by Sue Crane Vice President & Editor, Big Bear Computer Club, California
From the August, 2005 issue of the I/O Port Newsletter
AMD's Antitrust Suit Against Intel
Advanced Micro Devices complaint accuses Intel of maintaining its monopoly in
the PC processor market by illegally coercing customers around the world into
using its products. The 48-page complaint alleges that Intel used illegal
subsidies to win sales, and in some cases threatened companies with "severe
consequences" for using or selling AMD products. Meanwhile, hoping to win the
support of U.S. legislators and average computer users, AMD is publishing
full-page ads in 7 U.S. newspapers, explaining why it filed suit and encouraging
readers to read the full text of its 48-page complaint The AMD complaint is
available online
here.
Coming soon: 30Gb on a 1-inch drive
A Japanese university has shown a prototype 10GB 1-inch hard disk drive that
packs data on the disk surface more densely than existing hard drives with an
areal density--the number of bits per unit of disk surface areal--of 138
gigabits per square inch. The drive uses perpendicular recording technology to
achieve its higher areal density, The Japanese researchers project they will be
able to boost the areal density of 1-inch disks to about 500-gigabits per square
inch in 2007. This could enable 1-inch drives to have capacities as high as 30GB
a few years from now. Currently, the highest-capacity 1-inch drives on sale
store a maximum of 6GB of data.
Court Rules against File-Swapping
In a unanimous decision justices ruled: companies that build businesses with the
active intent of encouraging copyright infringement should be held liable for
their customers' illegal actions. The decision will likely reshape the Internet
landscape in which file swapping has become commonplace.
Man vs. SuperComputer
Michael Adams, United Kingdom's strongest chess player, is the latest player to
take on a supercomputer. Adams and the Hydra computer will play up to 6 games
for a prize fund of $150,000. Some experts are already predicting that Hydra
will win the contest. But correspondence chess grandmaster Arno Nickel, who
recently beat Hydra 2-0 in a correspondence match, has predicted that Adams
could secure a 3-3 draw. According to the team that developed Hydra, it can
calculate 200 million moves per second and see up to 40 moves ahead.
Tired of waiting for Windows XP?
Giga-byte Technology has stumbled upon a faster way to boot up PCs based on the
Windows XP operating system.
iRam is a PC add-in card with four DDR DRAM memory slots, designed to be used as
a PC drive. iRam uses DRAM to store information, data can be retrieved up to 60
times faster. The iRam holds up to 4Gb of DRAM in four memory slots. The card
fits into a standard PCI slot, which provides power, and it uses a SATA (Serial
ATA) connection for data transfer. If the PC is unplugged, the iRam has an
on-board battery for emergency power that can last up to 12 hours. The iRam will
be available in July.
Laptop Batteries Recalled
Batteries in some notebook computers from Fujitsu Siemens can overheat, with a
risk of fire. The company has recalled the batteries in some of its Amilo
notebook computers, and will replace affected batteries free of charge.
No IE7 for Win 2K
According to an unnamed employee, .Microsoft will not be releasing IE 7 for
Windows 2000 as this would involve a lot of work for an operating system that is
in the later stages of its lifecycle and some of the security work in IE 7
relies on operating system functionality in XP SP2. Win 2K users argue that
Microsoft is committed to provide extended support to Windows 2000 through 2010.
Microsoft was also criticized for building a Web browser that cannot run
independently of the operating system. IE 7 will be available in beta this
summer, offering improved security features, basic tabbed browsing and improved
standards support, including support for CSS 2 and PNG transparencies.
Digitally Enhanced Photos May Be "Too Good"
Kacie Powell, a photographer for Centre College in Danville, Ky., tried to get
some digital photo shots printed at Wal-Mart, but employees said they looked
"too professional." She ended up signing an affidavit that included pictures of
college employees who were authorized to print her pictures. When a colleague
whose portrait was included among the authorized photographers went to Wal-Mart
with some candid shots from graduation, she got turned down too.. Photo Labs,
fearful of being sued by professional photographers, are in a tough spot: should
they anger their customers or risk a lawsuit? Don't be surprised if your
digitally enhanced personal photos are turned down by WalMart and other
fast-photo labs.
Do the walls have ears?
The experimental system--which consists of a series of sensors under a baby's
mattress and a camera mounted on a wall--will monitor a child's heart rate,
temperature and movement; stream video of the infant; and even take pictures.
Captured data is sent to a parent's PC. In another experiment, researchers have
tagged all of the items in a person's house with RFID sensors that effectively
will tell a remote computer whether the occupant has moved a spoon or turned on
the television. Though it might sound Orwellian in the abstract, the system is
being designed to provide relatives or professional caregivers information on
the daily habits of the elderly.
$100 Computer
A little-known company called Novatium plans to offer a stripped-down home
computer for about $70 or $75. Adding a monitor doubles the price to $150, but
the company will offer used displays to keep the cost down.
Porn gets its own domain
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) that oversees
Internet addresses has approved a new online neighborhood specifically for
pornographic Web sites: the .xxx domain. Proponents say this will help parents
screen out the porn sites for their children, but other groups argue that it's
not a reliable safeguard until its mandatory.
There is no restriction against any non-profit group using this article as long
as it is kept in context with proper credit given the author. The Editorial
Committee of the Association of Personal Computer User Groups (APCUG), an
international organization of which this group is a member, brings this article
to you.
For more information on the Tulsa Computer Society click here