8th March 2000 Archive

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Scarcity of mobos hits AMD platforms

And 533MHz and 550MHz K6-2s live

Suppliers of systems using AMD's Athlon processor have reported a shortage of motherboards for the chip to plug into. That follows an exceptional day of trading in AMD shares, with the price of each rising to $55 before trading shut in Wall Street. For most of last year, AMD's share price trundled along at between $16 and $20, …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 07:35
VeriSign grabs Network Solutions for $21bn

Synergy from domains and certificates? Well, maybe...

In a surprise move, VeriSign has acquired domain registrar Network Solutions for a massive £21 billion in shares. The deal is that VeriSign will issue 2.15 shares, which closed on Tuesday at $200, off 19 percent, for each Network Solutions share, which closed at $407.39, up 13 percent. At the time of the announcement, the …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 08:15
MS strikes back by quitting critical trade body

A friend of the court is no friend of Redmond

Microsoft has quit the Software and Information Industry Association, the major Washington-based body representing the industry. Last month the SIIA filed an amicus curiae brief supporting the DoJ after its board apparently voted 7-2 for filing it, with ten abstentions. It seemed that Microsoft wanted to pick a fight, as last …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 08:20
Blizzard of documents dumped on Europe MS probe

It's all in there somewhere, right...

From what Microsoft lawyer John Frank said yesterday in Brussels, it seems that the European Commission is about to be buried in boxes of documents as part of its enquiry into the complaint lodged by Sun, and probably others. Frank said the EC would be getting "boxes and boxes of information" in response to the "very broad …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 08:22
XML: Does MS really have nothing up its sleeve?

Leadership by innovation? An innovation in itself...

With the rise of XML, Microsoft is being cast in an unfamiliar role: that of being a leading innovator (but not the instigator) of an architecture for interoperable distributed Web applications. XTech in San Jose last week brought together many of the hard-core developers of XML protocols without the marketing types. The focus …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 10:46
US users are game for a PC

Knocking down elves with a bowling ball is all the rage, apparently

Over 60 per cent of PC owners in the US are gamers, according to Media Metrix. A survey by the US research organisation found that 61 per cent of home PC users – 54.1 million Americans - played at least one PC game during December 1999. The most popular games overall were Solitaire and other Windows-bundled offerings. The …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 10:54
Congress clarifies spy warrant legislation

No more Wen-Ho Lees, Senators hope

US Attorney General Janet Reno's failure to consider an FBI request for surveillance of Los Alamos nuclear scientist Wen-Ho Lee may well jeopardise his prosecution, and has moved Congress to amend the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) of 1978. Lee, who moved highly classified data concerning the design and testing of …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 11:10
BT slashes SurfTime prices

But don't get carried away -- this is a wholesale announcement, Joe Punter ain't welcome

BT has hit the panic button and introduced new rates for its discredited wholesale Internet service, SurfTime, in a bid to appear competitive. The move is in response to plans by AltaVista and NTL to introduce cheap flat-fee Net access within the next couple of months. Yesterday, a spokesman for BT was unmoved by the …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 11:46
IBM's Batty: No takeover of PC business

Ah, a denial story and we didn't even ask

Big Blue said today that despite the fact it has totally re-vamped its Emea strategy, there was no truth that it was going to sell off its beleaguered personal computer division. Ken Batty, well known as being the manager of RS/6000 marketing for many years and who now runs the marketing for the personal systems group in the UK …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 11:47
Intel wades in with 1GHz Pentium III

Claims 15 per cent speed boost over others

As predicted here 10 days back, Intel today will announce the arrival of a 1GHz Pentium III at a speed of one gigahertz and costing $990 in quantitites of 1,000. The company cited a SPECint 2000 benchmark of 410, and a SPECfp2000 score of 284, compared to the Pentium III 800's equivalent of 355 and 256 respectively. The …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 11:57
Telco caught sending users' phone nos. to Web sites

Call up a Web page on your Sprint PCS cellphone and your number gets sent too

US telco Sprint PCS was exposed this week for breaking the unwritten rules of Net privacy. According to a report in the San Francisco Chronicle, when users of Sprint's new wireless data service call up a Web site, their cellphone numbers are embedded in the http requests. This allows Web sites to work out the identities of …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 12:39
Channel Flannel Extra

Update: What the channel papers say

Haven't got time to read this week's Computer Reseller News or MicroScope? Don't worry, we've read 'em for you. Here's our round-up of some of the channel weeklies' best stories. Computer Reseller News Ingram has launched an online auction for surplus stock. The distributor will primarily use the service to sell return-to- …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 12:46
X-Box vapour triggers Nvidia stock frenzy

But does any of it make sense?

Nvidia's stock went wild yesterday on what seemed to be fairly conclusive news that the company had won the graphics gig for Microsoft's X-Box games console, which itself is tipped to be announced by Bill Gates at the Games Developer's Conference in San Jose this Friday. When Bill flips the switch the stock may well climb some …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 12:49
IBM fleshes out Eon strategy

Watch out for server farms too

David McAughtry, who we met maybe 12 years ago when he was an OS/2 guru, took time out this morning to put flesh on the future products that the personal system group will roll out this quarter, and to explain IBM's thinking on its Edge of the Network (Eon) strategy. McAughtry is now VP of marketing for Eon, and is now …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 13:04
Chinese hackers turn to identity theft

To exploit the 'faceless society' on line is glorious

Organised Chinese fraud rings on the mainland and overseas are more likely to hack databases to compromise credit and identity details than ply the more traditional avenues of bribing bank employees favoured by their Nigerian counterparts, a federal investigator claims. "The Chinese gangs have moved into the electronic age where …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 14:20
Tom's Hardware looks for Coppermine shine

Good news for Via, but only experienced users need apply

Our good friends over at Tom's Hardware have published the second part of an in-depth piece looking at the best platform for Intel's Coppermine chip. Written by Tom Pabst, part one looked at Intel's 820 chipset and VIA's Apollo Pro 133A. Chipzilla took it on the chin and VIA came out on top. Now in part two of the piece, Doctor …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 15:47
Sony to recall all PlayStation 2 Memory Cards

It's causing DVD glitches, apparently

The Register is receiving reports that Sony has discovered some rather nasty post-launch problems with its new PlayStation 2 console. At this stage, we ourselves have seen no official Sony comment, but various PlayStation-oriented sites are reporting that Sony has recalled all the 8MB Memory Cards that have shipped with …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 15:48
Internet TV, M@ilTV prepare to do battle

ISP about to be undercut by its own partner in the war for living room loyalty

TV distributor Alba has revealed plans to bring Internet TV into the homes of millions of Brits. But yesterday the move looked set to place the UK company in direct competition with an earlier deal it had struck with ISP World CallNet. This week Alba saw its share price jump after announcing a deal with Pace Micro Technology to …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 15:58
Railtrack hacker arrested

Man released on police bail

A man has been released on police bail after being arrested in connection with the hack attacks that paralysed the Web sites of Lloyds of London and Railtrack at the beginning of the year. The man was arrested on Friday and but has to report back to police in June pending further enquiries. The alleged offences come under …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 16:04
Apple Expo Paris renamed Macworld Expo/Europe

Will IDG run this one too?

Paris' Apple Expo show - now the only major European Mac event - is to be renamed Macworld Europe, according to Macworld UK. Surprise, surprise. Apple Europe has been engaged on a plan to centralise operations throughout Europe since last autumn, a move that treats the European Union as a single territory along the lines of the …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 16:09
Lernout & Hauspie swallows Dictaphone for $511m

Belgians buy US classic - including its $425m debt

Dictaphone, founded by Alexander Graham Bell in 1888 and thought by many to have disappeared off the face of the map, has been bought by Belgian voice-recognition specialist Lernout & Hauspie (L&H) for 4.75 million shares, in a deal worth $511 million at last night's Nasdaq closing price. It was sold by Stonington Partners, a …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 16:23
Softbank and co. to invest $1bn in Euro Net start-ups

$450m coming to UK, rest to the Continent

Softbank, Rupert Murdoch, the French Vivendi and smaller partners are investing $1 billion in two venture capital funds, one in the UK with $450 million, and the other in Europe with $550 million. The focus will be on funding Internet start-ups. So far, Softbank has invested around $2 billion of the $5 billion it is planning to …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 16:39
Mannesmann takes CallNet into Europe

Expands toll-free model

CallNet Plc has jumped into bed with German communications giant Mannesmann to offer toll-free access to the Net across Europe. The plan is to replicate what CallNet has achieved in Britain as part of a wider integrated telecommunication tie-up between the two companies. The deal is with Mannesmann ipulsys, a division of the …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 17:16
Apple defeats iMac cloners

Future Power/Daewoo, eMachines settle out of court

Apple's anti-iMacalike lawsuits against Korean PC vendor Daewoo and Korea-backed eMachines have been won by the Mac maker. Both actions were settled out of court, and comes after the San Jose Federal District Court granted Apple preliminary injunctions against Daewoo banning it from "manufacturing, distributing, selling or …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 17:33
X-Box: Nvidia schmoozes MS, drops huge hints

Do we have to draw you a 3D picture?

The Register's department of strange coincidences notes with some irony that Nvidia, subject of much tipping earlier this week vis a vis the Microsoft X-Box games console His Billness is expected to announce on Friday, has made a couple of possibly related announcements itself today. The one we like best is Nvidia's "premier …

Business 8 Mar 2000, 19:16