| Intel Adds Seven Sandy Bridge CPUs Posted: 31 Jan 2012 08:21 PM PST |
| Microsoft's Office 15 Technical Preview Program Now Underway Posted: 31 Jan 2012 08:08 PM PST 
The next version of Microsoft's popular office suite, codenamed Office 15, on Monday entered the technical preview phase, allowing a select group of NDA-bound customers to test early builds of the software suite and provide valuable feedback in the process. The launch of the Office 15 Technical Preview Program, a significant development milestone, was announced by PJ Hough, CVP of Development in Microsoft's Office Division, in a post on the Office blogs site. "At this early point in our development cycle, I'm not able to share too much about Office 15, but I can tell you Office 15 is the most ambitious undertaking yet for the Office Division. With Office 15, for the first time ever, we will simultaneously update our cloud services, servers, and mobile and PC clients for Office, Office 365, Exchange, SharePoint, Lync, Project, and Visio. Quite simply, Office 15 will help people work, collaborate, and communicate smarter and faster than ever before," wrote Hough. "While the Technical Preview program is already full," according to Hough, "everyone will have the opportunity to try the Office 15 public beta later this summer, and we'll have more to share about the release then." In related news, a new rumor suggests that Office 15 for Windows 8 will not get the proper Metro UI treatment. According to The Verge, its sources have revealed to it that the various apps in the next-gen productivity suite will essentially still be traditional Windows desktop apps, and not full "Metro style" apps, despite their overall interface being very touch friendly. Image Credit: blogsolute |
| U.S. Law Enforcement Used Warrant to Spy on MegaUpload Posted: 31 Jan 2012 03:08 PM PST  Ever since MegaUpload was hit with arrests and seizures last week, everyone has been wondering how the US government managed to get access to internal communications between the company's founders. Most of the incriminating conversations cited in the indictment are Skype IMs that would have long been purged from Skype's servers. According to Cnet, it has been confirmed that the FBI obtained a warrant to obtain the data, and that might have included using government-issued spyware.
The FBI gained court approval in 2007 to use spyware that could be planted on a suspect's computer, allowing the feds to monitor a user's activities. While Skype deletes data from its servers after 30 days, a local log on a user's machine could contain much older data. Some of the IMs in question are from 2007. It is unclear if 5 years of logs were on a compromised PC, but a possibility of a 5 year surveillance operation seems more unlikely. The 70 page indictment contains a multitude of IM conversations in which the founders admit to being a 'risky situation' with regard to the site. They also regularly downloaded infringing videos from the MegaUpload servers. How do you think the feds got all this evidence? |
| New Foxconn Factory Jobs Draw Huge Crowds in China Posted: 31 Jan 2012 02:47 PM PST  More likely than not, the phone or tablet you have sitting nearby was assembled in mainland China at one of the mega-facilities run by companies like Foxconn. The news cycle has recently brought stories of poor and dangerous working conditions, and even suicides in Foxconn plants. Still, the lines outside an employment agency yesterday in the Chinese city of Zhengzhou illustrate how easy Foxconn still finds it to hire workers.
Foxconn has recently moved to build five new factories in China and Brazil to build iPhones, and is doubling its workforce in Zhengzhou. That's why thousands of young people lined up for hours on Monday. Foxconn could be on the way to adding 100,000 more workers in China, and a similar number in Brazil. The salary most new hires in Zhengzhou can expect is about $261 per month, with a raise to $379-506 later. Foxconn workers live in dormitory-style housing, and meals are provided as part of the salary. It's not easy work, but as the lines show, it's better than nothing for many. As consumers demand lower prices on mobile technology, this pattern can only continue, though. Image via MicGadget |
| WikiLeaks Considering Moving Servers Off-Shore — Way Off-Shore Posted: 31 Jan 2012 02:31 PM PST  If you were wondering what WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has in common with a super-villain, wonder no more. It's his desire for an eccentric base of operations. According to sources inside WikiLeaks, the site is looking for a new server location, and some bizarre options have been explored including a certain micro-nation sea platform you might remember.
The financial backers of WikiLeaks are reportedly concerned about prosecution if the site data is stored anywhere that US law can reach. The servers are currently based in Sweden and Iceland. The idea has been floating that WikILeaks might set up shop on the micro-nation of Sealand. This is a WWII-era anti-aircraft platform that The Pirate Bay briefly considered using. Sealand is in international waters, and might afford some legal protection. Another notion is even a bit more unusual: boats. Some have reported on plans to place servers on old military barges in international waters. The logistics of this plan, and the Sealand strategy, seem dubious at best. Servers have been run from Sealand, which has Internet access, but will WikiLeaks make the move? We don't know that this report is true, we just really hope that it is. |
| Journey to the Center of the CPU: 15 Gorgeous Closeups of Microprocessors Posted: 31 Jan 2012 12:33 PM PST Mmm…chips. So darned tasty, such a perfect accompaniment to a frosty glass of beer on a hot summer afternoon. But do any of us really need to see a microscopic view of what goes on inside those yummy spud slabs? Hell no! Most of us are too terrified to even read the list of ingredients. Computer chips, on the other hand, are ripe for a little up close and personal examination. Particularly the one chip that towers above all others—the big, bad CPU. We know there are millions, and often billions, of transistors packed inside each and every modern-day processor. This in itself is a testament not only to man's obsession with miniaturization but his unstoppable thirst for power. But there's other stuff too—silicon wafers; dielectric insulators; copper electroplating; a high-speed, multi-layered highway of interconnections; and assorted unit-specific bits and pieces. Wanna see what it all looks like? Check out the gallery below! |
| Linux Dev Unveils Fully Open, KDE/Mer-Powered "Spark" Tablet Posted: 31 Jan 2012 11:15 AM PST Tablets are nifty, but for the most part, they're built to be walled gardens; Apple is notorious for its heavy-handed curation, Microsoft plans on keeping Windows 8's Metro-style apps close to the chest, and the hot-selling Kindle Fire is a deeply tweaked and thoroughly managed variant of Android. One Linux developer hopes to make things more customizable with Spark, a Mer/KDE Plasma Active-powered tablet that's fully unlocked and open for tinkering. 
Ars Technica pointed us towards the blog of Aaron Seigo, the brains behind the Spark. Seigo claims the €200 tablet (that's around $260 USD) packs " 1GHz AMLogic ARM processor, Mali-400 GPU, 512 MB RAM, 4GB internal storage plus SD card slot, a 7" capacitive multi-touch screen and wifi connectivity." The touchscreen-friendly Plasma Active UI is built on top of Mer, a community-created fork of the MeeGo Linux platform. Siego hopes the Spark will, well, spark adoption of more open practices on the mobile front. Even the content store will be free, open, and available for tweaking. "On release, the client will be Free software and the APIs openly documented so others can write front-ends," Seigo writes in another blog post. "Most interestingly, however, is the server side. It has been designed in such a way that other people with other devices or concepts can use that same back end to make their own stores. It supports the idea of a single, large set of content which can then be curated into any number of different stores with different focuses and delivery targets." Interested? Keep an eye on Seigo's blog. He promises to nail down answers about launch dates, purchasing/delivery methods, and details about hardware, software and other specific questions in the days to come. Hopefully this project bears fruit. Delicious, open, mobile fruit. |
| Symantec Stomps Out Anonymous Source Code Threat with a Security Patch Posted: 31 Jan 2012 11:07 AM PST  Symantec had promised to release a security patch for its pcAnywhere software to neutralize known vulnerabilities arising from the theft of certain source code, and the security firm has now made good on its word. The first patch was actually rolled out on Monday, January 23, 2012 for pcAnywhere 12.5 users, but there's another update now available to support pcAnywhere 12.0 and 12.1.
With the patch(s) in place and the ability to follow general security best practices, Symantec says its customers have nothing to worry about. Symantec was also willing to confirm that a portion of its source code was stolen by the hacking group known as Anonymous, though it believes the theft occurred around six years ago and mostly applies to out-of-date products. "Our investigation continues to indicate that the theft is limited to only the code for the 2006 versions of Norton Antivirus Corporate Edition, Norton Internet Security, Norton SystemWorks (Norton Utilities and Norton GoBack), and pcAnywhere," Symantec said. You can grab the pcAnywhere hotfixes here. |
| Firefox 10 Touches Down on Stable Release Channel Posted: 31 Jan 2012 10:48 AM PST  Mozilla's popular Firefox browser officially turns 10 today, as in version 10, not years in existence (if we're to use the launch of Firefox 1.0 as the browser's birth date, Firefox will turn 10 years old on November 9, 2014). New to version 10 is the absence of the Forward browsing button, which is now hidden until you navigate back. It also includes anti-aliasing for WebGL, and a few other tricks.
From a user standpoint, there aren't any big 'gee-whiz' changes introduced in Firefox 10, partially the result of the browser's rapid release schedule that sees Mozilla churning out new builds at a feverish clip. There are, however, some underneath the hood enhancements that deal with standards support, HTML5 coding, and upgrades that are of interest to developers. You can download the latest build here. Release notes are here. |
| Razer's True 7.1 Tiamat Gaming Headset Delayed... Again Posted: 31 Jan 2012 10:35 AM PST  Bad news for surround-sound gaming headset fans; Razer's Tiamat 7.1 headset was already delayed from its original 2011 launch, and now it's been delayed yet again. The company recently announced that its January rescheduling was a little too ambitious and now says that the cans will ship next month, instead. (Maybe the name should have been a warning: Wikipedia says Tiamat was "the monstrous embodiment of primordial chaos" in Babylonian mythology.) By way of apology, the company's offering some free Razer swag to early buyers.
"We feel our relentless pursuit of quality, and our refusal to ship a 'good enough' product will pay off when you plug in your pair and hear them for the first time," Razer wrote on its website. "We do not take delays lightly, and you can bet your ass we are busting ours to make this product perfect." If you add your name to the Tiamat's notification list, Razer will send you a coupon code for a free Razer t-shirt and flask, which you can redeem when the Tiamat goes up for sale. A quick refresher: Razer pegs the Tiamat as a true 7.1 headset thanks to its 10 individual positional drivers, which it claims is a "world's first." Other gaming headsets use simulated surround sound. Are you thinking of picking one up? |
Intel updated its processor price list on Sunday. While nothing seems to have changed where the prices of existing chips are concerned, 
