27th September 2002 Archive

Browse by publication date, or search the site.

Intel dampens DRAM alliance speculation

Out of proportion?

There was rampant speculation in the Far East yesterday that Intel Corp was plotting an alliance with a raft of DRAM vendors. Local reports suggested the Santa Clara, California-based company was in talks with Taiwan's Powerchip Semiconductor Corp, Hitachi Ltd, NEC Corp and Mitsubishi Electric Corp. The reports coincided …

Channel 27 Sep 2002, 09:51
Jobs axe falls at Colt

800 heads roll

Colt Telecom has confirmed massive job cuts amid the continuing slump in the telecoms industry. Over the next year some 800 people will find themselves out on the street as Colt makes savings of £40m. Although the job cuts are a massive blow for those who work at the company, it's not as bad as first thought. Insiders had …

Business 27 Sep 2002, 09:53
Software firms team to fight bug leaks

Organisation for Internet Safety - very Orwellian

A loose coalition of software developers and security companies has come together with the aim of preventing vulnerability information being released prematurely, Kevin Murphy writes. Yesterday, a body calling itself the Organization for Internet Safety, announced its existence, and said it intends to have draft guidelines …

Security 27 Sep 2002, 09:53
Nortel warns again of Q3 revenue slump

Penny stock

Nortel Networks Corp has issued a second profit warning on its third-quarter figures and announced plans to avoid the ignominy of de-listing of its shares in New York and Toronto by a reverse stock split. The network equipment vendor said it now expects revenue in the third quarter to September 30 to show a 15% decline on …

Security 27 Sep 2002, 09:53
Nokia launches first dual-mode 3G phone

The 6650

Nokia Corp attempted to shine a light across the gloomy European 3G landscape yesterday with the launch of the first 3GPP-compliant WCDMA and GSM900/1800 dual-mode, tri-band handset. The device, known as the Nokia 6650, is also notable for allowing users to record up to 20 seconds of video (128x96 pixels) with sound using a …

Personal 27 Sep 2002, 09:55
PCA attacks ‘shabby’ handling of Great Fujitsu HDD fiasco

We publish Open Letter from trade association

To: Adam Harris VP – Fujitsu Europe From Keith Warburton Executive Director PC Association 27th September 2002 AN OPEN LETTER Dear Adam, I write on behalf of the Personal Computer Association, a trade organisation consisting of businesses from throughout the UK and international IT industry. I have made two attempts to …

Personal 27 Sep 2002, 10:44
AOL UK pulls unmetered dial-up Net access

Some telcos won't play ball

AOL UK is to cease offering unmetered dial-up Net access to up to 30,000 customers because their telcos don't support unmetered Internet services. From November 9 all customers who don't use BT, Telewest or NTL as their phone provider will be switched to a new metered price plan called AOL 30 HOUR, which will provide 30 hours …

Music and Media 27 Sep 2002, 11:23
Nagel, Sakoman map Palm's future

Not the usual Bull

One of my very first forays into the wicked, wicked world of journalism (aged 15) was being shown by a local radio reporter how to re-edit a tape to make the Mayor of Middlesbrough appear to be a slurring, bumbling wreck. I'd wangled a school assignment with the station and having just met the Mayor - a confused and very red- …

Personal 27 Sep 2002, 13:28
Nvidia turns water into wine

Updated Converts stock options into stock

Nvidia is to take a charge of up to $66m to cover the cost of converting underwater - i.e. worthless -employee stock options into stock. If all the option holders take up the offer - and they would be as daft as a brush not to accept free shares - 20.6 million stock options will be cancelled and 4.8 million new shares will be …

Personal 27 Sep 2002, 13:28
Hacker groups declare war on US.gov

Pesky kids

A record number of malicious hacking attempts were made this month, and anti-American groups are responsible. So says Mi2g, the London-based security consultancy, which notes that US government on-line computers belonging to the House of Representatives, Department of Agriculture, Department of Education, National Park Service …

Security 27 Sep 2002, 13:46
The Nortel anti-worm defence system

Catch-all

Nortel Networks yesterday revealed the anti-computer worm defences it had developed in-house after it was hit hard by last year's outbreaks of Nimda and Code Red 2. According to John Morris, an IT manager at Nortel Networks, the anti-worm system could help large institutions and even ISPs. He challenged vendors to develop a …

Anti-Virus 27 Sep 2002, 14:48
Viruses are dead. Long live viruses!

What's the next big thing?

This year has been mercifully quiet on the virus front but anyone who reckons the virus problem has finally been beaten is failing to learn the lessons of history. The problem of computer viruses has been declared "over" before, only to be "reinvented" a few months later, argues David Perry, a marketing manager at Trend Micro …

Anti-Virus 27 Sep 2002, 14:54
Let me out of here, I'm an anti-virus expert

Lockdown!

Mollycoddled attendees at the Virus bulletin conference remained confined to the Hyatt Hotel, New Orleans on Wednesday night, as Tropical Storm Isiodore petered out. After the Mayor ordered a 10pm curfew and the French Quarter's famous bars failed to organise hoped for lock-ins, attendees at the conference confined themselves …

Bootnotes 27 Sep 2002, 14:56
BT sets DSL demand levels for 58 more exchanges

Trigger happy

BT Wholesale has set pre-registration trigger levels for a further 58 telephone exchanges, it announced today. In total, 653 exchanges now have a trigger level which, if converted into firm orders, will result in BT Wholesale concerting the exchange to DSL. The trigger levels set for those exchanges announced today range from …

Telecoms 27 Sep 2002, 15:43
Windows XP version 2 mooted for 2003?

Interim release tap might get turned on again

Despite earlier suggestions to the contrary (which we didn't believe anyway) Microsoft may be planning an interim version of Windows XP to fill the chasm between last year's rollout of XP itself, and the next big one, Longhorn, which quite possibly won't hit until 2006 or later. According to an eWeek piece by Mary Jo Foley (who …

Software 27 Sep 2002, 15:51
Letters: let's hear it for Nvidia stock options

Cleaning up, good for the engineers

Our criticism of Nvidia's plan to convert employee share options into stock (Nvidia turns water into wine) is not universally shared. Here are two contrarian opinions. "So when Nvidia is talking of 'employees' it really means a few senior managers who we guess are holding the vast majority of shares options. " That may be …

Letters 27 Sep 2002, 20:50
CNET intros listing fees for Download.com

It figures

CNET is to start charging software publishers for listing their apps on Download.com. From September 30, the tech publisher will charge a fee to have software posted or updated. Software already posted on Download.com will stay there until the end of the year. But then publishers will have to pay up if they are to avoid …

e-Business 27 Sep 2002, 21:57
Win-XP Help Center request wipes your HD

It's either SP1 or a bit of tinkering for you

A malicious Win-XP Help Center request can easily and silently delete the contents of any directory on your Windows machine, we've learned. Worse, MS has rolled the fix silently into SP1 without making a public announcement. A good sketch of the problem in English, along with a harmless self-test, can be found here, thanks to …

Software 27 Sep 2002, 22:28
NTK in suit-busting apparel shocker

404/shirt/tie not found

Good news for lovers of all things NTK today, as our Cash'n'Carrion Reg shop unveils the latest apparel offering from the kings of IT drollery. If the last time you wore a suit was for an unscheduled appearance before the beak, then this is for you - "404/shirt/tie not found" writ large on a 100 per cotton premium t-shirt. And …

Site News 27 Sep 2002, 22:28