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6th May 2005 Archive

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  • Intel feels healthy and dual-core happy

    Coming for AMD

    A confident collection of Intel executives boasted today about the company's financial health and upcoming dual and multicore processors during an analyst conference. Exiting CEO Craig Barrett, incoming CEO Paul Otellini, CFO Andy Bryant and a host of other division heads did their best to woo the Wall Street crowd. Intel this …

    Servers 6 May 2005, 01:00

  • Bashful IBM takes orders for Opteron blade server

    Reg outs the LS20

    IBM's long-awaited Opteron-based blade server has quietly gone up for sale on the company's web site. Back when the dual-core Opteron chip shipped in April, IBM promised to deliver an Opteron blade sometime this quarter. It, however, has yet to formally announce the system to the public. But the secret is out after The Register …

    Servers 6 May 2005, 06:53

  • Hollywood calls BitTorrent Brits to US Court

    Exclusive Website owners can't afford to comply, apparently

    The US movie industry has made good its promise to name Brits Kevin Reid and Ian Hawthorne in its legal action against the users of their bds-palace.co.uk website, which links to BitTorrent-hosted content. Last month, Reid formally received a summons to appear before the US District Court of New Jersey, where MPAA members …

    Music and Media 6 May 2005, 08:40

  • O2 goes down the pan

    Well, that is what you do with toilet cleaner

    Our thanks goes to the vulture-eyed Register reader who sent us this snapshot after a late night shopping trip to his local supermarket. Mulling the vast and colourful array of toilet cleaners on offer, he spotted this germ killer - and could have sworn he'd spotted the logo somewhere before. A spokesman for mobile phone giant …

    Bootnotes 6 May 2005, 08:48

  • ATI multi-card rendering details emerge

    Turns to tiles - but where's the grouting?

    ATI's SLi-style multi-card image rendering system will be able to use any of the company's 3D graphics cards, if claims made by hardware website Hexus.net are anything to go by. ATI's system - apparently dubbed Multi Video Processing (MVP) - will, like Nvidia's rival SLi technique, speed image rendering by getting two GPUs to …

    Peripherals 6 May 2005, 09:19

  • Marconi culls 800 jobs

    'Cost reduction initiative'

    Marconi is to rid itself of 800 workers in the UK following its failure to win a slice of a major £10bn contract from BT. The job losses were widely expected after BT rejected Marconi's bid to become a preferred supplier for its new, gee-whiz 21st Century Network (21CN). Although BT said Marconi's telecoms gear was up to …

    IT Director 6 May 2005, 09:30

  • Intel: 65nm output to surpass 90nm production Q3 06

    Fast ramp

    Intel's first 65nm microprocessors are due to ship at the end of this year, with volume shipments taking place in Q1 2006. However, the company revealed yesterday it expects 65nm output numbers to surpass those of 90nm parts as quickly as Q3 2006. The first Intel chip fabbed at 65nm is expected to be 'Yonah', the dual-core next …

    System Builder 6 May 2005, 10:01

  • Europe annexes Caribbean islands

    Caymans in the wrong location for ICANN

    You often hear it said that the Internet is redrawing the map of the world, but little did any of us know that was a literal truth. Because - at least according to Internet overseer ICANN - 20,000 square miles of Caribbean water and land has been lifted intact, transported 5000 miles east and deposited in the heart of Europe …

    Music and Media 6 May 2005, 10:36

  • CWU accepts BT pay offer

    Completes 'long and tough negotiations'

    The Communications Workers' Union (CWU) is closer to settling this year's pay dispute with BT. Union bosses are recommending workers accept BT's 3.5 per cent pay increase to be backdated to 1 April. Throughout the pay talks - described by the CWU as "long and tough negotiations" - BT had offered a below-inflation deal which …

    IT Director 6 May 2005, 10:41

  • Aussie boffins patent single-photon generator

    One at a time, please

    A group of Australian scientists has developed a new technique for producing single photons at room temperature, paving the way for real-world quantum cryptography. The research team already holds a worldwide patent on their invention, and has secured a AUD3.3m ($2.6m) grant from the Victorian government to develop their …

    Science 6 May 2005, 10:45

  • Americans are pants at password security

    Willing to spill the beans for coffee vouchers

    Americans are just as blasé about password security as the Brits, according to a new survey. Two out three three people (180 of 272) approached in a downtown San Francisco street by researchers were happy to provide their password in exchange for a coffee gift card. Of those respondents that declined offering their actual …

    ID 6 May 2005, 10:51

  • Amazon.com leaks PalmOne LifeDrive info

    Basic specs, nice pictures

    All the speculation surrounding PalmOne's much-rumoured LifeDrive aka Tungsten X aka LifeDrive (again) has achieved a level of legitimacy: the product as appeared on Amazon.com. It will be called the PalmOne LifeDrive Mobile Manager, and while the details are sparse - nothing beyond the basic specs really - there are a host of …

    Mobile 6 May 2005, 11:21

  • Can IBM's Euro problems continue?

    They couldn't have been avoided

    This story has expired from The Register's archive. You can now find it at its original location on the Forbes.com website: http://forbes.com/technology/2005/05/05/cx_ld_0505ibm1.html?partner=theregister.

    Financial News 6 May 2005, 12:42

  • Pope's auto auctioned for $250,000

    Old banger

    The Pope's old motor has been snapped up for $250,000 after being auctioned off on eBay. The 1999 Volkswagen Golf was once owned by Cardinal Josef Ratzinger, before he was elected head of the Catholic Church last month and renamed Pope Benedict XVI. The car was bought by Benjamin Halbe, 21, earlier this year, although at the …

    Music and Media 6 May 2005, 12:55

  • One mobile phone for every European by 2007

    Launch of 3G will be catalyst

    Mobile penetration in Western Europe is expected to exceed 100 per cent by 2007, according to a new forecast issued by the research firm Analysys. The company predicts that penetration of mobile phones will grow from 90 per cent in 2004 to 98 per cent by 2006, before reaching the 100 per cent mark the following year. The …

    Mobile 6 May 2005, 13:09

  • McAfee charts course for turnaround

    Every day, in every way, we're getting better and better

    Anti-virus firm McAfee has reported a drop in first-quarter earnings despite increased turnover. For the quarter ending 31 March 2005, McAfee reported net income of $35.9m on revenues of $236m, compared to profits of $58m on a turnover of $219m in same period last year. The lowered results reflect a change in McAfee's business …

    Financial News 6 May 2005, 13:15

  • PC-dumping ex-prosecutor mired in teen porn scandal

    Binned hard drive reveals all

    A former Dutch prosecutor, who resigned last year after it emerged he had chucked his old PC out with the trash is in trouble again. The PC, which contained hundreds of pages of confidential information about high-profile cases, as well as former Dutch prosecutor Joost Tonino's social security number and personal tax files, …

    Public Sector 6 May 2005, 13:17

  • Apple vs Apple trial date set

    But will the Mac maker own the music industry by then?

    Apple Computer will face Apple Corporation, the Beatles' recording company, in court in just under a year's time. According to the Mac maker's latest 10-Q filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, the two Apples will battle it out over which of them has the right to use the word 'apple' in relation to the music …

    Mac Channel 6 May 2005, 13:18

  • Sci-fi solar sail tested in Cleveland

    Get the orchestra warmed up for a space-opera

    Space missions to the sun and inner solar system could be powered by solar sail within a decade, Californian researchers claim. Solar sails - thin sheets of material that use photons from the sun to propel craft through space - have been the stuff of science fiction for decades. Now scientists at ATK Space Systems are putting …

    Science 6 May 2005, 13:22

  • Mashboxx opens beta test scheme

    Exclusive Legal P2P client uses Shawn Fanning's Snocap, with added EMI

    Snocap, Napster creator Shawn Fanning's attempt to build a legal P2P music-sharing network, has signed major recording company EMI. Separately, Mashboxx, the first P2P software to leverage Snocap's tracking technology, launched a public beta-test programme today, calling on interested parties to sign up to express their …

    Music and Media 6 May 2005, 13:55

  • UK DrinkorDie members jailed for software piracy

    Trio face total of six years' imprisonment

    Three UK software counterfeiters who styled themselves as "latter-day Robin Hoods" received lengthy prison sentences today over their role in infamous software piracy organisation DrinkorDie. Another defendant escaped with a suspended sentence after a hearing at London's Old Bailey. Former city bank worker Alex Bell, 29, of …

    Music and Media 6 May 2005, 14:04

  • 'Unscheduled downtime' floors postmaster.co.uk

    Starting to come round though

    Email outfit postmaster.co.uk appears to be up and running again after reportedly going AWOL since Tuesday. One irate punter who hasn't been able to access his email for the last couple of days told us: "Do you guys happen to know WTF is going on with postmaster.co.uk? Their servers have been dead for nearly 48 hours, the …

    Financial News 6 May 2005, 14:06

  • Phobile retro mobile phone headset

    Review Those were the days...

    Following on from the huge success and notoriety of the Pokia handsets, online store Firebox.com has jumped on the bandwagon and released a cheaper version it calls the Phobile, writes Stuart Miles. Unlike its Pokia siblings which are custom made from original handsets and then sold for vast amounts of money on eBay, the …

    Reviews 6 May 2005, 14:21

  • PSP disc protection cracked

    Illegal game swaps not far off

    It was never going to take very long, of course, but hackers have at last worked out how to bypass the copy protection scheme used by Sony to lock down content on the PlayStation Portable's Universal Media Disc (UMD). Piracy doesn't appear to be an issue yet, since there's no way of copying games pulled from an official 1.8GB …

    Consoles 6 May 2005, 14:45

  • VAT on email troubles Reg readers

    Letters And no one is keen on signing avatars, either

    The notion that we might all owe VAT on the content of some of our emails really caught your attention this week. Plenty of you wrote in wondering similar things, so here follows a representative sample of the thoughts you've been having: You say "Emailing the data keeps it in a form where it's useful - spreadsheets, databases …

    Letters 6 May 2005, 16:23

  • Genome may be future step for virus writers

    Gene genie

    Advances in genetic circuits may mean that virologists will have to look at the mechanics of Internet worms for a model of future threats. Recent technological advances in so-called genetic circuits have brought closer a world where cells and viruses could be modified to more effectively serve humans, but also have raised …

    Malware 6 May 2005, 16:29

  • Fiorina ready to discuss 'most successful hi-tech merger in history'

    HPagiography

    Former HP CEO Carly Fiorina has reemerged as brash and bold as ever on the public speaking circuit. Fiorina is the Washington Speakers Bureau's newest featured presenter, knocking the likes of former FCC Chairman Michael Powell and former Secretary of State Colin Powell from the "spotlight" position on the company's web site. …

    IT Director 6 May 2005, 17:46