10th April 2009 Archive

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Tesla Roadster runs for 241 miles in Monte Carlo e-rally

'Leccy Tech On a single charge of the battery, too

As an answer to those who say e-cars will never take off because their range is limited, this isn't at all bad. A Tesla Roadster managed to cover 241 miles on a single charge while taking part in the Rallye Monte Carlo d'Energies Alternatives. Organised by the Automobile Club of Monaco, the annual rally is open to cars powered …

Reg Hardware 10 Apr 00:02
Apple muffles PC noisemakers

Acoustic Annoyance Model

A pair of Apple filings published Thursday by the US Patent and Trademark Office aim to lessen the annoyance provoked by your PC's various and sundry noise-making components by letting you take control of how it sounds. The first filing focuses on determining a user's opinion of various annoying sounds, then ameliorating them …

PCs & Chips 10 Apr 00:10
Apple bullish on iPhone refresh sales

100 million reasons why

Apple is apparently quite optimistic about its upcoming iPhone refresh, having ordered 100 million 8Gb NAND flash chips from Asian suppliers. According to a Thursday report by the Taiwanese market-watchers at DigiTimes, the chips were ordered mostly from Samsung. Apple's NAND grab, along with orders from Nokia and Sony, is …

Mobile 10 Apr 04:39
A Twitter PR agency: Just what the world needs now

Or how to stop your client doing a Britney in less than 140 characters

Social networking micro-blog site Twitter is the platform for start-up Twitter Partners to market twitterising services to businesses and celebrities. Twitter is a micro-blogging site where users can issue statements - so-called tweets - of up to 140 letters, saying what they are doing and thinking. It has become a platform …

Mobile 10 Apr 07:02
NetApp guarantees virtuality

Rapid virtual desktop cloning

NetApp is setting itself up as the natural storage partner for VMware server virtualisation, provisioning virtual desktops faster, associating its 50 per cent storage savings guarantee with VMware's 50 per cent server savings guarantee. The firm is putting its money where its mouth is by offering $1m of its kit and services to …

Storage 10 Apr 08:02
The mobile phone as self-inflicted surveillance

And if you don't have one, what have you got to hide?

Like the breadcrumbs in Hansel and Gretel, mobile phones leave a trail wherever they go. Practically everybody can be tracked via this trail, and the beauty of it all is, we're effectively tracking ourselves. By design, phones pass their location on to local base stations. You can gauge how effectively the networks can track …

Policing 10 Apr 09:02
Seagate shows off HDD-to-TV media player

Video FreeAgent Theatre demo'd

Click here for a more bandwidth-friendly version Can't see the video? Then download Flash Player from Adobe.com

Reg Hardware 10 Apr 09:02
Scareware scammers adopt cold call tactics

Supportonclick scam spreading

Scareware scammers are phoning up prospective marks in an effort to frighten people into buying software that has little or no value or utility. Rogue security (AKA scareware) packages are a growing problem. The number of such bogus packages in circulation rose from 2,850 in July to 9,287 in December 2008, tripling in number …

Security 10 Apr 11:02
How the government uses dirty data to legislate morality

So what's a standard deviation?

When it comes to sex and censorship, Government's insistence that laws are "evidence-based" is little more than hot air. The statistics quoted in support of any given case are frequently misleading, partial, and - according to one expert in this field - subject to highly unethical collusion of interest between government and …

Government 10 Apr 12:02
QLogic claims FCoE queue lead

Fills InfiniBand niche

QLogic says it is at the front of the FCoE queue. Talking with Henrik Hansen's QLogic's EMEA marketing director, we learn that QLogic is convinced it is well ahead of Emulex and Brocade with its Converged Network Adapter (CNA) efforts. These 8100 series cards, featuring a second generation ASIC, are available in 1- and 2-port …

Storage 10 Apr 13:02
Microsoft's 3DV acquisition a go

Digital depth detection

Microsoft is going ahead with its purchase of 3D real-time depth detection digital camera company 3DV, as reported at the beginning of April. The controlling shareholder of Israel-based 3DV, IDB Holding Corporation's Elron Electronic Industries and its subsidiary, Rafael Development Corporation, have signed a Memorandum of …

Business 10 Apr 16:07
Microsoft and Yahoo! resume mating ritual

Bartz eyeballs Ballmer

Microsoft and Yahoo! have entered "early discussions" on a possible search and advertising partnership, including a face-to-face meeting between new Yahoo! chief executive Carol Bartz and Microsoft boss Steve Ballmer. Citing "several sources with knowledge of the situation", All Things Digital has reported the two Google …

Financial News 10 Apr 17:04
Sun software - Does it make diddly?

Comment Give it away, and some day they'll pay. Maybe

With Sun Microsystems on the block - and perhaps on the chopping block - for the past several weeks, it is probably a good time to take a gander at the family jewels: Sun's software business. Sun likes to count downloads and the size of installed bases because the company's top brass believes this a kind of leading indicator …

Software 10 Apr 17:15
New Navy SEAL minisub's IT-system specs released

US frogmen to get inertial nav, 'plug & play' periscope

The secretive US Special Operations Command (SOCOM) has revealed the data-handling features it would like to see on its planned new fleet of mini submarines for use by elite US Navy frogman-commandos. At the moment, the famous yet hush-hush Navy SEALs use the Swimmer Delivery Vehicle (SDV) Mark 8 Mod 1, a large electrically- …

Science 10 Apr 17:16
Cable-cutting vandals disconnect Silicon Valley

Police searching for AT&T snippers

Police are on the lookout for saboteurs believed to have gone on a fiber-optic cable slashing spree on Thursday, leaving hundreds of thousands of Silicon Valley residents without internet access, landline, and mobile phone service for much of the day. California Bay Area officials say vandals cut four cables belonging to local …

Networks 10 Apr 18:40
Apple to surgically remove MobileMe parts

Time called on .Mac

Parts of Apple's MobileMe service grandfathered in from the company's previous online efforts will be shut down this summer. The most popular casualty is the .Mac HomePage, the simple-but-useful template-based web-page creation application. According to an Apple email that went out Friday, you will be able to access pages for …

Music and Media 10 Apr 18:42
Google streams data center pods to world+dog

Project Will Power hits YouTube

A week after it was shown to a group of industry engineers during a company event in Mountain View, Google has publicly released a video detailing its once top-secret data center design. As has been rumored for years - and as The Reg confirmed this fall - Google pieces together its data centers using intermodal shipping …

Servers 10 Apr 20:56
Microsoft ready for an open-source skoolin'

FAT patents pie

Sam Ramji wants more input from the open-source community, hoping to make Microsoft more responsive to their needs. The director of the open-source development lab at Microsoft has told a Linux Foundation event he's trying to educate Microsoft and slowly change its ways. The only way he can do that, Ramji said, is to hear from …

Software 10 Apr 21:21
Goldman Sachs seeks Goldman sucks site suit

Claims gripe blog confuses customers

Goldman Sachs certainly has its share of troubles these days but it's not about give up the little things that make life sweet. For instance, hiring a major Wall Street law firm to take down a blogger who may sully its sterling reputation. The Manhattan investment bank - which is struggling amidst a massive global recession, …

Business 10 Apr 22:10
IBM serves System S streaming super

Prototype lands in Canada

Information - which is what happens to data when you filter out useless stuff and add context so human beings can make decisions - cannot be easily generated or quickly integrated with business processes. The advent of the Internet and its various forms of media complicate the task of turning data into information, what …

Servers 10 Apr 23:09
Yahoo! gifts (more) boffins stuffed elephant

Hadoop fuels home page

Yahoo! has opened up its Google-battling Hadoop research cluster to three more big-name US universities. Yesterday, the company announced that The University of California at Berkeley, Cornell University, and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst are poised for large-scale data-crunching research on its M45 cluster, the 4 …

Servers 10 Apr 23:14
Teens reject Microsoft's Zune

Player's stairway to Heaven

Not a single teen plans to buy a Zune, Microsoft's ill-conceived challenger to Apple's iPod. And that's probably just as well, given it looks like Microsoft is sending its player heavenward following what's looking like the Zune's final physical manifestation. In a result that has more in common with North Korean election, a …

Music and Media 10 Apr 23:52