24th February 2005 Archive

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IBM dominates dull Q4 server market

No surprise

IBM continued to dominate a slow-growing worldwide server market during the fourth quarter, according to latest figures from Gartner. Server vendors moved a total of 1.87m units during the period - 6 per cent more boxes than they shipped in the same quarter one year ago. All told, customers shelled out $14.2bn in the fourth …

Channel 24 Feb 2005, 00:33
Iranian blogger jailed for 14 years

Espionage and counter-revolutionary activities

An Iranian blogger accused of spying and counter-revolutionary activities has been jailed for 14 years. Newspaper editor Arash Sigarchi - whose blog criticised an Iranian crackdown on similar websites which has resulted in around 20 arrests - was himself cuffed in January on charges of "espionage, insulting the founder of Iran's …

Music and Media 24 Feb 2005, 09:30
'Rocket fuel' found in US breast milk

Perchlorate permeates food chain

US research has found that perchlorate - a chemical used in rocket fuel and though to be linked to metabolic disruption in adults and mental retardation in children - is widely present in breast and cow's milk across the United States. According to a New Scientist report, perchlorate is made naturally in the atmosphere, and …

Science 24 Feb 2005, 09:35
TUC to IT workers: 'You're working too hard'

Relax a little

IT workers put in more unpaid overtime than almost any other profession, according to the TUC (Trades Union Congress). The organisation is calling on managers to recognise the extra time their staff puts in, and has declared Friday 25 February "Work your proper hours day". IT managers work an average of nine hours and 12 …

IT Director 24 Feb 2005, 09:48
Easynet invests more in LLU

That's it

Easynet plans to spend £3m upgrading and promoting its own brand of unbundled broadband. Easynet has earmarked £2m to upgrade its local loop infrastructure during the first three months of the year. A further £1m is to be splashed out in marketing and support costs. This additional investment comes as the UK broadband operator …

Telecoms 24 Feb 2005, 11:27
AMD invests in Intel accuser

Licenses Patriot processor design, patents

AMD has invested in the small chip technology development company that's suing Intel for alleged patent infringement. Patriot Scientific this week confirmed that AMD has bought an undisclosed number of the company's restricted shares and licensed not only its ShBoom processor patent portfolio but also its Ignite 32-bit …

PCs 24 Feb 2005, 11:31
Seagate, Hitachi launch 1in 6GB HDDs

Who's shipping first, though?

Seagate and Hitachi both announced 1in hard drives with a 6GB storage capacity this week, though the US company appears to have been the first to ship such a product. Seagate's 6GB ST-1 unit started shipping last December, the company said yesterday, and may well be the storage component found in Apple's latest iPod Mini, …

Storage 24 Feb 2005, 11:47
UK.gov launches virus advice site

Is ITsafe

The UK government launched an official virus alert site yesterday. ITsafe is designed to help home users and small businesses use the net more safely through a combination of free advice and threat alerts about risks such as fast-spreading computer viruses. Users can sign up to receive alerts by either text or email. The …

Security 24 Feb 2005, 11:57
Intel prunes prices

Up to 34 per cent off selected CPUs

Intel this week chopped up to 34.1 per cent off selected processors, following last week's Xeon DP refresh and the launch this week of 64-bit Pentium 4 processors for desktop PCs. The price cuts centred on the chip maker's desktop Celeron line-up, across both the 90nm Celeron D range and the older 130nm parts. Prices here fell …

PCs 24 Feb 2005, 11:59
UK telco sector remains in doldrums

Colt warns of tough times ahead

The UK's telecoms sector shows little sign of improving over the coming year as it continues to wrestle with "tough" conditions. This rather glum assessment coincides with the publication of results from alternative telco Colt, which has been busy "refocusing its business" and "implementing a new strategic plan". Turnover for …

Telecoms 24 Feb 2005, 12:05
Sony 'suspends' PSX production - again

Update pending... or demise?

The Register still receives plenty of emails asking when Sony's PSX PlayStation 2 PVR will ship in Europe. We don't know, but it's looking increasingly unlikely now that Sony has apparently stopped producing the Japanese version. According to an announcement on the Japanese PSX website, cited by German-language games news …

Consoles 24 Feb 2005, 12:12
Ebbers trial team begins defence

WorldCom trial continues

The WorldCom fraud trial in New York entered a new phase yesterday after the prosecution concluded its case against former chief exec Bernie Ebbers. Prosecution lawyers have tried to show that Ebbers - who denies the charges against him - masterminded the fraud. In more than two weeks of questioning only former CFO Scott …

Telecoms 24 Feb 2005, 12:22
Global warming cleared on ice shelf collapse rap

Natural causes to blame, expert claims

The high-profile collapse of some Antarctica's ice shelves is likely the result of natural current fluctuations, not global warming, says a leading British expert on polar climates. This surprising finding is supported by analysis of data from the European Space Agency's ERS-1 satellite, according to Duncan Wingham, Professor …

Science 24 Feb 2005, 12:47
FBI issues Sober notice over Windows worm

Sober-K also poses as Paris Hilton clips

Virus writers are attempting to scare surfers into opening malicious code with a message posing as an FBI notice that they have visited an "illegal website". Recipients are invited to open a "questionnaire", which is really the latest Windows worm Sober-K. To add authenticity infected emails come from a faked @fbi.gov address. …

Anti-Virus 24 Feb 2005, 12:56
Apple 15in PowerBook G4

Review Cool'n'Quiet

Ten months is a long time to go without a hardware refresh in the PC industry. For Apple, whose top-end PowerBook notebooks pretty much defined the genre, it's an eternity. The introduction this month of new, speed-bumped PowerBooks thus felt enormously overdue - the delay had led many to expect the fabled PowerBook G5. …

Reviews 24 Feb 2005, 13:26
Euro MPs face scam crackdown

To find out more dial our premium rate hotline on...

Euro MPs (MEPs) are due to vote on an amendment to the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive today which would crack down on telephone and internet scams. If agreed, the amendments tabled by Euro MP Diana Wallis, "will make telephone prize scams and rogue internet trading illegal". The Liberal Democrat MEP for Yorkshire and …

Telecoms 24 Feb 2005, 14:05
NTL email floored nationwide

No idea when it will be sorted

Many of NTL's 1.4m internet punters are without email today following technical problems at one of the cableco's data centres in Winnersh near Reading. A spokesman for the UK's largest cable company was unable to provide exact details of the snag. However, he confirmed that the glitch is affecting NTL's internet customers …

Telecoms 24 Feb 2005, 14:09
BT rogue dialler court case delayed

More time needed to prepare case

A legal challenge to BT's decision last year to block access to numbers suspected of being used by rogue dialler companies has been delayed. Birmingham-based Opera Telecom was due to have its case against BT heard at the High Court tomorrow (Friday). It is suing BT for blocking access to lines Opera leases to adult content …

Telecoms 24 Feb 2005, 14:16
HP lifts the kimono on secure router

Packetastic

HP has announced the ProCurve Secure Router 7000dl series, a branch office router range with built-in security and mobile access features. The kit starts shipping in April and is cheaper than Cisco equivalents, HP says. By launching secure routers, HP is tapping into a growth area in anotherwise flat market. Worldwide …

Data Networking 24 Feb 2005, 14:34
Socially inadequate? Meet V-girl

Virtual tease for the desperate and lonely

There's some good news on the relationship front today for those heterosexual male readers who are tired of the trouble and expense of having a real girlfriend, or are just too ugly or dull to get their hands on the real thing - V-girl, aka Vivenne Rose. Vivienne is a virtual minx brought to you by the power of mobile …

Bootnotes 24 Feb 2005, 14:37
LAN switches on fire

Sales up 22% on year

L2-L7 LAN switch revenue hit $3.8bn in the fourth quarter, up 22% on the year, according to latest research from Infonetics, with Cisco once again leaving its footprints all over the market. L2-L3 ethernet switch revenue dominated the market, taking $3.6bn of total sales, though this was down 3% on the previous quarter. …

Data Networking 24 Feb 2005, 15:22
eBay plays down 'shill' bidding allegations

Lawsuit launched

Giant auction site eBay is being sued for allegedly using "shill" bidding against its own customers to force up prices and increase the fees it's able to charge. The class action lawsuit filed in the California Superior Court in Santa Clara was brought on behalf of a Pennsylvania man who maintains he fell foul of eBay's "shill …

Financial News 24 Feb 2005, 16:13
Intel puts Itanium saviour on ice

Takes the radical out of Tukwila

Intel has plumped, constrained and then killed a future version of Itanium once meant to save the entire franchise, The Register has learned. The once elegant Tukwila processor with all of its eight glorious cores will now have just two or four cores, according to a source familiar with the processor's design. Intel has decided …

Servers 24 Feb 2005, 16:47
EDS shutting 21 US, European centres

Cost cuts mean boost for India

EDS will pull down the shutters at 21 facilities, including four in Europe, by the end of next year as it shifts more work to India. The services giant plans to cut 17 centres in the US and four in Europe as it looks to shave another $1bn off its costs under its ongoing turnaround plan. The labour force reorganization should …

IT Director 24 Feb 2005, 16:56
Japan.gov weathers DDoS attack

Storm passes for now

Surfers were intermittently unable to reach the websites of the Japanese prime minister and Cabinet Office this week following a sustained denial of service attack. Japan Today reports the National Police Agency is tracing the source of attacks which left Japanese government websites difficult to reach between Tuesday and …

Enterprise Security 24 Feb 2005, 17:11
Windows licensing - don't swallow it, says MS

A sales pitch you could caulk boats with...

Microsoft is as famed for the quality and incisiveness of its marketing as it is for the security of its products, but we're particularly impressed by a recent effort which seems designed to make it just that bit tougher for the Redmond sales teams when they hit the corporate accounts. "Microsoft Windows licensing", says the …

Software 24 Feb 2005, 17:16
Mandrakesoft snags Conectiva

Penguins mate

Mandrakesoft, the French Linux distie, is bulking up by buying Brazil-based Linux distributor Conectiva for $2.3m in stock. Conectiva, was founded in 1995 and employs 60 people, mainly in Brazil. The company recorded $2.2m in sales in their latest audited fiscal year. It reached break-even during its latest fiscal half-year, …

Software 24 Feb 2005, 17:36
Spy fears spook IBM-Lenovo deal

The PRC in your PC?

For years the Chinese government fretted that the US was using its technology lead to spy on the country - but now the tables are turned. The US government has much deeper concerns about what China can glean from the historic Lenovo-IBM PC deal than recent reports have indicated. Concessions offered by IBM to the US Treasury's …

Security 24 Feb 2005, 18:10
Cisco switch partners see Fibre Channel green

Be our friend

Cisco knows the way to a channel partner's heart - cold, hard cash. The switch maker this week announced a new program to reward partners who can move certain amounts of Cisco's MDS 9000 line of Fibre Channel storage switches. The Cisco Clear Advantage Program is aimed at channel partners in the US and EMEA. These companies …

Storage 24 Feb 2005, 19:55
Strength through pessimism! Keeping your stuff safe

Lock up your datum

"We have a lot of optimistic engineers - but not enough pessimistic engineers," reckons David Rosenthal. In the 1980s, Rosenthal designed the NeWS windowing system with James Gosling. In the 1990s he was NVidia's fourth employee, or really the first person the three co-founders hired. But for the past few years Rosenthal has …

Storage 24 Feb 2005, 20:04