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29th October 2003 Archive

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  • Sharp preps upgraded, rugged Linux PDA

    SL-6000 to extend SL-5500 family

    Sharp is preparing an updated version of its Zaurus SL series of Linux-based PDAs that boasts a larger screen that previous models and integrated wireless networking. That at any rate is what a posting on the Zaurus User Group web site claims. We contacted the poster, but (s)he declined to comment further on the source of the …

    Mobile 29 Oct 2003, 09:13

  • Boffins buff bugging bugs

    Roaches enlisted in War on Terror

    As military scientists plan to dehumanise the battlefield, replacing humans with fighting robots, there's another trend bearing down on us from the opposite direction. Boffins are anthropomorphising select members of the animal kingdom to help in the War on Terror. The latest species to receive its marching orders is the humble …

    Bootnotes 29 Oct 2003, 09:18

  • Fiorina rules out consulting buy

    Purse stays in handbag

    Having swallowed Compaq in an $18 billion merger, HP is in no mood to go shopping. Asked this week if the company eyed a consulting or services target, CEO Carly Fiorina said that her purse will remain tucked away in her handbag. "Would I buy EDS? Would I buy a big consulting company? I have been offered many opportunities to …

    Hardware 29 Oct 2003, 09:30

  • Chip biz body ups world sales forecast

    Now 2000's record will be beaten in 2005, not later

    Global chip industry monitor World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) has decided that business will be better this year than it previously thought. In June, the organisation forecast worldwide chip sales would this year rise 11.5 per cent over 2002's total. Now it's saying that growth will be around 14.2 per cent. That's …

    Channel 29 Oct 2003, 09:41

  • TSMC, UMC post upbeat Q3 figures

    Lost and foundry

    The world's two largest chip foundries, TSMC and UMC, both saw significant sales growth during their third fiscal quarters, the companies reported this week. TSMC saw net sales rise 37 per cent year-on-year to $1.6 billion, which represents a sequential gain of ten per cent. Net profit for the quarter rise 29 per cent on Q2 and …

    Channel 29 Oct 2003, 10:06

  • Prep school head snared in chat room sting

    Extra curricular

    The headmaster of a posh New York City prep school has been accused of making nasty Internet advances toward teenage girls. John Dexter, the head of Trevor Day School, faces two counts of attempting to send child porn to minors and is being held on $25,000 bail, the Associated Press reports. The man allegedly sent naughty …

    Music and Media 29 Oct 2003, 10:26

  • Mandrake Linux ate my CD drive

    That's one powerful OS you got there, boy

    Mandrake has warned users of its Mandrake Linux 9.2 to beware of a "severe problem" which totally trashes CD drives by overwriting their firmware. The issue is caused when the kernel that ships with Mandrake Linux 9.2 and early updates sends a FLUSH_CACHE command to the CD drive. For "certain" CD drives manufactured by LG, this …

    Personal 29 Oct 2003, 10:32

  • China Telecom: provincial investment

    Potential subscriber base of half a billion

    China Telecom Corp Ltd, the Hong Kong-listed arm of China Telecom, will expand its potential subscriber base to half a billion people, after announcing it would pay its state-owned parent CNY46 billion ($5.55 billion) to acquire six provincial fixed-line networks. The regions have high growth potential, although significant …

    Business 29 Oct 2003, 10:33

  • US outguzzles world+dog in paper, bandwidth consumption

    We are all squirrels now

    The storage industry's two favorite professors have completed their annual look at data growth and found once again that data is growing. Peter Lyman and Hal Varian of Berkeley's School of Information Management and Systems say that information production has increased by 30 percent each year between 1999 and 2002. Last year …

    Storage 29 Oct 2003, 10:36

  • No PDA market growth in Q3 without HP

    Saturation point reached?

    That the global PDA market grew at all in Q3 this year is entirely due to HP, market watcher IDC has claimed. And if things don't pick up this Christmas, the market might soon be moving backwards. Shipments of PDAs - classed by IDC as devices without voice telephony features - during Q3 rose a mere 1.1 per cent over the year- …

    Mobile 29 Oct 2003, 10:44

  • Sage founder buys computer reseller

    Wylie Coyote

    Graham Wylie, founder of Sage,Newcastle-based accounting and business software giant, is back in business once more, less than six months after bailing out of the firm he ran for 22 years. The 43-year old entrepreneur said his latest venture, dubbed Technology Services Group, will see him turn from software to IT services. The …

    Channel 29 Oct 2003, 10:45

  • One million UK surfers to get broadband next year

    Speed greed

    Oftel gave itself a hearty pat on the back yesterday after announcing that, for the first time, more than half of all UK households are now connected to the Internet. The telco watchdog found that home Internet use continues to rise, describing the current level of 50 per cent as a "significant increase" from 47 per cent in May …

    Telecoms 29 Oct 2003, 10:54

  • Bristol & West axes online banking

    Customers stay away in droves

    UK financial services company Bristol & West is preparing to quietly kill off its online banking offering at the end of next month because of a lack of customer interest. The firm, which is part of the Bank of Ireland's UK Financial Services group, said its website, which enables customers to manage savings portfolios online, …

    Music and Media 29 Oct 2003, 11:03

  • Microsoft to bring DirectX 8 gaming to PDAs

    Bigger screens too

    Microsoft plans to radically boost the multimedia performance of the next generation of PDAs and smartphones based on its software, if pronouncements made at this year's Professional Developers Conference (PDC) come to fruition. We're not just talking bigger screen sizes here. PDC coverage among specialist Pocket PC and …

    Mobile 29 Oct 2003, 11:51

  • Napster 2.0 goes live

    The cat's back

    Napster goes live today, segueing from the beta release launched earlier this month into a fully fledged version 2.0, whose only real connection with the infamous file swapping service of yore is the headphoned cat logo. Like Apple's iTunes Music Store, which provided the template for the new service, Napster 2.0 offers …

    Music and Media 29 Oct 2003, 12:25

  • Microsoft shoots the Windows Messenger

    So farewell then, magnet of spam

    Microsoft is to disable Windows Messenger service and activate Internet Connection Firewall (ICF) by default on XP boxes, in a move to better shield Windows PCs against hostile attack. Windows Messenger service, a function used to exchange data between computers unrelated to MSN Messenger, has become more trouble than its worth …

    Security 29 Oct 2003, 12:27

  • How does your e-biz measure up?

    Benchmark this

    UK small businesses can see if their e-business performance is up to scratch following the creation of a new online benchmarking survey. UK Online for Business, a government agency, has launched the new web-based service specifically for small and medium sized firms to find out how their e-business progress fares on a regional …

    Small Biz 29 Oct 2003, 12:34

  • No public Longhorn preview, says MS – developers only

    And they have to ask for it first

    The leak of the special Longhorn build designed for Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference (PDC) this week may turn out to have a lot more rarity value than expected. According to Microsoft, this build will not be widely available after all. The PDC build, 4051, is part of a DVD package, which also includes the Longhorn …

    Software 29 Oct 2003, 13:49

  • Mac fan's blog leads to layoff in Redmond

    Raunchy G5 photos

    A temp worker at Microsoft's in-house print shop appears to have lost his job as a result of his two biggest passions - Macs and blogging. Earlier this week, Michael Hanscom posted a picture of several Power Mac G5s being off-loaded outside of the MSCopy print facility. Four days later, someone at Microsoft caught wind of the …

    Mac Channel 29 Oct 2003, 16:25

  • Logitech launches budget digital camcorders

    Reg Kit Watch And its face-tracking webcam

    Digital Camcorders Logitech today followed up last week's Pocket Digital 130 digicam launch with the release of a pair similarly cheap and cheerful digital camcorders. The Pocket Video 550 and 750 aren't likely to challenge either big-brand digital camcorders, or even mid- to high-end digicams that can take small video clips, …

    Personal 29 Oct 2003, 16:39

  • MS moves to counter open source growth in UK gov

    In an extremely shrewd way, we reckon

    Faced with the possibility of open source making a damaging breakthrough in UK local government, Microsoft has reacted in the usual way, with strong money. But this time around that money could be being shrewdly spent and - so far so good - there's currently no sign of Steve Ballmer. One of the organisations involved in the UK …

    Software 29 Oct 2003, 18:06

  • MP unleashes brilliant anti-spam plan

    Citizens can sleep sounder in their beds

    Proof that the country is in safe hands with the UK's keenest minds working tirelessly to protect their fellow citizens from the greatest evil of our age - spam - comes with one MP's brilliant solution to spam. Derek Wyatt has been on a jolly to Washington DC as "Chairman of the all party internet group". It was time and …

    Bootnotes 29 Oct 2003, 18:27

  • Blue Coat buys Ositis

    More security biz consolidation

    Security appliance vendor Blue Coat Systems today announced a deal to acquire anti-virus appliance firm Ositis Software in a cash and stock deal valued at approximately $7.1 million. Blue Coat is to pay $1.0 million in cash and 363,125 shares of Blue Coat stock as part of the agreement, which is expected to close early next …

    Security 29 Oct 2003, 18:30

  • Mobile gambling hits UK

    But will it tempt Lotto-weary Brits?

    Today sees the launch of The Mobile Lottery, the UK's first opportunity to squander your hard-earned cash via your mobile phone. The initiative is the brainchild of Charles Cohen - he of Beenz fame - and offers the chance to win up to £1,000 instantly for a £1 stake. The Mobile Lottery is pitching itself as a direct rival to …

    Music and Media 29 Oct 2003, 18:35

  • ISPA submits broadband action plan to parliament

    Triggers all round, more price cuts...

    The Internet Service Providers Association (ISPA) is encouraging the government to create an environment that encourages further growth of the UK broadband market. The trade association last week submitted written evidence to a Trade and Industry Select Committee inquiry into broadband, where it spelled out a proposed action …

    Telecoms 29 Oct 2003, 18:40

  • Oracle expands reach in China

    Beijing beginning

    Oracle kicked open the doors at a second software development lab in China on Wednesday, trying to tap into one of the hottest areas for database growth. The new China Development Center in Beijing will have workers focus on five main areas. Oracle wants to step up its services practice to be able to handle large, national …

    Hardware 29 Oct 2003, 22:34

  • Sun shouts at analysts with customer wins

    Have you seen our momentum

    A command has come down from somewhere near the top of Sun Microsystems to answer critics with a "momentum showing." It's common knowledge that Sun has passed into another one of its whipping boy cycles. The company seems to manage to keep critics at bay for three quarters or so and then - boom - a series of bad news hits, and …

    Servers 29 Oct 2003, 23:25