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6th August 2012 Archive

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  • Oz regulator tells telly-makers to mind their language

    Sony, LG, Panasonic, Samsung and Sharp won't say “WiFi Ready” any more

    The Australian Consumer and Competition Commission (ACCC) has told the top five telly-makers to stop describing their products as “WiFi Ready” when a dongle is needed to connect them to a network. "The ACCC considered that the term 'Ready', when used in promoting audiovisual products, is widely understood by consumers to mean …

    Hardware 6 Aug 00:00

  • The Curiosity Show - Mars rover touches down at 5:31 GMT

    Watch Mars rover Curiosity touching down from the comfort of a Reg story

    NASA's biggest rover yet, Curiosity, is hours away from boldly going where no semi-autonomous vehicle has gone before. El Reg's Iain Thomson is shoulder-surfing real, live, space boffins at NASA's Pasadena facility to get as close to the action as was possible after our bid to travel aboard the craft was rejected on the …

    Science 6 Aug 02:20

  • Climate change behind extreme weather, says NASA

    'Virtually no other explanation' for heatwaves and temperature rises

    James Hansen, the head of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, has written a Washington Post op-ed in which he discusses a new climate study he says recent heat waves have “... virtually no explanation other than climate change” The study will be published on Monday, US time, in the Proceedings of the National Academy …

    Science 6 Aug 03:33

  • Qantas' website goes all-but-titsup for an hour

    What's the reason website's not flying?

    Australian flag carrier QANTAS' website went all-but-titsup for at least an hour on Monday afternoon. El Reg tried to book a ticket at 1:50 PM AEST and found the site operated only in very limited mode, with basic booking functions only on offer. Even that functionality was flaky: the site changed from the limited graphical …

    Business 6 Aug 04:07

  • Curiosity landing live from NASA's JPL: How the drama unfolded

    Curiosity Mars mission Constantly updated as it happened

    El Reg is live from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, waiting to see if the Mars Science Laboratory, or Curiosity as it's better known, will land safely or crater the surface of Mars. 8:45pm In an effort to keep people occupied NASA has been bussing in celebrities to keep the assembled press talking. Geek icon Will …

    Science 6 Aug 04:18

  • Baidu bods arrested after deleting posts for dosh

    Four sacked for doing a bit of freelance censorship

    Chinese web giant Baidu has been forced to sack four employees, three of whom were arrested by local police on suspicion of accepting bribes in return for deleting user-generated posts on one of the firm's sites. Baidu PR officer Li Guoxun told Global Times that police got involved in the case due to the large sums of money …

    Security 6 Aug 04:24

  • Xiaomi to go quad core with iPhone challenger

    Chinese handset firm reportedly working with Qualcomm's APQ8064 chip

    Much-hyped Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi is set to launch the follow-up to its hugely popular iPhone rival the M1 next week, with rumours swirling that it will be the first device to run Qualcomm’s powerful quad-core APQ8064 Snapdragon chip. Xiaomi rose from virtual obscurity a couple of years ago to make an unprecedented …

    Business 6 Aug 06:14

  • Success! Curiosity Mars lander arrives precisely on schedule

    Curiosity Mars mission | Pics Perfection still possible – thanks, Yanks

    NASA's Curiosity Mars lander settled down on the Red Planet as scheduled, no problems, thank you ma'am, nothing to worry about ... oh, what is it? a quarter of a billion miles from here or so? Nice job, mates. A news conference is being held as we post this note, but we thought you might enjoy a few images from the live feed …

    Science 6 Aug 06:19

  • What's the point of a cloud storage gateway?

    Deep Dive More and more vendors pushing them out, but not every cloud needs one

    What exactly is a cloud storage gateway? We know what direct-access storage (DAS) is, and understand SANs and NAS, forms of networked storage. Cloud storage is, obviously, storage in the cloud. But when, where, how and why do we need a cloud gateway for storage? We can envisage a four-layer IT stack and three kinds of IT-as-a- …

    Storage 6 Aug 07:02

  • Watchdog sets rules on ad-slinging in vid-streaming services

    What do you mean you have a pop-up blocker?

    Media companies that provide video-on-demand (VOD) services are responsible for ensuring compliance with VOD advertising rules when advertising appears as a direct result of a user choosing to view VOD programmes, the Committee of Advertising Practice (CAP) has said. Those media service providers are not responsible for …

    Media 6 Aug 07:27

  • If Ultrabooks lasted longer, would YOU open your wallet?

    LSI is betting its flashy controllers you would

    Unfruity Ultrabook users will be able to keep it up for longer with LSI's specially enhanced SandForce controllers. The SF-2100 and -2200 Flash Storage Processors as they are called handle flash so sensitively that Ultrabook users may get an extra hour of battery life compared to other, non-specified controllers. It's all to …

    Hardware 6 Aug 08:02

  • Boffins: We are VAPORISING the Earth... for science

    Supervillainesque move helps them learn about super-earths

    A group of scientists have been practising blowing the Earth into smithereens. Whooooooooomph.... BOOM! The astroboffins, who claim they are doing it for scientific reasons, have used a computer simulation to vaporise our home planet. "We scientists are not content just to talk about vaporising the Earth," Bruce Fegley, …

    Science 6 Aug 08:24

  • NHS trust: Not buying through NHS IT saved us £7m

    Patient record database bargain

    A direct tender has enabled Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS foundation trust to purchase a patient records system at a cost more than £7m below the price paid by the Department of Health (DH). "We set a capped limit for cost and we introduced this rate at the start of the project," Jane Berenzynskyj, Caerus project manager …

    Government 6 Aug 08:44

  • God-botherers burst onto IPTV Freeview: The End is Nigh

    Teapot Makeover, another sign of the coming crapocalypse

    Freeview HD, the UK's broadcast platform of default, now has a selection of god channels to accompany the nationalistic broadcasters, as the move towards narrowcast TV continues despite its inevitable destination. Revelation TV is already up and running, along with The Christian Faith Network, while The Christian Channel will …

    Media 6 Aug 08:58

  • Samsung lengthens Note phone-cum-tablet to 10 inches

    Pen is mightier than the finger

    Samsung's pumped up Galaxy Note phone will be inflated to full tablet size this month as the Galaxy Note 10.1. As the numeral suggests, this is a 10.1in device - the resolution is 1280 x 800 - and it comes running Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich on a 1.4GHz quad-core CPU. Storage: 16-64GB plus Micro SD. Like the 5in Note, the …

    Tablets 6 Aug 09:02

  • Amazon: e-book purchases push past paper

    Folk favour electronic convenience in the convenience

    Amazon.com's UK wing claims its British customers are now buying more e-books than printed-on-paper editions. According to the online retailer, for every 100 print books sold in 2012 so far, 114 electronic tomes have been purchased. That, it notes, includes sales of paperbacks and hardbacks that lack an equivalent e-edition. …

    Tablets 6 Aug 09:25

  • Curiosity success 'paves way for Man on Mars by 2030s'

    Curiosity Mars mission We've sent a laser-armed nuke tank, next we'll send the boffins

    The landing of a "one ton automobile-sized piece of America" also known as the Curiosity rover on Mars today could clear the way for Man's arrival within the next 20 years. NASA's Administrator Charles Bolden said that the Curiosity mission, the sixth successful shot at the Red Planet by his organisation, could lead to human …

    Science 6 Aug 09:27

  • Iran's Ayatollah Khamenei outs his supreme-self as arty hipster

    Instagram photo-bloggers get an unlikely new friend

    Iran's Supreme Leader of 23 years, "divine" boss of the country's military, judiciary, and state broadcasting services, has joined hipster cupcake-pic site Instagram and posted four photos. Ayatollah Khamenei, or more realistically a member of his staff, appears to have created an account, khamenei_ir, where arty snapshots of …

    Bootnotes 6 Aug 09:57

  • Euro NCAP to mandate auto-braking in new-car test

    From 2014, car must brake if driver doesn't

    Euro NCAP, the European car safety organisation, is to insist that, from 2014 onwards, all vehicles seeking its approval must be able to hit the anchors without driver intervention. From that date, so-called Autonomous Emergency Braking (AEB) technology will be required by any car seeking a New Car Assessment Programme rating …

    Science 6 Aug 10:10

  • Rampant fake Facebook ad clicks riddle hits dead end

    Analysis Are you bot or not?

    After a startup claimed that 80 per cent of clicks on its ads in Facebook were bogus, sales of pitchforks and burning torches went through the roof as pundits circled in search of a scandal. However, the figures in the case lead to an unexpected dead end rather than to a smoking gun of unimaginable fraud. Facebook charges …

    Small Biz 6 Aug 10:18

  • Microsoft UK bigwig leaps into bed with Bucks biz

    Services boss is making his mind up: he's off to Softcat

    Software and services supplier Softcat is bringing Microsoft UK services boss Colin Brown on board as deputy MD, The Channel can reveal. Current MD Martin Hellawell, who pitched up at the reseller-cum-integrator in March 2006, confirmed the recruitment. "There will be a bedding-in process for three to six months, and if it …

    The Channel 6 Aug 10:42

  • For flock's sake: Scared sheep send SMSes to Swiss shepherds

    Da big bad wolf S cmng ovr hill

    Swiss boffins have been testing SMS-equipped sheep to see if they can send a warning text message when the big, bad wolf approaches, and it looks like they can. The sheep don't voluntarily send the message, but a heart-rate monitor fitted to a sheep's collar can detect when the animal is stressed, and automatically sends an …

    Mobile 6 Aug 11:04

  • Acer Iconia Tab A510 10in Android review

    Quad-core cost-cutter

    In my view, the 16GB Google Nexus 7 is pretty much the ideal Android tablet, but if that form factor is too small for you, then you might be interested in what Acer has cooked up lately. Say hello then to the Iconia Tab A510. Targeted at those who want a quad-core machine, it offers a 10.1in screen, 32GB of storage and for a …

    Tablets 6 Aug 11:13

  • Google silences podcast app Listen, disbands Team tool

    Web giant chucks more of its stuff overboard

    Google has announced another cull of services it reckons won't be missed, including Google Listen. Podcast finder and playback utility Google Listen is among software axed by the web advertising giant, as there are plenty of other podcast apps available in the company's online Play store. "People now have access to a wider …

    Business 6 Aug 11:25

  • Foxconn big daddy's latest fear: An expensive Sharp stake

    Hon Hai bares fangs at monitor biz as pulse fades

    Shares of beleaguered electronics firm Sharp continued to fall today as Foxconn parent Hon Hai said it was still taking the agreed stake in the firm, but it wanted a lower price. Sharp announced a massive billion-yen net loss for the second quarter on Friday and said it now expected the loss for the full financial year to …

    Financial News 6 Aug 11:40

  • Scrunched Street View spymobile spied in India

    Vid Have you tried turning it off and.. oh, forget it

    A brief vid has popped up on YouTube purportedly showing a pranged Street View spymobile in northern India. The 22-second clip also features someone venting his spleen at the Great Satan of Mountain View by lobbing rocks at the wrecked Orwellian black Opel, as you can see in the above still. This being YouTube, the resident …

    Bootnotes 6 Aug 12:02

  • Console content can cause crime, claims cop

    Blame game played down under

    Australian police have pointed the finger at Grand Theft Auto and other games of its kind for an alleged increase in the acceptance of violence in the country. Barely a month has passed since Australia introduced an 18+ rating certificate for games which will allow titles such as the hotly-contested Mortal Kombat to be sold on …

    Games 6 Aug 12:08

  • IT job creation bucks up US economy

    Other sectors slacking

    The US economy added more jobs than economists had been expecting in July, according to a report released Friday from the Department of Labor, and the IT sector did its part to push up the numbers once again as it has since the beginning of the Great Recession five years ago. According to the July jobs report (PDF), the …

    Jobs 6 Aug 12:23

  • EMC: We're turning VMAX into mainframe tape KILLER

    Who needs physical when you can have virtual?

    EMC has turned its VMAX array into a mainframe virtual tape library – the DLm8000, with synchronous replication – in a move that could see tapes banished from mainframe operations. The company last year bought Bus-Tech, a mainframe virtual tape library vendor. EMC has a range of Disk Library for mainframe (DLm) products, …

    Storage 6 Aug 12:39

  • Vodafone loses access to punters' records in IT cock-up

    Billing system refused to get out of bed this morning

    Vodafone is investigating a glitch with its billing system that left its workers unable to access UK customer accounts today. Punters contacting Voda to chat about their accounts were told that was impossible because the computers that host their details were down. Voice calls and data on the mobile operator's network carried …

    Mobile 6 Aug 12:56

  • Scribe's mobe, MacBook pwned after hacker 'fast-talked Apple support'

    iCloud burst in social engineering attack claim

    Tech journo Mat Honan has told how he helplessly watched a hacker remotely erase and lock his iPhone, iPad and MacBook after his iCloud account was hijacked. It's a cautionary tale against relying too heavily on one cloud platform. But the kicker? It's alleged that the miscreant sweet-talked an Apple support staffer and …

    Management 6 Aug 13:29

  • Radio hams unite to fight off new powerline comms standard

    If you tolerate this, your ADSL will be next

    The Radio Society of Great Britain is mobilising Europe's radio hams in protest against the forthcoming standard for powerline networking, predicting dire consequences if existing standards aren't applied. The society has issued a call to arms (PDF, lots of details) in protest at the new standard for powerline …

    Broadband 6 Aug 14:03

  • Wikipedia collapses threatening the very fabric of civilisation

    Updated Quick, to the LIBRAR- oh wait, I think it's back up

    Fount-of-dubious-knowledge Wikipedia has gone down around the world, prompting a Twitter frenzy from people struggling to remember how to open books. The anyone-can-try-to-edit encyclopaedia won't serve a page at all beyond a placeholder "error" message, but an announcement on the Wikimedia Foundation's site stated that …

    Hosting 6 Aug 14:23

  • France's biggest Apple reseller shuts up shop

    Pending court cases are all that's left of 30-year-old business

    Lawsuits are all that remain of France's biggest Apple reseller after no credible bidders came forward to save the business. eBizcuss officially went into liquidation on 31 July, after 36 years of trading. We understand that there were at least two offers for the reseller but none were sufficient to save the business. eBizcuss …

    The Channel 6 Aug 14:39

  • Nimble Storage clusters up for scale-to-fit flash-in-a-can

    Big as you like... with boosted controller

    Hybrid iSCSI storage array start-up Nimble Storage has added a new controller, clustering and expansion shelves to enable scaling of performance and capacity separately or together. Nimble Storage produces a CS200 series of hybrid iSCSI storage arrays using NVRAM, SSD caching and disk drives, with compression increasing the …

    Storage 6 Aug 15:03

  • MDNX swallows Griffin: I ain't afraid of no channel conflict

    Pure channel firm's new daddy has 'different' approach

    Network integrator MDNX has devoured pure channel connectivity provider Griffin for an undisclosed sum. MDNX was formed in 2003 through the acquisition of Solution 1, CIG (which traded as CI-Net) and VTL - all which focused on the provision of data networking and data centre services. The buyer is split into three units: a …

    The Channel 6 Aug 15:11

  • EMC hooks up with Lenovo, tries to penetrate China

    Server-storage bundles alliance

    The head mandarin of storage firm EMC, Joe Tucci, has signed a strategic partnership with computer-maker Lenovo involving China penetration, Lenovo replacing Dell in EMC's affections, SMB filers and – word has it – servers. The deal will help Lenovo get a look-in within the x86 server segment. These servers will be sold by …

    Storage 6 Aug 15:29

  • TSMC doles out $1.4bn to buy Moore's Law breathing space

    Intel already in bed with chip etchers ASML, Samsung next?

    The Dutch maker of the lithography equipment used to etch the world's chips has been going cap in hand to its largest customers. ASML Holding wants its clients to fork out some co-development funds for the creation of next-generation 450mm silicon wafer-baking technology and the lithographic gear to etch ever-smaller …

    Business 6 Aug 16:04

  • MetroPCS waves wand, turns Samsung Galaxy mobe into a TV

    Turn on, tune in, pray for no signal drop outs

    Cell phone operator MetroPCS has unveiled a Samsung Galaxy variant capable of receiving Dyle TV. The cheapo network seems undeterred by other companies' inability to successfully broadcast television to mobile phones. The handset is a $459 spin of the Galaxy S with an extendible antenna and the capability to pick up Dyle TV - …

    Mobile 6 Aug 17:14

  • Bargain-hunting Chinese make life tough for iOS devs

    App Store generates just THREE PER CENT of global revenue

    Apple iOS developers in China are struggling to make a living from the platform, with App Store revenues in the region accounting for just three per cent of the global total, despite scooping 18 per cent of worldwide downloads. A new report from Shanghai-based analyst Stenvall Skoeld (via TNW) claims that Apple and its …

    Business 6 Aug 18:30

  • Woz: Cloud computing trend is 'horrendous'

    Beardy Apple wildman voices fears while treading the boards

    The risks of cloud computing will be "horrendous", Steve Wozniak said last night, in a statement that will set eyeballs rolling at Apple - the company he co-founded with Steve Jobs. The bearded designer of the Apple II is prone to off-message statements, but the latest one takes a dig at an area Apple has just invested a lot …

    Storage 6 Aug 19:02

  • Curiosity snapped mid-flight by Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter

    Curiosity Mars mission Rover reports as ready for duty

    NASA has released the first photo of the Curiosity rover in flight, after the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter's (MRO) HiRISE camera snapped a shot of the spacecraft parachuting down to the Martian surface. The MRO was 340km away from Curiosity as its parachute was deployed, slowing the craft from around 900mph to 180mph, before …

    Science 6 Aug 19:33

  • Alteryx does Big Data integration for dummies

    Everyone wants to be a 'data artisan'

    The real challenge of Big Data is not storing and chewing your clickstreams and other operational data to get the right product in front of the right person. That's easy. But taking multiple data sources from your own systems and outside sources, mashing them up, and then spitting them out as information that some person or …

    Storage 6 Aug 19:36

  • AMD borrows $300m to fill war chest

    Time to buy Calxeda or Applied Micro

    Advanced Micro Devices is wading into the debt markets to raise money for a whole bunch of things it needs to get done. The chip maker designer and peddler said in a statement that it would be making a private offering of $300m in senior notes due in 2022, and that it had a number of potential uses for the funds. Four, to be …

    Hardware 6 Aug 20:12

  • Qualcomm taps former Intel mobile maven as CMO

    If you can't beat ARM, join ARM

    Anand Chandrasekher, the man who was responsible for many of Intel's low-power mobile chip initiatives, has joined Qualcomm as its new chief marketing officer. Chandrasekher was a 24-year veteran of Intel, but resigned his position as general manager of the company's Ultra Mobility Group in March 2011, saying he wished "to …

    Hardware 6 Aug 20:59

  • Vodafone Oz serving ice cream sandwiches by the Galaxy

    Still no Jelly Beans on the menu as Samsung "preparing update"

    Vodafone Australia will soon start to serve Ice Cream Sandwiches, Android-style, to owners of Samsung GALAXY Note handsets. The upgrade process starts at 1:00PM AEST today (August 7th), at which time some lucky punters will have the chance to upgrade their handsets. Only those who acquired their Galaxy NOTE handset through the …

    Networks 6 Aug 21:00

  • Khronos Group updates OpenGL and OpenCL graphics standards

    20 years of the graphics standard

    The Khronos Group has released the latest version of its OpenGL graphics standard, 20 years after SGI first opened up the code. The latest revision, OpenGL 4.3, adds the ability to harness the GPU for shading and draw commands, ETC2/EAC texture compression is included as standard, and an improved debugging system has been …

    Applications 6 Aug 21:28

  • Microsoft opens app store for Office 2013

    Web-based add-ons

    With the next version of its business productivity suite already in public preview, Microsoft has launched a beta version of the Office Store, a marketplace for developers to distribute web-based add-ons for Office and SharePoint. "We know our users spend an incredible amount of time using the Microsoft Office suite," writes …

    Applications 6 Aug 22:27

  • France backs away from Hadopi

    Anti-piracy group is ‘unwieldy, uneconomic and ultimately ineffective’

    The French government is counting the cost of having copyright enforcement shifted from the corporate to the public sector – and it’s not pleased at what it sees. Hadopi, the body charged with hunting down freetards under France’s three-strikes law, has sent a million warning e-mails and 99,000 registered letters. This …

    Policy 6 Aug 22:59

  • Iran’s ‘domestic Internet’ schedule slips

    Government ministries to unplug ‘next month’

    Iran’s leader Ayatollah Khamenei had best make the most of his time on Twitter and Instagram, since the country’s telecommunications minister is doggedly pressing ahead with his program to cut the country off from the Internet. In the fullness of time, as Sir Humphrey Appleby would have put it. In spite of Khamenei’s …

    Policy 6 Aug 23:05