30th March 1999 Archive

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Yields rise at AMD but so do rumours

A year ago .25 micron process up to speed again

Posted 31st March 1998 Reliable sources within AMD US have confirmed that the company is on top of its yield problem which have dogged its K6 processor for the last six months. But the company is in its so-called "quiet period" meaning that no official will go on the record about the improvements in production. "Yields are now …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 07:09
More bovver hits Hyundai-LG deal

The path to true merger is never smooth...

Today's Korea Herald is reporting that the giant semiconductor company merger between Hyundai and LG faces anti-trust investigation by both the EU and the US. The putative merger, pushed through by the South Korean government in the teeth of relentless LG opposition, was supposed to have been concluded by the first of April this …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 07:19
Serial numbers unmask Melissa author

FBI is on the case

Serial numbers may not be so good for your privacy, but they come pretty damn useful when tracking down virus authors. Using Microsoft's highly contentious Global Unique Identifier, two bug hunters have unmasked the web site where -- they claim -- the Melissa email virus originated. Bug hunter Richard Smith, president of Phar …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 07:26
AMD scores Compaq notebook win

Prosignia notebooks use cheap, fast K6-2s

In another blow to Intel's battered pride, AMD announced late yesterday that Compaq will use its mobile K6-2s in Prosignia notebooks. According to AMD, Compaq will use its 380MHz and 350MHz mobile K6-2Ps in a range of its machines. Intel has recently vowed to mop up the low end market for notebooks, with senior executives saying …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 07:35
Linux and the kitchen sink to blame for Register downtime

Careless Wisper

The Register went down this morning for more than four hours. Our ISP says a G703 converter failure is to blame. The Register went down for 15 minutes yesterday afternoon. Our ISP does not know who to blame. The Register went down for 20 hours on Friday night through Saturday afternoon. Our ISP says a sub-contractor is to blame …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 13:02
Gates interviews – more rewrites of history from Bill

Softball is the name of the game as he pushes his new book

The transcripts of Gates' interview with Sir David Frost, and several speeches that Gates gave in his east coast tour to promote his book, have become available. They provide some fascinating details of the dear leader's current thinking. Frostie, the one-man conglomerate and impresario, is himself the author of 17 books, but …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 13:21
‘Leading’ PC vendor to bundle Corel WordPerfect

Is it Compaq? And is it more than a bundling deal?

Corel is set to announce today what it calls a major strategic alliance with a leading PC vendor -- in other words, just another bundling deal. However, if speculation as to the identity of the PC manufacturer in question is correct, the deal could signify something rather more important for Corel. According a report from the …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 13:25
Gates promo tour cost to exceed book revenues

Graham reviews it, but says it's 'dull and unreadable.' So maybe he didn't read it then?

More and more it seems that Gates does not want to be remembered for what he is: rich on monopoly profits (it's around $100 billion now, and he is on track for being the world's first trillionaire). Gates seems to be trying to make his mark as some kind of business strategist, but his new book is both boring and lacks any real …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 13:26
IBM PC group dons hair shirt

We're committed to ThinkPads and PCs, honest

Big Blue has found it necessary to post a message from the head of its PC division after the world's press reacted badly to CEO Loot Gerstner's statement about losses last week. David M. Thomas, group executive of IBM's Personal System Group (PSG), said: "I do not condone or excuse our business shortfalls, nor should any …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 13:29
Analysis: Who wins from the Qualcomm-Ericsson deal?

They may not be fighting any more, but neither of the new CDMA partners looks that healthy

Sighs of relief all around. The biggest winner of the Ericsson-Qualcomm dispute is probably Qualcomm - it could have ill afforded a protracted legal fight and the deal finally rids the company of its disastrous infrastructure division. But losing the network business entirely weakens Qualcomm's ability to influence third …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 13:30
Future of Alpha chip revealed

Snakes alive! ProLiants sail and crawl on belly

Terry Shannon, editor of newsletter Shannon knows Compaq is delivering a presentation today at a user group meeting which reveals the future of the Alpha roadmap. Shannon is an analyst and journalist who has tracked Digital and latterly Compaq for years. He has kindly sent us a copy of the presentation he will make to DECUS …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 13:31
Palmer to walk into AMD wardrobe?

The man has expensive tastes

US wires reported late yesterday that Bob Palmer, who ran Digital before it was bought by Compaq, may be invited to be a board member of AMD. Palmer, who had a walk-in wardrobe when he worked at Digital, has natty taste in clothes. But he is widely blamed for selling off Digital's "family silver", leading it to a point where it …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 13:31
MS reorg – so how many divisions was that?

But why the delay? Surely not to avoid eclipsing Bill's Bookish Adventure?

Yesterday's Microsoft reorganisation announcement was strangely confused. It refers to two divisions (business and enterprise, and consumer Windows) and three groups (business productivity, developer and consumer and commerce). In addition there is a home and retail products group that is said to "operate outside of the four …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 13:33
States push for shackles on MS in settlement talks

MS on Trial It looks like Bill & Co will be facing some tough demands

Bill Gates would not comment on the possibility of successful settlement talks with the DoJ yesterday: "I think that kind of speculation is not valuable," he said, sticking to the script. "We've certainly been interested even before the lawsuit was filed." He then went on again to demand that the "integrity" of Windows be …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 13:40
Now IDT takes Socket 370 route

But the K7 couldn't, could it. Super Seven dead?

Sources close to IDT said today that it will create a version of its Winchip2 using the 370 pin socket first developed by Intel. That adds IDT to Cyrix and Rise, who have already said they will create their chips in the pin factor. The source said that Cyrix and IDT will produce a "pin for pin" version of the chip, making things …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 13:47
Now Compaq tipped to buy AMD

It makes more sense than IBM, doesn't it?

The complex pieces of the jigsaw that makes up the AMD and Compaq relationship are now beginning to slot into place. Bob Palmer joins the AMD board, even though he's still a member of the Compaq board. Jerry Sanders III, CEO of AMD, delivers the company's results in a few days. The results will be bad. Intel's reputation has …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 13:58
Overseas gamblers to take advantage of William Hill site

Tax-free betting site is closed to UK punters though

High street betting office giant, William Hill, is to set up a gambling Web site aimed at European and Asian people who want to bet on UK football matches. That’s soccer, to the rest of the world. UK gamblers will not be able to participate though, as the site will be based on the Isle of Man. Despite being part of the UK, the …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 14:08
Peer of the realm lets public peer at his love life online

It’s not just the lions of Longleat that are rampant, it seems

Saucy old scoundrel Lord Bath has exposed himself by putting his amorous autobiography online. The hereditary peer, famed for a string of relationships that he refers to as his "wifelets", has launched the first of six volumes of his life story into cyberspace. From Strictly Private, To Public Exposure kicked off yesterday with …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 14:09
UK tax-free savings hit by computer glitch

New accounts will face delay of up to a month

Tax-free ISA savings accounts will be delayed because they are too complex for some investment houses’ computer systems. Three of the UK’s biggest fund managers, Invesco, Mercury and Save & Prosper, will not launch the replacement to Tessas and Peps on time next month. The individual savings accounts will be between a week and a …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 14:11
Ziff-Davis rejigs benchmarks after AMD complaint

Seems like an anomaly means 3DWinmarks don't compare apples with apples

Distributors and customers of AMD have received a bulletin from the company pointing out that Ziff-Davis' 3DWinmark benchmarks using the null driver are inaccurate and misleading. AMD's bone of contention is that processors, such as AMD's K6-III and Pentium III are not compared fairly. Ziff-Davis has now posted a warning on its …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 14:11
Citrix adds new tiers to accreditation scheme

Resellers can go for gold, or silver if they prefer

Citrix Systems is targeting more than 1,000 companies in Europe with the expansion of its reseller accreditation programme. The server software vendor has added two levels – Silver and Gold Solutions Provider – to its existing Authorised level in its reseller programme for Northern Europe. It aims to reach over 1,100 Citrix …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 14:18
Memsolve and Roldec await outcome of meetings

Time to stand up and be counted as channel players face the music

Two failed UK channel companies will face angry creditors tomorrow morning. Memsolve’s winding up hearing takes place at The Royal Courts of Justice, London, at 10.30. The petition for winding up was presented by the distributor Northamber on 10 February. Administrative receivers from BDO Stoy Hayward were appointed when the …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 14:26
Mystery litigation hits humour sites

Updated April Fool is past and gone -- you're the fool and we are none...

Three sites (now four sites) which all specialise in parody and satire have received writs from a large corporation which lacks a sense of fun. The sites concerned were Segfault, Userfriendly and Bedope. But we have just received an email from a reader that shows another "fun site" has received a writ from m'learned friends. If …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 14:29
Chipzilla gets all arty

Just say no to Intel Web sites

You have got to watch Intel all the time. Over the weekend it registered ten online sites and now we discover it has a new one called Art Museum It is a joint venture, says Intel, it sells merchandise and has a Van Gogh picture on the front and the first 10,000 memberships are free. So we joined, being cultural folks. ®

Business 30 Mar 1999, 14:48
Computacenter wins Microsoft service gong

Joins top table

Computacenter has become Microsoft’s first UK Authorised Support Centre (ASC) since the programme’s launch six years ago. IT reseller and services giant Computacenter was appointed a top ranking services partner following what Microsoft described as: "Computacenter’s continued investment and experience in delivering and …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 16:32
Citrix chairman receives Order of the Vulture

Prestigious pin gets pinned on prestigious lapel

We have, so far, pinned our prestigious Vulture badges on only those who deserve it. So we are pleased to announce that in the last 24 hours, there have been three recipients of the pins, which don't get given to anyone. Oh no. Last night we bestowed the pin on Ed Iacobucci, chairman of Citrix, and his charming wife Nancy, in a …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 17:19
Where is Compaq going on the software front?

Analysis Forget the MIPS and chips, watch how the software plates spin

When you buy a company -- any company -- legacy comes with it. So when Compaq bought Tandem, it was obvious it was making a strategic move into the telecomms space. Tandem, after all, supplied most of the automatic till machines (ATM), with its 99.9999 per cent non stop computing Himalaya model. With Tandem, it also bought …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 18:15
Microsoft UK's PR screws up on IE5 . Big time

Something wrong in the state of WA?

For obvious reasons, The Register is rarely invited to Microsoft gigs, whether here or anywhere else. Don't worry, Bill Gates, your UK agency Text 100 can screw things up all by itself. We were not invited to the launch of IE5 for some reason but met many Brit journalists who were and went there. We're still trying to figure out …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 20:43
Melissa virus author is hacker too

Virus or sexually transmitted disease?

The Melissa Virus is the sexually transmitted disease for our virtual sex times. It was a masterstroke by the author to post the virus on an alt.sex newsgroup. This ensured that Melissa spread almost as fast as syphilis in 16th century Europe. Contagion is infectious. It's been quite some time since those arch-scaremongers, the …

Business 30 Mar 1999, 23:01