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28th May 2012 Archive

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  • Big Blue supers crunch kaon decay

    Massive machines probe matter mystery

    Looking at the fundamental properties of matter can take some serious computing grunt. Take the calculation needed to help understand kaon decay – a subatomic particle interaction that helps explain why the universe is made of matter rather than anti-matter: it soaked up 54 million processor hours on Argonne National …

    HPC 28 May 00:14

  • 'Biocoal' fuels steam train comeback

    Uni of Minnesota steampunks plot loco speed record

    Trainspotters who find the homogenized world of modern locos a bit dull could soon be celebrating the return of steam, if all goes well in a University of Minnesota study. The university, along with Sustainable Rail International, are to restore a 1930s locomotive – 3463, a 4-6-4 Hudson-type loco built by Baldwin that’s spent …

    Science 28 May 00:23

  • Trekkie wants to build USS Enterprise … in twenty years

    Suggests open source design process to get spaceship boldly going

    A US Star Trek fan has launched an online project aimed at building a working replica of the USS Enterprise … in twenty years. “BTE Dan”, as the fan identifies himself at the buildtheenterprise.org site, says he's tired of stagnation in the world's space programs and feels that shooting for an iconic project like building a …

    Science 28 May 01:21

  • Bandwidth broker to light up dark nets

    Mobsource adds "network as a service" to the "x-aas" lexicon

    A new global bandwidth exchange and trading platform targeting the growth in cloud-based services and leveraging a global bandwidth glut has been launched by an Australian telecommunications executive. Globally launched earlier this month at International Telecoms Week in Chicago, Mobsource.com now has between US$10 -20 …

    Networks 28 May 02:03

  • ITU adopts two ultra-high def TV specs

    4K and 8K both get UHDTV moniker

    The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) has “agreed a draft new Recommendation on the technical details for ‘Ultra High Definition Television’,” but has decided that both 3840x2160 tellies, and future 7680 x4320 screens, both get the name UHDTV. You'd think the ITU would have learned from global confusion around just …

    Media 28 May 02:27

  • Acronis loses Australian General Manager

    Interviews under way for replacement, steady as she goes etc.

    Backup software vendor Acronis has lost its General Manager for Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific. Karl Sice left the company in May to take up a new position as Head of Sales and IT Solutions at online stationer Staples. Acronis confirmed Sice's departure to The Register and said interviews for a replacement have …

    Data Center 28 May 04:09

  • China claims piracy at new low

    Wait a minute, how low?

    The rate of software piracy in China dropped to just 38 per cent in 2011, according to new government-backed figures that are markedly different to those from the Business Software Alliance (BSA), which recently branded the country the world's worst offender. State-run newspaper China Daily proudly reported the figures, which …

    Business 28 May 04:16

  • Biz social networking set for take-off

    Asia Pac leading the rush to work smarter

    The market for enterprise social media and Web 2.0 tools is growing by over 20 per cent a year and will top $126m (£80m) by 2017 as firms look for better ways to collaborate and manage content across Asia Pacific, according to a new report from Frost & Sullivan. The analyst’s Enterprise Social Media and Web 2.0 Market 2010 …

    Software 28 May 05:57

  • Hands on with Nokia's 808 41Mp camphone

    First look Lumia 610 too

    If a company needed some luck right now, then Nokia would certainly fit the bill. Having partnered with Microsoft to deliver a new range of smartphones based on Windows Phone 7, it consequently shares a platform with the likes of HTC and Samsung. Still, Nokia is thinking lucky because it reckons it can deliver services on …

    reghardware 28 May 06:00

  • Foxconn to create workers' paradise?

    Report suggests 144 per cent pay rise on the way

    Foxconn plans to double the minimum wage of its mainland China workers by 2013 as part of a renewed attempt to soften the image of the ultra-secretive company, says Taiwanese site Want Daily. The outlet reports that Foxconn president and chairman Terry Gou said he wanted the firm’s Chinese workers paid at least 4,400 yuan (£ …

    Jobs 28 May 06:03

  • Ex-Nokia Siemens engineer admits eBaying nicked routers

    Cash-strapped dad in court for Wi-Fi kit theft

    A hard-up ex-engineer at Nokia Siemens swiped wireless routers worth thousands of pounds from his employer to refurbish and flog on eBay. Dewaldt Hermann, 33, appeared at Swindon Crown Court to admit he was behind a spate of thefts some months after he started work at the firm, Newbury Today reports. Tessa Hingston, …

    Channel Register 28 May 07:01

  • New Brit nano-satellite to use Xbox Kinect for docking in space

    Consumer kit really is more powerful than trad space gear

    Boffins at Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL) have come up with a second zany satellite in their STRaND line, which will use Xbox Kinect technology to hook up with another satellite in space. Bits and pieces of the STRaND-1 nanosatellite STRaND, or Surrey Training Research and Nanosatellite Development, is the company's …

    Hardware 28 May 07:29

  • TalkTalk subsidiary's customer data placed on the web in IIS whoopsie

    Updated Called TalkTalk, not ListenListen

    Greystone Telecom, adopted child of TalkTalk and provider of telecommunications to the business community, is unwittingly sharing customer and contract details with the world: but TalkTalk doesn't care. The details include customer and contract prices, copies of sales orders and spreadsheets showing how things are going at the …

    Broadband 28 May 08:01

  • Why don't the best techies work in the channel?

    'Cos the channel doesn't want them

    I'm OK at Firewall One, but any number of people reading this are better, completing the tasks 10 times more quickly and screwing up 10 times less often. But I'm a better employee than you are. Firstly, a consultancy or reseller is going to be selling me by time, methodically setting up firewall rules taking a day is more …

    Channel Register 28 May 08:32

  • Jabra Clipper

    Geek Treat of the Week Discreet Bluetooth headset

    Jabra’s Clipper is a two-piece Bluetooth headset designed to be attached to clothing or a bag. The clip part houses the Bluetooth circuitry, controls, a micro USB socket for charging, and a 3.5mm audio jack. The other part is a standard set of stereo earbuds, though you’ll probably want to use your own. The controls on the …

    reghardware 28 May 09:00

  • Disk-flash storage mix biz chief on the SSD situation

    Interview A NexGen view of flash

    EMC has confirmed a 3-layer enterprise flash cake composed of server cache, server-area Thunder array and SAN-attached Xtremio technology, but not a new design hybrid flash and disk drive array. Start-up NexGen has such an array. We asked NexGen founder and CEO John Spiers questions about his company's views on solid state …

    Storage 28 May 09:18

  • Fusion-io stuffs workstation storage into bulging hand luggage

    HPC blog Dual-GPUs, 3GB/sec I/O and fits in overhead bin

    Fusion-io nabbed prime real estate on the GTC 2012 exhibit floor – right inside the entryway. They took advantage of it by offering a hosted oxygen bar, complete with an oxygen bartender and a wide selection of coloured/flavoured airs. I got the lowdown on their offerings (it's hospital grade oxygen – something I insist upon) …

    HPC 28 May 09:41

  • EU set to smack Chinese telcos over state subsidies

    Getting money off gov is not playing fair, kettle tells pot

    The European Trade Commission is all set to launch a massive case against Chinese firms Huawei and ZTE for allegedly dumping products on the EU market after allegedly benefiting from illegal state subsidies. The commission has told EU member states that it has hard evidence against the two telcos after working on the case for …

    Broadband 28 May 10:02

  • Free Windows 8 desktop app development is dead

    Metro or bust with Visual Studio 2011 Express

    The next free version of Microsoft’s Visual Studio programming suite won’t build normal Windows desktop apps, it has emerged. Visual Studio 2011 Express edition will only allow developers to build touchscreen-friendly programs for the new Windows 8 Metro UI, according to the software's product page here. Coders will have to …

    Windows 8 28 May 10:13

  • LG shows off 'first' full HD LCD for smartphones

    5in, 440dpi screen, anyone?

    And the latest entry in the 'how many pixels can we cram into a phone display' stakes comes from LG which today announced a 5in in-plan switching (IPS) LCD with a 1920 x 1080 resolution. It's the first full HD screen for a handset, LG claimed. Do the sums and that yields a pixel density of 440ppi. That's than enough to ensure …

    reghardware 28 May 10:31

  • '6,000 RIM jobs at risk' of a pink slip

    Heins source claims layoffs as early as June

    BlackBerry maker Research In Motion is threatening to axe thousands of its workers, according to reports. The ailing mobe firm shed co-CEOs Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis in January after a slump in sales, and replaced the pair with Thorsten Heins. More recently, head of global sales Patrick Spence departed. According to …

    Channel Register 28 May 10:33

  • Virgin Media wipes out websites with routing blackhole

    'Issues which may cause issues' leave network 'virtually unusable' for days

    Virgin Media customers have been struggling to access websites via the telco's network for the past four days, after routing errors crippled the service. The ISP's punters have griped about the problem on VM's forums and various El Reg readers have been in touch to complain that they can't currently access their beloved tech …

    Broadband 28 May 10:43

  • Sony KDL-55HX853 55in 3D LED TV

    Review Flagship Bravia with the Olympics in mind

    The 55inch KDL-HX853 is currently the highest ranked of Sony’s 2012 TVs. It heads up a new Spartan range from the brand intended to rebuild its TV fortunes. Interestingly, it doesn’t come laden with features seemingly pulled at random from a brainstorming session down the local Karaoke; which means it’s not competing directly …

    reghardware 28 May 11:00

  • Space Station crew enter the Dragon

    Pic Pop the hatch, get blast of 'new car smell'

    The crew of the International Space Station cracked open the hatch of the SpaceX Dragon cargoship to see what's inside - after the docked capsule was declared safe for them to step in. Don Pettit prepares to unload the SpaceX craft Astronauts Don Pettit and Oleg Kononenko entered the Dragon at 9.53am GMT on Saturday wearing …

    Science 28 May 11:12

  • Cloud migration: The applications killing season

    How to determine the business value of an app

    Moving applications to the cloud can help to tighten the efficiency of the IT department, but does that mean that every application should be moved? Software may have to be rewritten or at least reconfigured to function properly in the new environment, and it may not always be appropriate to invest the necessary time and money …

    Cloud 28 May 11:30

  • Self-driving Volvos cover 200km of busy Spanish motorway

    Real-world test for Project Sartre

    Three cars have successfully driven themselves by automatically following a lorry for 125 miles on a public motorway in the presence of other, normal road users. The real-world trial, conducted in Spain by Volvo and car automation specialist Ricardo, put technology created for Project Sartre (Safe Road Trains for the …

    reghardware 28 May 11:33

  • Phoenix restructure sends profits down in flames

    Salesforce distracted by overhaul

    Phoenix IT Group saw its wings decisively clipped over the last year, as a wide-ranging restructure battered profits and helped knock sales off-course in an already tough market. The services group insisted it was confident it will see revenue growth over the current year, but remained “cautious” about its likely performance …

    Channel Register 28 May 11:45

  • Dell Windows 8 tablet, hybrid details leak

    United slates

    Dell's tablet plans for 2012 have slipped out, revealing a chunky Windows 8 slate and a tablet-laptop hybrid also set to run with Microsoft's tile-centric OS. A leaked company product slide shows the upcoming Dell Latitude 10 to be a dual-core tablet with a 10.1in, 1366 x 768 pixel display, Neowin reports. The Windows 8 …

    reghardware 28 May 11:49

  • Facebook ninjas scale wall, pluck iPhone techies from Apple's garden

    Social network boosts hardware skills as Zuck mulls Facebook phone

    Facebook has apparently hired in more than six iPhone and iPad engineers who could well be the social network's team for a Facebook smartphone, the The New York Times reports. Facebook privately cherry-picked the Apple employees rather than posting jobs openly, say the NYT's unnamed sources. Over six hardware and software …

    Mobile 28 May 12:03

  • YouView reportedly set for 2500-home pre-Olympics trial

    Soft launch to justify deadline met claims?

    YouView, would IPTV world's answer to Freeview, may get a soft launch into 2500 homes before the start of the Olympic Games. The platform, backed by broadcasters the BBC and ITV, ISPs BT and TalkTalk, and broadcasting infrastructure owner Arqiva, is currently being tested in a hundred locations in London by YouView stakeholder …

    reghardware 28 May 12:15

  • Student cluster warriors to face off on new battlefield: ISC

    HPC blog Nearly THIRTY Chinese universities entered heat

    I’ve been following the annual SC Student Cluster Competition (SCC) for a few years now. It’s a great programme that pits teams of university undergrads against each other in the quest to design, build, and benchmark their own clustered systems. In the process they learn a lot about HPC, get a lot of exposure to the industry, …

    HPC 28 May 12:39

  • Microsoft will fiddle with prices as euro burns, UK biz fears

    Tumbling currency a nightmare for costing volume buying

    Microsoft's partners are braced for further changes in volume pricing this year as the euro flutters wildly in the economic storm. The Windows 8 maker tore up its licensing price list and rewrote it in euros for a 1 July Europe-wide relaunch. At the current exchange rate with the pound sterling, UK customers will pay on …

    Channel Register 28 May 13:02

  • Crazy Geckos: Nitot on Mozilla's post-Firefox mobile crusade

    Open-source handset versus Android and Apple

    First came the BlackBerry, bringing the smartphones for suits perfected by RIM to consumers. Next came the iPhone, which quickly hoovered up 23 per cent of the market. But the iPhone came at a price: the freedom of users and coders. It is tightly controlled by Apple, as Adobe quickly found to its cost with Flash. Next up was …

    Operating Systems 28 May 13:33

  • Renesas rumours: Semi seeks $1.3bn stimulus, stiffs 12,000

    Chip giant ducks mass redundancies claims

    Down-on-its-luck semiconductor biz Renesas Electronics announced today the first step of a rumoured restructuring plan that's believed to include 12,000 job cuts. Reports over the weekend suggested that Renesas could axe employees and look for a helping hand of up to ¥100bn ($1.3bn, £803m). The Japanese microcontroller maker …

    Hardware 28 May 14:02

  • Agriboffins' site downed by DDoS after GM protest

    Hactivists may have been linked to Anonymous

    Agricultural research institute Rothamsted Research was pulled offline in a DDoS attack just hours after police stopped protestors destroying a GM crop trial at the facility. Rothamsted said that the site was down from Sunday afternoon until this morning after distributed denial of service attack. The cyber-strike came after …

    Science 28 May 14:27

  • Steve Jobs' Atari memo, Apple I to go under the hammer

    Bids for musings of 19-year-old pre-titan start at $10k

    Before Steve Jobs came up with the iPhone or even the Apple II, he designed paddles for ball-flipping games at Atari where the scruffy 19-year-old was employed to improve game design. Sotheby's New York will auction off a document dating from Jobs's time there: a 1974 report that Jobs wrote for his boss suggesting ways to …

    Hardware 28 May 14:28

  • Hit upgrade on Symantec Backup Exec, and unleash Hell

    Irate users jet into company HQ for facemail criticism

    Backup Exec 2012 users are screaming in frustration over the "improvements" pushed out this year. Users were chatting on the Symantec Connect forum about the redesign, saying that it's more like a trip to the dentist after all. Here are just a few of the 228 comments on the forum: Bulbous: "Menus are now hidden behind other …

    Storage 28 May 15:02

  • UK High Court split over Twitter airport bomb joke

    New hearing ordered to discuss fate of Paul Chambers after judges disagree

    A man who was convicted of posting a tasteless joke on Twitter about blowing up a UK airport is to have his case heard again. According to report today from New Statesman legal scribe David Allen Green – who is also representing Paul Chambers in the appeal – two judges in the Divisional Court of the High Court had failed agree …

    Law 28 May 15:29

  • Facebook phone tagged for 2013 release

    Off the wall

    The Facebook hardware rumour mill is in full spin again this week after reports suggest the social network is preparing its own smartphone for 2013. While there have already been numerous whispers that the company is planning to jointly develop handsets with HTC, the latest word on the matter suggests Facebook will go it alone …

    reghardware 28 May 15:50

  • Complex cyberwar tool 'Flame' found ALL OVER Middle East

    20 times larger than Stuxnet, two years old... and still active

    A new super-cyberweapon targeting countries like Iran and Israel that has been knocking around in computers for two years has been discovered by researchers. "Flame", a highly sophisticated piece of malware, was unearthed by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and Kaspersky Lab, which said it was more complex and …

    Security 28 May 16:01

  • Dual-dock prototype iPad eyed on eBay

    Own a piece of history

    Some time back, an Apple was granted a patent which showed an iPad with two dock connectors, allowing the device to be docked in either landscape or portrait mode. It was claimed back then that Apple was planning to add the second dock connector to a second-generation iPad. It never did, of course, and it now turns out that …

    reghardware 28 May 16:13

  • Facebook needs Opera - to rescue it from dependence on Apple

    Analysis Fat lady barely starting a preliminary gargle, though

    Facebook is reported to be interested in buying Scandinavian browser company Opera Software. The facts are few, the sourcing criminally light, but the story arrives as Opera is also reported to have instituted a hiring freeze that some claim is a harbinger to putting itself up for sale. Both firms refused to comment on the …

    Financial News 28 May 16:37

  • Scan co-jacking nets crooks '€40k in IT gear'

    Imposters lure recession-hit suppliers

    Crooks have masqueraded as buyers at web bazaar Scan to obtain goods from its suppliers by deception. The fraudsters bought a domain name similar to scan.co.uk, and crafted a counterfeit website and headed paper using the etailer's logo. Letters, complete with the correct VAT and company registration numbers, with orders for …

    Channel Register 28 May 17:02

  • Indonesia cleans up SMS

    Telcos spammed one other to harm service

    Indonesia has changed its telecommunications laws to ensure that the nation's mobile carriers pay for SMS messages sent to rivals. Indonesia's current regime is a “sender keeps all” arrangement whereby a mobile subscriber's carrier charges for a TXT, but the recipient's carrier (if different) doesn't get a single rupee. The …

    Networks 28 May 19:30

  • ACCC set to okay Optus HFC exit

    Monopoly concerns outweighed by consumer benefits, apparently

    Optus will exit the HFC business and pocket $AU800 million, if yesterday’s proposed determination from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission stands. The draft determination from the ACCC would allow Optus to pass its HFC customers to the National Broadband Network as it rolls out, and once the rollout is complete …

    Networks 28 May 22:09

  • Bye! Bye! Yahoo! Livestand!

    Mobile ‘personal media’ relevance app irrelevant

    Yahoo! Livestand has become a casualty of the Scott Thompson CV row, with new boss Ross Levinsohn killing off the company’s iPad “personal magazine” app. When it was launched, the mishmash application was supposed showcase Yahoo!’s C.O.R.E. (content optimization relevance engine) to assemble a user-preference-based newsreader …

    Business 28 May 22:14

  • Internode founder exits exec role amid reshuffles

    Gets seat on the iiNet board

    The executive team of South Australian ISP Internode has been reshuffled following iiNet’s AUD$105 million acquisition of the indie carrier. Founder and MD Simon Hackett has announced that he take leave of his executive role and join the iiNet board in August. Hackett who is also a significant iiNet shareholder said that the …

    Networks 28 May 22:41

  • NSW gov orders two new green data centres

    Metronode creates 250 jobs

    Leighton Contractors' data centre specialist subsidiary, Metronode, has secured a AUS$182m contract with the New South Wales Government for the creation of two new data centres. The deal has an initial ten year term and will see more than 250 jobs created during the construction phase. Once deployed each data centre will be …

    Policy 28 May 23:10