Sights & Sounds

Chinese electronics manufacturers have officially unveiled the first CBHD disc players, China’s home-grown alternative to Blu-ray (and, formerly, HD-DVD) which it hopes will jump-start a market for high-definition video in mainland China. Like Blu-ray, CBHD uses a blue laser to read high-capacity optical discs, although CBHD discs have a physical structure more like a traditional dual-layer DVD that could make it easier for existing DVD manufacturers to produce CBHD titles. CBHD is based in part on Toshiba’s defunct HD-DVD format, and uses AACS copy protection. Dual-layer CBHD discs can accommodate about 30 GB of data.

Chinese manufacturers Chinco and TCL are getting ready to put their first CBHD players on sale, with prices starting around 2,000 yuan (roughly $293 USD), which makes them substantially cheaper than Blu-ray players, in part because CBHD players don’t have to pay the licensing fees associated with Blu-ray. As for content, China hopes to have at least 100 movies available on CBHD by the end of 2009…including titles from major Hollywood studio Warner Bros.

Despite how some consumers feel about Apple products, few will argue that Apple has some of the most desirable products and best product marketing on the planet. Apple has dominated the mobile music player market and is now conquering the smartphone marketwith its iPhone. To go along with the iPhone, Apple launched its App Store last year that provided third-party applications for the handset ranging from video games to productivity apps. The App Store was a raging success from the start with over $30 million in sales during its first full month of operation.

This week Apple announced that the billionth download had been made from the App Store. A contest was running as the countdown to one billion downloads ran and the contest is now over. The one-billionth download was made yesterday by an unnamed user. Apple says that it will announce who made the billionth download soon. The person who made the record setting download stands to get a serious gift package including $10,000 in iTunes credit, a 17-inch MacBook Pro, a 32GB iPod touch and a Time Capsule backup system. Apple says that in all it will give away $13,000 in prizes for the contest. All App downloader’s were automatically entered into the contest. Apple’s App Store is so popular and has generated so much revenue that most all smartphone makers are now readying their own versions of the App Store, each trying to be slightly different from the Apple offering.

Posted on 24.04.2009 at 15:54 in Tech News by Martin

Microsoft has reported its first ever year-on-year drop in sales as the decline in the global PC market hit the world’s largest software supplier. The company announced third quarter revenue of $13.65bn (£9.3bn), six per cent down on the same period last year. Net income of $2.98bn (£2.03bn) was down 32 per cent. In its previous financial quarter, Microsoft announced 5,000 job cuts, which resulted in $290m (£198m) spent on employee severance charges in the subsequent three months. The supplier said that sales in its Client, Microsoft Business Division, and Server & Tools divisions were most affected by the weakness in the global PC and server markets, although revenue from corporate customers remained stable.

“With our continued R&D investment and our broad suite of products and services, we remain in a great position to compete and gain share in the marketplace,” said Kevin Turner, chief operating officer at Microsoft. Chris Liddell, chief financial officer at Microsoft, added: “While market conditions remained weak during the quarter, I was pleased with the organisation’s ability to offset revenue pressures with the swift implementation of cost-savings initiatives. We expect the weakness to continue through at least the next quarter.” Analyst IDC said worldwide PC sales slumped by 7.1 per cent in the first three months of this year.

Source: Vnunet

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Posted on 23.04.2009 at 11:39 in Tech News by Martin

Cyberspies have hacked into government computers and stolen sensitive information on a next-generation stealth fighter, according to an investigation published in The Wall Street Journal Tuesday. The hackers lifted terabytes of data on the Pentagon’s $300 billion Joint Strike Fighter project, the Journal reports, including details about the aircraft’s design that could expose vulnerabilities. The hack is believed to have happened through a hole in a contractors’ network. Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and BAE Systems are the primary contractors on the project. None of them has publicly commented.

While the details surrounding the reported Joint Strike Fighter breach are far from clear — how the intruders made off with such a massive amount of data, for example, has yet to be revealed — there’s no question the magnitude of the attack is alarming. Even worse, the unnamed officials cited in the story say hackers have worked their way into the U.S. Air Force air traffic control system recently as well. The F-35 is the Pentagon’s most expensive, complex and ambitious aircraft program. According to program estimates, the total investment required in the F-35 exceeds $1 trillion — more than $300 billion to buy 2,456 aircraft and $760 billion to keep them flying beyond their expected life cycle.

Posted on 23.04.2009 at 12:17 in Tech News by Martin

Apple has gone and posted up the financial results for operations during the second quarter of 2009. Not only this, but they commented on the possibility of an Apple netbook in the future. According to the press release, “Apple sold 2.22 million Macintosh® computers during the quarter, representing a three percent unit decline from the year-ago quarter. The Company sold 11.01 million iPods during the quarter, representing three percent unit growth over the year-ago quarter. Quarterly iPhone units sold were 3.79 million representing 123 percent unit growth over the year-ago quarter.” Apple posted a revenue of $8.16 billion and a net quarterly profit of $1.21 billion. Apple has said the results exceeded their expectations, despite the lacking economy.

“We are extremely pleased to report the best non-holiday quarter revenue and earnings in our history,” said Apple chief financial officer, Peter Oppenheimer. “Apple’s financial condition remains very robust, with almost $29bn (£20bn) in cash and marketable securities on our balance sheet.” Looking ahead to the next quarter, Oppenheimer added Apple expected revenue in the range of about $7.7bn (£5.3bn) to $7.9bn (£5.4bn). A recent Gartner report showed worldwide PC shipments totalled 67 million units in the first quarter of 2009, a near seven per cent decline versus the first quarter of 2008. Gartner said that low priced mobile PCs continue to be the growth driver for the PC industry.

Source: Vnunet, Neowin

Posted on 21.04.2009 at 12:48 in Tech News by Martin

Adobe has signed a deal putting Flash in chips for set-top boxes and TVs, meaning Web-based content will be coming to your living room screen. Adobe has announced a major deal that will put its Flash software on chips for set-top boxes and televisions, meaning they’ll be able to deliver Web-based content and applications. Although the deal doesn’t include Sony and Samsung TVs, it does cover most chips, including those from Broadcom, Intel, NXP and STMicroelectronics, the BBC reports, with the first applications arriving on TV sets next year.

It could lead to televisions taking on many tasks currently performed by computers, and for its first series of applications, Adobe has signed up Disney, the New York Times, and Netflix. Adobe says Flash is on 98% of PCs, and some 80% of online video (including YouTube) is delivered via Flash, leaving it far ahead of rival Silverlight. Anup Murarka, director of technology strategy for Flash, said: “Change is coming to TV and we will see more and more content get used and taken to TV.” Adobe is hoping for dominance in market for all three screens - PC, TV, and mobile. Flash Lite was on 40% of all mobile devices that shipped last year, the big exception being the iPhone.

Source: Digital Trends

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Posted on 20.04.2009 at 15:12 in Tech News by Martin

Oracle Corp plans to enter the computer hardware market by buying Sun Microsystems Inc for more than $7 billion, swooping in after Sun’s talks with IBM fell apart. The announcement on Monday surprised many Oracle watchers, who believed the company can boost profitability at Sun’s software businesses but were unsure if it can be as successful with Sun’s hardware unit amid stiff competition against IBM, Hewlett-Packard Co, Dell Inc and new entrant Cisco Systems Inc. “It’s an out-of-the-box, left-field type of a deal because Oracle is buying a predominantly hardware business,” said Jefferies & Co analyst Ross MacMillan. “The push-pull of the deal is the uncertainty of the hardware business with the earnings accretion of the software business.”

Oracle will pay $9.50 a share for Sun, which values the high-end server and software maker at about $7.06 billion, based on 743 million shares outstanding as of the end of its second fiscal quarter on December 28, according to Sun. Sun had previously rejected IBM’s offer to pay up to $9.40 a share, according to sources with knowledge of the matter. Shares of Sun jumped 35.7 percent to $9.08 in morning Nasdaq trading, while Oracle shares fell 3.7 percent to $18.36. Shares of IBM, which did not immediately return calls for comment, fell 1.8 percent to $99.49 on the NYSE. Oracle President Safra Catz said on a conference call that Oracle intends to make the hardware division profitable. Sun’s top-selling products are high-end servers and storage equipment.