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17th January 2012 Archive

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  • Motorola Xoom 2 Media Edition Android tablet

    Review Size of relief

    Like Goldilocks with porridge, I’ve yet to find a tablet size that I think is just right. Seven inch models are too small, 10.1 inchers too big. The iPad with its 9.7in screen should do the trick but it’s just too square for me – physically and metaphorically. Cut down to size: Motorola's Xoom 2 Media Edition Motorola may …

    Tablets 17 Jan 2012, 07:00

  • Taxman two months late on cyber-crimefighters deadline

    HMRC still wants our dosh on time though

    HMRC has missed a key deadline to create teams of cyber crime investigators and launch initiatives to counter the increased threat of web attacks on the authority's systems and customers. In its structural reform plan progress report (PDF) for December, HMRC says work on the project should have been completed by November 2011 …

    Security 17 Jan 2012, 08:04

  • Olympics volunteers urged not to blab online

    A journo might be reading, fear organisers

    Volunteers at this year's Olympics should not "get involved in detailed discussion about the games online", according to guildelines issued by organisers, a report says. A spokesman for the London Organising Committee (LOCOG) told Out-Law.com that the volunteers, known as 'Games Makers', would be advised to go through official …

    Security 17 Jan 2012, 09:02

  • OCZ refunds punter for dud drive shortly after El Reg steps in

    Pure coincidence

    OCZ promises to refund purchasers of failed solid-state drives, but at least in one case it seemed unable to do so - until Vulture Central poked its beak in. Dorothy Perry had three OCZ Agility SSDs fail over a period of about two years. The bricked flash drives wouldn't even show up in her PC's BIOS or that of another PC she …

    The Channel 17 Jan 2012, 09:31

  • First ever private rocket to space station in launch delay

    'We'll go when we're good and ready', say Musk rocketeers

    SpaceX, the private rocket firm helmed and in large part bankrolled by famous nerdwealth biz kingpin Elon Musk, has announced that its first attempt to send one of its Dragon capsules to the International Space Station will be further delayed. Breathes fire - but it needs to show it can fly, again It had been tentatively …

    Science 17 Jan 2012, 09:51

  • WikiHow

    Android App of the Week The RTFM guide to life

    All you techies, spare a thought for the dumb-as-a-bag-of-spanners portion of humanity who don’t know how to use, maintain or get the most from the gadgets they already own. To the rescue of the benighted masses comes WikiHow, a compendium of 'how to...' guides ranging from cleaning the screen of your telly or smartphone, …

    Phones 17 Jan 2012, 10:00

  • GAME: Our website wasn't hacked!

    Leaked account login details are bogus, says chain

    Video games purveyor GAME says it has not been hacked after reports yesterday claimed that the retail biz had suffered a security breach. A list that purported to be 200 email addresses and unprotected clear text passwords from GAME was posted on Pastebin, sparking widely reported hacking fears on Monday. However, after …

    Games 17 Jan 2012, 10:18

  • AMD readies answer to Intel's Ultrabook

    'Ultrathin' PC, anyone?

    How powerful is the Ultrabook brand? AMD is betting it is less important to punters - and laptop vendors - than price. The chip maker is to launch a platform for skinny machines in Q2. According to moles, AMD's "Ultrathin" platform will debut in June with a view to costing computer makers 10-20 per cent less than Intel's …

    Laptops 17 Jan 2012, 10:33

  • Symantec gobbles email warehouse LiveOffice

    Cloudy archiving for just $115m

    Symantec has gone and bought itself a cloud archiver, LiveOffice, for $115m, and is now integrating its archival storage and eDiscovering offerings more closely. Symantec is basing a better information governance pitch on this acquisition. Privately held and venture-funded LiveOffice was founded in 1998 and is headquartered …

    Cloud 17 Jan 2012, 10:41

  • Steve Jobs action figure kicks the bucket

    GI Jobs KIA

    The Steve Jobs action figure project has been killed, although this time there was no "Oh Wow" moment, and the move was hardly a shocker. The 12in figurine drew much attention when Chinese sculpture maker InIcons announced plans to bring the 'GI Jobs' to retail in February. Unsurprisingly, Apple got rather annoyed about the …

    Hardware 17 Jan 2012, 10:51

  • Clouds must be transparent

    Deep Dive Customers want to see what they're paying for

    Public cloud computing won’t be successful unless its providers make the full breadth of services transparent and accountable. Customers must be able to see what they are getting and know it has been delivered. Infrastructure and focus I work in infrastructure. That means I’m most concerned with the hardware, software and …

    The Channel 17 Jan 2012, 11:00

  • Zombie Olympics ticket resale site resurrected TODAY

    Oh, you want to buy a pass? Wait until April

    London 2012 organisers are finally, albeit partially, reanimating their swamped ticket resale website. The government-owned Locog firm - in charge of bringing the Olympic Games to Blighty's capital later this year - was forced to pull the plug on its ticket system hours after it launched earlier this month. The website briefly …

    Media 17 Jan 2012, 11:14

  • Sony goes SuperSpeed with MicroVault Mach

    USB 3.0 Flash drives ahoy!

    Sony has upgraded its MicroVault line of USB Flash drives to USB 3.0. The aluminium-cased MicroVault Mach family runs from 8GB to 64GB, and Sony promised read speeds of up to 120MBps on all the drives by the 8GB model, which runs to 60MBps. Write speeds on the faster drives reach 90MBps. The four Sony MicroVault Mach drives …

    Hardware 17 Jan 2012, 11:23

  • Apple will not kill iPad 2 at iPad 3 debut

    LCD orders suggest 25m old iPads to ship this year

    Apple is ordering fewer 9.7in, 1024 x 768 IPS LCD panels but it hasn't cut out the part entirely. That suggests it does indeed plan to continue selling the iPad 2 after the LTE-equipped iPad 3 has gone on sale in March. According to whispers from the Asian display supply chain, the Mac maker asked for 1m 9.7in, 2048 x 1536 …

    Tablets 17 Jan 2012, 11:23

  • Iraq demands return of Saddam Hussein's arse

    Ex-SAS bloke in bronze rump rumpus

    The Iraqi government is demanding the return of a piece of Saddam Hussein's tyrannical arse "liberated" by a former SAS soldier during the fall of the dictator's regime in 2003. Nigel "Spud" Ely was acting as bodyguard for a TV news crew during the coalition's overthrow of Hussein. Arriving in Baghdad shortly after jubilant …

    Government 17 Jan 2012, 11:31

  • Xmas actually accelerates Dixons sales drop

    Hardware sellers record 5% quarterly fall in sales

    Dixons are facing a grim new year as it was revealed that the Christmas season actually accelerated their decline in sales. Takings across Dixons stores and the Currys and PC World outlets run by the company fell by 5 per cent compared to the quarter before, reveal figures published today. That fall follows a drop of 3 per …

    The Channel 17 Jan 2012, 11:43

  • Japanese boffins fear virus nicked spacecraft blueprints

    Tokyo, we have a problem

    Japanese space engineers have admitted one of their computers has been infected by a Trojan that may have leaked sensitive data, including system login information, to hackers. The breach also exposed blueprints stored in the attacked terminal, according to a statement by the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). …

    Science 17 Jan 2012, 12:03

  • RIM BlackBerry Bold 9790

    Review Touch and type slimline smartie

    A recent rash of BlackBerry 7 handsets sees RIM's Bold 9790 sitting in the middle of the range and with a tempting feature set for BBM fans. For starters, the manufacturer's classic Qwerty keyboard is paired up with a touchscreen. RIM's BlackBerry Bold 9790 Compared to the Bold 9900, the Bold 9790 has a less powerful …

    Phones 17 Jan 2012, 12:03

  • Darwin's lost fossils found down the back of a cupboard

    Always in the last place you'd look - a vault in Surrey

    Fossils collected by a young Charles Darwin have been discovered in a gloomy corner of a British Geological Survey vault. The treasure trove of fossilised wood, stone and vegetation includes samples that Darwin collected on the HMS Beagle journey during which he came up with his theory of evolution. Lost for 165 years, the …

    Science 17 Jan 2012, 12:11

  • Apple offers cash for old kit

    iDevices, Macs, PCs even

    Apple has begun paying punters for any of its old products they own but no longer want. The service, run on the Mac maker's behalf by German recycling operation Dataserv, allows you to post your kit free of charge to the company and, if the gadget is in good working order and, if it has one, an unbroken screen, you'll get a …

    Hardware 17 Jan 2012, 12:14

  • RIM readies 7in, 10in BlackBerry tablets for 2012

    Second time lucky?

    RIM seems unwilling to give up on tablets, if what's claimed to be a leaked roadmap is correct. According to the tabulation of the BlackBerry company's plans, a revamped 7in PlayBook will be out in April. It will sport improved, 3G HSPA+ connectivity, fansite 3NBB reports. By Christmas, RIM will have released a 10in PlayBook …

    Tablets 17 Jan 2012, 12:31

  • Microsoft raises 'state of the art' son of NTFS

    Will join forces with Storage Spaces in Windows 8

    Microsoft has unveiled a "state of the art" file system for the next 10 years that builds on NTFS. Named Resilient File System (ReFS), Microsoft's latest baby will be delivered with Windows 8 Server and become the foundation of storage on Windows Clients. ReFS will be used with Windows 8's Storage Spaces, a feature in …

    Developer 17 Jan 2012, 12:46

  • Google accused of vandalising OpenStreetMap

    But OSM admin dismisses claim as 'mountain out of tiny pimples'

    Google has once again been accused of underhand business tactics, this time by OpenStreetMap. The not-for-profit organisation published a light-on-detail blog post alleging that Mountain View was "moving and abusing" the mapping outfit's data. However the very same post appears to have been completely debunked by an OSM …

    Developer 17 Jan 2012, 12:57

  • Woz praises Android, blasts iPhone limitations

    Apple co-founder speaks out

    Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak has underlined his love for Android handsets, stating his gripes with the iPhone and why in many ways he prefers Google's OS. He even claimed voice commands worked better on Android, as does the GPS system, the Daily Beast reports. “My primary phone is the iPhone, I love the beauty of it. But I …

    Phones 17 Jan 2012, 12:59

  • NSA constructs hardened Android, unleashes it on world

    Vicious apps squashed by super-spook mobile OS

    The US Defense Department's The National Security Agency (NSA) has released a security-hardened version of Google's mobile OS, Android. The spook-enhanced build of the operating system was released last week and is based on SELinux, also created by the National Security Agency. The inaugural release of the SE Android project …

    Security 17 Jan 2012, 13:23

  • Work from home, find a new hobby, buy a fountain - UK.gov

    New advice site saves your boss cash while you stay in bed

    Anywhere Working, the government-backed initiative to get us chipping in towards the cost of offices, now has a working website hub portal and advice on picking the perfect fountain. The scheme was launched in November by then-transport minister (and Lib Dem) Norman Baker, who's now been replaced by the Conservative Justine …

    Government 17 Jan 2012, 13:43

  • Porno cyber-squatter landed in Branson pickle

    Richardbranson.xxx is Virgin on ridiculous, complains Sir

    Virgin Group founder Sir Richard Branson has filed a cybersquatting complaint over the domain name richardbranson.xxx. Branson is one of the first people to use ICANN's snappily titled Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) to try to reclaim a potentially embarrassing address in the new porn-friendly .xxx space …

    Hosting 17 Jan 2012, 14:01

  • Fresh Apple lawsuits target 15 Samsung gadgets

    Design ethos nicked, allegedly

    Apple is having another go at Samsung, telling a German court that it thinks ten of the South Korean giant's phones ape its established design language. It's going after five Samsung tablets too, in a separate action. The iPhone maker wants the Dusseldorf Regional Court to ban the allegedly offending gadgets from sale, …

    Phones 17 Jan 2012, 14:02

  • Motorola strengthens Defy+ with JCB logo

    Do ya dig it?

    Motorola's Defy+ handset is already touted as a tough-as-nails smartphone, embracing the elements and surviving tumbles from great heights. However, for those who need to turn things up to 11, the company has teamed with digger maker JCB to launch an even more rugged version of the beefy blower. The limited edition JCB …

    Phones 17 Jan 2012, 14:09

  • White House shelves SOPA... now what?

    Analysis We can ditch the laws when the Valley's snotty web teens grow up

    I am going to propose something that may sound radical, but really isn't. Legislation like SOPA ideally isn't necessary in an ideal world, and this idea comes about through voluntary agreeement. The Stop Online Piracy Act was proposed because of a tragic impasse, a lack of agreement between two powerful and deeply entrenched …

    Law 17 Jan 2012, 14:23

  • McDonald's punters offered sex in exchange for Chicken McNuggets

    Drive-thru strumpet cuffed for fast food indecent proposal

    A Los Angeles woman earned herself a cuffing for allegedly offering McDonald's drive-thru punters "sexual favours" in return for Chicken McNuggets. According to this report, Khadijah Baseer made her pitch at the fast-food outlet in West Olive Avenue, Burbank, last Wednesday night. She "opened customers’ car doors" and …

    Bootnotes 17 Jan 2012, 14:42

  • Samsung to raise $1bn in US bonds for Texas plant

    Punts MeeGo carcass into Bada fold

    Samsung is planning to raise a billion dollars to fund US expansion, and will be pushing Tizen onto Americans as a Bada-compatible platform, with Intel's help. The bonds will have a five-year maturity, with the money being used to expand production at Samsung's Austin factory in a move which Bloomberg attributes to the …

    Financial News 17 Jan 2012, 15:02

  • Nekkid Tech: Why Amazon is the crack dealer of cloud

    Podcast Funk soul brother

    Greg Knieriemen and trusty sidekick Ed Saipetch have posted another Nekkid Tech classic. This week they chat to Mark Twomey (aka "StorageZilla") and "disruptive tech diva" Christina Weil. This week: Ed and Greg figure out data plans in Europe; Thai massage parlours in Soho; Spotify vs Pandora; Fatboy Slim's subliminal …

    Cloud 17 Jan 2012, 15:29

  • Amazon blows $95m on Chinese warehouse

    Parks more gift-laden tanks on China's lawn

    Amazon is reportedly pumping $95m (£61m) into an e-commerce distribution centre in the Chinese city of Nanning, Guangxi Province. The Kindle maker inked a deal with the Economic and Technological Development Zone in Nanning on Monday, according to a report in The Shanghai Daily. The warehouse located in the Beibu Gulf …

    The Channel 17 Jan 2012, 16:01

  • HP hawks huge 132in 'tablet'

    Monster multi-touch fondle... wall

    HP unveiled a behemoth this week, catering for the BFGs of the world with a 132in multi-touch display. The HP VantagePoint is made up of six 47in, 1366 x 768 screens linked together and covered in tough Gorilla Glass. The prodigious panel packs a combined resolution of 4098 x 1536 and supports 32 simultaneous touch-points. …

    Hardware 17 Jan 2012, 16:24

  • Women pick the family's mobile tech - and pay for it too

    Sit down chaps, it's nothing for you to worry your little heads about

    American women are increasingly selecting their families' mobile tech, and paying the bills too, according to the latest figures from US wireless trade body CTIA. The company asked just over 1,000 women within families who was calling the wireless shots. Around 94 per cent told the CTIA they were "primarily responsible or …

    Phones 17 Jan 2012, 16:33

  • Enterprise IT's power shift threatens server-huggers

    Open ... and Shut Users get what they need, not what you want

    It's not that the role of enterprise IT is dying. It's just that it's changing so much that it may soon be virtually unrecognisable from its golden age of installing servers and managing data centres. As more developers take on the task of building, deploying, and running applications on infrastructure outsourced to Amazon and …

    The Channel 17 Jan 2012, 17:02

  • Cloudy servers shoot to the stratosphere

    Rise of the ODMs

    Building out cloudy server and storage services as well as support the gazillion of apps running on iOS and Android devices has the cloudy server business absolutely exploding, say the box-counters at market researcher iSuppli. In its just-released Compute Platforms (PDF) report, analysts Peter Lin and Matthew Wilkins say that …

    Cloud 17 Jan 2012, 17:34

  • Boffins quarrel over ridding world of leap seconds

    What should set the time - atomic watches or the sunrise?

    The measurement and regulation of time could start to change this week if an ITU meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, gives the nod. International Telecommunication Union members are discussing whether Co-ordinated Universal Time (UTC) should be set using a system that does not factor in the Earth's imperfect spin – which …

    Science 17 Jan 2012, 18:02

  • ScaleXtreme makes cloud hopping easier

    Xpert system, Xpress freebie take on the big boys

    Cloudy toolmaker ScaleXtreme has rolled out an easier-to-use update to its Xpert server-admin tool in its continuing effort to take on the big initials of systems management: IBM, HP, BMC, and CA. You have to keep the heat on if you want to win business from incumbents in the data center. Since the launch of its Xpert service …

    Cloud 17 Jan 2012, 18:11

  • Rumoured 'GarageBand for e-books' to bulldoze textbook biz

    Apple hype machine powers up for Thursday

    A new app from Apple will emerge this week allowing users to create their own books - and steamroller the textbook industry - according to moles claiming to be close to the fruity tech titan. All we know for sure is that the iPhone maker will hold an e-book-related media event on Thursday - it may not sound like the hottest …

    Applications 17 Jan 2012, 18:34

  • Nissan unveils 'self-healing' iPhone case

    Magic auto paint vanquishes scratched shiny-shiny

    Japanese automaker Nissan's European arm is migrating the company's "pioneering self-healing paint" to the world of pocketable shiny-shiny, introducing an iPhone case that removes its own scratches with nary a buff nor a polish. "The Scratch Shield iPhone case is a great example of us taking a Nissan automotive technology that …

    Phones 17 Jan 2012, 20:43

  • Southern Cross Cable offers discount bandwidth

    Beefs up network for NBN and UFB action

    The Southern Cross Cable network has increased capacity and dropped its prices by 44 percent to keep up with competitive projects. Southern Cross told customers of availability of the first 200 Gigabits of capacity from its latest upgrade, along with the price reduction. The antipodean cable consortium also announced the …

    Business 17 Jan 2012, 21:30

  • NEC claims terabit-plus record with 10,000 km hop

    High capacity for oceanic links

    NEC has demonstrated a single fibre link – with no repeaters – running at 1.5 terabits per second over 10,000 km. The company says this is the first time that a single laser source has sent a terabit channel over such a distance. The lab setup achieved an aggregate of 4 Tbps by binding four “superchannels” together using …

    Business 17 Jan 2012, 22:00

  • Google to join Wednesday's anti-SOPA protest

    Updated No blackout, though other website shutdowns multiply

    Google will join Wednesday's anti-SOPA and anti–PROTECT IP Act (aka PIPA) protest by noting its opposition to the bills on its home page. "Like many businesses, entrepreneurs and web users, we oppose these bills because there are smart, targeted ways to shut down foreign rogue websites without asking American companies to …

    Media 17 Jan 2012, 22:06

  • Yahoo! cofounder! Jerry! Yang! quits!

    End of an era for internet portal

    In a surprise announcement, Yahoo! cofounder Jerry Yang has said that he’s stepping down from all positions in the company, and from the board of directors of Alibaba, effective immediately. In a letter to the Yahoo! chairman Roy Bostock, Yang wrote: "My time at Yahoo!, from its founding to the present, has encompassed some of …

    Cloud 17 Jan 2012, 22:16

  • Microsoftie takes over HP's strategy

    Veghte to keep Meg & Co 'on top'

    Bill Veghte, the former Microsoft hotshot that was brought in to run HP's small but important software business back in May 2010, has been named the company's chief strategy officer. Veghte came to HP back when Mark Hurd was still boss – that was two CEOs ago – and kept his job when Hurd was ousted and replaced by former SAP …

    Business 17 Jan 2012, 22:24

  • Data centers to cut LAN cord?

    60GHz wireless links ease east-west traffic jams

    People are using cell phones and killing their landlines. We have wireless networks in the home to connect our myriad devices. And maybe wireless is coming to the data center, as well. In days of old, servers kept to themselves pretty much in the data center, and interacted with end users out there on the Internet and the …

    Cloud 17 Jan 2012, 22:38

  • Microsoft aims at VMware with System Center 2012

    Offers future-proofing with unlimited VMs

    Microsoft is taking the fight to VMware with a new release candidate of Systems Center 2012 which includes a new pricing structure and eight management tools that run on a unified interface. Ever humble, Microsoft is billing it as the future of private cloud systems. System Center 2012 comes in two flavors – standard and data …

    Cloud 17 Jan 2012, 22:56

  • Oz domain regs running at 60k per month

    Deloitte forgets history

    Deloitte Access Economics has announced an ‘explosion’ in Australian domain registrations compared to ten years ago, in a report released today. The company says its research finds that more than 85 percent of the registrations in the .au domain are in the 2.18-million-strong .com.au space. New .com.au registrations are …

    Business 17 Jan 2012, 23:30