The world’s biggest maker of x86 central processing units and supporting chipsets has been eyeing the market of standalone graphics processors for some time and, according to rumours spread at Computex Taipei 2007 trade show, will finally enter it a little sooner than expected.

Several makers of graphics cards have already been contacted by Intel in regards of roll-out the company’s first discrete graphics solutions in years. DigiTimes web-site reports that if current plans go smoothly, the launch of the new products is projected to be “around early in the second quarter of 2008”. Not everything is yet clear with Intel’s product roadmap: so far the company has not provided its potential partners specifications of the forthcoming graphics processing units (GPUs). It is expected though that the company will “deliver a more complete roadmap and specifications” in the Q4 2007.

Source: XbitLabs

Best Buy finds itself in the embarrassing position of having to explain its lawyer's conduct after he admitted to falsifying documents in a class-action lawsuit against the company.

The suit alleges that the electronics retailer was signing up customers for MSN Internet service without their consent between 1999 and 2003, which resulted in credit card charges the consumer did not authorize. Best Buy received a cut for each customer it registered.

Approximately 100,000 were affected by the practice, and Microsoft is accused of allowing it to continue. However, with these latest developments, if the judge enters a decision against Best Buy, Microsoft would basically no longer be liable.

Minneapolis lawyer Timothy Block acknowledged that he altered both e-mails and a memo before turning them over to plaintiffs. In addition, Best Buy has been chastised in the past for not cooperating with the court in turning over documents.

Block's law firm has since asked to be removed from the case, and the judge will rule June 22 whether to grant the withdrawal. He has told the court that neither Best Buy nor his firm -- Robins, Kaplan, Miller and Ciresi -- were aware of his actions.

Source: BetaNews  

Intel has recently revealed the phasing out schedule of their last Pentium 4 and Pentium D desktop processors. According to the document, starting from August 8 they began to discontinue single-core Pentium 4 661 (3.6GHz), Pentium 4 641 (3.2GHz) and Pentium 4 631 (3.0GHz), and dual-core Pentium D 945 (3.4GHz), Pentium D 935 (3.2GHz), Pentium D 925 (3.0GHz) and Pentium D 915 (2.8GHz). The reason for this decision is quite natural: market demand for the Desktop Intel Pentium 4 Processors and Intel Pentium D Processors has shifted to other Intel processors.So,

CPUs on NetBurst micro-architecture are finally becoming history. Only some Pentium 4 6x1 and Pentium 4 5x1 processor may fall under the special discontinue program, because they may still be demanded by the OEMs and system integrators. As for all other Pentium 4 and Pentium D processors, the last orders will be accepted on December 7 2007. It is the case for both: boxed retail solutions as well as tray units delivered to OEMs and system integrators.

By the way, this September Intel is planning on discontinuing the relatively young Conroe CPU models, too, which should free the market for new solutions.

Source: WinBeta

I posted about thts site in the fourm a few weeks ago, and I have been using it for a few months myself.  On Tuesday, August 14th Microsoft released a download service called the Microsoft Update (MU) Catalog.  The MU Catalog is a central location for Microsoft updates and 3rd party Windows drivers. You can search the site for updates, add them to a 'basket', and then download the updates for later distribution using your favorite ESD tool. Additionally, you can link the MU Catalog with products like WSUS, SCE, and SCCM to import updates that might not otherwise be available. 

Private Hotfixes, Anyone?

One of the most compelling features that didn't make it in v1 is the ability to download private and/or limited release hotfixes. Readers with access to Premier Support know how handy it is to download private hotfixes through the PSS web site. Here's a screen shot of Microsoft Premier Online's listing for KB 940046 - a hotfix for Windows Server 2003. Notice the link to download the hotfix right at the top of the page.  Now imagine if you could sign on to the MU Catalog with your Passport (er, Windows Live) credentials and import this same hotfix right into WSUS, SCE, or SCCM. That would simplify deployment and improve the usefulness of WSUS, SCE, and SCCM in one fell swoop. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that this feature makes it into MU Catalog v2!!

Source: WindowsConnected

Most vulnerabilities in applications never see the light of day, according to security expert.

While the number of reported security vulnerabilities was around 7,200 last year, the actual figure could be as high as 140,000, according to an expert.

Gunter Ollmann, director of security strategy at IBM's security subsidiary ISS, said that while 7,247 flaws were publicly disclosed in 2006 and over 2,500 were discovered so far this year, many more will escape the attention of most of us.

Ollmann reckoned that 125,000 flaws per year never saw the light of day as they were found by penetration testers working under contract to organisations. These organisations then claimed ownership of vulnerabilities while working to fix the bugs.

View: ITPro

Review: But Kaspersky Anti-Virus 6.0 needs a broader reporting function.

Kaspersky Lab's Kaspersky Anti-Virus 6.0 is a robust desktop security solution that's backed by a lightning-fast security response team and a seemingly endless supply of signature updates.

However, while the product's management platform performs its core duties satisfactorily, we'd like to see Kaspersky widen the scope of the software's reporting capabilities—either through internal development or third-party partnerships.

Although the product is called Kaspersky Anti-Virus, this name singles out only one of the several layers of security defense that Kaspersky has bundled into its offering. The product automatically defends against viruses, Trojans and hack tools, plus other spyware and adware.

 View: eWeek

Peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing networks, which let users trade movies, music and software online, are increasingly being used to trick PCs into attacking other machines, experts say.

Computer scientists have previously shown how P2P networks can be subverted so that several connected PCs gang up to attack a single machine, flooding it with enough traffic to make it crash. This can work even if the target is not part of the P2P network itself.

Now, security experts are warning that P2P networks are increasingly being used to do just this. "Until January of this year we had never seen a peer-to-peer network subverted and used for an attack," says Darren Rennick of internet security company Prolexic in an advisory released recently. "We now see them constantly being subverted."

View: New Scientist Tech

According to the CEO of Walt Disney, Robert Iger, there is no high-def format war outside of the US.

In his own words: "If you look across the globe, the only place there is really a format war is in the United States. In other markets where next-gen DVD is starting to penetrate, Blu-ray is winning, and substantially; so much so there isn’t even a perceived format war."

Do you hear that Europe? There is no war! Go back to sleep! Everything will be just fine! The US is taking care of it. You have only friendly fire to fear. But seriously, it’s a silly thing to say when you consider that HD DVD players and PS3s now share space in the same stores. In fact according to ERT Weekly, most UK electrical retailers - over 60 per cent - prefer HD DVD to Blu-ray.

Now, if Iger had said that the war outside the US right now is just a little – but fierce – conflagration, he’d have hit the nail right on the head. Especially in the UK.

View: The Inquirer

AMD is denying reports that its highly anticipated Barcelona quad-core processor has been hit by a delay. Barcelona is scheduled for release this summer and is still on track, AMD spokesman Andrew Fox told vnunet.com.

In the run-up to the launch, AMD is showing off the first working production chips at the Computex tradeshow in Taipei this week.

Supercomputer company Cray started raining on the chipmaker's parade with a warning on Monday that its upcoming XT4 supercomputer would be delayed because of production problems with Barcelona.A story on the Dow Jones Newswire on Wednesday quoted Cray spokesman Steve Conway as saying that Barcelona was behind the delay.

Conway declined to comment to vnunet.com, but pointed to news reports that discredited his original quote.Cray's XT4 will in fact be using Budapest, another quad-core AMD chip that has always been scheduled for a late 2007 release. Budapest is aimed at low-cost single-socket servers for application in file servers, print servers and other less CPU-intensive tasks.

 Source: Vnunet

Microsoft is in full throttle with the evolution of Windows Vista Service Pack 1. Having released the first wave of pre-beta builds to a select pool of testers in mid July, the Redmond company is hard at work on the development of the operating system’s first refresh.

A clear indication of this is the fact that a new build of Windows Vista SP1 has shipped to testers. Microsoft however is still mute on the subject and under Sinofsky’s Windows Omerta, codename Translucency. At this point in time the Redmond company failed to officially confirm the new release of Vista SP1. Still, it seems that the fresh stage of the service pack is still in pre-beta phase, and the company delivered no indication pointing to when it plans to move Vista SP1 into beta.

The latest Vista SP1 beta release is build 6.0.6001.16633 (longhorn.070803-1655), according to Mary Jo Foley. Outside of the build number there is actually very scarce information available about this release. Undoubtedly, as the fresh Vista SP1 version will be dropped in the laps of more and more users additional details will leak. The previous release of the service pack made it clear that leaks are inherent, as Windows Omerta is not in effect outside of Redmond. One aspect seems to be clear though, the new pre-beta build of Vista SP1 is a standalone .EXE installer.

With the initial versions of SP1 released to testers Microsoft choose to deliver an ISO containing the entire operating system, with the service pack installed on top. The full build tag of the first Vista SP1 was 6001.16549.070628-1825. Microsoft had to face not only a feast of information about the 6001.16549 after the July availability but also leaks of the actual pre-beta version of the service pack to torrent trackers. The Company failed to react in any manner to the fact that Vista SP1 6001.16549 was offered for download via peer-to-peer file sharing networks. The only difference is that with the new release, Microsoft scrapped the 3+ GB ISO file in favor of an executable file with the Vista SP1.

Source: Softpedia