14th April 2009 Archive

Browse by publication date, or search the site.

Intel to help Chinese netbookers

New life for Linux

Intel is making it easier for Chinese white-box computer manufacturers to get into the hottest segment of the market by offering them netbook packages aimed at four market segments. According to a report Monday by Taiwanese industry-watcher DigiTimes, the four packages are defined by cost as follows (denominated in China's …

PCs & Chips 14 Apr 00:13
Conspiracy theories aplenty as Amazon delists gay books

Right wingers blamed

Gay and lesbian advocates took umbrage at Amazon.com on Monday after the online seller removed sales rankings for hundreds of books that contained homosexual themes. The delisting, which affected books including James Baldwin's Giovanni's Room, Rubyfruit Jungle by Rita Mae Brown, and Brokeback Mountain by Annie Proulx, has been …

Music and Media 14 Apr 00:16
NASA rover resurrected twice over Easter weekend

Mars explorer 'Spirit', of course

In what could be an attempt to trump Jesus of Nazareth's record for divine Easter resurrections, NASA has said its Mars Exploration Rover Spirit mysteriously rebooted twice during the holiday weekend. "While we don't have an explanation yet, we do know that Spirit's batteries are charged, the solar arrays are producing energy …

Science 14 Apr 00:32
Businesses will postpone Windows 7 rollouts

Vista left a nasty taste

Windows Vista's left such a bad taste in the mouth it's become one reason most organizations won't be moving to Windows 7 next year. A poll of 1,100 Windows customers has found 84 per cent won't be adopting the successor to Windows Vista during the next twelve months. The survey of IT and management staff by systems …

Operating Systems 14 Apr 00:37
IBM-free Sun unwraps Nehalem EP servers

Let's not talk about that Bigger Indigo thing

Sun Microsystems is today finally expected to unwrap two blades, four racks, and a tower workstation based on Intel's quad-core Nehalem EP Xeon 5500 processors. The launch follows a delay that pushed out this next generation of Galaxy servers by two weeks - probably caused by the hubbub surrounding that much discussed, planned …

Servers 14 Apr 04:02
Satyam sold to BT-backed Indian firm

Bargain buy or pig in a poke?

Tech Mahindra looks set to seize control of Satyam - the almost terminally troubled Indian outsourcer. Tech Mahindra has paid $351m for a 31 per cent stake in the firm - on top of the 31 per cent it already owned. This gives a rough value for Satyam of $1bn, a good premium on its current share even if it is only a fraction of …

Channel Register 14 Apr 08:54
EMC federates Symmetrix controllers in virtual matrix

Keanu Reeves to allegedly play Joe Tucci in film

EMC is announcing a V-Max top-end Symmetrix architecture and product that federates potentially hundreds of controllers across a RapidIO fabric, forming a virtual matrix and scaling to support hundreds of petabytes, thousands of virtual servers, and millions of IOPS. The Symmetrix V-Max product will co-exist with the current …

Channel Register 14 Apr 09:24
Storage firm hopes to cut IP litigation costs with escrow discovery

Laptop-in-locked-room idea to solve legal conundrum

A legal document storage company has launched a service that will allow teams of lawyers to examine disputed intellectual property assets in a monitored, secure room. Software would be examinable on a laptop with printing and networking disabled, it said. Legal archiving company Iron Mountain said that it is launching the …

Storage 14 Apr 09:47
eBay looks to flog useless stuff

Its, not yours

eBay has sold web bookmarking site StumbleUpon back to its founders, and could do the same with Skype, according to reports. The online tat bazaar swallowed StumbleUpon for $75m in 2007 in an apparently aimless fit of web 2.0 envy. It's now back in the hand of founders Garrett Camp and Geoff Smith, backed by venture capital. …

VoIP 14 Apr 09:48
Atrato adds SSD to its sealed arrays

Self-optimising software adds Skynet element to storage

Atrato, which supplies Velocity1000 arrays using sealed canisters of 2.5-inch hard drives, is adding solid state drive (SSD) storage and self-optimising software for extra performance. Atrato supports SSDs with either single-level cell (SLC) or multi-level cell (MLC) technology, or a combination of such SSDs. The SSDs can be …

Channel Register 14 Apr 10:21
Hybrid Jaguar XJ en-route?

'Leccy Tech Luxury eco travel

Come 2011, Jaguar will launch a Chevy Volt/Opel Ampera-swatting extended range electric hybrid version of its next generation XJ saloon. Jaguar's 2007 C-XF. The shape of things to come? According to a report by magazine Autocar, the leccy XJ will be capable of roughly 30 miles of battery powered travel before the range …

Reg Hardware 14 Apr 10:23
Nikon unveils the D5000

Take that, Canon 500D

Just weeks after Canon launched its entry-level 500D Digital SLR, Nikon has responded with its latest entry-level DSLR shooter: the D5000. Nikon's 12.3Mp D5000 DSLR Although only fitted with a 12.3Mp sensor – Canon’s 500D has a 15.1Mp sensor – the D5000’s most notable feature is its 2.7in “Vari-angle” LCD screen, which can …

Reg Hardware 14 Apr 10:24
Hair-stripping fungus threatens future of judo and sumo

Martial artists felled by itchy foot to the head

Japanese academics have warned that the national sports of sumo and judo are under threat of extinction because of the rapid spread of a fungal infection that is making participants' hair fall out. The All Japan Judo Federation has commissioned research into the spread of Trichophyton tonsurans, The Times reports, amidst fears …

Bootnotes 14 Apr 10:39
Labour flames whistleblowers in email smear brouhaha

Opinion Would have gotten away with it if not for pesky bloggers

As repercussions from the weekend's email-smear blogosphere meltdown continue to be felt at the highest levels in government, senior Labour figures are scrabbling to blame those responsible for the leaks of having obtained their story by unethical means - including hacking. Those at the centre of the row are being very clear …

Government 14 Apr 10:40
Nokia-branded laptop edging closer?

Finnish firm rumoured to be in production talks

A Taiwan-based PC manufacturer’s entered into talks with Nokia to potentially construct the Finnish mobile phone giant’s first notebook, it’s been reported. According to Chinese-language newspaper the Economic Daily News (EDN), by way of DigiTimes, Elitegroup Computer Systems (ECS) is currently in talks with Nokia over …

Reg Hardware 14 Apr 10:53
Brussels to sue UK over Phorm failures

Updated ICO and Phorm respond

The European Commission has revealed plans to sue the UK government over its failure to take any action against BT and Phorm for their secret broadband interception and profiling trials. Last year The Register revealed the pair had run covert wiretaps on tens of thousands of broadband lines in two trials in 2006 and 2007, to …

Telecoms 14 Apr 10:55
'Vista Capable' judge tosses class-action status - again

Plaintiffs can appeal or sue individually

Microsoft scored a second significant victory in the “Vista Capable” lawsuit late on Friday, after a federal judge declined to restore class-action status in the long-running case against the software giant. According to ComputerWorld, US District Court Judge Marsha Pechman denied a motion by the plaintiffs to recertify a …

Channel Register 14 Apr 11:01
Nokia N79 Active

Review Keep track of your ticker

You'll have seen from our review of the Nokia N79 that, even in bog standard form, it's an extremely capable multimedia powerhouse, equipped with a 5Mp camera, HSDPA connectivity, Wi-Fi and Assisted GPS. Nokia's N79 Active: complete with hear-rate monitor This latest incarnation, however, is aimed squarely at gym warriors, …

Reg Hardware 14 Apr 11:02
Profs: Facebook, Twitter users are lazy, thick, amoral

Worthless as people, as well as commercially

Fresh research from America confirms that online social networks are in fact playthings of the devil. Ohio profs say that use of Facebook leads to lower college grades, and others in California have found that Twitter gradually renders its users' moral compasses untrustworthy. First up comes Aryn Karpinski of Ohio State Uni, …

Bootnotes 14 Apr 11:06
Spam spurt fuelled by booming underground economy

Junk mail trebles as crooks barter for IDs

The expanding underground economy is fuelling an identity price war, with unskilled crooks now able to buy full personal identities for pennies, according to the latest edition of Symantec's Internet Threat Report. The study, published on Tuesday, reports that credit card details, names, addresses and date of births of …

ID 14 Apr 11:09
Sony talks up 'digital only format' PSP game

But only as a 'test case'

Sony has announced that an upcoming PlayStation Portable videogame may not be released on UMD. Instead the firm’s considering opting to release Patapon 2 on a “digital only format” as a “one time test case” for digital downloads. However, Sony Computer Entertainment America’s announcement should be taken with a pinch of salt …

Reg Hardware 14 Apr 11:28
Seagate sees more restructuring ahead

More jobs on the line

Seagate's third financial 2009 quarter revenue was better than feared but still lower than the previous quarter, and the company anticipates more restructuring to lower costs, indicating more jobs may be lost. The storage firm reported preliminary Q3 fy09 revenues of $2.1bn, compared to Q2 fy09's $2.27bn, better than the …

Storage 14 Apr 11:38
BT health problems will cost more jobs

Telco engaged in write-offs and job cuts

BT shares fell sharply this morning on rumours that it is to cut another 10,000 jobs and take a massive hit on the cost of its NHS work. The telco is preparing to cut 10,000 more jobs - alongside the 10,000 which have already gone. It will also use next month's results announcement to write £1.5bn off the value of ongoing …

Telecoms 14 Apr 11:49
More IBM contractors get rates cut

Elan feels the burn

Another group of contractors at Big Blue have had their pay rates cut, this time via recruitment outfit Elan. The company and Elan are remaining quiet on how much the rates have been cut by, but one anonymous source told The Register that it was by as much as 15 per cent. "This seems ridiculous to us, when the majority of …

Financial News 14 Apr 12:04
Play unveils AspireRevo launch date

And it's next month!

Online retailer Play.com has begun accepting UK pre-orders for Acer’s recently launched AspireRevo Ion-based small, cheap desktop PC. Play UK names the AspireRevo day, and prices According to the retailer, four models of the machine will be released on 18 May for between £180 ($267/€201) and £330 ($490/€369). All are based …

Reg Hardware 14 Apr 12:14
IDC: Linux to benefit from recession

And from the recovery, too

Economic turmoil has always driven change (and sometimes innovation) in the data centre, and this global recession will be no different. This time around, like the recession that started in 2001, it looks like Linux is going to be one of the big beneficiaries. That's the prognostication coming out of IDC, anyway, which was …

Operating Systems 14 Apr 12:35
US superputer nuke boffins puff mighty, arse-kicking GPU

Petaflop pipe-fatness touches 25 kilowrists

It almost goes without saying these days that if you have a powerful computer you should also have a powerful graphics card. This also holds true in the world of supercomputing: boffins operating the fifth most powerful known computer in the world - the "Intrepid" system at the Argonne US national laboratory - are chuffed as …

Servers 14 Apr 12:56
Goldman Sachs threatens blogger over demonic domain name

Sachs says Sachs 666 sucks

A blogger has taken legal action to defend his right to criticise bailed-out investment bank Goldman Sachs. The bank has threatened to sue over trade mark infringement, but the blogger has launched his own legal campaign to defend himself. Goldman Sachs was bailed out with $10 billion of US public money last year under the …

Law 14 Apr 13:07
One in ten PCs still vulnerable to Conficker exploit

Scared yet? Eh? Eh?

Many systems are still unprotected against the Conficker superworm, weeks after the malware began spreading across the internet creating a huge botnet of compromised machines thought to number in the millions. Data from enterprise users of Sophos's Endpoint Assessment Test, which checks the state of Windows PC patching and …

Malware 14 Apr 13:42
IPCC U-turn on Tomlinson CCTV

Did we say that?

The Independent Police Complaints Commission has admitted there could be CCTV footage of the moments before Ian Tomlinson was struck by police officers shortly before he suffered a fatal heart attack. Last week Nick Hardwick, head of the IPCC, said there was no CCTV footage of the incident during the G20 protests and there …

Policing 14 Apr 13:49
Brazilian ejected as lingerie arouses border staff suspicions

No cover-up at Newcastle airport

UK Border Agency officials in Newcastle were patting themselves on the back this weekend after they turned back a Brazillian woman, whose suitcase contained nothing more than a few T-shirts and an extensive collection of boudoir wear. The un-named 32-year-old was refused entry at Newcastle airport after border staff searched …

Bootnotes 14 Apr 13:51
Nintendo confirms MotionPlus launch

Extra motion sensitivity coming soon

Nintendo’s hotly anticipated MotionPlus add-on for the Wii Remote will launch into Europe slightly earlier than expected. MotionPlus will detect "every slight movement" A recently leaked document had led European gamers to think they wouldn't get their hands on the add-on until July. However, the Japanese gaming giant’s …

Reg Hardware 14 Apr 13:57
Fourth anti-virus firm buys into behavioural blocking

Veni, Vedi, Avinti

Web and email security firm Marshal8e6 has bought behaviour-based malware detection specialist Avinti. The terms of the deal, announced Tuesday, were undisclosed. Marshal8e6 said the deal would allow it to offer its customers improved protection against blended threats, emails that attempt to trick recipients into visiting …

Malware 14 Apr 14:35
Microsoft ends mainstream XP, Office 2003 support

Just click your heels together three times

Microsoft retired mainstream support for Windows XP and Office 2003 today - but that doesn’t necessarily mean anyone should be in a hurry to upgrade to Vista yet. The firm will continue to offer extended support packages on both products through to 8 April 2014, allowing businesses and individuals plenty of time to consider …

Software 14 Apr 15:02
Radiopaq punts 'custom tuned' cans

Rock earphones for rockers, Jazz for jazz fans...

Not content with acting only as a search engine for web-based audio, Radiopaq has branched out into audio hardware and designed a selection of earphones tuned to your musical tastes. Radiopaq's earphones emphasise the audio qualities of different music genres The firm’s launched four genres of Custom Tuned Earphones: …

Reg Hardware 14 Apr 15:19
Symmetrix and the death of monolithic arrays

V-Max is modular through and through

EMC's Symmetrix V-Max, announced today, represents the death of monolithic storage arrays and the rise of combined scale-up/scale-out modular arrays built from commodity components tied together with ASICs, very clever software and geographical distance cluster interconnects. It's also a tribute to 3PAR's T-Class InServ design …

Storage 14 Apr 15:36
NASA probes seek remnants of lost 'Theia' planet

Boffins: Ancient world smashed into us to create Moon

A pair of NASA "space weather" monitoring spacecraft are having something of a change of pace, as they search for evidence of a long-lost world which may once have crashed into the Earth, and so formed the Moon. The two probes in question are those of the space agency's Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO) …

Physics 14 Apr 15:51
Former Qwest CEO headed to prison

Dot-com, insider-trading stir

Qwest International's former chief executive is finally heading to jail, nearly two years after being found guilty in a massive case of insider dealing. Joseph Nacchio is expected to today report to a minimum-security prison in Pennsylvania after a federal appeals court denied his emergency request to remain at liberty while …

Business 14 Apr 17:52
Microsoft extends Red-Ring-of-Death cover to fresh Xbox fault

E74 - a failure in any language

Just as Microsoft had recovered from the Xbox 360's notorious "Red Ring of Death" fiasco another big hardware error has begun slaughtering its boxes. The Xbox 360 "E74 error" has become enough of a problem that Microsoft is now covering it under the console's extended three-year warranty reserved for RRoD failures. Redmond is …

Music and Media 14 Apr 18:20
Dell chases Sparc shops with migration offer

You and everybody else, Michael

Server makers have been picking on the Sparc/Solaris base for so long that it seems normal. But with faith in Sun Microsystems being shaken after it rejected a takeover bid by rival IBM two weekends ago, and with Sun announcing its own "Nehalem EP" Xeon 5500 servers today, Dell decided that this was a particularly good time to …

Servers 14 Apr 18:42
Cisco dismisses 'hefty' layoffs rumor

Smells not quite right

Cisco Systems has dismissed predictions of a 10 per cent reduction in headcount from a JPMorgan analyst. Ehud Gelblum has gone out on a limb and said Cisco “could” announce the 10 per cent cut and “could” save the company about $900m (£600m) a year through the move according to report by the Silicon Alley Insider. The Insider …

Business 14 Apr 18:59
Toshiba secretly working on TG02 and TG03?

Leaked document reveals Tosh's phone roadmap

Toshiba’s recently unveiled TG01 smartphone isn’t even out yet, but a leaked document’s apparently uncovered evidence of two further phones in the TG line. A leaked slide reveals some of the TG02's features According to a report by website Techblog, the document – from sources unknown – not only appears to signal a second …

Reg Hardware 14 Apr 19:02
Google gives a peek of Android 1.5

UIs, tools and APIs revealed

Google has announced the availability of an "early look" at the SDK for the next version of its Linux-based Android mobile operating system, version 1.5. Highlights include UI refinements such as animated window transitions and accelerometer-based application rotation, a soft keyboard and support for third-party keyboards, …

Mobile 14 Apr 19:33
Tesla to open London showroom

'Leccy Tech Firm's first non-North American abode

Californian ‘leccy car maker Tesla has announced plans to build its first showroom outside of North America in Blighty. Tesla's Model S (left) and Roadster (right) will, eventually, be available to buy in London The firm’s Sales and Service Centre will be built in London’s famous Knightsbridge district, on a site previously …

Reg Hardware 14 Apr 20:02
BSA hijacks Somali pirate hype

Yo Ho Ho...ld on a minute

As the world's media continues to follow the scourge of piracy off the coast of Somalia, perhaps it's time to take another look at the label of "pirate" for copyright thieves. It's an oddly accepted title on both sides in the debate on illegal software and content. Sure, some have adopted the name in pseudo-jest while others …

Channel Register 14 Apr 20:26
SLED 11: a distro for businesses, not idealists

Review Fruit of Novell's Microsoft marriage delivers

SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop (SLED) is perhaps best known as the distro whose owner Novell, in 2005, signed an extremely unpopular patent-protection deal with Microsoft. From that moment on, Novell was essentially dead to those that prize the free software aspects of Linux. Given SLED's $120 price tag, individuals unconcerned …

Operating Systems 14 Apr 22:59
eBay to divorce Skype on Wall St

Hangs up on Web 2.0 telco dream

eBay plans to spin off Skype sometime in 2010, having failed to turn itself into a Web 2.0 telecoms hybrid. eBay said today it's targeting an initial public offering for Skype in the first half of next year. The IPO idea follows recent rumors that Skype founders Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis were rounding up private equity …

Business 14 Apr 23:33
Student sentenced for F-ucked up grade hack

Act of ~~God~~ clods

A university student in Florida on Tuesday was sentenced to 22 months in prison for his role in a bungled scheme to hack into his school’s computer system and make hundreds of grade changes. Christopher Jacquette, 29, of Tallahassee was also ordered to serve three years of supervised release for his part in the plot, which …

Security 14 Apr 23:52