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April 8, 2003
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New Palms feature Intel chip, camera
Palm is getting ready to launch two handheld devices, one with built-in wireless and the other with a digital camera, sources say, features that mark company firsts for the industry leader.
The Milpitas, Calif.-based handheld device maker will introduce the latest editions in its Tungsten and Zire product lines toward the end of April, according to sources familiar with the company's plans.
The enterprise-focused Tungsten C is expected to be the first Palm handheld to come with built-in 802.11b wireless networking and the first Palm device to use an Intel XScale processor. Targeted at consumers, Palm's new Zire 71 is expected to feature an integrated camera.
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Philips adds streaming to DVD recorder
Philips Semiconductors is adding broadband connectivity and streaming media capabilities to its reference design for DVD recorders, a sign of interest among consumer electronics makers in supporting the playback of digital media.
The semiconductor division of Royal Philips Electronics announced Tuesday that it has enhanced its Nexperia DVD+RW reference design to include a media chip that will aid in the processing of multiple media formats, such as MPEG-4 and DivX, as well as adding the ability to connect to the Internet.
The company plans to sell the enhanced reference design initially to electronics makers in Japan and South Korea, where broadband access is more widely adopted. The United States will likely see products based on the new reference design in the middle of next year, according to Jeroen Keunen, general manager for consumer and multimedia within Philips Semiconductors.
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Antispam activist claims victory
An antispam activist who posted a purported spammer's contact information on his Web site is claiming a legal victory.
Francis Uy said a Maryland state judge refused the Internet marketer's request to remove his address and phone number from the site.
Uy, a Web coordinator at the Center for Talented Youth at Johns Hopkins University, said he posted the address and phone number of George Alan Moore Jr. on his "Maryland's most wanted spammers" list to give the Internet marketer a taste of his own medicine. Moore's company, Maryland Internet Marketing, hawks products including Fat-N-Emy and Extreme Colon Cleanser via e-mail.
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W3C advances Semantic Web drafts
Aiming to rehabilitate both the technology and the image of its Semantic Web initiative, the Web's leading standards group has issued a number of updates and promised a spring and summer education campaign.
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) last week issued five updated working drafts for the Web Ontology Language (OWL): the OWL Overview, Guide, Reference, Semantics and Abstract Syntax, and Use Cases and Requirements.
Altogether, the specifications provide the most detailed layer of the W3C's model for describing data on the Web so that computers can "understand" more about what the data is and how it fits in context with other data.
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Intel Offers Developers Hyperthreading Tool
Intel Corp. is trying to make it easier for software developers to create applications that can run with the chip maker's performance-enhancing hyperthreading technology.
Hyperthreading, currently found in Intel's Pentium 4 and Xeon chips, enables a single chip to work like two virtual processors, improving PC and workstation performance by as much as 30 percent, according to company officials.
On Tuesday, the Santa Clara, Calif., company unveiled Thread Checker 1.0, a tool that enables developers to more quickly find errors and bugs in hyperthreading-enabled applications. It points out the problem, classifies it using a range from errors to warnings, and then makes it easy for developers to analyze the situation by showing variable, source line and call stack information.
Available now directly from Intel-and later in the second quarter from resellers-Thread Checker 1.0 starts at $1,198 for a single user license. The price also includes Intel's VTune Performance Analyzer software.
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Intel helps found WiMAX broadband wireless forum
Intel Corp. has joined leading communications component and equipment companies in forming a non-profit corporation, called WiMAX, to help promote and certify the compatibility and interoperability of broadband wireless access equipment.
The group's efforts will help accelerate the introduction of IEEE* 802.16.a wireless broadband equipment into the marketplace, speeding up last-mile broadband deployment worldwide.
WiMAX members include Airspan, Alvarion, Aperto Networks, Ensemble Communications, Fujitsu, Hughes Network Systems, OFDM Forum, Nokia, Proxim and Wi-LAN, Intel said.
The 802.16a standard, approved in January of this year, is a wireless metropolitan area network technology that will connect 802.11 hot spots to the Internet and provide a wireless extension to cable and DSL for last mile broadband access. It provides up to 50-kilometers of range and allows users to get broadband connectivity without needing a direct line of sight with the base station. The wireless broadband technology also provides shared data rates up to 70-Mbit/s.
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Alternative fusion machine limbers up
Scientists have taken another stride forward in the quest to develop fusion power - the energy source that powers the Sun and other stars.
Fusion promises relatively cheap energy - the fuel is seawater - with far fewer pollution problems compared with conventional nuclear power.
But the path to this technology has been long and expensive, with no commercial generation in sight.
Now, US scientists have created a hot, dense plasma that produces thermonuclear neutrons - a step, they say, towards harnessing nuclear fusion energy they say.
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Sun likely to use AMD's Opteron chip
Sun Microsystems will likely adopt the Opteron processor from Advanced Micro Devices as it extends into new branches of the server market.
Menlo Park, Calif.-based Sun has been testing the forthcoming Opteron chip for servers in its labs, and has found interest for the chip among customers, said John Loiacono, vice president of Sun's operating platforms group. Although he couldn't commit to any definite product plans, Loiacono said that the chip, which comes out April 22, would probably end up in a Sun product.
"Can we commit to using Opteron today? No," Loiacono said. "Can we use it? Are we likely to use it? Yes."
The probable endorsement from Sun is one of the strongest yet for the upcoming chip. Although RackSaver and a host of second-tier manufacturers have come out with product plans, no large manufacturer has done so yet. AMD declined to comment.
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Dell to set PC recycling goals
Dell Computer has long been glad to tally the number of PCs it ships to customers. Now it's going to count up those it takes back.
The Round Rock, Texas, PC maker on Tuesday said it was working with the Calvert Group, a firm that offers "socially responsible" mutual funds, and several likeminded groups to set goals for and then publish the results of its product recycling program.
Dell said it will set those goals by March 2004 and then begin publishing results from its program via its Web site and in an environmental report it issues annually.
The move to set goals and make results public is a step forward for environmentalists, who are concerned about the amount of waste generated by the high-tech industry, said Julie Frieder, environmental analyst at Calvert. The mutual fund company began prodding Dell about recycling last year, saying that failure to address the potential "e-waste" hazards posed risks and liabilities that could hurt shareholders.
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Via all set to release Athlon KT600
The Athlon XP with the 400MHz FSB seems to have caught the imagination of the chipset makers. With the KT400A only just settling into the marketplace, Via is already prepping the next step onwards, the KT600 chipset. It's expected in May or June.
You might think that motherboard manufacturers would be up in arms about this but there's no reason for them to be. The KT600 chipset is pin compatible with the KT400 and KT400A, so it's just a straight swap for them. That means no dual channel memory from this beastie either.
The KT600 doesn't appear to have many new features other than support for the 400MHz FSB. The Southbridge component is the VT 8237, the same on that's used with the KT400A.
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ViewSonic touts adjustable flat panels
ViewSonic on Tuesday launched a new line of flat-panel displays offering thin bezels and adjustable height.
The VP ThinEdge Series, which offers screen sizes ranging from 17 to 21.3 inches, is geared toward businesses. The thin bezels, adjustable height and higher resolutions are designed to suit graphic designers, financial traders and video editors, in particular.
Thinner bezels--as small as 17 millimeters for the 17-inch model--allow for an easier fit on trading floors and in call centers, where workers commonly use many displays and space is tight. A display's height can adjust up or down 4.25 inches to match a user's height.
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US turns to net for war updates
US citizens are turning to the internet in record numbers to find out about the war in Iraq, a survey has found.
According to a report from the Pew Internet and American Life Project 77% of Americans have used the net to find out about the conflict.
While TV remains the dominant way of getting war news, the numbers going online have leapt since the terrorist attacks on September 11.
Back then only 3% of online Americans said the net was their primary source of information about the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
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HP does low-price PC limbo
Lowering the bar on the price of an entry-level PC, Hewlett-Packard on Tuesday introduced a line of build-to-order models that start at just $319 after a $50 rebate.
For that price, customers get a Compaq Presario S3000V desktop computer that includes a 2GHz Intel Celeron chip, 128MB of memory, a 40GB hard drive and a CD-ROM drive. What they don't get is a monitor, which is sold separately. Shipping is also extra, with HP typically charging around $99 to ship a PC and monitor.
"That's really the most aggressive thing I've seen," said IDC analyst Roger Kay. "That's a lean, mean price."
Other computer makers have been somewhat less aggressive on price. Gateway, for example, has moved to a pricing structure that includes monitor and shipping, with more powerful machines starting at $799. A Gateway machine for small businesses is listed at $599 without a monitor. Dell Computer has a model featured on its site for $599 including a 17-inch monitor, a free CD burner and free shipping.
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Grim future for gorillas and chimps
Two of man's closest relatives in the animal kingdom will be on the edge of extinction within a decade, unless drastic conservation measures are put in place immediately.
That is the alarming conclusion of a major international study of gorillas and chimpanzees in the forests of Western Equatorial Africa, published in the scientific journal Nature.
The dense jungles of the Republic of Congo and Gabon were previously thought to be the last stronghold of the two species, since deforestation in this region has been much less intense than in other parts of Africa.
But a comprehensive survey of ape numbers in Gabon between 1998 and 2002 has revealed a dramatic decline in the population in recent years, caused by a combination of commercial hunting for bush meat, and the deadly Ebola virus which has also attacked local people.
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Gainward to offer liquid cooling for Nvidia FX Video Card
NVIDIA partner Gainward said it will provide a liquid cooling add on for the next generation GeForce FX PowerPack! family of processor products.
What is that? That is a "highly conductive pure metal alloy cooling block" which will sit over the graphics chip and chill it out, if it looks like losing its temper.
The firm said that circulating conductive hot air around a PC with fans is not very efficient. "Liquid cooling," said Hans Wolfram Tismer, "paves the way to the next level of 3D graphics performance".
The cooling block will, the firm said, keep the GPU and its memory modules close to ambient temperatures and will give a claimed 25% better 3D performance.
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Koreans Upset by U.S. Hynix Decision
Public reaction has been universally negative here to the U.S. Department of Commerce's decision late last month to impose a 57 percent tariff against memory-chip imports from Korea's Hynix Semiconductor. Insiders say the tariffs are unjustified and may be only the beginning of U.S. government-sanctioned financial pressure against Korean chip makers.
The larger-than-anticipated penalties follow charges by U.S. semiconductor maker Micron Technology that Hynix received subsidies from the Korean government in the form of debt relief. Korean government officials and industry experts here, however, say they've explained to their U.S. counterparts that Hynix creditors made independent decisions, without any interference by the Korean government. The Korea International Trade Association (KITA) has called the Commerce Department's decision "unfair" and has asked that it be withdrawn.
"It is regrettable that the United States has moved to impose these high countervailing duties on Hynix," said a high-ranking official in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT). "Hynix's debt-rescheduling plan was agreed to voluntarily by Hynix's Korean and foreign creditor banks. Past financial assistance and tax benefits by the Korean government were not in violation of the WTO subsidy pact."
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Google: Is all the news fit to post?
Nestled among the headlines from the thousands of newspapers, magazines and wire services that appear on Google News are press releases and government statements that are not clearly distinguished from actual news articles.
Press releases that companies distribute through commercial services and that appear on federal Web sites currently receive equal billing with legitimate news sources, a practice that Google on Tuesday said it would change.
In response to a query from CNET News.com, a representative for the popular search engine said that Google would in the future differentiate corporate and government statements from news articles. "It is not our intention to list press releases without clearly marking them as a press release," the representative said. "I will notify the team about the issue...and we will work to fix the problem."
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Patients warned over internet drugs
People who take medicine bought over the internet could be putting their health at risk, according to experts.
A survey of more than 100 pharmacy websites has found that few provide customers with adequate information to enable them to use the medicines safely and effectively.
Many also failed to inform customers of the potentially dangerous consequences of taking different types of drugs at the same time.
Researchers from Monash University in Victoria, Australia, surveyed 104 pharmacy websites from more than a dozen countries around the world, including the US, UK and Australia.
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California town fails to sell on eBay
A 150-acre Mojave Desert town located on Route 66 failed to sell after a monthlong auction.
Bidding on the auction site eBay ended Friday after a month on the Internet auction site with no offers reaching the minimum reserve price. Amboy, with seven residents, has a listed value of $1.9 million, but the top bid reached only $995,900.
Amboy has a post office, motel, cafe, gas station, church, gift shop and two landing strips. A buyer also gets about 540 acres of surrounding land divided in five parcels. The town is owned by celebrity photographer Timothy White and his business partner, Walt Wilson.
"It was below the price that the sellers would be willing to accept," said Rob McManus, estate director for Dilbeck Realtors, which is selling the town for Christie's Great Estates.
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Intel, Via bury the hatchet
Intel and Via Technologies have settled all of the lawsuits pending between them and entered into an agreement that will let Via manufacture processors and chipsets and let Intel collect royalties.
The settlement--which involves 11 cases filed in five countries--will essentially make it far easier for Via to sell processors and chipsets to PC makers. Intel claimed that the Taiwanese company's products infringed on its intellectual property and that Via did not have a valid patent license to make them. Under patent law, any PC maker that used Via's chips could have been sued on the same ground.
Via alleged that the fear of legal liability prompted customers to steer clear of its products. The company is one of the larger manufacturers of chipsets in the world, although sales of its chipsets for Intel-based PCs have shrunk in recent years. The company also makes microprocessors for the Linux-based PCs sold by Wal-Mart.
Via also filed countersuits, alleging that Intel's Pentium 4 infringed on its patents. In total, 27 patents were at issue in the various cases.
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Computers that watch while you work
Canadian researchers have designed a computer that pays attention to the person using it.
With modern-day computer users struggling under a deluge of e-mail, instant messages and phone calls, researchers from the Human Media Lab at Queen's University in Ontario have decided to ease the burden.
The team is designing devices that can work out the level of attention a person is paying to their PC and the importance that each message received may have for them.
"Today's digital lifestyle has the unfortunate side effect of bombarding people with messages from many devices all the time, regardless of whether they're willing, or able to respond," said Dr Roel Vertegaal, Director of the Human Media Lab.
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