Acer Intros Stackable Modular PC
On Wednesday during IFA 2015 in Berlin, Acer announced a number of new products such as tablets, phones, and laptops. One of the more interesting items currently on display is the latest edition to its Revo series of mini PCs, the Revo Build M1-601. This device follows the Revo One mini PC that launched during CES 2015 back in January.
What makes the Revo Build unique is that it’s modular, allowing customers to stack components like building blocks instead of cramming them into a single chassis. These blocks communicate with each other using pogo pins that have a magnetic component. That means customers won’t have to hassle with wires when switching out components.
“The Blocks can also work independently or with other PCs,” Acer says. “The Revo Build M1-601 desktop is packaged in a tiny 1 liter chassis with a 125 x 125 mm footprint that takes up minimal space and can be placed almost anywhere.”
The Revo Build consists of a base block that plays host to the motherboard, an Intel Pentium or Intel Celeron “Skylake” processor, Integrated Intel HD graphics, and memory configurations of up to 8GB of DDR4 RAM. The company says the memory can be upgraded by simply “loosening” one screw.
Acer says it also plans to release 500GB and 1TB hot-swappable portable hard drives at launch, plus a Wireless Power Bank block, an Audio Block with speakers, and a microphone sometime thereafter. Additional reports state that the company is also releasing a GPU block and a projector block

Lenovo launches World’s First Tablet with Immersive Dolby Atmos
Lenovo has added improved audio capabilities to both its YOGA and PHAB series of tablets, making the Lenovo YOGA Tab 3 Pro the world’s first tablet with Dolby Atmos speaker virtualisation. Dolby and Lenovo claimed it allows the YOGA Tab 3 Pro, which offers a projector and four-speaker soundbar powered by Dolby Atmos, to transform mobile entertainment into a cinematic-quality experience. Immersive audio, such as that offered by Dolby Atmos is the latest hot topic in the entertainment industry, with many of the latest cinemas, games and movies being designed with it in mind. Developers of content creation tools are following suit - next week’s IBC show in Amsterdam promises to be abuzz with immersive audio.
Dolby said Atmos transforms the mobile entertainment experience over headphones and built-in speakers with moving audio that flows above and around the user. The company claimed it creates richness and depth for a superior speaker experience. As well as the Tab 3 Pro, Lenovo launched four other new mobile devices enabled with Dolby Atmos - the YOGA Tab 3 8, the YOGA Tab 3 10 and the PHAB Plus. The new Lenovo Tab 2 A10-30 will also feature Dolby Atmos sound

Microsoft Acquires Organizational Analytics Company VoloMetrix
Microsoft announced recently that it will be acquiring VoloMetrix, a Seattle-based company that provides analytics to help businesses better understand how their organization works. The acquisition will be used to improve Microsoft’s Office 365 productivity tools. According to a blog post by Rajesh Jha, Microsoft’s corporate vice president in charge of Outlook and Office 365, the deal is supposed to boost the tech titan’s efforts to make employees more effective at their jobs. VoloMetrix’s technology will be integrated into Office 365, in particular, its forthcoming Delve Organizational Analytics product.
Companies currently using VoloMetrix’s services can get insights about how their business functions, like how their employees are working and how different groups inside the company interact with one another. It’s powered by software that integrates with calendar and email servers along with other business applications to gather metadata about how people are working.
That dovetails with Microsoft’s plans for Office 365, which has picked up more tools to help users collaborate, and has an organizational analytics service coming later this year. Microsoft showed off Delve Organizational Analytics at its Ignite conference earlier this year. It’s designed to provide employees and businesses with more information about how their work habits compare with their colleagues using information gathered from Office 365. Office 365 customers can already access Microsoft’s Delve service, which lets users view shared activity among people who they work with.
The terms of the deal were not disclosed. Microsoft will continue to honor the agreements VoloMetrix has with existing customers like Facebook and Symantec, but the company will stop selling its services to new customers. In addition to the acquisition news, Jha said that Microsoft plans to launch an early preview of Delve Organizational Analytics by the end of this month, and launch the service later this year. This deal is one in a long series of acquisitions Microsoft has been making to improve its Office suite in different ways

Firefox Coming to iOS This Year, Mozilla Says
Mozilla hopes to have its version of Firefox for iOS devices out by year’s end as part of its push to grow its share of mobile traffic. The company has begun testing a preview version in New Zealand. Mozilla already offers Firefox on Android, but the OS makes up just a sliver of total Web traffic on mobile, easily surpassed by Google’s Chrome browser and Apple’s Safari, according to data from StatCounter. Overall usage of Firefox across desktop and mobile has fallen in recent years, according to Web analytics company W3Counter. Creating a version of Firefox for iOS has required Mozilla to retool its back end because Apple’s App Store only allows browsers that are built atop Apple’s rendering and JavaScript engines. But Mozilla appears to be making progress. On Thursday, the company said it was rolling out the first public preview version of the browser for iOS in New Zealand. It plans to extend availability to a few more countries soon