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15th November 2001 Archive

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  • Researchers probe Net's ‘dark address space’

    Study finds hackers, military in phantom zones

    Broadband customers and US military systems are the most common victims of an online phenomenon researchers have dubbed "dark address space," which leaves some 100 million hosts completely unreachable from portions of the Internet. For a variety of reasons ranging from contract disputes among network operators to simple …

    Security 15 Nov 2001, 02:31

  • ICANN ponders DNS hack defence role

    Paper tiger burning bright

    The international body that oversees the Internet's naming system struggled this week to find a role in the war against terrorism by putting one of the Net's weakest links under a microscope. In the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) swept aside most of …

    Security 15 Nov 2001, 09:43

  • MS to donate custom WMP skins to US military

    We have the ear of the Pentagon...

    A brief note posted at skinz.org claims that The Skins Factory has been commissioned by Microsoft's Windows Media Division "to create four Custom Windows Media Player 7 skins for the United States Armed Forces." The intent is to show support for the US Military. Both Microsoft Spin Central and the Windows Media Division's press …

    Software 15 Nov 2001, 10:36

  • iPod coming to Windows

    But not from Apple...

    Cross-platform computing specialist Mediafour is developing a software bridge to allow Windows users to download their digital music collections to Apple's highly rated MP3 player, iPod. Called XPod, the code will transfer MP3s, WAVs and AIFFs to iPod from any machine running Windows 95, 98, Me, NT 4.0, 2000 and XP, Mediafour …

    Mac Channel 15 Nov 2001, 10:44

  • Telewest signs up 70k broadband customers

    Demand is starting to shape up

    Telewest has reported a massive jump in broadband customers putting it behind rivals NTL and ahead of BTopenworld. Publishing its latest figures Britain's second biggest cableco reports that 70,000 households now subscribe to its blueyonder broadband service - an increase of 71 per cent in the three months to September. The …

    Media 15 Nov 2001, 10:55

  • nForce too expensive for retail, mobo makers claim

    Price not worrying the top-tier boys, though

    The high price Nvidia is charging for its nForce AMD-oriented chipset has forced motherboard makers to steer clear of the retail market, fearing that nForce-based boards will be just too expensive for price-sensitive consumers. nForce boards have started to appear in the Taiwanese retail channel, according to a DigiTimes report …

    Channel 15 Nov 2001, 11:31

  • Dell PC biz grows in Q3

    Mikey reckons he's riding HPaQ confusion

    Dell, already the world's largest PC maker, has grown its global market share, as well as its piece of the American pie. IDC is set to report that Dell bumped up its share to 14.5 per cent in the third quarter from 11.5 per cent in Q2 for the worldwide market, no mean feat. In the US, it rose from 24.8 per cent (Q2) to 26.4 per …

    Business 15 Nov 2001, 11:34

  • Computerlinks hits forecasts

    Sales up, earnings down

    Fayrewood, the UK-listed networking distributor, has reported its German subsidiary Computerlinks AG has grown sales but seen earnings drop in its Q3. Computerlinks AG (51 per cent owned by Fayrewood and listed on the Neuer Markt), which trades in the UK as Unipalm, reported earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and …

    Channel 15 Nov 2001, 11:35

  • IT spend up 1% in 2001 – IDC

    11 September, telco hell, economic slump

    The "perfect storm" of the 11 September terrorist attacks, slowing global economy, and the telecommunications supply-demand mismatch, means that worldwide IT spending will only increase one per cent in 2001. The figure comes from IDC which forecast spending growth will recover slowly to 5.5 per cent by the end of 2002. The year …

    Business 15 Nov 2001, 12:19

  • AMD learns Italian

    Public sector win

    AMD this week scored a strong public sector win in Italy. A Government organisation decided to go Duron on an education contract involving 60,000 desktop PCs. Italian system builder CDC will supply the machines, which will be based on 1.1GHz Duron chips. AMD has done well in education circles. Its year-on- year market share …

    Channel 15 Nov 2001, 12:21

  • Freeserve threatens legal action against UK Govt

    Tax loophole row rumbles on

    Freeserve is prepared to take legal action against the British Government unless it resolves a loophole which excludes some Internet companies from paying tax. The UK's biggest ISP has lobbied for a change since the summer but it is becoming increasingly frustrated at the delay. Under the current law, ISPs based outside the …

    e-Business 15 Nov 2001, 12:24

  • Salmon Days Trailer Trash

    Shuts down end of next week

    We are shutting off the Salmon Days trailer at the end of next week. So far, just shy of 90,000 people have seen our BOFH-inspired comedy vidstrip effort. Join the crowd while you still have the chance. There has also been more than 60,000 downloads of clips from Salmon Days Cutlets, an annoyingly effective viral marketing ploy …

    BOFH 15 Nov 2001, 12:48

  • WinXP: log on as admin if you want to play games, MP3s?

    New security systems baffle users

    Home users seem to be coming badly unstuck when tangling with the new security features of Windows XP. Now it's possible for them to set up one account on their machine with administrator rights, and lesser accounts for the kids, less significant other, cat and so forth - but setting things so that the right people get access to …

    Software 15 Nov 2001, 13:03

  • Intersil takes 802.11 knock

    WLAN confusion

    Intersil is fighting an uphill battle to get its OFDM (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing)technology accepted as the 802.11g wireless networking standard, It received just 55 per cent of the vote at the long-awaited IEEE ratification meeting this week. It needed 75 per cent for its proposal to be set as the standard. …

    Data Networking 15 Nov 2001, 13:43

  • Business drives the Wireless Web

    Incoherent m-commerce standards

    Businesses applications will drive the market for the wireless Web while the consumer market struggles through its formative years. This is the conclusion of analyst firm Insight Research which concludes that hopes are misplaced that consumers will kickstart wireless Internet use. Extensive wireless Web browsing and mobile …

    Data Networking 15 Nov 2001, 15:38

  • Job axe falls at Novell

    Falling software sales

    Novell is reducing its headcount by 19 per cent - 1,400 employees - to cope with falling software sales. The cuts will save Novell $200 million annually by the second half of fiscal 2002. The software vendor expects to take a $55 million pre-tax restructuring charge to implement its redundancy programme, which will result in …

    Business 15 Nov 2001, 15:44

  • Oftel fixes fines for LLU failure

    Regulator acts tough

    Oftel has set the service level agreements that (SLA)operators can expect from BT. This is another step forward in completing the regulatory framework for local loop unbundling (LLU). Today's announcement marks the first time that the telecoms regulator has formally intervened to set service level standards (after industry and …

    Data Networking 15 Nov 2001, 15:51

  • This (external) HDD supports USB 2.0 and Firewire

    Technology in search of a market?

    SimpleTech has developed a portable external hard drive which is compatible with USB 2.0 and Firewire (1394b). Combining the two connectivity technologies on one drive seems to be a first. The product, called the SimpleDrive Deluxe, comes in 6GB, 10GB, 20GB and 30GB capacities, with the entry-level model priced at $200. The …

    Personal 15 Nov 2001, 16:01

  • AMD ships 1.2GHz Duron

    'DDR faster than single data rate SDRAM' shock

    AMD has released its latest Duron processor, running at 1.2GHz. The chip, based on AMD's Palomino core, supports a 200MHz frontside bus and contains 128KB of on-die L2 cache. AMD reckons that a system based on the 1.2GHz Duron and DDR memory yields "significantly" better 3D games performance than a PC with a 1.2GHz Celeron and …

    Channel 15 Nov 2001, 16:24

  • Cisco high-end routers in DoS peril

    12000 series flaw is causing ISP pain

    Cisco has issued a fix for a flaw which potentially makes its high-end routers susceptible to denial of service attacks. The performance of Cisco 12000 series routers can be degraded when they have to send a large number of Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMPs) unreachable packets, something that usually happens as a result …

    Security 15 Nov 2001, 18:22

  • Piracy stops Xbox in China

    Not worth the bother

    Microsoft's Xbox gaming console will not be sold in Hong Kong or China for the foreseeable future, due to rampant piracy in the region. The company is selling the actual hardware at a loss - as much as $125 per box, according to Merrill Lynch - and plans to recoup profits on its software titles, much like the razor blade or …

    Personal 15 Nov 2001, 18:35

  • Redmond's Tablets don't work – not for Dell, anyway

    A Texan salesman foresees his death, and walks off smartly

    Dell isn't buying the Tablet PC revolution - not yet, anyway. Yesterday Michael Dell himself told the Austin American Statesman (which he surely didn't have to go to Las Vegas to talk to) that his customers weren't interested, and that there were "some other reasons" Dell wasn't going to build Tablets right now. We don't know …

    Software 15 Nov 2001, 18:39