7th September 2004 Archive

Browse by publication date, or search the site.

Microsoft sees sluggish PC growth ahead

No repeat of fiscal 2004

In Microsoft's latest SEC filing again, Redmond warns that next year won't see the handsome growth in PC sales that it has seen over the past twelve months. Fiscal year 2004 in Redmond ended in June, and Microsoft saw revenues soar on the back of 13 per cent unit growth in PC sales. It says it doesn't expect similar growth next …

Financial News 7 Sep 2004, 09:07
ITNet makes loss, calls lawyers

Cabinet Office blamed

ITNet posted a loss of £16.6m for the six months ended 30 June 2003, compared with profits of £8m for the same period last year. Turnover grew 15 per cent to £104.6m. The company blamed the cancellation of an £83m contract with the Cabinet Office for the loss. Bridget Blow, chief executive of ITNet, said: "2004 has been marred …

Financial News 7 Sep 2004, 09:10
Swansea IT strikers go marching on

Workers' rally tomorrow

Striking IT workers in Swansea are to hold a march tomorrow in a show of support against plans to privatise the council's IT department. One hundred IT workers currently in their fourth week of industrial action hope to be joined by hundreds of other council staff as they march from Swansea Guildhall to Castle Square tomorrow …

IT Director 7 Sep 2004, 09:19
How to succeed with open source

Site Offer Discounted guide for IT managers

Modern IT managers face many daunting challenges, including relentless pressure to cut costs and the unending demand for innovative solutions. To meet these seemingly disparate goals, IT organizations are increasingly investigating the use of open source software for its cost-effectiveness and flexibility. However, myths about …

Site News 7 Sep 2004, 09:30
AMD, Infineon to spend $200m on nanotech know-how

Yet another Dresden plant

AMD and Infineon are to spend €170m ($200m) to build a nanotech research facility. According to Bloomberg, the R&D centre will be located in Dresden, Germany, probably not far from the chip fabs the two partners run there, and their jointly funded Advanced Mask Technology Centre. Local government will pump in a further €80m ($ …

Financial News 7 Sep 2004, 09:38
Online pharmacist jailed

He won't need diet pills where he's going...

A Florida man is facing 33 months in prison after pleading guilty to conspiring to distribute a controlled substance. Vineet Chhabra ran a series of websites offering Viagra, diet pills and other controlled drugs. Customers had to fill in online questionaires or complete a telephone interview but did not need to see a doctor or …

Music and Media 7 Sep 2004, 09:42
AMD heralds OS support for dual-core CPUs

IDF Fall '04 As Intel prepares to detail its own multi-core chips

Novell, Red Hat and Sun today said they will support future multi-core Opteron processors, AMD said today. That's no great surprise, perhaps, since dual-core AMD64 CPUs were designed to appear to the operating system as a pair of processors, and SuSE Linux, Red Hat Linux and Sun Solaris are all capable of running on multi- …

System Builder 7 Sep 2004, 10:07
Computacenter pulled down by France and Germany

Price erosion

Computacenter revenues for the six months ended 30 June 2004 are unchanged at £1.25bn. Profits rose slightly to £33.2m, up from £32m for the same period of 2003. The reseller blamed continued pressure on prices for the static turnover. Profits in Germany fell to £2.5m from £3.2m in 2003 and France posted a loss of £1.5m, …

Channel Register 7 Sep 2004, 10:09
Mac users get Vodafone 3G data access

Network offers Mac OS X drivers

Vodafone UK has begun offering Mac OS X drivers for its 3G Mobile Connect Card, enabling PC Card adaptor-equipped PowerBook owners to connect to the Internet at (potentially) broadband speeds when they're miles away from the nearest Wi-Fi hotspot. Vodafone's 3G card is made by Belgian data card specialist Option, which has had …

Mobile 7 Sep 2004, 10:36
Softbank snubbed in Japanese 3G allocation

Mulls legal action

Softbank is unlikely to be able to start offering mobile services after the Japanese regulator decided to split remaining frequencies between NTT DoCoMo and KDDI. Softbank took the unusual step of complaining publicly about the decision. DoCoMo and KDDI will now share the 800Mhz frequency which the regulator says is needed to …

Mobile 7 Sep 2004, 10:57
Call centres are a nightmare

Press '3' to read this story or hold for a hack

Contacting call centres can be a right pain in the neck. Who hasn't been hacked off with being kept on hold for ages after navigating the maze of automated options? However, the problem is even more acute for those people on low incomes. Many find that call centres are neither helpful or accessible, leaving them out of pocket, …

Telecoms 7 Sep 2004, 11:08
DrinkorDie suspect to be 'extradited to US'

Aussie rules (not)

The alleged ringleader of a gang of internet copyright pirates is to be extradited from Australia to the US on multi-million dollar software piracy charges, after all. Hew Raymond Griffiths, 41, of Berkeley Vale, NSW, Australia, was indicted on one count of criminal copyright infringement and one count of conspiracy to commit …

Channel Register 7 Sep 2004, 11:13
Fuji gives photographers the two-finger salute

Say cheese, then eff off

We gather that there are companies who specialise in making sure that proposed global brands do not offend local sensibilities. For instance, if you're thinking of launching a international network of Wi-Fi hotspots and calling it "Cabrones", these boys will tell you that you'll certainly have to rethink for the Spanish-speaking …

Bootnotes 7 Sep 2004, 11:15
Hearing aids reach the internet

'YES - ON THE INTERNET...'

Start-up mail order firm Augmentics Ltd is promising to cut the price of digital hearing aids, typically between £2,000 and £3,000. The firm will use a website and mail order to keep costs down. It also offers a "cloning" service for people wanting a replacement, or back-up, for their existing aid. Customers send in their …

Financial News 7 Sep 2004, 11:49
Symbian sale drives Psion into the black

One-off gains fuel turnaround

Psion has turned resolutely away from the Symbian operating system, but it is unlikely to find an easy fortune in its new focus on industrial handheld devices. In the six months to the end of June, Psion had turnover of £63.4m from continuing operations, which nearly matches the £63.3m in turnover it had in the corresponding …

Financial News 7 Sep 2004, 11:52
TiVo and Netflix 'team for movie downloads'

Partnership brings Java full circle

Netflix and TiVo are to team up to deliver movies over broadband, according to NewsWeek. The magazine expects the partnership to go public later this month, although neither company would comment, and details on pricing and availability have yet to be disclosed. It's hardly unexpected: the two companies are natural partners and …

Financial News 7 Sep 2004, 12:01
Introducing the BOFH-brand internet café

Episode 29 Or should that be 'Technology Centre'?

BOFH 2004 "What's going on downstairs?" the Boss asks excitely slipping into Mission Control. "Can I have a sports question?" I ask, not knowing what he's going on about. "The building!" "The one we're in, or another building?" "I mean the CONSTRUCTION, in the foyer!" "Oh I think it's a visitor's centre," the PFY responds …

BOFH 7 Sep 2004, 12:02
SurfControl rides spam tsunami

Strong results, shares up

Shares in UK-based censorware outfit SurfControl rose sharply today with the release of strong annual earnings results. For the year to 30 June, SurfControl posted annual revenues of $87.3m. That's up 19 per cent on $73.2m last year and in line with analyst predictions. Earnings before bad stuff came out at $15.7m this year, …

Spam 7 Sep 2004, 12:49
Stores slash PSX prices - report

Almost 50 per cent off

Japanese retailers have slashed the price of Sony's PVR-cum-games-console, the PSX, by almost 50 per cent in a bid to drum up consumer interest, according to Internet reports. Sony offers two PSX models in Japan, the only territory in which the machine is currently sold. One sports a 250GB hard drive, the other a 160GB unit. To …

Consoles 7 Sep 2004, 13:11
PlusNet throws broadband 'lifeline' to ISPs

Order through us, reduce wholesale cost

PlusNet says it's "thrown a lifeline" to the UK's small ISPs facing a 30 per cent increase in the wholesale cost of broadband. PlusNet reckons that if enough small ISPs consolidate their orders through the Sheffield-based ISP, it can make the cost of wholesale broadband much cheaper for small service providers. Said Marco …

Telecoms 7 Sep 2004, 13:40
Nokia calls up RIM, again

Pivotal role for email gateway

Nokia has again called on Research in Motion to beef up its enterprise credibility, inking a deal with the Canadian company to bundle the latter's Blackberry Connect software on its Nokia 9500 communicator. The deal also extends to other Series 80 devices. Nokia already offers Blackberry Connect on 6820 phones in Europe, …

Mobile 7 Sep 2004, 13:44
Colour laser printers = commodity

Prices plunge

Almost a quarter of colour laser printers sold during the first half of 2004 in key European markets cost under €500 (£339), up from a mere 0.6 per cent in H1 2003, market watcher Context said today. The companies numbers come from sales through resellers in the four main European national markets: the UK, Germany, France and …

Channel 7 Sep 2004, 13:50
Oracle's biz suite lumbers on stage

Shipping in 60 days

Oracle has outlined at its user conference in London some of the increased functions of the latest version of its E-Business Suite 11i.10, including better business intelligence tools. Other improvements to the software are for specific industries like government or healthcare. The software has a new user interface which the …

Hardware 7 Sep 2004, 14:25
Keyboards are old - tap tables to send email

Sensor system allows input from virtually anything

A startup whose technology will allow you to turn virtually anything into an input device, so for example you could use a table to change channel or pick up the phone, or control your computer by banging your head on the wall, has received €2 million in financing from European VC outfit Sofinnova. French company Sensitive Object …

Science 7 Sep 2004, 14:38
Seagate ups Q1 estimates

Expects good quarter

Hard disc maker Seagate told Wall Street today that it hopes to do better than expected in its first quarter. The company expects to end the first quarter of 2005, ending 1 October 2004, with sales of between $1.48bn and $1.52bn with earnings per share of between 6 and 8 cents rather than the $1.47bn turnover and earnings of 3 …

Financial News 7 Sep 2004, 14:45
Microsoft patents tabbing through a web page

Just tab along to our IP licensing agreement...

Last week Microsoft was granted an ancient patent claim covering the navigation of web pages by keyboard. According to US Patent 6,785,865 (Discoverability and navigation of hyperlinks via tabs - Cote et al), the practice of tabbing through hyperlinks on a web page now belongs to Microsoft. The claim was filed more than seven …

Developer 7 Sep 2004, 15:46
Wanadoo to build Dutch broadband network

Incumbent too costly

Pan-European ISP Wanadoo is to build its own broadband network in The Netherlands after claiming that the cost of using the incumbent telco's (KPN's) network was just too expensive. Commenting on a report in Dutch financial newspaper, Financieele Dagblad yesterday, a spokeswoman for Wanadoo confirmed that the ISP intends to …

Telecoms 7 Sep 2004, 15:49
McAfee AV ate my application

False Trojan horse alert causes chaos

An Australian software developer has been left fuming after the latest virus definition update from McAfee caused his package to be wrongly identified as a Trojan horse programme. The false positive meant that ISPWizard, an internet setup program wizard, was labelled as the BackDoor-AKZ Trojan by users running the latest update …

Malware 7 Sep 2004, 16:00
Wikipedia 'to make universities obsolete'

Look out, Old Guard - it's the Khmer Rouge in nappies

For most web surfers, the Wikipedia is simply an occasionally useful online resource that needs to be taken with a huge sackful of salt. For others, it's a poor excuse for a real encylopedia. But for its proponents, it's nothing short of revolutionary! It's Emergent[*], you see. A column by veteran tech writer Al Fasoldt has …

Music and Media 7 Sep 2004, 16:33
Beastly Itanium delayed until Q4

IDF Fall '04 Slower, fatter

Intel will confirm later today that a new version of the Itanium processor with 9MB of Level 3 cache will be delayed until the fourth quarter and come in at a slower speed. Intel now plans to debut a 1.6GHz Itanium chip with the beastly Level 3 cache in the fourth quarter. The company had originally planned to bring this chip …

Servers 7 Sep 2004, 18:32
IBM taps Emulex for cheap Fibre Channel

Never mind the fabric, feel the price

Are smaller businesses ready to adopt SANs? History is dubious, but the latest converts to the cause are Emulex and IBM, via a pair of cheap 'n cheerful Fibre Channel switches based on silicon that Emulex has been selling to the embedded market for use in disk arrays and the like. They follow several other attempts to sell low- …

Storage 7 Sep 2004, 22:03
HDS aims virtual Lightning at EMC, IBM

Discovers virtualisation just as everyone else is trying to forget it

Hitachi Data Systems has combined hardware and multi-vendor storage management in its drive to recapture the market share its Lightning arrays have lost in recent months to EMC and IBM. Its latest TagmaStore Universal Storage Platform (USP) includes both a new high-end storage array and a virtualising SAN controller capable of …

Storage 7 Sep 2004, 22:04
Intel plans for digital planet

IDF Fall '04 Think different, developers told

Intel has called on its developer community to recognise that it's designing for a digital planet now, and urged developers to think differently in approaching both established and emerging markets. In his keynote address at the Intel Developers Forum in San Francisco, Intel President Paul Otellini revealed little detail about …

Developer 7 Sep 2004, 22:12