21st March 2006 Archive

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Fujitsu to pay Rambus for third-party DRAM purchases

Prosecution immunity?

Rambus has licensed its memory technologies to Fujitsu, presumably allowing the Japanese vendor to buy DRAM from any company it cares to without the fear that Rambus' lawyers will come knocking on its door because it has bought allegedly unlicensed product. How else are we to explain the royalty mechanism behind the deal? " …

Bits 'n' Chips 21 Mar 2006, 10:11
Intel lining up Q3 Pentium D price cuts?

Clearing the way for 'Conroe'

Intel hasn't launched the dual-core Pentium D 960 yet - it's due late April, we understand - but already it's planning to cut the processor's price, sometime in Q3, according to the latest claims coming out of Taiwan's system builder community. Sources cited by DigiTimes allege the 960's price will fall from $530 to $316 in …

Bits 'n' Chips 21 Mar 2006, 10:39
Philips turns on feature-filled Media Centre system

But where's the digital TV tuner?

Philips has begun pitching its entry into the Media Centre PC arena to UK consumers, touting its MPC9350i as the ultimate home entertainment rig, offering music and movie playback, twin TV tuners, hard disk-based PVR functionality, wireless internet access and more. The MPC9350i is part of Philips' Showline range. It's got …

PCs 21 Mar 2006, 11:38
Boffins build see-through chip

Transparently

Scientists at the Oregon State University (OSU) have produced the world's first "completely transparent" integrated circuit using inorganic materials. The see-through transistor technology will revolutionise electronics, allowing circuitry to be integrated into items like windows, bottles, glasses and car windscreens. It will …

Bits 'n' Chips 21 Mar 2006, 12:22
LG to ship GSM-flavoured Chocolate in Europe

Award-winning LG5900 handset coming soon

LG is to bring its popular 'Chocolate' mobile phone to Europe in May, the company said today. The handset, also known as the LG5900, is a dark-brown - hence the more casual moniker - slider phone with a touch-sensitive keyboard outlined in red. The product has won a variety of awards for its looks. Chocolate is 1.5cm thick and …

Phones 21 Mar 2006, 14:09
Samsung unveils 32GB Flash-based 'HDD killer'

Designed for notebooks

Samsung has launched what it reckons its the world's first 32GB NAND Flash-based hard disk drive replacement unit. The company claimed the so-called "solid state disk" can access data three times faster than an HDD can and write files one-and-a-half times more quickly - though we don't know what HDD spec it was comparing its …

PCs 21 Mar 2006, 14:25
Western Digital Raptor X 150GB HDD

Review A hard drive with a view

The Western Digital Raptor, possibly the most talked about hard drive among the PC performance community, but why would you even consider buying a 36 or 74GB hard drive? Well, most people wouldn't, but with the introduction of the latest Raptor products Western Digital has remedied this problem to a certain degree by upping the …

Bits 'n' Chips 21 Mar 2006, 14:56
Handheld Xbox: third time lucky for MS iPod killer scheme?

Comment Lest we forget PMC - oh, I see you have...

World+Dog is this week feverishly reporting on rumours that Microsoft is hard at work on an iPod killer. Or it may be a PlayStation Portable killer. Or perhaps a PMC killer. No, wait a moment, PMC - aka Portable Media Center - was Microsoft's last attempt at an iPod killer, and just look at what that did to restrict Apple's …

Consoles 21 Mar 2006, 15:57
Computer games push up UK inflation rate

MP3 players and music downloads added to national shopping basket

The UK's Office of National Statistics (ONS) has placed Apple's iPod and the some of the company's iTunes Music Store downloads in the standard shopping basket the organisation uses to monitor the cost of living in Britain. Each year the ONS lists a stack of goods it uses to track prices and thus inflation. This year, the ONS …

Consoles 21 Mar 2006, 16:20
UK parents offered kid-friendly MP3 player

Playground-proof and eardrum-safe

German MP3 player specialist Maxfield has launched a digital music player for kids. Pitched at children between the ages of six and 12, the primary colour player sports a playground-safe water-resistant shell and limits the decibels lest the young ones' passion for loud metal play havoc with their wee ear-drums. The Max-Joy …

Gadgets and Gizmos 21 Mar 2006, 18:43
France votes for DRM interop

And new fines for breaking it

It's the "dawn of an equitable internet", says French culture minister Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres. The nation's parliament has backed a bill to mandate interoperability between competing lock-down software restrictions on digital media. The lower house voted 296 to 193 in favor of a draft law that would force, for example, …

Media players 21 Mar 2006, 19:25