks the American launch of one of the most talked-about Android smartphones, LG Optimus G Pro. LG unveiled US version of the phone during “Share the Genius” event in NYC last Wednesday. It was coordinated together with a popular indie group – Atlas Genius. Thanks to the newest Dual Recording feature, Atlas and LG could share the experience also with the fans who did not manage to obtain tickets to the concert.

For those who don’t know it yet, Dual Recording function allows you to simultaneously record videos with 13 mega-pixels rear facing camera and 2.1 megapixels front one. New add-ons like LG Quick Memo, QSlide 2.0 and Live Effects further enhance the real life experience. QSlide drives multitasking, letting you add personal comments to the photos shared on social media via Quick Memo and edit your videos through Live Effects at the same time. Also, no matter what your in-built flash storage is, thanks to Tuxera exFAT you can boost your phone’s memory capacity to the maximum with an external SD or SDXC memory card.

This 5.5-inch phablet received a lot of buzz in the news recently. After its launch in Korea, national sales reached 500,000 in just 40 days. It is not as surprising when we look at the smartphone replacement rate in the country, which is currently on the level of 70%. Even though the market is nearing maturity, the South Korean smartphone industry is expected to grow further 8% this year. Think-tank ROA Holdings estimates that the mobile penetration rate will reach 112 % with 33.8 million units sold in 2015.

Posted on May 8, 2013 by Karolina Mosiadz in android, Asia, exfat, sdxc, tuxera | Tagged , ,

Android Set-Top Boxes in Trend

The way we use TV has changed significantly in the past couple of years. According to a recent survey conducted by a management consulting firm Booz&Co, media-entertainment industry growth comes now mainly from user payments and not like it used to be, from advertising. Traditional broadcast networks slowly give a way to Pay-TV and Internet based platforms with media content that can be accessed and streamed whenever convenient for the user.

Android powered set-top box transforms your TV into an intuitive device. It lets you access digital content, play games, make a use of a robust app ecosystem, video-conference and surf the Internet. Common connectivity options include SD card reader, HDMI outputs, USB 2.0 ports, Bluetooth, integrated Ethernet port and WI-FI connection.

Set-top box popularity spiked recently due to an influx of reasonably priced, feature – rich and innovative products from Roku, Xiaomi, EXOON, Plex and SKnet among others. SKnet newest home media accessories bring support for multichannel, high-definition recording and playback, thanks to integrated Tuxera file system solutions. Forecasts say that the emergence of video gateways and media players will further drive the value of set-top box market up to $26 billion by 2017.

Let’s not forget about the arrival of content-on demand, custom programing and live TV streaming platforms. Services such as Netflix and Aereo offer people an option to stream favourite programs & movies, whenever they want, for a flat price. The number of available outlets is constantly growing. Depending on a set-top box provider, the offer includes a variety of channels like Hulu, Vudu, HBO Go, Amazon Instant Video and more.

Set-top boxes make up a part of networked home, a concept where all the devices communicate with each other and where the media content can be shared & accessed at any time. Increasing connectivity requires a high level of interoperability and that is what we focus on here at Tuxera.

Posted on April 23, 2013 by Karolina Mosiadz in android, file system suite, interoperability, set top boxes, tuxera | Tagged , ,

Open Source Development Goes Strong

As many of you probably know, Tuxera comes from the open source development. Apart from the commercial file systems it is mainly recognized for its open software: NTFS – 3G.

NTFS-3G is the original, free-software, read and write NTFS driver for Linux, Android, Mac OS X, FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenSolaris, QNX and other operating systems. It is widely used in GNU/Linux distributions, including Fedora and Ubuntu among others. The software allows users to mount Windows partitions and edit or delete Windows files. It comes with a full support for all Windows versions from Windows XP to Windows 8, added in the recent update.

In April 2011 Tuxera merged NTFS-3G together with Ntfsprogs, a collection of free Unix utilities for managing NTFS file systems, creating Tuxera NTFS Community Edition.

Open source community continues to be a big part of our business and we aim to contribute to it as much as we can. The software is regularly updated and maintained by our developers. This January we have released latest stable version ntfs-3G ntfsprogs 2013.1.13 with following specifications:

  • ntfs-3g: fixed returned files types in readdir()
  • ntfs-3g: force option ‘ro’ when mounting a read-only device
  • ntfs-3g: keep the name of a deleted file in place for easier undeletion
  • ntfs-3g: accept multiple read-only mounts
  • ntfs-3g: improved Windows-type ACL inheritance, as needed by Windows 8
  • ntfs-3g: avoid unnecessary runlist update when appending data to a file
  • ntfs-3g: added inheritance of the set-group-id flag
  • ntfs-3g: deny mounting when fast restart mode of Windows 8 is detected
  • ntfs-3g: reject getting/setting DOS names on hard linked files
  • ntfsclone: fixed wiping user data when creating metadata images
  • ntfsclone: implemented a new option to set a new serial number
  • ntfsfix: implemented fixing the backup boot sector
  • ntfsfix: fixed clearing the bad cluster list
  • ntfsinfo: added allocation data to the volume parameters summary
  • ntfsinfo: output the numbers of runs and fragments for the selected file
  • ntfslabel: implemented a new option to set a new serial number
  • ntfswipe: added optional wiping of file tails and undelete data
  • mkntfs: insert an $Info stream in $UpCase to comply with Windows 8
  • openindianas: merged OpenIndiana requirements into the driver and fuse-lite

On the top of the stable release, there are always further add-ons, which are aimed at developing, maturing and releasing features that might be integrated in the future upgrades depending on user feedback.

Our commercial high-performance alternative, Tuxera NTFS for Mac OS X and embedded devices is currently one of the most widely deployed solutions on the market.

Posted on April 19, 2013 by Karolina Mosiadz in file systems, interoperability, linux, mac, ntfs, open source, storage, tuxera | Tagged , ,

Tuxera NTFS for Mac – Everything You Wanted to Know and More

As most of you know, Mac OS X provides limited support for Microsoft Windows NTFS formatted volumes. Out of the box, the files will be in read-only mode so you won’t be able to copy, edit or delete them. However, a lot of us use many different devices at work and at home. It can quickly become very annoying to handle huge amount of digital data that is produced every day. According to a recent survey made by Deloitte, there was a 150% increase in the so-called digital omnivores, people who own at least 3 portable devices (a smart-phone, tablet and a laptop).

Tuxera focuses on development of file system solutions that help to overcome these obstacles. Our Tuxera NTFS for Mac software is widely used by Mac users to transfer, access, edit and store media content from a variety of devices. It is crucial for us to have all updates in place so the solution is fully compatible with the newest Mac OS X versions released by Apple.

Just last week we published our Tuxera NTFS for Mac 2012.3.6 in response to a new Mac OS X 10.8.3 update. The new package includes 2 new exotic languages, Polish and Brazilian Portuguese. Our customers come from around the globe and to cater to all of them we also added multiple currencies to our online store.

If you are interested in getting to know more about the Tuxera NTFS for Mac we invite you to subscribe to our newsletter and receive news, updates and promotions on regular basis.

Posted on March 22, 2013 by Karolina Mosiadz in file systems, interoperability, mac, ntfs, tuxera | Tagged , , , ,

Xiaomi – the Chinese Phenomenon

Recently we have been posting about Chinese rapid technological expansion and its constantly growing demand for smart devices. One of the most interesting, young companies that have emerged in China in the past couple of years is Xiaomi. This handset manufacturer managed to establish its brand in a surprisingly short time. It aced in most of the categories: innovation, distribution channel, business model and first year sales figures.

The company is mostly known for its flagship Android Mi smartphones that are sold in batches online with a pre-order system. This way several thousand phones get sold in a matter of minutes, sometimes even faster. Value added to the customer includes custom Android interface called MUI, instant messaging service – Miliao IM chat and a large assortment of accessories.  It is not surprising that Xiaomi acquired a huge fan base that calls themselves “mi fen” (米粉) which literally means “rice flour”, a clever word play to Xiaomi name which translates to “little rice”. Its messaging app MiTalk has now 17 million users and last year it recorded 1 million simultaneous online users.

At the end of last year Xiaomi published its first set-top box, Xiaomi Box. Now, after signing with Chinese TV network iCNTV, it starts a trail run with a shipment of just 10 000 devices to Shanghai, Hangzhou and Changsha. Xiaomi Box that allows its users to stream, record, store and playback any media content hassle-free, ships with Tuxera file system solutions that ensure smooth working process, interoperability, high performance and ultimate data safety.

The company is planning to expand to the US and Europe in the next two years.

Last week over 20 Chinese media outlets such as China Daily or Sina.com run ads featuring our file system solutions shipping inside the Xiaomi’s set-top box.

What distinguishes this device from the others? Off the top of head I would mention ease of use, high performance, reliability and compatibility. All four of them were attributed to Tuxera file system solutions.

“In the standard version of the Android file system the performance can be drastically lessened in case of unexpected power outages, the accidental loss of data in the the user USB storage media or in case of other unforeseen situations. More often than not, the user could lose the data forever. Tuxera NTFS / FAT write fail-safe data protection features, as well as support for on-the-fly repair function, prevents the loss of data due to unexpected power failure or improper operation.”

Xiaomi first trial shipment of 10 000 devices has been snapped almost immediately by the customers. Those who did not manage to purchase it in time will have to wait until the 9th of April. It is already called one of the most desired smart-TV accessories.

Posted on March 19, 2013 by Karolina Mosiadz in android, Asia, file systems, set top boxes, tuxera | Tagged , , , ,

Finnish Start-up Scene Wins Over the Press

Finland has been branded a vibrant start-up hub for a reason. Finnish sense of entrepreneurship dates back to the post dot-com period in the early 2000s when MySQL and Rovio were born. Now we boast a growing start-up community buzzing with enthusiasm and creativity. Not to mention the abundance of start-up agencies, entrepreneur-led accelerators such as TEKES, pool of high-tech know-how and entrepreneurship-friendly environment. However, up till now the Finnish tech and business press, with the single exception of ArcticStartup – an independent technology blog, has been eerily silent about the emerging start-up scene. It is nice to see it springing to life now.

Kauppalehti, the most influential business paper in Finland, just launched a special start-up section compiling all the news, public information, features and most recent capital investments. The newspaper picked out 149 promising companies, fishing for high potential and growth orientation. Interestingly, only 26 of them reported positive profits, most of which would usually not exceed €100 000 per annum. Tuxera, presented as a star among the start-ups, stands out with high potential, profitability and forecasts for the future. In the first feature of the series, apart from a brief summary, Kauppalehti article underlines how our focus markets switched from almost equal distribution between Europe, Asia and the USA to almost 80% of our business being conducted in the Far East.

Tietoviikko, Finland´s only independent ICT news magazine, also gets its say on the start-up scene. March edition of the bi-weekly publication comes out with an article on Tuxera, highlighting the international aspect of our business. As you can see, almost 100% of our sales occur abroad and it is hardly surprising that our team boasts nearly 20 different nationalities. We speak multiple languages; bring culture diversity and expertise from various parts of the world. In the commentary from Artturi Tarjanne, sought after mentor and advisor for Infocom entrepreneurs, you can read about Tuxera high growth, tech expertise and ideas for business expansion in the future.

With Tuxera in the lead, the start-up focus is slowly moving away from gaming industry into more diversified products and services.

Posted on March 4, 2013 by Karolina Mosiadz in Features | Tagged , ,

Mobile Innovations You Should Keep an Eye on

Yesterday kicked off, one of the most interesting events for mobile & tablet enthusiasts, MWC 2013. To facilitate increased number of booths and time-constrained attendees, the fair moved to a bigger location close to the airport. However, nothing changed in regard to head-spinning innovations and product releases. The prevailing theme up till now has been giant phones, tablet – phone hybrids and phablets in all spec and price ranges.

A while ago we had to decide which one to chose: a phone or tablet, now it´s irrelevant because we can have a variation of both with different specifications. Last year we have seen an emergence of phablets, now the trend moved to interconnected mobile platforms.

ASUS is teasing the customers with its newest invention FonePad, a word play based on another famous product of the company PadFone. FonePad is a 7-inch tablet (half way between 5-inch and 10-inch screens making up PadFone) running on Android 4.1 and powered by1.2GHz Intel Atom Z2420 processor. It can work either as a phone or a tablet.

Just unveiled Samsung Galaxy note 8 is an inch bigger, but still comes with phone functionality. It runs on Android 4.1.2, and other specifications include HSPA+ support, dual-band 802.11n Wi-Fi, a microSD slot, Bluetooth 4.

LG sticks to more conventional route with it´s newest Optimus G Pro. This 5-inch, 1080p phone runs on the latest Qualcomm mobile chip, Snapdragon 600.

Fujitsu shows off its ARROWS line of water-resistant phones and tablets. This time it revealed new additions to the family: ARROWS X powered by a 1.7GHz quad-core Tegra 3 and 2GB of RAM and ARROWS V with 4.7-inch 720p display, a 13.1-megapixel camera, and1.5GHz quad-core CPU.

Sony showcased new Xperia Z tablet, voted the thinnest one on the market. This 10.1-inch Android device is 6.9 mm thick and weighs only 495 grams. Following into Fujitsu steps it also provides the highest levels of water resistance.

Android is the predominant operating system and so it shouldn’t come as surprise that an impressive number of devices offer SDXC support, enabling people to extend the memory capacity up to 128 GB (and soon up to 2T).  We are excited to share with you that majority of the these devices ship with Tuxera exFAT inside.

Posted on February 26, 2013 by Karolina Mosiadz in android, exfat, mobile, phones, sdxc, storage, tablets, tuxera | Tagged , , , ,

SD Memory Card Technology in Demand

SDA is a global collaboration between companies aimed at mutual goal – to design and promote the adoption of the industry standards for SD memory cards. Tuxera, as an executive member, not only actively engages in development and improvement of the FAT and exFAT technology but also participates in decision-making regarding the course of action of the Association and it´s governed standards.

Over the past years, digital storage has been constantly improving in speed, size, performance and ease of use. Even though the digital imaging market is relatively mature, the mobile market is currently evolving and the demand for SD card technology is surging.

Nowadays everyone expects to always be able to access and transfer his or her media content, no matter the device or the operating system. It´s an important factor in the constant drive for innovations seeing as all the brands strive to create superior product features. Our smartphones and tablets now equipped with SDXC or microSDXC card can support up to 128 GB, making possible to not only store even more music, photos and movies but also to record HD videos. Most recent novelty are wireless cards letting you stream the files to portable devices over Wi-Fi without hassle of using cables, card readers or a computer. Full interoperability is a requisite across all the consumer electronic markets ranging from digital TVs to entertainment systems in your car. SD memory card technology is employed by over a 400 brands and utilized in more than 8,000 models.

As you know, we at Tuxera focus on development of file system solutions aimed at tackling current and future challenges in the interoperability field. A part of our strategy is to be present in the developing markets in Asia where most of the SD card manufacturers are based and where the demand for smart devices is the highest.

Posted on February 4, 2013 by Karolina Mosiadz in exfat, sd, sdxc | Tagged , ,

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