From The Editor
By Jeff Caruso, Site Editor
- 10 Firefox add-ons for better browsing
- Jason Meserve has added on every add-on and plugged in every plug-in. If you're ready to take your browsing to the next level, he's got a list of 10 add-ons for Mozilla's Firefox that will do just...
- Network failure delays flights across U.S.
- Brad Reed writes:
A network failure at a Georgia facility is being blamed for multiple flight delays across the eastern United States, including flights departing from major Northeastern cities...
- What a Verizon-Google deal would mean
- Verizon choosing Google as its default search engine has obvious benefits for Google, and fairly obvious benefits for Verizon as well. But how would Verizon users benefit, if at all?
Network...
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Banks mining cash from their computers; Samsung ink lawsuit Listen now!
- Video games poised to boost corporate training
- Technology first made popular in the video gaming landscape is poised to enter the enterprise by powering training and other tools that can help companies cut costs, meet the needs of younger workers and help fulfill "green IT" requirements, according to Forrester Research Inc.
- Cellular operators say they're ready for Gustav
- With threats that Tropical Storm Gustav will clobber the U.S. Gulf coast, the nation's major cellular network providers say they are prepared, having learned from the devastation of Hurricane Katrina three years ago.
- Wider implications of the Red Hat breach
- Reports of data losses and system breaches are almost becoming passe but from time to time events happen that take on a life of their own and have effects far beyond what the initial breach would normally represent.
- 6 hacks for your mobile gear
- We'd be lost if we ever left the house without our arsenal of mobile tech gear, but we're also sick of being hamstrung by gadget makers who leave out important features or micromanage what we can--and can't--do with the products we buy from them. Fortunately, you don't necessarily have to settle for the limited features that mobile tech products ship with out of the box.
- Atom demand still stymied by testing bottleneck
- Demand for Intel's Atom processor is strong, with computer makers clamoring for more chips to plug into the small, portable laptops called netbooks, but the chips remain in short supply. The problem isn't that Intel can't make enough of the silicon chips -- the company can, and it is -- but availability remains stymied by a testing bottleneck that prevents the chip maker from meeting demand.
- How to buy a mini-laptop
- Mini-laptops are among the hottest new products this year and with the back-to-school sales season upon us, I created a list of items to help you choose the right one.
- Toshiba's XDE DVD players won't hurt Blu-ray Disc
- When Toshiba announced its new XDE DVD player promising it could convert the picture quality of standard DVDs up to the high definition, industry watchers took note.
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- Microsoft buys European comparison shopping site for $486M
- Microsoft has agreed to buy comparison shopping business Ciao in a deal worth around $486 million, and plans to integrate the service into its Live Search sites, it announced Friday.
- As inflation climbs, Vietnam's PC market on shaky ground
- Vietnam posted its highest inflation rate in 17 years this month, reporting a 28.3 percent increase in prices as concerns grow about the impact on the country's PC market.
- Kaminsky flaw prompts DNS server overhaul
- One of the companies most at risk from the notorious DNS cache poisoning vulnerability has overhauled security in the latest release of its DNS server software in what looks like a major code rethink.
- Privacy feature in IE8 leaks private data
- A privacy feature built into the second beta version of Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8 browser isn't as private as advertised.
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- MTN posts increased revenue, subscriber base
- MTN, Africa's largest mobile phone provider, has posted its half year results, recording a 35 percent increase in revenue and a 53 percent increase in subscribe base across its 21 African operations.
- Kenya judiciary embraces IT to tackle corruption
- The Judiciary of Kenya has initiated IT reforms calculated to reduce corruption and improve service delivery.
- African bank increases e-banking services
- Ecobank Sierra Leone recently launched a set of online banking services, including real-time transaction notifications via e-mail and SMS (Short Message Service).
- Sierra Leone telecom gets $30M boost from Indian gov't
- The Indian government has provided US$30 million in aid to Sierratel, Sierra Leone's national telecom carrier, to revamp its landline services in Freetown, Kono, Port Loko, Kenema, Bo and Moyamba with new switches, said Sierratel managing director Alpha Sesay Thursday.
- KENIC embarks on aggressive .ke marketing campaign
- Kenya Network Information Centre (KENIC), the administrator of .ke top-level domains, has embarked on an aggressive marketing campaign to promote the local domain name.
- Akhter announces frugal 55 watt PC
- British PC maker Akhter Computers has launched a computer that can run at 3GHz, yet consumes just 55 watts when in use, less energy than a light bulb.
- Proctor & Gamble outsources security to IBM, but keeping security staff
- Proctor & Gamble has selected IBM ISS to provide managed security services worldwide under a 5-year contract in which IBM ISS will manage internal- and perimeter-based security and host defenses.
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- Toshiba to launch Cell-based TV in 2009
- Toshiba is planning to bring the powerful Cell processor into consumer electronics and launch a TV based on the chip in the second half of 2009, it said Friday at the IFA electronics show in Berlin.
- Samsung aims at Apple with slim laptop
- Samsung came out all-guns-blazing at this week's IFA electronics show in Berlin with its lightweight X360 laptop that appears targeted at Apple's Macbook Air.
- Microsoft reduces Office price to combat Kenyan piracy
- Microsoft East Africa announced a 40 percent reduction in cost of its home and student office suite amid complaints of rampant software piracy in the Kenya.
- Kenya BPO society lobbies for license fee reduction
- The Kenya Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) Society has urged the Communication Commission of Kenya to reduce the annual license fee for BPO businesses. The group wants the fee lower from 100,000 Kenyan shillings (US$1,516) to 10,000 shillings in order to attract more investors.
- Kenya WiMax network gets $3.5M investment
- AccessKenya has invested US$3.5 million to build a WiMax network targeting Kenyan homes with an initial deployment of 35 base stations in Nairobi and Mombasa.
- Glossy black finish dominates consumer electronics
- One trend more obvious than any other at the IFA electronics show is how glossy black has taken over the consumer electronics market as the color and finish of choice.
- Continuent launches open-source database scale-out stack
- Open-source middleware maker Continuent has launched a database scale-out stack called Tungsten, which support open-source databases like MySQL as well as proprietary ones from the likes of Oracle.
- iPod touch case roundup: Two grips and a shade
- Back in May I took a look at three silicon skins for the iPod touch. This week, I have three more skin-like cases that offer snug protection for your iPod touch.
- Critics question Comcast broadband caps
- Comcast's decision to put a 250-gigabyte cap on monthly bandwidth use for its residential customers may look like a generous number, but some critics suggested the cap may cause problems for users in the future.
- Oracle technical forum upgrade plagued with problems
- Oracle's technical forums have been racked with performance issues all week since the vendor upgraded the system.
- New Orleans IT departments brace for Tropical Storm Gustav
- As Tropical Storm Gustav approaches the Gulf Coast this weekend and threatens to become a hurricane, the IT lessons learned from the devastating Hurricanes Katrina and Rita that smashed New Orleans and other areas in 2005 are on the minds of many worried IT managers.
- Humax looks into set-top box future
- Humax showed off some of what it has in store with a demonstration of the forthcoming iCORD Hybrid set-top box at the IFA electronics show in Berlin.
- Telepresence promises productive meetings
- The travel budget needs cutting, says the CFO. The corporate -social responsibility people say we have to take this green agenda seriously. HR reports that the latest polls have executives bleating about how much time they're spending on planes. Smaller local subsidiaries think they're not getting enough face time with company leaders. What are you going to do? For some CIOs, the answer lies in a relatively new concept called telepresence.
- iPhone photo scavenger hunt is afoot
- You know, our high school used to have an unofficial scavenger hunt run by seniors, but it eventually got shut down after it took a turn for the...er...inappropriate. Still, scavenger hunts aren't just for kids, especially when they involve high tech gadgets.
- Two gaming powerhouses from ATI
- ATI is on a bit of a roll these days. Last month, they launched their new Radeon HD4850 GPU, which really shook up the market. It won the price performance crown handily, but Nvidia responded quickly by dropping prices on their cards. Today, however, we're looking at two of ATI's latest: the Asus EAH4870X2, and the HD 4870.
- Updated management appliance corrals Apple iPhone
- If you've been wondering how to manage the Apple iPhone 3G smartphones mushrooming on your network, wonder no more. Kace has updated its systems management appliance with beta software to put that Apple in the palm of your hand.
- Quick fix for Firefox 3 bug with Yahoo Mail
- If you use Firefox 3 and Yahoo Mail (the nice new interface, not Classic), you might be dealing with a bug I've noticed where the message pane scrollbar doesn't display. It's not a game-breaker, as you can still use the page-down and page-up keys to navigate, but it's an annoyance.
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- Profile: DriveSavers stays true to data-recovery roots
- DriveSavers takes data recovery seriously. So seriously, in fact, that the company recently installed a $2 million cleanroom complex in its Novato, Calif., headquarters. In this 2,000 square foot facility, DriveSavers can unseal and open up hard drives for diagnosis and repair without dust-borne contamination assaulting the now-naked spinning platters and swiftly seeking head assemblies.
- Bracing for Gustav, Oracle and Google woes
- This is typically one of the slowest weeks of the year for IT news, but the approach of Hurricane Gustav has Gulf Coast IT departments in full-out preparedness mode and the rest of the country anxiously watching with sharp memories of Hurricane Katrina, which hit that coast and devastated New Orleans on Aug. 29 three years ago. Also in the news were woes with an Oracle forum upgrade and Google offering credit to paying customers of its online Apps suite, to compensate for three Gmail outages earlier this month.
- Sony opens lithium-ion battery plant in Singapore
- Sony was scheduled to open a lithium-ion polymer battery plant in Singapore on Thursday, marking a milestone in the company's efforts to expand its production capacity for batteries.
- New Hynix chip factory may hurt NAND flash prices
- The global NAND flash memory market has been suffering from oversupply all year, keeping chip prices down, and a new factory built by Hynix shows why: companies have built too many new factories.
- One For All launch rubber protected remotes
- One For All has launched a new family of programmable remotes that are covered with circular stripes of rubber, which work both as buttons and shock protection, it announced at the IFA electronics show on Thursday.
