26th April 2000 Archive

Browse by publication date, or search the site.

Red Hat Piranha ‘backdoor’ password discovered

Enables total control of a server

An undocumented backdoor password in the Red Hat Linux Piranha package containing Linux Virtual Server (LVS) software has been discovered by Allen Wilson of the X-Force department of security outfit Internet Security Systems. The backdoor password allows remote attackers to execute commands on a server, ISS says. If an affected …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 03:24
Paul Allen nearly divested of M$ stock

If he won't hold it, why should we?

Acting on a tip from one of our beloved readers, The Register took a peek at the recent securities trading history of Micro$oft Co-founder, Director and all around mysterious character Paul Allen. Allen, we confirmed, has unloaded roughly US $8 billion in company stock over the past twelve months, which leaves him holding a …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 05:17
Time doles out £40 million of free software to schools

Retail or wholesale?

UK PC builder Time Computers has agreed to hand out more than £40 million of software from its Free Software for Schools promotion. The IT giveaway, run with Time subsidiary supanet, generated over 35,000 orders for free software from more than 23,000 schools between September and March. So far the company has given away more …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 05:27
Tiny revs up for flat-fee ISP launch

Off-peak option for £6.99 per month

Tiny Online, the ISP and e-tailing arm of the PC manufacturer, has finally published the fees for its new unmetered Internet access service a month confirming it would be offering a flat-fee service. 24/7 unmetered Net access will set punters back £25.99 a month, while off-peak unmetered access will cost £6.99 a month. …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 05:31
Compaq outsells Dell by 1m units in Q1

But can't regain top slot in home country

Worldwide PC shipments topped 30 million units for the first quarter of 2000, according to a report by IDC. Volume showed 20 per cent year on year growth to 30.4 million units, fuelled by healthy consumer demand in markets in Asia, but represented an overall sequential decline of 9.3 per cent. The Asia Pacific and Japanese …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 05:44
Hell.com for sale

$8 million price tag to be in league with the devil

Domain name shoppers are to get the chance to buy one of the hottest URLs ever. hell.com is up for sale, and US domain name broker hitdomains.com expects to auction it off for no less than $8 million. "Considered by branding experts to be one of the most powerful and recognised words in the world, 'hell' is about to conjure a …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 05:49
Compaq delivers bland financials

Q1 nothing for Q to crow about

Although Wall Street professed itself satisfied by Compaq's financial results for its first quarter, with the firm's share price rising four bucks to close at $30.25, in truth there is little need for Houston to break out the Moet bottles. The firm said that it had delivered turnover of $9.51 billion for the quarter up until …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 06:37
AMD unveils Corvette, plans 1.5GHz part

Japanese coverage of WinHEC 2000

Thanks to AMD Zone for pointing us to the famous Akihabara Pricewatch pages, which have extensive coverage of the Wintel sponsored WinHEC 2000 show in New Orleans. Time to roll out our Lernhowtospell Japanese to English translator then... As well as pictures of the AMD Thunderbird and Spitefires, and Socket A of course, the page …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 06:53
Intel takes next step to i840 heaven

Just follow steps 1, 2 and 3, wah wah ooh

The Carmel chipset, now known to aficionados (read geeks) as the i840, was supposed to be the Intel Rambus chipset that put the i820 in the shade. Alas, that was not to be, and soon enough it was discovered that there were minor errata (not bugs) that caused fluttering both in customer dovecots and in the board division of Intel …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 07:26
MS opens free piracy hotline to squeal on rivals

Confidentiality guaranteed

Microsoft has started a free hotline for resellers to secretly squeal on suspected software pirates. The 0800 number has four full-time Microsoft lackeys beavering away at combating software fraud. All leads will be pumped into a central European database in the hope of cross referencing information to combat international …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 08:35
IBM ThinkPads hidden under NDA kimono

Pleasant breakfast though

Over to the Langham Hilton for an exciting briefing on the new ThinkPads IBM intros in the US next Monday. Whoops. It's under a non disclosure agreement, so we made our excuses after we'd eaten our continental breakfast and left. Still, nice to be in the Langham Hotel, near the BBC the scene of one of our more spectacular …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 10:06
Elvis sees God thrash Pope

All change at the top

Larry Ellison is about to achieve his life's ambition – he's about to overtake Bill Gates as the world's richest man. With Microsoft's shares now around half their value of four weeks ago, Gates – once described as the 'PC Pope' by Ellison – has seen his personal worth drop from $90 billion to a piffling $49 billion. The Oracle …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 10:16
Microsoft DoJ pantomime enters final scene

"We'll split you up", "Oh no you won't", "Oh yes we will"

With the DoJ's anti-trust boys really having to give their final final proposal for the future of Microsoft by Friday, it's good to see the company's uniquely confident attitude remains unaltered. Following fairly heavy speculation that The Beast of Redmond is to be split up - thereby making it worthwhile for anyone else to …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 10:35
Oracle launches Japanese Linux venture

Joint operation with NEC, TurboLinux

Oracle is to release its own Linux distribution aimed at the Japanese business computing market. And next month it will form a subsidiary to market and develop both the open source OS and services based around it. The Miracle Linux Corporation will begin operating in early June with 20 employees and Y620 million ($5.87 million) …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 10:46
Intel launches USB 2.0

Watch out IEEE 1394?

Intel's Pat 'Kicking' Gelsinger, the company's desktop products group VP, will today unveil the long-awaited final spec for USB 2.0 at WinHEC. USB 2.0 takes the bus' data throughput up to and beyond IEEE 1394 standards. 1394 currently runs at 400Mbps - USB 2.0 will run at 480Mbps, forty times greater than USB 1.1's 12Mbps. USB 2 …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 11:17
Is this CD the kidnappers' friend?

Disk knocks on directors' front door

The man behind a CD-ROM containing the names, addresses and financial details of all UK company directors has been accused of putting people's lives at risk. All of the information contained on the UK-Info Power CD is already in the public domain, but the inclusion of a route-finder on the disk has prompted allegations of …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 11:21
BT rips open ADSL pricing kimono

All is revealed

BT has finally published the prices for its broadband Internet services. Consumer will pay £39.99 a month (inclusive of VAT) for the service plus a one-off installation fee of £150. However, if ordered before June 30 BT said it would waive the installation fee. Single business users will also pay £39.99 although this is …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 11:32
Intel plays for legal time with Via

Updated And files action against Intelia

Chip giant Intel appears to have taken fresh legal action against chipset and CPU manufacturer Via. The latest action, which was filed in the US on the 13th April, was filed against Via US and Via Taiwan, and scant details are at present available about the nature of the latest suit. According to a Via representative, the action …

Business 26 Apr 2000, 11:54