31st October 2008 Archive

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FCCer expects thumbs up for Goosoft white space plan

'Could be a 5-0 vote'

One of the FCC's five commissioners is "optimistic" the US government agency will approve chairman Kevin Martin's plan to unleash internet devices into the country's television white spaces. The plan was originally floated by strange bedfellows Google and Microsoft, along with several other big-name tech outfits, and it's set …

Mobile 31 Oct 2008, 00:00
Hubble back in full snapping mode

Returns fetching first image from main camera

The Hubble space telescope yesterday resumed "regular science operations" following the failure of the 'scope's operational Science Instrument Command and Data Handling unit (SIC&DH) back in September and susbsequent coaxing into life of the back-up unit (more details here). NASA yesterday released the first snap from the Wide …

Space 31 Oct 2008, 08:11
WD adds Firewire 800 to Mac-friendly hard drive

Western Digital has added a Firewire 800 interface to its Mac-oriented My Passport Studio external hard drive line, the better to appeal to buyers of Apple's new MacBook Pro. MacBook owners are, of course, stuck with slower USB 2.0 drives thanks to Apple's decision not to equip the consumer-oriented model with a Firewire port …

Reg Hardware 31 Oct 2008, 08:43
Can I connect two gadgets to one powerline Ethernet adaptor?

Q&A

Thanks for your review of the Netgear HDX101 powerline Ethernet adaptor. It's more technical than most I have found so far, but I have a question about it. I have two HDX101s and I'm very happy with them. I was wondering if you know whether it's possible to have the following setup. Modem to router then router to server and …

Reg Hardware 31 Oct 2008, 08:44
BT Global Services boss falls on sword

Profit warning sparks boardroom coup

BT issued a surprise profit warning this morning and saw its share price tumble by almost a fifth as a result. The telco announces results for the third quarter on 13 November. But it told the Stock Exchange this morning that although revenues had grown in line with expectations, profits have missed targets, especially in BT …

Channel Register 31 Oct 2008, 09:16
Sharp shows image-retaining LCD

Cut the power, still see a picture

Boffins at Sharp have come up with an LCD that continues to show a picture when the power's pulled. Demo'ing the technology in Japan this week, Sharp showed off black-and-white and colour versions of the panel, in a range of sizes running from 1.7in to 14.1in. Unfortunately, the company didn't say how it has brought e-paper …

Reg Hardware 31 Oct 2008, 09:18
Data Protection the DVLA Way

Just don't ask awkward questions

Don’t mess with the DVLA, or bad things might happen to your data. At least, that is the experience of Register reader, James Collins, who has been at odds with the DVLA for the best part of a year over what he believes to be serious inadequacies in its handling of penalty notices. Let’s park that issue for now. After a year …

Government 31 Oct 2008, 09:40
EMC heads towards CA and Tivoli turf

Automated server and network configuration management

EMC has launched two products that are aimed straight at CA and Tivoli in the automated compliance and configuration management areas. Storage integration is lacking and will come next year. The idea is to treat IT as a process delivering services which have to be compliant with regulations and best practices. EMC is expanding …

Storage 31 Oct 2008, 10:41
3PAR reverts to a loss

OPEX increase offsets sales rise

Beating Wall Street earnings estimates, 3PAR grew revenues 61 per cent in its second fiscal quarter of 2009, although it reported a net loss compared to a profit in the previous quarter. Q2 fiscal year 2009 revenues were $45.1m, a satisfying increase from the year-ago quarter's $28m, but the company had a GAAP net loss of $1. …

Storage 31 Oct 2008, 10:51
Century-old hydropower plant to run on fudge

Old Greek wisdom powers Yorkshire dales

Proof, if it were needed, that technical illiteracy is now well and truly out of control in the UK has been furnished in the last 24 hours by a rash of news reports on a small hydroelectric power plant. The Linton Falls generating station, built on the River Wharfe in the Yorkshire Dales in 1909 but out of action since 1948, is …

Environment 31 Oct 2008, 11:07
Isilon installs ex-NetApp channel boss

Improving quarterly results but still a loss

Leonard Iventosch, the previous and abruptly departed head of NetApp global channel sales, has turned up at Isilon as VP for channel and OEM sales. No public reason was given for Inventosch's exit from NetApp at the end of July. Three months later he is at Isilon, which makes and sells clustered network-attached storage (NAS) …

Channel Register 31 Oct 2008, 11:10
Nintendo DSi to come West next summer

Japanese roll-out tomorrow

Nintendo's media-savvy DSi handheld console could debut next summer, the videogames pioneer's President has said. Nintendo's DSi: coming here next year Speaking in Japan today ahead of tomorrow's local roll-out of the DSi, Satoru Iwata narrowed the previously stated overseas launch target of sometime in 2009 to a summertime …

Reg Hardware 31 Oct 2008, 11:40
Vodafone prices up first touchscreen BlackBerry

Storm to blow in on 11 November

Vodafone has priced up Research in Motion's touchscreen BlackBerry, the Storm 9500, and it's going to giving it away. Well, sort of. The iPhone-like handset will come free of charge, provided you're willing to cough of £35 a month for two years to get access to Vodafone's network. RIM's BlackBerry Storm: yours for up to £500 …

Reg Hardware 31 Oct 2008, 11:40
IPS dismissed 14 over data protection

Misconduct punished

The Identity and Passport Service has dismissed 14 people over the last three years, most for abusing access to the passport database. Of 16 cases where data protection was breached, all but one involved members of staff who had legitimate access to the Passport Application Support System database, and who used this for …

Government 31 Oct 2008, 11:44
House key copied from photo

Your door ain't so secure, mate

Security researchers have developed a technique for copying house keys using only a picture of a key. The approach - developed by computer scientists at UC San Diego - requires no physical access to keys and only a relatively low resolution picture for the software to work. Boffins at the university said they developed the …

Security 31 Oct 2008, 11:51
Sony Ericsson Walkman W595 music phone

Review Versatile slider that hits the right notes

Flag-flying top-of-the-rangers like the Walkman W902 and C905 are all very well for grabbing headlines, but the really big sellers are usually further down the range. And with the W595, Sony Ericsson might very well have a serious mid-tier box-shifter on its hands. Sony Ericsson's W595: funky-looking HSDPA-enabled 3G phone …

Reg Hardware 31 Oct 2008, 12:02
BOFH: Radiating sincerity

Episode 35 Wheely bad things are afoot

When you've got a problem it's always good to have a couple of bastards to call upon in times of trouble. Sadly, Brand and Ross aren't taking calls at the moment, so I have to call upon a fellow IT bastard, Jerry, for his thoughts... "So how big is this pile of monitors?" he asks. "180 last count," the PFY says. "And you …

BOFH 31 Oct 2008, 12:02
Sarah Palin's words get data mined

USA '08 Whoah, there's data here? Business analysis gets to work on VP transcripts

Business Intelligence (BI) is about extracting information from data. The name implies that it is only applicable to business information, but that’s misleading. Given the right techniques, information can be found in the most unexpected places - even in the speeches of vice-presidential candidates. Sarah Palin’s meteoric rise …

Bootnotes 31 Oct 2008, 12:19
Fujitsu buyout of Siemens stake is 'imminent'

Maybe next week

Fujitsu may buy out the Siemens half share in their Fujitsu Siemens Computers (FSC) joint-venture for half a billion dollars and sell off the PC and retail side of the business to Lenovo. According to a Bloomberg report a sum of 50-60 billion yen is involved, with a possible announcement next week. Siemens is known to want to …

Channel Register 31 Oct 2008, 12:54
Bumpkin's Brum — Roving Reg blogger hits the road

He wears skintight jeans and he’s off to Birmingham!!!

The sun glows a kind of burned cheese’n’onion Pringle yellow as it flops behind a rain-washed terrace, the wind sighs through a neighbour’s sickly privet hedge, a minicab driver irritably sounds his horn, unable to walk the five yards to his fare’s front door: Birmingham, the UK’s biggest city beginning with “B”, is my new home …

Bootnotes 31 Oct 2008, 12:57
Relocated Oz croc menaces tourist beaches

Find this reptile, and make it snappy

Oz's Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is taking a bit of stick for relocating a 3.5-metre crocodile to a north Queensland creek from where it has menaced nearby tourist beaches, the Australian reports. The EPA trapped the beast earlier this year 1000km south of its current home, close to the Cape York community of Bamaga …

Biology 31 Oct 2008, 12:58
Jesus Phone won't go to the Opera

Steve says no

Apple won't let Opera release its Mini browser for the iPhone, says the Opera boss. Jon von Tetzchner made the comments to the New York Times last week. It isn't a great surprise. Apple holds a monopoly on the distribution of iPhone applications, and can do what it likes in its self-appointed gatekeeper role. Apple has already …

Applications 31 Oct 2008, 13:25
Symantec plans layoffs as sales fall short

Ill wind blows forecasts off course

Symantec has announced plans to cut its wage bill by 4.5 per cent in a move likely to means hundreds of people will lose their jobs with the security and storage software firm. Chief financial officer James Beer also detailed previously announced plans to outsource work done by its IT and finance departments during a …

Malware 31 Oct 2008, 13:31
DARPA seeks crawling, burrowing river-recce sub bot

Contract inked for rinky-dink ink squirt squidroid

US weapons'n'rockets company Alliant Techsystems (ATK) has won a small military contract related to a planned underwater robot. The Unmanned Underwater Riverine Craft (UURC) will carry out "clandestine surveillance tasks in riverine and shallow water environments" using "bottom locomotion (crawling)" mode and "burrowing" …

Government 31 Oct 2008, 13:37
Google! Yahoo! looking! doubtful!

Microsoft back in the frame?

Google is considering walking away from its advertising deal with Yahoo! because the Department of Justice is demanding too much in return. The deal is currently on hold while it is assessed by the DoJ. Lawyers there have proposed some kind of reporting system to keep an eye on what prices the two would charge customers. …

Law 31 Oct 2008, 13:38
Elon Musk to bail out Tesla Motors with own money

Personally guarantees $100k supermilkfloat deliveries

Famous battery-supercar firm Tesla Motors has said that it expects to secure its financial position by raising further investment within a week, following rumours that it might not be able to deliver cars it has already taken deposits on. The company's new CEO and primary financial backer, PayPal multimillionaire and tech …

Financial News 31 Oct 2008, 14:32
Asus to phase out sub-10in Eee PCs, says CEO

Netbook de facto standard to be a 10in HDD model running XP

Buy your 7in and 8.9in Eee PCs while you can - Asus is going to phase them out next year, company chief Jerry Shen has revealed. Don't expect it to happen all of a sudden - Shen told DigiTimes it'll happen slowly. However long it takes, it's clear that Asus sees the 10in form-factor as the emerging standard for netbooks. Shen …

Reg Hardware 31 Oct 2008, 14:49
Ofcom pledges spectrum sell-off early next year

Auction is on while O2 digs heels in

Ofcom has issued another update on progress towards flogging off spectrum in the 2GHz band, this time stating that all the legal action should be finished off by February next year, allowing the regulator to put up the For Sale signs in March. The spectrum concerned comes in three chunks, and mobile operators T-Mobile and O2 …

Telecoms 31 Oct 2008, 14:59
Tablet MacBook launched... again

And still not by Apple

Tablet computing fans fed up with waiting for Apple to release a pen-powered Mac are at long last able to buy one thanks to US-based Mac upgrade specialist Other World Computing. OWC's Axiotron Modbook: a tablet Mac at last Slip OWC $1300 (£795/€1015) and send in your brand new metal MacBook, and the company will convert …

Reg Hardware 31 Oct 2008, 15:14
PayPal co-founder to bail out Tesla with own cash

Famous battery-supercar firm Tesla Motors has said that it expects to secure its financial position by raising further investment within a week, following rumours that it might not be able to deliver cars it has already taken deposits on. The company's new CEO and primary financial backer, PayPal multimillionaire and tech …

Reg Hardware 31 Oct 2008, 15:23
Halloween pardon sought for accused witches, sorta

PR-hungry costumiers jump on broomstick bandwagon

Campaigners are submitting a petition to the government today in the hope that hundreds of people executed as witches will be posthumously exonerated. The Times earnestly reports that the family behind a well-known costume hire company in the UK decided to try and achieve justice for the dead, in an altruistic and noble move …

Bootnotes 31 Oct 2008, 15:38
McAfee suspects fingered for $3.8m fraud

Billing for 'services not rendered'

Police have arrested a former marketing exec at anti-virus firm McAfee on suspicion of scammming millions of dollars out of the security software firm. Susan Despinic, 35, of Los Gatos, California and her husband Aurawm Almaneih, 37, were arrested on Wednesday over allegations they conspired together to misappropriate McAfee …

Crime 31 Oct 2008, 15:55
Daily Mail punts Georgina Baillie filth

NSFW Middle England cops an eyeful of...

The Daily Mail earlier today sought to squeeze extra value from the Manuelgate scandal by exposing some sordid secrets regarding Georgina Baillie's alleged life as "Mistress Voluptua - a dominatrix who charges clients £110 an hour for the dubious pleasures of being treated as her 'slave'". However, its original choice of snap …

Bootnotes 31 Oct 2008, 15:56
Sainsbury's to sell £99 DRM-free unlimited music

Carrots - milk - entire EMI catalogue

Supermarket chain Sainsbury's is amongst the retailers who'll be offering you a £99 a year unlimited music service that lets you keep the DRM-free songs you download. Datz's "Music Lounge" is a riposte to Nokia's Comes With Music bundle, and has several advantages: it's DRM free, and you don't need to buy a Nokia phone. Majors …

Music and Media 31 Oct 2008, 16:28
Sun freshens Solaris 10 for new iron

Zettabyte goes root

Sun Microsystems came in just under the wire with its Solaris 10 10/08 update, squeezing it out on the last day of the month. The company had intended to do the launch a few days ago, but pushed it out to the other side of its Q1 financial results. The 10/08 update is not a major release, something that Sun has not put into …

Operating Systems 31 Oct 2008, 16:40
Verizon-Alltel OK by DoJ

Must flog some assets

The US Justice Department has approved Verizon's takeover of Alltel, to create the largest mobile operator in the USA, as long as the company sells off assets in 22 states. The approval was expected, and Verizon has been working with the Justice Department to identify areas where the combined company might be at risk of …

Mobile 31 Oct 2008, 16:45
Steve Jobs poaches IBM chip and blade geek

Big Blue phones lawyers

Mark Papermaster, one of the top Power chip gurus at IBM and its current vice president in charge of its blade server development unit, wants to take a job at Apple as a technology adviser to Steve Jobs, the company's chief executive officer. After 26 years at Big Blue, you can probably imagine that a change would feel good. …

Servers 31 Oct 2008, 18:36
Security researchers lift the lid on Torpig banking Trojan

300K bank accounts compromised by backdoor code

Security researchers at RSA have uncovered how a banking Trojan may have stolen the login credentials of as many as 300,000 online bank accounts. The Sinowell (AKA Torpig) trojan has also lifted email and FTP account login details. Previous attempts to track the source of the Trojan have run into blind alleys. One popular …

Security 31 Oct 2008, 18:38
NAND revenues in two-year fall

iSuppli's gloomy forecast

Worldwide NAND flash revenue will fall for the first time on an annual basis in 2008 and is predicted to fall in 2009 as well. The forecast from iSuppli Corp. is for 2008 revenues to fall 14 per cent to $12b from 2007's $13.9bn. A further 15 per cent fall is expected in 2009 to $10.2bn. NAND flash revenue growth was above 100 …

Storage 31 Oct 2008, 18:41
Undetectable data-stealing trojan nabs 500,000 virtual wallets

Sinowal's evil genius

A well-organized crime gang has stolen credentials for more than a half-million financial accounts in less than three years using a sophisticated trojan that remains undetectable to the vast majority of its victims, a report published Friday warns. The haul of bank, credit, and debit card account numbers stolen by the Sinowal …

Security 31 Oct 2008, 19:41
Sprint accused of 'partitioning internet'

Snips Cogent connection

After a long contractual dispute between the two companies, Sprint-Nextel has severed the net connection it supplies to Cogent Communications, one of the world's largest bandwidth providers. As a result, many Sprint and Cogent customers are unable to communicate. The way Cogent sees it, Sprint has "partitioned" the internet. …

Networks 31 Oct 2008, 20:05
US court blocks Amazon-style patent trolls

Back to reality

A US court has made the task of getting patent protection for software and business methods a la Amazon's "One-Click" a whole lot more difficult. The ruling means businesses and individuals with a penchant for patenting trivial or abstract concepts, and suing over infringement, may soon receive a swift kick to the intangibles …

Law 31 Oct 2008, 20:48
Nokia's ~~Trolltech~~ Qt Software previews cross-platform IDE

In brief OMG ur a qt 2

Nokia-owned Qt Software (formerly Trolltech) today released a tech preview of its cross-platform environment for creating embedded applications on Mac, Windows, and Linux machines. "Project Greenhouse," now dubbed Qt Creator, is designed to be a lightweight and consistent IDE for the Qt application framework. The pre-release …

Developer 31 Oct 2008, 22:15