26th March 2010 Archive

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Google remarkets behavioral ad eyeball creep

The ad that stalks you

At the very least, it's yet another demonstration of Google's uniquely creepy ability to control what you see on the interwebs. On Thursday, Mountain View formally announced a behavioral targeting scheme that allows a third-party advertiser to place a piece of Google code on its website that will track your visits to the site …

Music and Media 26 Mar 00:09
Sun grows Oracle but stunts profits

The ups and downs of acquisition

All eyes were on Wall Street this afternoon as software giant and new hardware vendor Oracle reported sales of $6.4bn for its third quarter of fiscal 2010 ended in February, up 17 per cent from the year ago period. However, thanks to its $7.4bn acquisition of Sun Microsystems, which happened a month before the end of the quarter …

Servers 26 Mar 00:10
Segway + motorbike = futuristic dorkmobile

This Taurus isn't from Ford

Just when you thought that the Segway "self-balancing personal transportation device" concept had finally had a stake driven firmly through its überdorky heart, it's baaaack. But now you have a place to sit, and not be forced to stand up as must a Segway-mounted policeman, paramedic, or polo player. Perfect for posterior- …

Odds and Sods 26 Mar 00:49
Apple display patent enslaves sun

Or cute little umbrellas

An Apple patent application published Thursday describes a variety of techniques for capturing light from external sources to either replace or supplement traditional backlighting of electronic-device displays. The goals of the application, entitled "External Light Illumination of Display Screens", are threefold: to make …

Music and Media 26 Mar 01:57
Games console 'killer' powers Avatar 3D power package

Autodesk tests cloud services

A fledgling gaming service claimed to be a "console killer" is being used to test delivery of high-end 3D modeling and design software from the cloud. Autodesk has been testing the delivery of its signature AutoCAD, Maya - the visual effects software used by director James Cameron in Avatar - plus its Inventor and Revit …

Applications 26 Mar 02:58
Desktop Colour Laser Printers: Best Buys

Group Test And the winner is...

While any of these six printers can turn out a decent business page, with sharp black text and vibrant colour graphics, some definitely have more to offer than others and two stand out. The Reviews... Canon i-Sensys LBP5050 Dell 1320c HP Color LaserJet CP1215 Lexmark C540N OKI C3450N Xerox Phaser 6125 Colour Laser …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 07:55
Review Xerox Phaser 6125

This printer has the lowest official retail price in the group by a good way and this feeds through to typical internet prices, where it can be had for around £139. You might expect Xerox to have cut some corners to get to this price, but not a bit of it. The tall white machine with dark blue highlights has a full two-line …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 07:55
Review OKI C3450N

Alone among the printers in this group test, the OKI machine uses strips of high-intensity LEDs to illuminate its photoconductor drums, rather than laser beams. This makes for a simpler design, though in this case the machine is deeper from front to back than most. The controls are very simple, with just two buttons for on/ …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 07:56
Review Lexmark C540N

This is a comparatively big machine, in a case full of bumps and bulges, and has a similar arrangement of drums and toner cartridges to the Dell 1320C. It’s control panel is better than most, with a backlit two-line by 16-character LCD display and an array of six buttons to control functions. The 250-sheet paper tray at the …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 07:56
Review HP Color LaserJet CP1215

This printer and the Canon i-Sensys LBP5050 use the same colour laser engine, designed by Canon. HP puts it in a case of its own design, but there are still many similarities between the two machines. Set into the heavily curved front edge on the right is a simple control panel with a series of eight indicators and two control …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 07:57
Review Dell 1320c

Tall and black, this big, square Dell cube makes its presence felt on the desk. Paper feeds from a decent-capacity, 250-sheet paper tray and there’s a single-sheet multipurpose feed, too. The control panel is simple, but includes warning LEDs built into a useful schematic of the printer. What this Dell machine saves in desktop …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 07:57
Review Canon i-Sensys LBP5050

This is a squat machine, cased all in white, with a simple, LED-filled status panel. It has a single paper tray, holding just 150 sheets, which isn’t a lot if you print frequently. There’s a multi-feed slot for envelopes and other media. The machine uses a print engine integrated into the toner cartridge, with cartridges good …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 07:58
Buyer's Guide: Colour Laser Printers

Group Test What to watch out for

On price alone, you might think there’d be no contest between inkjets and colour laser printers, but the strength of the latter lies in areas other than the monetary bottom line. The key advantages are all results of the technology itself: cleaner quality print, more robust documents and higher print speed. In an inkjet …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 07:58
Dell and Caringo in OEM cahoots?

Comment Competes with EMC's Centera and Atmos

Dell's DX6000 object storage platform, built using unidentified partner technologies, is set to compete with MC's Centera and Atmos products. DX software looks to be sourced from Caringo. Caringo is a company that produces CAStor, a content-addressable storage (CAS) system in the Centera mould which is self-managing, built to …

Storage 26 Mar 08:41
Desktop Colour Laser Printers

Group Test Put some pep into your pictures

Laser printer have been hit hard by the rise of inkjet machines in the last ten years or so. Excellent inkjet print quality, especially in colour and on photo paper, caused many pundits to predict that was it for the laser - and the colour laser in particular. But laser printer makers have rallied to the cause, and in the last …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 08:44
Times websites want £1 a day from June

The Times They Are a-Chargin

The Times and the Sunday Times are set to charge for access to their websites from June. Rupert Murdoch said in August last year he wanted to charge for all his sites, though in November he suggested the firm could miss the June deadline. Rebekah Brooks, chief executive at News International, said: “These new sites, and the …

Music and Media 26 Mar 09:16
Apple's iPad to launch with 30,000-volume free library

Project Gutenberg provides public domain e-books

Apple's e-book reader application, iBooks, may be more widely available than anticipated, thanks to the inclusion of more than 30,000 free e-books from Project Gutenberg. Not longer after the iPad's January introduction, it emerged that iBooks might not feature on versions of the tablet sold outside the US because of licensing …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 09:50
Tesco Internet Phone rings off the hook

Another VoIP op goes titsup

Tesco is pulling the plug on its foray into VoIP, giving customers a month to find an alternative to its Tesco Internet Phone and Talk Wi-Fi services. From today customers can no longer top up their pre-paid accounts and refunds are available for outstanding credit. The supermarket will refund the cost of the handset if you …

VoIP 26 Mar 10:14
'Switch to Century Gothic to save the planet'

Arial will doom us all, says American IT director

A university CIO says that sysadmins determined to do their bit for the environment - and save cash on printer consumables - should switch fonts wherever possible to Century Gothic. Diane Blohowiak, Director of Computing and Information Technology at the University of Wisconsin at Green Bay, says she has switched the college's …

IT Director 26 Mar 10:27
Roger Boyes probes Vienna Boys’ Choir

Catholic paedo scandal? The Times has the man for the job

You know how it is: you've got a hot story on the Vienna Boys’ Choir that needs writing up pronto, so you put your top man on the job... ...and the next thing you know, the El Reg Friday Bootnote schoolboy innuendo sub-division is all over it. We got in touch with a chum at the Times who admitted that "poor Roger always …

Bootnotes 26 Mar 10:56
GSMA trials spam snitch scheme

Sling yer SMS hook

The GSMA is piloting a scheme allowing GSM users to report SMS spam to a standard short code, in the hope of stopping the trickle before it becomes a flood. The pilot will be offered to customers of AT&T, Korea Telecom and SFR, who will be able to forward spam texts to short code 7726 (T9 for "SPAM"), except where that's not …

Mobile 26 Mar 11:14
European conference sets agenda for cybercrime fight

Talking shop calls for tougher domain registration checks

The Council of Europe has called for a worldwide implementation of its Convention on Cybercrime to fight the growing problem of economic crime on the web. During the fifth annual CoE conference on cybrecrime in Strasburg this week, participants spoke in favour of greater international cooperation in sharing existing tools, …

Crime 26 Mar 11:17
Asus goes all out for SuperSpeed USB

Says dozens of USB 3.0 products coming

Asus is ramping up the number of device it offers with SuperSpeed USB 3.0 on board, announcing that more than 20 gadgets will feature the high-speed bus. The Taiwanese company has already launched a USB 3.0 motherboard, introduced late last year, and is preparing one of its O!Play set-top boxes with a SuperSpeed port. Asus' …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 11:24
Sarah's Law review skewed by handpicked sample

Home Office research raises questions

Home Office jubilation over the "success" of its sex offender disclosure scheme may be premature amid yet more evidence of the Home Office twisting research to suit its own agenda. That is the conclusion of sharp-eyed blogger, Hawktalk, who also questioned whether the way the scheme works in practice might create problems for …

Government 26 Mar 11:26
Lads from Lagos pose as US troops to snare unwary ladies

'Breaking hearts and bank accounts' on home front

The Lads from Lagos have struck again, this time posing online as US servicemen at war overseas in order to become "romantically involved" with American women fond of a man in uniform and then "prey on their emotions and patriotism". “We are seeing a number of scams being perpetrated on the internet, especially on social, …

Crime 26 Mar 11:29
How ready is your business for unified communications?

Workshop Probably more than you think

Although unified communications (UC) still has some way to go before it achieves mainstream adoption, businesses increasingly understand what it is and what it can deliver in terms of benefits to the business. Moreover, sentiment towards UC is generally positive, with a significant proportion of companies already having it on …

Unified Comms 26 Mar 11:50
IBM: Mainframe emulator part of a conspiracy

Comment The irrelevant market is ours - all of it

Let's start with the obvious: there was never a poor bald geek's chance with a supermodel that IBM was ever going to willingly license its z/OS and related systems software so it could run on the commercialized version of the open source Hercules mainframe hardware emulator for x64 iron. So the launch of the TurboHercules …

Servers 26 Mar 12:02
Samsung WB5000

Review A 24x superzoom that goes the distance?

In the world of the serious superzoom bridge cameras, Samsung’s WB5000 is currently the company’s only fully-loaded model. It sports an 24x f/2.8–5.0 zoom lens, a 12Mp sensor with with RAW mode shooting and 720p HD video recording. It also features dual optical and digital image stabilisation, two user-defined shooting modes and …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 12:02
Phorm turns up in Brazil

'Is it safe?'

After months lost in a jungle of its own creation, Phorm, the much-maligned internet monitoring and profiling outfit, today emerged with new hopes its technology and the tens of millions spent on it might bring some return. Brazil has long been a destination of choice for those who hit trouble in Britain, and Phorm is no …

Telecoms 26 Mar 12:14
Adaptec's caching card uses MS code

MaxIQ uses Redmond algorithms

Adaptec has announced benchmark results for its MaxIS solid state drive (SSD) caching card and revealed it's based on licensed Microsoft code. The MaxIQ card is equipped with 32GB Intel X25-E SSDs and is an add-on card to Adaptec's RAID controllers such as the 5Z, which link to SATA and/or SAS hard drives. In effect Adaptec …

Storage 26 Mar 12:24
Apple 'real cost' comparison shows inflation beaten mercilessly

See just how much we owe China

A look at how much old Apple products would cost if they were released today doesn't quite show what it hopes to - that the iPad is very good value - but it does provide an interesting insight into the economics of technology. Online deal site Vouchers.co.uk has run a table showing key Apple launches of the past 30-odd years, …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 12:37
The Pirate Party is the shape of things to come

Comment The Angry Brigade are real winners from the Mandybill

A clear winner is emerging from the Digital Economy Bill - and it's the UK Pirate Party. The penny only really dropped for me yesterday, after the Open Rights Group's big demonstration at Westminster. "What was all that about, Andrew?" someone asked me in the pub afterwards. He'd been at the Commons for a meeting, and walked …

Music and Media 26 Mar 12:40
Vast 'Cloud 9' sky-wedding balloon destroyed in Vegas prang

Disappointed punters offered baby rhino fondle instead

An eleven-story-high helium balloon used for aerial parties and sightseeing has crashed to the ground and been destroyed by a storm in Las Vegas, fortunately with no-one on board. The owners intend to offer visitors a petting zoo while a replacement balloon is constructed. The Cloud Nine balloon, described as "the largest …

Science 26 Mar 12:45
Durex India eStore spills customers' personal details

Not electronically tested

A site that sold Durex condoms in India has threatened a whistleblower with a legal nastygram in the wake of an admitted security breach involving leaked client details. Problems with the kohinoorpassion.com site surfaced earlier this month after a customer noticed that simply changing the order ID numbers in a URL allowed …

ID 26 Mar 13:04
UK.gov biz department wonders if Twitter is worth the effort

Survey garners just 71 responses so far

The UK government’s business, innovation and skills department (BIS) is currently peering into its own Web2.0 navel in an effort to work out if it’s wasting time and money on “social media” websites. Earlier this month, BIS kicked off an “informal” consultation into its Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube and podcast activities …

Government 26 Mar 13:22
Saga servers quiver for Cameron

Will webinar lead to website wobbles?

Staff at aged organisation Saga are all a-quiver this Friday in anticipation of a website meltdown when they start a live interview with Tory leader and grannies' favourite David Cameron. A spokesman for Saga told The Reg: "We're planning for a big surge in visitors but it is difficult to know how big." The interview has been …

Government 26 Mar 13:23
ERP deniers their own worst enemy

Workshop If only we could start again

As new ideas and technologies emerge and develop in IT, we typically go through a maturity curve. Lots of problems are reported in the early days as a result of unproven products and lack of market ‘know how’ which gradually disappear over time as offerings become more robust, experience is gained, and best practices are defined …

ERP 26 Mar 13:59
Third of UK students would strip their way through college

Quarter not sure if prostitution the job for them

A third of female students would happily top up their funds by stripping while four per cent would consider escort work as a way to make ends meet. The findings, which will strike fear into the hearts of parents across the UK, come from a survey of 1,022 female students by temp work webwise Studentgems. The poll found that …

Bootnotes 26 Mar 14:06
Alleged spy traitor's bail bid blocked

Tried to sell stolen data to Dutch, it's claimed

A former MI6 officer who allegedly attempted to sell Top Secret computer files to what he thought was a foreign intelligence agency has had his bail application rejected. Westminster magistrates remanded Daniel Houghton, 25, from Finsbury Park, on an Official Secrets Act charge and a Theft Act charge until a further hearing on …

Government 26 Mar 14:27
Orange days from major tariff refresh

Exclusive Animal magic?

Orange is just days away from revamping its pay-monthly packages, Reg Hardware has learned. On 31 March, Orange will "refresh" its Panther, Racoon and Dolphin packages, and bring back Canary. The mobile phone company would not comment on the changes, but detailed documents seen by Reg Hardware reveal all the imminent …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 15:14
Has Symantec sprinkled Veritas developers with pink slips?

Comment Rejigs storage strategy - is it right to retreat?

The fate of hundreds of Veritas developers hung in the balance this week as parent Symantec was rumoured to have killed off its S4 object storage development effort. Last week ESG's Steve Duplessie blogged that up to 600 Veritas developers and engineers of Veritas Volume Manager (VxVM), file system (VxFS) and Cluster Server ( …

Storage 26 Mar 15:16
World Cup-themed PDF attack kicks off

Poisoned guide spotted

Miscreants have booted a World Cup-themed email malware attack onto the web, taking advantage of existing material on the tournament. Booby-trapped emails are doing the rounds, posing as messages from African Safari organiser Greenlife. The emails contain an attached PDF file claiming to provide a guide to the first African …

Malware 26 Mar 15:20
Microsoft's Hotmail flicks finger at UK students

You can't have egg bacon spam and sausage without the spam

Microsoft’s Hotmail and Outlook Live servers keep getting stuck on a spamming loop that is locking many students and teaching staff at UK universities out of the firm’s email service. On 18 March, Microsoft admitted that Hotmail and Outlook Live users at the University of Bath and the University of Manchester were unable to …

Applications 26 Mar 15:42
Anglia defends Oxburgh's eco network ties

He's still our man for the job

The University of East Anglia has defended the choice of Lord Oxburgh to head its enquiry into Climategate. On Tuesday we revealed Oxburgh's leading role in a global warming campaign network called Globe International. Funded by the UN and the World Bank, Globe is a network for legislators. Oxburgh had disclosed a slew of …

Environment 26 Mar 15:47
Beijing erects giant pong-away sprays at rubbish dumps

See no evil, smell no evil

Beijing is putting up 100 giant deodorant sprays which can jet perfume over rubbish dumps in order to reduce their acrid smell. Continued economic growth in China means increasing pressure on landfill sites. Pressure also comes from China's growing middle class which increasingly complains about government decisions, just like …

Environment 26 Mar 16:00
Chattanooga devil dog eats cop cruiser

Vid Pepper spray and Taser cannot tame bulldog beast

Chattanooga cops have released a video of a one-sided encounter between officer Clayton Holmes's police cruiser and a local devil dog. According to the Chattanooga Times Free Press, Holmes was "running radar" and had stopped to file a report when he "reported he felt his car shaking and upon investigating he found the bulldog …

Bootnotes 26 Mar 16:22
Xbox 360 firmware update coming on 6 April

Adds support for USB keys, hard drives

It's official: the Xbox 360 is getting USB Mass Storage support on 6 April. And SanDisk will be releasing and Xbox-branded USB stick as a tie-in. The upshot: from that day - assuming you agree to the system update that will be pushed out over Xbox Live - you'll be able to connect any USB storage product - such as Buffalo's all …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 16:58
TechniSat Freesat set-top gets BBC iPlayer support

USB-connected wireless networking too

Own a TechniSat HDFS Freesat set-top box? You'll soon be able to gain access to BBC iPlayer on your telly if you do a couple of things. First, update the box's system software. TechniSat has begun pushing out an over-the-air patch that will enable the BBC's catch-up service. Second, plug a Wi-Fi adaptor into one of the box's …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 17:14
Vodafone: get your Sony Ericsson X10 from us on 2 April

Orange is not the only fruit

There's a huge buzz about the Xperia X10 - the upcoming Android smartphone from Sony Ericsson - and if you're keen to get your hands on one, Vodafone will set you a handset on 2 April, it said today. The operator said the X10 will be available for free on monthly contracts from £35 - with a two-year tie-in - providing 900 …

Reg Hardware 26 Mar 17:50
EMC to converge CLARiiON and Celerra arrays

Virtualised storage

EMC is about to converge its CLARiiON and Celerra arrays into a new V-CX product, according to a pair of sources with knowledge of the situation. This will be presented as virtualised unified storage with new levels of VMware integration, the sources say. The product will apparently come with iSCSI and FCoE block access and …

Storage 26 Mar 18:06
Mammoth patent ~~troll~~ holder snags smartphone threat

'Obscenely broad' implications

One of the largest US intellectual-property firms has acquired an "obscenely broad" patent that may cause migraines among the legal teams at Apple, Google, Palm, Motorola, NTC, and other smartphone makers. The patent in question is for motion-based smartphone control - the accelerometer-based technology found in nearly every …

Mobile 26 Mar 19:50
Microsoft to extend Silverlight for Mac?

No growing second-class status

HTML 5 in Internet Explorer may mean Microsoft is rejoined the league of civilized nations on browsers, but another Microsoft technology remains under lock and key more firmly than ever. Microsoft's Silverlight media player has, with version 4 due next month, gone from being closed source but able to work on other platforms - …

Developer 26 Mar 19:51
Nokia sharpens Vision with Novarra buy

Browser on board

Finnish phonemeaker Nokia has announced that it will acquire the privately-held, Chicago-based Novarra, makers of the Vision mobile browser and server platform. "By driving innovation in all segments of our portfolio, we are building one of the largest consumer audiences for web services and content," said NokiaEVP for service …

Mobile 26 Mar 20:59
Kit attacks Microsoft keyboards (and a whole lot more)

Sniffing and injecting 'private' traffic

Security researchers on Friday unveiled an open-source device that captures the traffic of a wide variety of wireless devices, including keyboards, medical devices, and remote controls. Keykeriki version 2 captures the entire data stream sent between wireless devices using a popular series of chips made by Norway-based Nordic …

Security 26 Mar 21:02
Apple pries iPad moniker from Fujitsu

But again: What about the bra?

A week and a day before Apple's "magical and revolutionary" iPad is scheduled to be released, Apple has finally acquired the rights to its name. As The Reg reported, shortly after Steve Jobs unveiled the iPad to the world on January 27, Fujitsu piped up to let Jobs know that he was using someone else's property. "It's our …

Music and Media 26 Mar 21:54