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5th March 2004 Archive

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  • The Mac's ‘ultimate remote control’ leaps forward

    Salling Clicker arrives on Series 60

    Apple Computer loves Jonas Salling's Clicker software, and it's not hard to see why Cupertino values it so highly. Clicker won two of the company's Mac Design Awards last year - for most innovative product and best Mac OS X software - and it plays to several of Apple's strengths. The software, which fuses Bluetooth devices to …

    Mac Channel 5 Mar 2004, 00:29

  • Microsoft ‘takes hard drive out’ of Xbox 2

    Flash supplier spills the beans

    Microsoft's tie-in with Flash memory specialist M-Systems has led some observers to conclude that the software giant plans to ship its upcoming Xbox 2 console without a hard drive. Well, that is indeed the case, if comments from M-Systems' CEO, Dov Moran, are anything to go by. Interviewed this week by Israeli business paper …

    Personal 5 Mar 2004, 10:00

  • Does open source software enhance security?

    Analysis Yes, but not for the reasons many think

    There are several reasons why open-source software provides for superior computer and network security, but the computing public seems confused about why this is so. Many attribute the security advantage to the very fact of openness. It's long been popular to cite the "many eyes" theory, which holds that flaws are discovered …

    Security 5 Mar 2004, 10:15

  • Intel narrows Q1 revenue forecast

    Lower guidance

    Intel issued a business update yesterday to provide a more accurate estimate of the company's first quarter sales. Having previously forecast revenues somewhere between $7.9bn and $8.5bn, the chip giant narrowed its numbers to $8.0-8.2bn. That puts the new average below the one implied by the previous prediction - and below …

    Channel 5 Mar 2004, 10:24

  • AMD Athlon 64 FX-53 to launch this month

    939-pin version to follow in May

    AMD will launch the much-anticipated Athlon 64 FX-53 this month, according to purported company roadmaps posted on the Net. The 2.4GHz, 940-pin gaming-oriented part will be followed by a 939-pin version on May, which will be accompanied by two the 939-pin 64-bit AMD chips, the Athlon 64 3500+ and the 3800+, clocked at 2.2GHz …

    Channel 5 Mar 2004, 10:55

  • Massive demand for umlauted domains

    German stampede leads to über-subscription

    DENIC, the German registry for .de domains, has received more than 600,000 applications for .de domain names containing umlauts - vastly in excess of the anticipated demand. This is the first time DENIC and its members have had to cope with such a huge influx of applications. The registry normally only processes a few thousand a …

    Media 5 Mar 2004, 11:22

  • Belgacom IPO will generate €4bn windfall

    Telco's market value to rise to €11bn

    Analysts expect Belgian telco Belgacom's forthcoming flotation to give the company a market value of &euro11bn, and raise more than €4bn. The sale of the state-controlled former monopoly - agreed by shareholders last October - should prove an attractive opportunity for investors seeking a strong dividend provider. Belgacom is …

    Business 5 Mar 2004, 11:23

  • SCO confirms MS ‘smoking gun’ email is genuine

    But neither smoking, nor a gun, insists SCO

    The SCO Group has confirmed that the email attributed to long-time pal and former colleague of Darl McBride, Mike Anderer, is genuine. But it says that Eric Raymond's characterization of this as "a smoking gun" - implying Microsoft is behind SCO's legal campaign against Linux - is incorrect. Raymond published the leaked email on …

    Mac Channel 5 Mar 2004, 11:24

  • Softbank rocked by giant data leak

    4.5m punters hit, execs distraught and out of pocket

    Senior execs at Softbank in Japan are to take a pay cut after the personal details of more than four million broadband punters leaked out. Softbank - which together with Yahoo! operates broadband outfit "Yahoo! BB" in Japan - has been the victim of a scam to extort billions of Yen from the company, reported The Japan Times. …

    Security 5 Mar 2004, 11:24

  • Dutch PC buyers threaten Dell

    What do we want? TFTs! When do we want them? Now!

    A shortage of flat panel displays has led to a consumer revolt in the Netherlands. The Dutch Hobby Computer Club (HCC) - one of Europe's biggest PC hobbyist organisations with over 200,000 members - says it will intervene on behalf of unhappy Dell customers who are still waiting for PCs they ordered months ago. Dell is simply …

    Channel 5 Mar 2004, 11:44

  • BT knocks Tiscali in ad. Tiscali gets cross

    'notquitesobroadband'

    Tiscali UK is hopping mad after BT ran a newspaper ad under the banner "The truth about Tiscali's notquitesobroadband". Furious execs have already fired off a letter to BT demanding that it doesn't repeat the ad, which they say includes "factual inaccuracies" about the ISP and suggests that it is "not truthful with its …

    Broadband 5 Mar 2004, 11:50

  • Tinfoil hats to retail with RFID tags?

    Letters: All the latest from El Reg's post bag

    Paranoia and malicious code filled our inboxes to bursting this week. It seems like every day there are more mini-outbreaks, or major ones to report, and the debate over how to handle to situation has gone on for so long that our weary security vulture, John Leyden, has started dreaming about MyDoom. Perhaps he needs a …

    Letters 5 Mar 2004, 11:53

  • Wags hijack TV channel's on-screen ticker

    Not quite the weather report viewers expected

    A cable news channel in Raleigh, North Carolina shut down a Web application designed to allow local schools and businesses to report weather-related closures last week, after a handful of puckish university students discovered they could use it to add textual graffiti to the station's newscast. Before the system was pulled, …

    Security 5 Mar 2004, 12:18

  • Business Objects makes Crystal Decisions

    Product line merger clear as, well, crystal

    Business Objects completed its acquisition of Crystal Decisions in December. That was the easy bit, writes Bloor Research analyst Philip Howard. Now comes the hard part - the actual merger of the two organisations and the two product lines. Business Objects has done well with Acta, but Crystal Decisions is an altogether bigger …

    Data Center 5 Mar 2004, 12:22

  • Wippit preps ‘EasyJet-style’ music download scheme

    No frills

    British-based commercial P2P music company Wippit is to launch an iTunes-style music download service offering songs for less than 50p (91c) a pop, The Register has learned. Wippit's move was pre-announced by the company's first major label music partner, EMI, which this week said that it would be offering its digital download …

    Media 5 Mar 2004, 12:48

  • Linksys clarifies Netgear comms breakdown

    Reason behind collapse of bridge on the river Wi-Fi

    Linksys has hit back at the Computing Which? report suggesting that the company's Wireless-G router failed to communicate with Netgear's Wi-Fi bridge during testing at Which? offices. Linksys corporate communications manager, Karen Sohl, says the publication is wrong if it suggests that there's any standards failure by Linksys …

    Broadband 5 Mar 2004, 12:50

  • Cisco dismisses VoIP snooping concerns

    Safe as houses, us

    Cisco has hit back at allegations that some of its IP telephony equipment is vulnerable to communications interception or denial of service attacks. Last month, penetration outfit SecureTest went public with test results which showed Cisco 7900 VoIP phones are susceptible to both DoS attacks and communications interception …

    Data Networking 5 Mar 2004, 13:09

  • Doom developer ‘confirms’ N-Gage 2

    Romero spills guts beans

    Nokia is working on a follow-up to the N-Gage that will address all of the key failings of the original phone-cum-console hardware. So says none other than shoot-'em-up pioneer John Romero. Having co-coded Doom and Quake for Id Software and wasted Eidos' money at Ion Storm, Romero now writes mobile games for his own company, …

    Mobile 5 Mar 2004, 13:30

  • Sex no bar to geekdom

    Girls and boys all like their toys

    The so-called technology gender gap has slammed shut in the US: university students, whether male or female, report near identical take-up of technology, according to the latest 360 Youth College Explorer Study. A survey of over 4,000 students found that men and women spend similar amounts of time playing computer games online …

    Bootnotes 5 Mar 2004, 14:10

  • C of E seeks dynamic cybervicar

    Online Anglican ministry

    The Church of England has announced a rather unusual spiritual vacancy - that of online vicar for its new i-church. This virtual place of worship - which come under the auspices of the Diocese of Oxford - is a "web-based community for those who wish to explore Christian discipleship, but who are not able, or do not wish, to …

    Bootnotes 5 Mar 2004, 14:10

  • Brazil loves Linux – true

    MS sidelined in steamy open source samba

    Brazil is the world's most enthusiastic exponent of open source software, a BBC report reveals. And, if the Latin-American love affair with Linux continues, a third of machines there may soon run non-MS OSes. Professor Arnando Mandel at Sao Paulo University summarises the appeal of Linux, which runs on both the university's …

    Software 5 Mar 2004, 14:10

  • Virus writers in malicious code hide-and-seek

    Bagle Zip shenanigans test new AV techniques

    A fresh angle of attack by virus writers is challenging new anti-virus techniques. The latest versions of the Bagle worm spreading this week contain a malicious payload hidden in a password-protected zip archive. This is the first time the trick has been used to spread the virus in the wild, though the ruse has been seen in lab …

    Security 5 Mar 2004, 14:26

  • Ask Jeeves if it ate Excite.com

    The answer is yes, for $343m

    Ask Jeeves is shelling out around $343m in cash and shares to acquire privately-held online search and media company Excite.com's owner, Interactive Search Holdings. It will issue 9.3 million shares of common stock and options, and $150m in cash - a purchase price of $343m based on Ask Jeeves' closing price on 3 March. With a …

    Business 5 Mar 2004, 14:37

  • HardOCP takes big stick to Infinium

    Spat develops into legal brawl

    News website HardOCP has filed a legal action against broadband console proponent Infinium Labs, in a move which it says is aimed at "clearing the air" following a number of demands and threats made by Infinium in the past weeks. Lawyers acting for KB Networks, the company which owns HardOCP, have based a legal action on the …

    Personal 5 Mar 2004, 15:19

  • Russian arctic castaways await rescue

    Airlift imminent for beleaguered boffins

    The 12 Russian scientists stranded in the arctic after most of their base sank into the Greenland Sea should be rescued within 48 hours. A Russian helicopter left Archangel this morning en-route to Spitzbergen where it will refuel for the final dash to the base, 700-odd km to the north-west, the BBC reports. North Pole-32 …

    Science 5 Mar 2004, 15:22

  • Samsung joins IBM 65nm R&D team

    Licenses 90nm fab tech too

    Samsung has joined an IBM-hosted project to develop next-generation 65nm and 45nm chip fabrication technologies.The South Korean giant also said today that it has licensed IBM's 90nm process technology. The next-gen development effort is backed by founder members Infineon and Chartered Semiconductor, which signed up with IBM …

    Channel 5 Mar 2004, 15:23

  • Nvidia touts GDDR 3 ‘first’

    GeForce FX 5700 Ultra boards to ship with fast RAM

    Nvidia has signed Samsung to provide its graphics card partners with Graphics DDR 3 SDRAM for inclusion in their 128MB GeForce FX 5700 Ultra-based boards. Products using the memory technology will ship this month. GDDR 3 runs at up to around 1.5 times the speed of GDDR 2 yet consumes half the power, thanks to a lower operating …

    Channel 5 Mar 2004, 15:55

  • HP holds storage lead in Q4

    Under fire from IBM and EMC

    Storage vendors, during the fourth quarter, enjoyed their most successful run since the economic downturn started, as both revenue and shipments increased, according to IDC. Worldwide disk storage systems revenue jumped 8.4 per cent year-over-year to $3.7bn in Q4. This came on a whopping 52 per cent year-over-year rise in …

    Storage 5 Mar 2004, 16:20

  • Symbian sale is for the best, says Psion

    Bird in hand

    Psion is pushing ahead with the sale of its 31.1 per cent stake in Symbian, despite dissent from its shareholder Phoenix Asset Management, which urges to push for a Symbian IPO. The disposal of Symbian by Psion will give the Finnish mobile phone giant Nokia control over the smartphone software maker. "The board reiterates its …

    Mobile 5 Mar 2004, 16:41

  • Californian ISP sues Bob Vila site for spam

    Home improvement guru falls foul of CAN-SPAM act

    Californian ISP Hypertouch is taking home improvement website BobVila.com and its marketing agency to court for alleged violations of America's CAN-SPAM Act. This is the first legal action under the new federal anti-spam law, although several US ISPs have taken alleged spammers to court under different laws in recent months. …

    Security 5 Mar 2004, 17:14

  • Al Qaeda boss confused phone SIM with cloaking device

    Apparently they make you entirely untraceable...

    Al Qaeda's technological expertise is perhaps somewhat less than it's cracked up to be, we note from a New York Times report on events surrounding the arrest of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed in Karachi a year ago. Mohammed, and indeed other Al Qaeda operatives, seems to have used a Swisscom 'anonymous' mobile phone card under the quite …

    Bootnotes 5 Mar 2004, 17:42

  • CERN celebrates 50th birthday

    I can remember when it was all gluons round here...

    Celebrations to mark the 50th anniversary of CERN officially begin on 8 March, marking five decades of European co-operation in the search for the nature of matter. The European Organization for Nuclear Research is best known for its fundamental probings into the very small, but CERN can also hold its head high in tech circles …

    Science 5 Mar 2004, 17:50

  • Mainframe DB2 emerges from primordial swamp

    Columns, memory and Cube Views. Oh my!

    IBM's mainframe machine keeps rolling along with the release this week of DB2 Version 8 for the venerable hardware and the z/OS operating system. With the new version of the database, IBM worked to increase the amount of memory that can be addressed, added new security tools and made the software work better with DB2 for Unix, …

    Data Center 5 Mar 2004, 19:01

  • Fireflies aid hunt for ET

    Little green bugs seek little green men

    Fireflies could in future help scientists in the search for extraterrestrial life. The insects contain a chemical called luciferase and it's this that makes the bugs glow. Luciferase is already used in various forms of bioanalysis - in particular for analysing DNA and as a positive indicator for the presence of bacteria. It …

    Science 5 Mar 2004, 19:33

  • Spam is 10

    Many, many unhappy returns

    Today (5 March) marks the tenth anniversary of what is generally considered the first spam message. On this day in 1994, US law firm Canter and Siegel posted a message on several Usenet newsgroups advertising its services to people interested in participating in the US Green Card lottery. These days we'd barely bat an eyelid …

    Media 5 Mar 2004, 19:33

  • Oracle strikes back against the Feds

    SAP says eating PeopleSoft is good for everyone (except PeopleSoft)

    Oracle has hit back against the government in its $9.4 billion bid for PeopleSoft. The database daddy filed a response Thursday in a San Francisco court, rebuffing US Department of Justice claims that a PeopleSoft acquisition would violate the Clayton Antitrust Act. In its filing, Oracle argued that the deal would spur …

    Data Center 5 Mar 2004, 22:36

  • Eolas' web patent nullified

    Go forth and embed

    In a very rare, but not unprecedented move, the US Patent Office has nullified a contentious technology patent. A spin off from the University of California, but described as a "one man operation", Eolas last year won $521 million from Microsoft for breach of what the former describes as its "web application platform". US Patent …

    Media 5 Mar 2004, 23:50