20th October 2004 Archive

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Gates: PC will replace TV, TV will become a giant Google

Chairman Bill hopes we'll keep pushing his buttons

Microsoft founder and chairman Bill Gates must see Google everywhere he looks these days. He must even see Google when he closes his eyes, and enters that lucid dreaming state from which all of Microsoft's great strategies eventually emerge. What he sees at that moment, we imagine, is a Tellytubby landscape that looks a lot like …

Consoles 20 Oct 2004, 00:06
Powergen wins whistleblower case

Chamberlain mulls appeal

A long-running civil trial between Powergen and a customer who highlighted a serious breach in consumer security more than four years ago has ended in victory for the utility firm. Powergen sued whistle blower John Chamberlain for breach of confidence over allegations that Chamberlain failed to keep a promise to destroy …

Music and Media 20 Oct 2004, 07:49
Bulldog investigated over 'unfair contract terms'

Ofcom acts on complaint

Communications regulator Ofcom is investigating broadband ISP - Bulldog Communications - following a complaint about "unfair contract terms". Details of the complaint, however, remain sketchy. A brief statement on Ofcom's web site reads: "Ofcom has received a complaint about terms in Bulldog Communications' contract 'Bulldog …

Telecoms 20 Oct 2004, 07:51
Botnets trawl for phishing victims

Phishing fleets tightly controlled - CipherTrust

A small number of zombie networks are responsible for all Internet phishing attacks worldwide, according to CipherTrust, the messaging security appliance firm. An analysis of messages sent to users of CipherTrust's IronMail security appliance found that less than one per cent of email messages during the first two weeks of …

Spam 20 Oct 2004, 07:54
O2 sues 3UK over ad bubbles

Trademark spat

Two of the UK's biggest mobile phone operators are to meet in the High Court next month after O2 issued a writ against Hutchison Whampoa's 3 UK. The action centres on O2's claim that 3 used "bubbles" in its ads. Snag is, O2 already uses bubble images in its ads and reckons that 3's use of bubbles infringes 17 of its trademarks …

Mobile 20 Oct 2004, 08:18
Freescale 1000-worker cull to cost $65m

Savings to be spent caressing customer companies, apparently

PowerPC maker Freescale yesterday told 1000 staffers they would lose their jobs in order to allow the chip maker to "accelerate new product development and.... drive greater customer intimacy", whatever that is. The announcement came as the company published figures for its most recently completed quarter, Q3, which ended 2 …

Financial News 20 Oct 2004, 08:43
Hello Moto, hello increased Q3 profits

Clamshells lead the fightback

Motorola continued an upbeat 2004 by announcing sharply increased profits in its third quarter earnings today. Revenues were $8.62bn, up from $6.83bn a year ago. Profits rose to $479m. The company had its phone division to thank, shipping more than 23 million units and generating $390m profits on revenues of $3.9bn. Moto …

Mobile 20 Oct 2004, 09:15
Fur flies in AT&T union punch-up

Outsourcing spat turns nasty

A war between AT&T and the largest US telecommunications workers union has degenerated into a tit-for-tat spat. The Communications Workers of America (CWA) organized Tuesday protests to chastise AT&T for laying off workers and closing call and customer care centers across the US. In addition, the union lobbed the expected …

IT Director 20 Oct 2004, 09:22
Feds probe huge California data breach

Details of 1.4m people exposed

The FBI is investigating the penetration of a university research system that housed sensitive personal data on a staggering 1.4m Californians who participated in a state social program, officials said on Tuesday. The compromised system had the names, addresses, phone numbers, social security numbers and dates of birth of …

Enterprise Security 20 Oct 2004, 09:26
Tul blasts PowerColor VGA 'forgeries'

Radeon 9550s masquerading as 9600 Pros

Taiwan's Tul has denied it has shipped 128MB PowerColor Radeon 9600 Pro graphics cards based on the older, less sophisticated Radeon 9550 chip. The allegation was made earlier this week by web site Xbit Labs, which discovered a number of the boards for sale in Russia. Closer inspection revealed the use of the 9550 in place of …

System Builder 20 Oct 2004, 09:42
Canon Ixus 430 digicam

Review More cool than tool?

Canon's huge-selling Ixus 400 has been given a makeover and rechristened the Ixus 430. It continues along the same vein as the older model, but has been encased in an attractively finished aluminium shell, instead of the metal and ceramic body of the 400, writes Andy Jameson. There's a new feature added too, in the form of a …

Reviews 20 Oct 2004, 10:25
Nvidia accused of patent violation

Ex-chip maker whips out bus snooping infringement claim

Nvidia has become the latest technology manufacturer to be tackled by an intellectual property holding company. Mountain View, California-based Opti, inc. today said it had issued a writ against the graphics chip maker, alleging infringement of five patents its owns. Opti was formerly a chip developer itself, but sold its fabs …

Channel Register 20 Oct 2004, 10:34
Big Apple stamps on guinea pigs

Ecuadorian delicacy off the menu

You know how it is - you wait years for a decent guinea pig story and then two turn up at once. Just yesterday we reported on the Peruvian Breed super-rodent - a hefty porker packing a couple of pounds of nutritious, rabbit-flavoured meat. Now we are receiving news that New York has clamped down on the sale of guinea pig as a …

Bootnotes 20 Oct 2004, 10:36
JBoss moves up to business processes

Introducing jBPM...

After a series of announcements last month JBoss has announced JBoss jBPM, their first step into business process management. They have taken the Java Business Process Management project (jBPM), founded by Tom Baeyens, and made changes so that it meets the stringent requirements of its professional open source environment. …

Developer 20 Oct 2004, 10:44
HP wins $500m WestLB outsourcing gig

450 staff move across

HP has won a five-year, $500m contract to look after IT for German bank WestLB. HP will take over from 1 January 2005 and 450 WestLB employees will move across to the ink giant. HP will deal with global IT infrastructure and some application development. It will be responsible for desktops, mail systems, network, intranet and …

IT Director 20 Oct 2004, 10:50
AOL Europe dumps Overture, plumps Google

'No financial sense' - Overture

Google has ousted Yahoo!'s Overture to win AOL's European ad-placement business. Google already provides targeted advertising for AOL in the US and now it is adding the ISP's European business. AOL said its partnership with Overture had been successful, but it had decided to work with Google in future. AOL and Overture started …

Financial News 20 Oct 2004, 10:54
Fight New Labour's ~~Poll~~ Identity Tax

Cash'n'Carrion More campaigning apparel from NO2ID

NO2ID - the outfit opposed to Labour's plans to introduce a voluntary/compulsory ID card to the UK - has strengthened its campaign arsenal with the release of a snappy new t-shirt. Yes indeed, if you don't fancy shelling out at least 75 quid per year to be granted your own identity on a small plastic rectangle, then pull on …

Site News 20 Oct 2004, 11:13
CE drive demand pushes Seagate into the black

Q1 2005 sales beat expectations

Hard drive manufacturer Seagate exceeded its expectations during the first quarter of its 2005 fiscal year, when it reported today Q1 revenues of $1.56bn, just above its $1.48-1.52bn forecast range. Q1's revenue figure marks sales growth of 17.3 per cent over the previous quarter, which the company described at the time as " …

Financial News 20 Oct 2004, 11:39
EDS allies with Cisco, Dell, EMC, MS and Sun

Coalition of the willing

EDS this week announced the formation of the Agility Alliance which aims to improve procurement relationships for the firm to improve customer service. Cisco, Dell, EMC, Microsoft, Sun and Xerox are all initial members of the alliance. They will co-operate on everything from R&D to working together on customer projects. Sam …

IT Director 20 Oct 2004, 11:51
Motorola bares its Bluetooth grin and points to the PMG

New toys to play with

We had hints, before, that Motorola was following the IXI path, and designing a personal mobile gateway wireless hub - with phones, text pads, cameras and other toys all being Bluetooth peripherals. Now, the veil is lifting a family of new Bluetooth peripherals. And plans including stereo audio devices. Today, the company said …

Mobile 20 Oct 2004, 11:57
Falling prices hit COLT profits

It's got a plan, a cunning plan...

COLT Telecom reduced losses for the three months ended 30 September 2004 and increased turnover seven per cent to £303.7m. Losses fell 11 per cent from £35.7m to £31.8m. But Ebitda (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization) fell 23 per cent from £43.3m to £33.4m. Chairman Barry Bateman said the …

Financial News 20 Oct 2004, 12:12
Register suffers DDOS attack

Update A rather boring day for us

Around 7am BST this morning, The Register came under DDOS attack. The attack continues — and is increasing in severity — but our hosting provider is doing what it can to mitigate its effects. ® Update 14:30 BST The good news is that our hosting provider's work is letting more and more of you see the site now. Apologies for the …

Site News 20 Oct 2004, 12:21
Toshiba preps HD DVD notebook PC

But don't hold your breath - it's not out til Q4 '05

Toshiba will release a notebook PC with an HD DVD drive this time next year, the Japanese company said today, returning fire after an initial salvo from Sony in the battle for the future of blue-laser optical media. In August, Sony said it would equip its upcoming PlayStation 3 with a Blu-ray Disc (BD) optical drive. Toshiba …

PCs 20 Oct 2004, 12:41
ATMs in peril from computer worms?

AV vendors plan sales push

Some anti-virus firms are trying to carve out a new market for their technology by trying to persuade banks that Automatic Teller Machines (ATMs) running Windows need protecting from computer worms. Trend Micro and Computer Associates have both identified this niche, but some rivals question the immediate need for content …

Anti-Virus 20 Oct 2004, 13:19
Web design challenge for kids

Citizenship online

Arts minister Estelle Morris yesterday launched a web design competition for students aged 11-14 and studying at school in England. The Web Design challenge is a joint project by the Hansard Society and the Design Museum, and is commissioned and funded by Culture Online, part of the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. …

Music and Media 20 Oct 2004, 14:24
C2000 offers lessons in software

Reseller re-education programme...

Computer 2000 is running a series of seminars and web-training events to teach resellers about software and how to sell it. The "Profit from Software" programme covers four main areas: licensing, security, productivity and communication. The distributor believes these are the areas that most concern customers, and therefore …

Channel Register 20 Oct 2004, 14:27
Nesta invests in drive-thru rad scanner

Symetrica to sort dirty bombs from bananas

A prototype drive-through scanner that can distinuish between various sources of radioactivity is being developed for use in airports and other high-security areas. The National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts (NESTA) has invested £99,000 in Symetrica, a University of Southampton spin-off, to develop the …

Science 20 Oct 2004, 15:08
Lycos gets jiggy with webmail

Whips out 300MB of throbbing free storage

Lycos is upping the amount of storage available to its free email subscribers to 300MB while those paying for its premier service will get a whopping 10GB. Subscribers pay £3.49 a month for 10GB storage. This beats Yahoo which offers 100MB and Hotmail which is still offering just 2MB, depsite promising an expanded service this …

Telecoms 20 Oct 2004, 15:17
Google launches search-in-a-box

Enterprise Search Appliance hits UK

Google has finally launched its enterprise Search Appliance in the UK. The appliance is designed to provide an internal search function for medium to large sized corporations and universities. Google says it can also be used to provide a public site-search. The appliance, a cheerful-yellow box, is basically a slice of Google's …

Data Networking 20 Oct 2004, 16:01
DrinkOrDie London trial opens

Two in the dock over software piracy charges

The long awaited trial of a pair of men accused of playing a key role in the DrinkOrDie international computer piracy ring began at London's Old Bailey this week. Steven Dowd, 39, of Sandpiper Close, Newton-le-Willows, Merseyside, and Alex Bell, 29, of Chafford Hundred, Essex, are accused of cracking software protection and …

Applications 20 Oct 2004, 16:15
StorageTek turns nifty Q3 profit

On lower sales. Good show

A streamlined StorageTek managed to turn a nice profit in its third quarter despite flat revenue. The tape specialist pulled in $527m during the period, which is just slightly higher than the $520m in revenue posted in the same quarter last year. StorageTek's net income, however, rose significantly to $43m in the third quarter …

Financial News 20 Oct 2004, 16:31
NEC brings supercomputing crown back to Japan

Backs to the labs for IBM

NEC has trumped US computer makers once again by announcing a new supercomputer that destroys previous performance marks. The "SX-8" is a follow on to NEC's Earth Simulator, which held the supercomputing top spot for some time. The new machine can reach a peak performance of 65 teraflops (trillion floating point operations per …

Servers 20 Oct 2004, 19:19
Quantum inserts the Certance

$60m of fresh tape

Quantum is looking to build out its tape storage business in the most obvious of ways - by picking up a fellow tape storage maker. Quantum intends to acquire privately held Certance based in Costa Mesa, California in an all cash transaction valued at $60m. Simply put, Certance will add tape drives, software and related …

Storage 20 Oct 2004, 21:46