General Technology Headlines

Note that you can keep up-to-date on most technology-related headlines by paying regular visits to sites such as NewsHub - a good index of up-to-the-minute headlines from the computing world. NewsHub links to articles found on other sites such as News.com, TechServer, Wired News, TechWeb, Info World, ZDNet, NewsBytes, Byte and others. Note that NewsHub doesn't index all articles from other sites, only the more important ones, so I recommend keeping an eye on the other news sites too.

Key: OD = Original Document

[03/Jan/12] LG Announces Ultra-thin 55-inch OLED TV

[Sorry for the enormous time gap here! Alas, life/work nonsense meant I never had the time to maintain this page. Still don't really, but I'll try anyway this year]

[28/Sep/06] Branson unveils Virgin spaceship

"Sir Richard Branson has unveiled a mock-up of the rocket-powered vehicle that will carry clients into space through his Virgin Galactic business."

[28/Oct/2005] Supercomputer doubles own record

"The Blue Gene/L supercomputer has broken its own record to achieve more than double the number of calculations it can do a second. It reached 280.6 teraflops - that is 280.6 trillion calculations a second."

[27/Jul/2005] Japanese develop 'female' android

"Japanese scientists have unveiled the most human-looking robot yet devised - a "female" android called Repliee Q1. She has flexible silicone for skin rather than hard plastic, and a number of sensors and motors to allow her to turn and react in a human-like manner."

[02/Jul/2005] Nasa probe strikes Comet Tempel 1

US space agency (Nasa) scientists are celebrating after seeing a probe crash into the heart of a comet.

[04/Oct/2004] SpaceShipOne rockets to success

The rocket plane SpaceShipOne has shot to an altitude of more than 100km for the second time inside a week to claim the $10m Ansari X-Prize.

[28/Sep/2004] DVDs could hold '100 times more'

"Future DVDs could hold 100 times more information than current discs. Imperial College London researchers in the UK are developing a new way of storing data that could lead to discs capable of holding 1,000 gigabytes. "

[21/Jun/2004] Private craft makes space history

"SpaceShipOne has rocketed into the history books to become the first private manned spacecraft to fly to the edge of space and back. The craft, built by aviation pioneer Burt Rutan, went over space's 100km (62 mile) boundary, said mission control."

[16/Jun/2004] Teleportation breakthrough made

"Scientists have performed successful teleportation on atoms for the first time, the journal Nature reports."

[28/Jul/2003] Virtual humans edge closer

"For years, one of the main goals in computer graphics has been to recreate a totally convincing human being on screen, something that looks and acts so life-like that it is indistinguishable from a real person."

[01/Jul/2003] Behold the pentaquark

"Physicists have discovered a new class of subatomic particle that will provide unexpected insights into the fundamental building blocks of matter."

[28/Apr/2003] The rise of the keyring drive

"The floppy disk is dead. Long live the pocket drive, a tiny piece of kit that is a revolution."

[06/Mar/2003] Net speed record smashed

"Scientists have set a new internet speed record by transferring 6.7 gigabytes of data across 10,978 kilometres (6,800 miles), from Sunnyvale in the US to Amsterdam in Holland, in less than one minute."

[11/Jul/2002] 3D graphics world shaken by patent claims

"The body governing the widely used graphics standard OpenGL faces tough decisions after Microsoft stakes a claim in the technology. Users of Mac OS, Unix and Linux may have a reason to worry."

[17/Jul/2002] Switch on for state snooping

"From August net service providers in The UK will be legally obliged to carry out automatic surveillance of their customers' web habits."

[26/Jun/2002] US telecoms giant admits huge fraud

"WorldCom, the number two US long-distance phone company, has admitted orchestrating a multi-billion dollar accounting fraud. The company said its profits between January 2001 and March 2002 were inflated by $3.8bn (2.5bn)." (this isn't normally the kind of article I'd cover, but I've added since I'm rather curious as to why all the supposedly sophisticated computer-based accountancy/money systems we have aren't able to spot something as bad as this. Impact on society? I certainly cover the ramifications of new telecoms technology, but if a major player goes bust because of greed and fraud, the impact of that is much greater - Ian)

[18/Jun/2002] 'Snoop' climbdown by Blunkett

"David Blunkett has admitted he blundered with the controversial 'snoop' plans to give a raft of public bodies access to e-mail and mobile phone records. The proposals are to be put on hold indefinitely in the face of huge opposition, which the home secretary conceded his department totally failed to predict." (how could they not have forseen the opposition to such a crazy piece of legislation? I can think of dozens of reasons why the plans are bad and cannot work. Do these people not even discuss what they're proposing? - Ian)

[17/Jun/2002] Australian teleport breakthrough

"It is a long way from Star Trek, but teleportation - the disembodiment of an object in one location and its reconstruction in another - has been successfully carried out in a physics lab in Australia."

[17/Jun/2002] Official site to advise on state snooping

"The UK Government has set up a website to advise other organisations on the best way to snoop on citizens. Later this month a raft of government departments and organisations will be added to the list of people that can compile records of what British people get up to with their mobile and fixed phones, fax machines, web browser and e-mail accounts."

[12/Jun/2002] 'Snoop' plans raise privacy fears

"Moves to let a new raft of UK Government agencies and local councils delve into people's e-mail and telephone records have prompted new privacy fears." (this legislation is insane - it must be stopped! - Ian)

[11/Jun/2002] 'Massive abuse' of privacy feared

"Plans to increase the number of organisations that can look at records of what you do online could lead to widespread abuse of personal information, warn experts."

[26/Apr/2002] Japanese supercomputer simulates Earth

"A new Japanese supercomputer costing hundreds of millions of dollars was switched on this month and immediately outclassed its nearest rival."

[11/Feb/2002] Games to take on a life of their own

"Video games of the future could have characters with almost human intelligence, capable of understanding and acting on your commands."

[14/Dec/2001] Digital history saved

"Millions of messages posted on electronic bulletin boards over the past 20 years have been saved from digital oblivion. The internet search engine Google has expanded its capabilities to include more than 700 million messages, offering a valuable insight into the history and the culture of the internet."

[13/Dec/2001] Paving the way for 'uncrackable' codes

"The heart of a new light-emitting diode (LED) developed in Cambridge, UK, can be controlled so precisely that it emits just one single photon of light each time it is switched on."

[12/Nov/2001] Cybercrime treaty gets green light

"A controversial treaty that tries to tackle cybercrime has been adopted by the 43-nation Council of Europe."

[29/Aug/2001] Linux has come a long way

"10 years after its inception, open source OS is mainstream"

[29/Aug/2001] New standard to boost hard-drive speed

"Hard drives will get a speed boost Wednesday from a new standard that will help them keep up with processors. ... The new standard, Serial ATA, will allow hard drives to keep up with PCs, which speed up with every iteration of processors from the likes of Intel and AMD. This not only will improve performance, but also enable PC makers to use smaller cables inside PCs, reducing heat and allowing for smaller systems to be developed. Serial ATA will allow data to be transferred at 600MB per second. "

[28/Aug/2001] 10 GHz In The Next 3 Years

"Intel's case for support of RDRAM shows some life - honest, it does. While the company acknowledges that it needs to support DDR, and will be coming out with DDR support in the first quarter of 2002, no sooner, it is also doing a better job of putting forward its RDRAM case. No DDR until 2002, dudes! Not from Intel, at least."

[27/Aug/2001] Intel launches 2 gigahertz Pentium 4 processor

"Intel Corp. on Monday launched its fastest Pentium 4 processor yet and slashed prices on older models to help spur demand in the weak economy. The new Pentium 4 is the first microprocessor to hit 2 gigahertz, or 2 billion cycles per second. Available immediately, it sells for $562 when purchased in quantities of 1,000."

[20/Jly/2001] Report: China shuts down 2,000 Net cafes

"China has shut down nearly 2,000 Internet cafes across the country and has ordered 6,000 to suspend operations and make changes, state media said on Friday."

[20/Jly/2001] Apache avoids most security woes

"The Apache Software Foundation Inc.'s Apache HTTP Server has earned what many hope for and few achieve: an enviable security reputation."

[16/Jly/2001] Hackers developing anti-censorship software

"A group of hackers is finishing work on software that would enable human rights workers to access censored Web sites, in a move that ratchets up the ``arms race'' between free speech activists on the Internet and government censors in Asia and the Middle East."

[16/Jly/2001] Half of U.S. Broadband Users Unprotected. Are you practically begging hackers and Internet thieves to attack?

"Up to half of U.S. broadband users are leaving themselves wide open to attack by Internet thieves and hackers. Why? Because subscribers to "always on" Net connections aren't using any protection--like a firewall or antivirus software--to keep the black hats from gaining access to their PCs."

[16/Jly/2001] Ericsson to Begin Including Info on Phone Radiation

"The world's major mobile phone makers will start in October to include information about the level of radiation emitted by their phones, a spokesman for Swedish telecoms equipment maker Ericsson said on Monday."

[15/Jly/2001] Civil libertarians alarmed by surveillance technology

"Visitors to Tampa's Ybor City nightlife district are being monitored by cameras that analyze their chins, noses and cheekbones with futuristic law enforcement technology that has evoked cries of "Big Brother." The video cameras along Ybor City's streets snap pictures of the faces in the crowd and compare those images to a database of 30,000 people that includes runaway teenagers and people wanted on criminal charges."

[13/Jly/2001] AMD Derides Intel's 'Monopolistic Practices'

"Advanced Micro Devices Inc.'s chairman, stung by a 92 percent plunge in profits from a year ago, slammed rival Intel Corp. Thursday for recent price cuts, accusing it of "monopolistic practices" that have stymied its efforts in the commercial market."

[27/Jun/2001] IBM's 9 million pixel LCD

"IBM announced today its T220 flat panel display. The T220 is a TFT-LCD display that is 22.2" diagonal and can show incredible detail. The display has a whopping 9.2 million pixels in a 22.2" area. For some perspective, a 1600x1200 resolution display has only 1.92 million pixels. The T220 features up to 12 times more detail than some current monitors and will be used for design and medical applications. It is also capable of fully displaying several top-resolution HDTV channels at once, suggesting possible applications in the broadcast television industry."

[25/Jun/2001] Compaq to stop making chips, put Intel inside instead

"Compaq Computer said Monday it is getting out of the business of making microprocessors, including its famed Alpha chip, and will license that job to Intel in a deal that calls for hundreds of Compaq engineers to eventually join Intel."

[25/Jun/2001] IBM claims new transistor fastest

"IBM said Monday it has built the world's fastest silicon-based transistor, a development that promises to make telecommunications chips run faster on less power."

[09/Jun/2001] Intel Claims World's Smallest, Fastest Transistor

" Intel Corp., the world's largest semiconductor maker, has developed what it says is the fastest and smallest transistor ever."

[06/Jun/2001] AMD launches multiprocessor Athlon

"With the release of the Athlon MP processor and DDR-based 760MP chip set, AMD goes after another slice of Intel's pie. Both are geared toward the multiprocessor servers and workstations, where Intel's Xeon processors are king. The first two Athlon MP processors, announced by the company Tuesday, run at 1- and 1.2-GHz speeds."

[04/Jun/2001] Decline of New Economy will make everyone pay

"It's payback time. The idealistic dream of a digital Camelot where everything is free is giving way to cold fiscal reality. Companies and Web sites are beginning to charge for content and services to survive the New Economy's 2000 crash."

[29/May/2001] Intel, HP Launch New Processor

"After nearly a decade of development and two years of delays, Intel Corp. and Hewlett-Packard Co. on Tuesday launched the first in a new generation of microprocessors they hope will dominate the next era of computing."

[31/Jan/2001] Dreamcast is officially dead

"Sega has finally confirmed that it will stop making Dreamcast gaming consoles and will concentrate on producing games for rival consoles and its existing Dreamcast consoles. ..."

[31/Jan/2001] Holographic Data Storage

'A 20-year-old data storage concept took a step closer to practicality yesterday as Lucent, Imation, and three venture capital firms created InPhase Technologies. InPhase's goal is to commercialize HDS (Holographic Data Storage), which has the potential to make huge improvements in data storage capacity and transfer speed, thus improving "video, Internet, data warehousing and games applications."'

[19/Jan/2001] Inauguration protesters get wired

"Forget peace signs and burning draft cards. The malcontents of 2001 are tuning in with handheld computers, cell phones and Web cameras ready to broadcast any police abuses to the world."

[18/Jan/2001] True nonstick polymer eliminates mechanical friction

"North Carolina State University professor Jan Genzer has hit on a method for creating the ultimate nonstick surface. Potential applications include covering adjacent disk-drive components to prevent scratching, improving the biocompatibility of medical implants by eliminating interactions with surrounding cells and coating airplanes with a water repellent that would automatically de-ice wings."

[15/Jan/2001] The military get mightier

"The US military is planning to turn soldiers into supermen by fitting them with powered exoskeletons."

[15/Jan/2001] Chinese mission progressing well

"It is still unclear as to when China will bring down the unmanned Shenzhou II capsule, which has been in orbit since its launch on Wednesday last week."

[12/Jan/2001] Microsoft warping IE?

"Microsoft plans to make MSN Explorer the low-end consumer Web browser, and plans to eventually aim a new browser product entitled "Netdocs" at business users. With that said, there may not be room for a plain version of Internet Explorer 6.0 that many of us are used to."

[12/Jan/2001] Intel Bashes CPRM Opponents

"The Register posted another in its series of articles on CPRM (Content Protection for Removable Media). This particular article focused on Intel's strategy to bash the opponents of CPRM and make sure that the mainstream media understood that it never intended to put CPRM code onto the firmware of fixed hard drives. ..."

[10/Jan/2001] Israeli Start-Up May Thwart Internet Hackers

"An Israeli high-tech firm says it has developed a system that cuts off the main route used by most Internet hackers when they try to break into a company's computer network."

[08/Jan/2001] AMD plans to open third processor factory in 2004

"Advanced Micro Devices plans to open a third microprocessor fabrication facility by 2004, but will likely share the space with another chipmaker to cut costs."

[13/Dec/2000] Microsoft scores big points in video game market

"Microsoft on Wednesday said the top independent video game developer, Electronic Arts, will make titles for its upcoming Xbox console, giving a huge boost to the software giant's push into the $20 billion-a-year video game market."

[13/Dec/2000] Tellabs Introduces Industry's Largest Optical Switch

"To help service providers manage the exploding demand for bandwidth, Tellabs today announced the industry's largest intelligent optical switch, with enough capacity to carry 80 million simultaneous Internet calls. The TITAN 6700 optical switch enables carriers to manage more than 10 terabits of traffic in its initial release and will grow with carriers' demands to manage transparent wavelengths in a future release."

[11/Dec/2000] Intel breakthrough promises superfast chip

"Intel, the world's largest manufacturer of computer chips, says it has built the world's smallest and fastest transistor - a milestone that will allow the Santa Clara, Calif.-based company to build within the next five or 10 years microprocessors that will be 10 times more powerful than the ones available today."

[10/Dec/2000] Power company to test endless fuel cells next year

"The time when a home can be powered by one endless battery is drawing near in the North West where many are living outside the reach of electrical transmission lines."

[07/Dec/2000] IBM, Infineon plan magnetic memory chips

"IBM AND INFINEON Technologies have agreed to jointly develop a new memory technology that could significantly increase battery life of portable computing devices and lead to "instant on" computers, the companies announced Thursday."

[05/Dec/2000] All systems go for space station

"The second of the International Space Station's giant solar wings is now in place."

[04/Dec/2000] Net faces 10-year Olympic shutout

"Websites will be banned from using or showing video clips of Olympic events for the next decade. The restriction, which is being imposed by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), is designed to protect the substantial investments made by national broadcasters who do not want their television and radio audiences undermined by internet coverage."

(this move gets my "dumb idea of the decade" award - Ian)

[04/Dec/2000] Experts: Prolin Worm Serious

"Anti-virus vendors on Friday, Dec. 1, closed ranks around the conviction that a new style of malicious code, the Prolin worm, represents a more serious threat than first believed when it was first detected."

[04/Dec/2000] China, U.S. Battle Over Domain Names

"A dispute between the United States and China over the control of Chinese-scripted Internet addresses deepened on Monday as China reiterated its claim over all Chinese language Internet domain names."

[04/Dec/2000] Privacy Groups Wage War On Amazon.com

"Privacy advocates on both sides of the Atlantic on Monday pressed their governments to investigate Amazon.com's privacy policy."

[29/Nov/2000] Digital TV makes long-awaited debut at industry show

"Digital television and its broadband possibilities -- long confined to the spin of corporate meeting rooms -- are finally breaking out into viewer living rooms as new services roll out of the box.

[22/Nov/2000] 'Bionic' hand success hailed

"British scientists have created the world's first truly "bionic" hand small enough to be used by a toddler."

[21/Nov/2000] Web worries over French site ban

"A landmark ruling in France ordering Yahoo! to prevent French users from accessing sites selling Nazi memorabilia has raised fresh challenges for companies struggling with the laws of cyberspace."

[21/Nov/2000] Sony unveils its first humanoid robot

"It has a long way to go before it can wash the dishes, but Sony Corp.'s first humanoid robot kicks a mean soccer ball and does the "Para Para," Japan's latest dance craze."

[20/Nov/2000] Intel's Future Rides On Pentium 4

"When Intel officially unveils its long-awaited Pentium 4 microprocessor line Monday, there will be few surprises in terms of specifications and pricing. But the future of Intel -- which has revealed most of the details about the Pentium 4 in a systematic, step-by-step approach over the last several months -- could be riding on it, according to analysts."

[20/Nov/2000] Intel Releases AGP 8X Spec For Public Comment

"Intel Corp. released a draft version of the next-generation AGP 8X specification, paving the way for future graphics performance. "

[12/Oct/2000] 10 Terabyte disks

"A new fluorescent disk technology has emerged, similar to the technology we've reported on a couple of times that is still expected to allow for 140 GB optical disks. The downside of that technology was a 6 month lifespan for data, as the disks were unable to hold data successfully for longer. The new technology, dubbed "Hyper-CD-ROM," should be able to hold 10 TB (roughly 10,000 GB) of information and has a lifespan of 5,000 years, according to its inventor, Romanian scientist Eugen Pavel. It achieves such massive storage capacity by writing to 10,000 different levels of an optical disk and changing the flourescence of the disk."

[04/Oct/2000] Space Flight Center Tests Sixth Inflatable Structure

"Engineers at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., have completed tests on an experimental lightweight, inflatable structure that one day might lead to optical, solar power or propulsion uses in space."

[03/Oct/2000] INEEL researchers create mighty magnets with minuscule structure

"INEEL researchers have discovered a way to make magnets used in computer hard drives and motors more powerful and durable, while also slashing their manufacturing costs."

[26/Sep/2000] 10 Gbit networking

"The race is on for 10 Gbit networking. Four physical medium-dependent interfaces for 10 Gbit Ethernet were approved by the most recent meeting of the IEEE 802.3ae. 10 Gbit/second Ethernet is set to be ratified in 2002."

[00/Oct/2000] Live Wires

"In many ways, DNA is almost the perfect building block for constructing tiny objects on the scale of nanometers (billionths of a meter). In some of the most promising research, scientists have recently learned to synthesize strands of DNA that conduct electricity."

[29/Aug/2000] Recall may hurt Intel's effort to defend market

"Competition from AMD contributed to Intel's recent production problems, but AMD's limited chipmaking capacity will prevent it from cashing in on the embarrassing mistakes, according to analysts."

[28/Aug/2000] Intel recalls its fastest chip

"Intel Corp. said Monday it is recalling the fastest model of its Pentium III family after it found a failure in one of the chip's circuits, the latest in a string of missteps that has plagued the world's largest semiconductor maker."

[15/Aug/2000] IBM Says It Develops Most Advanced Quantum Computer

"International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE:IBM - news) said on Tuesday it had developed the world's most advanced quantum computer, a device based on the mysterious quantum physics properties of atoms that allow them to work together as a computer's processor and memory."

[12/Jul/2000] Step forward for space station

"A Russian rocket carrying the key service module for the International Space Station (ISS) has blasted off from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan."

[12/Jul/2000] Privacy advocates fight FBI's e-mail snooping system

"Civil liberties and privacy groups are attacking a new system allowing law enforcement agents to intercept and analyze huge amounts of e-mail "

[12/Jun/2000] Technology First Aimed At Heavens Now Makes 'Super' Human Vision Possible

"Adapting technology originally developed by astronomers to obtain better images of the heavens, a University of Rochester scientist has developed an optical system that has given research subjects an unprecedented quality of eyesight. The research dramatically improves the sight even of people who have 20/20 vision. Vision scientist David Williams presented his work this week at the summer meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Rochester, N.Y."

[12/May/2000] Competition comes -- belatedly -- to Net access in Britain

"UNIVERSITY students John and Ruth Goodall connect to the Internet only after 6 p.m., and then for less than an hour. With daytime online charges at around eight cents a minute, compared with about three cents a minute at night, ``We just can't afford the telephone charges for hours of surfing,'' Ruth Goodall said."

[23/May/2000] Yahoo Blasts French Maneuver

"Yahoo France said Tuesday a court ruling to stop the French from accessing online sales of Nazi memorabilia could set a dangerous precedent for Internet users worldwide."

[22/May/2000] Quantum Disk Speeds E-Commerce Sites

"That's the message from storage company Quantum, which claims to have devised a new way to package its solid-state disk technology for e-commerce sites. Using the system, customers can dramatically improve the performance of their existing servers - in some cases, allowing five servers do the work of 25, according to the company."

[06/May/2000] 'Love Bug' Takes New Forms to Deceive Users

"Copycat variants of the ``Love Bug'' virus burrowed their way into computers systems around the world on Friday, a day after the most widespread cyber-attack ever wreaked havoc on business and government operations."

[05/May/2000] Wired News 'Love Bug' Coverage

"Follow the "Love Bug," and check back often for new developments."

[05/May/2000] Virus hoax illustrates Microsoft email security issues

"An email appears in Microsoft Outlook's in-box. Even before the computer user does anything, a message pops up on the screen. "Had this been a real virus, you would not be happy," it reads. The relieved user clicks "OK," and another box pops up. "Deleting hard drive now...Just kidding," it says. This message circulating around the Internet is the work of one Leigh Stivers, chief code architect for software firm DP Technology. He's trying to draw attention to a security hole in Microsoft's Outlook and Outlook Express programs that is potentially far more dangerous than the now ubiquitous "I Love You" virus."

[05/May/2000] "Love" virus took advantage of Outlook

"According to a spoofed Associated Press story making the rounds today, following the worldwide spread of the "I Love You" virus, Microsoft Corp. is changing the name of its Outlook personal-productivity software to "lookOut!""

[17/Apr/2000] Lucent raises the optical networking bar

"LUCENT TECHNOLOGIES MONDAY boosted the power of its DWDM (dense wave division multiplexing) system, raising the number of wavelengths the system can handle from 80 to 320."

[17/Apr/2000] Robots helping doctors perform better surgery

"Safer and less-invasive operations now possible"

[17/Apr/2000] PlayStation2 Export Restriction Won't Hurt Sony

"Japan electronics giant Sony Corp. played down Monday the risk to its business from export restrictions imposed on its flagship PlayStation2 video game due to concerns it could be used for military purposes."

[16/Apr/2000] Computer game addicts become 'cyberathletes' in tournaments

"Using a mouse or keyboard, game masters creep and sprint their way through digital warehouses, castles and space stations with one goal - annihilate everyone else. And Angel Munoz is certain people want to watch."

[14/Apr/2000] Ardent Linux Fans Have An Itch to Break Windows

"You might assume the awe-struck young man asking for ``maddog's'' autograph is a pro-wrestling fan until you remember this is a trade show for the Linux computer operating system, not a knock-'em-sock'-em event."

[13/Apr/2000] Nanomachines get their orders

"Nanotechnologists have taken two vital steps toward manipulating matter into tiny machines"

[13/Apr/2000] AMD's blowout quarter has analysts reeling

"Advanced Micro Devices Inc. had market analysts seeing double Wednesday with its stunning first-quarter earnings, which were twice as large as what Wall Street had expected."

[05/Apr/2000] Netscape 6: Does Anyone Care?

"America Online is set to release the beta version of its updated Netscape browser in the same week that arch-rival Microsoft was found guilty of antitrust violations by a federal judge. But even the wrath of the Department of Justice and the ruling from U.S. District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson won't really give Netscape 6.0 a leg up, according to analysts."

[05/Apr/2000] Judge may speed resolution of Microsoft case

"The federal judge who found Microsoft in violation of antitrust law said yesterday he may put an appeal of his verdict on "a fast track" to the U.S. Supreme Court, bypassing an appellate court to speed resolution of the case, according to a report."

[05/Apr/2000] A Chilling Wave Hits Schools

"Columbine. That word never fails to dredge up thoughts of misery and terror since the student massacre left 15 dead just over one year ago. And there's nothing quite like fear to open up the path for new rules and regulations, new policies and plans. That might explain why North Carolina has quietly launched a program that allows students to call in anonymously or fill out a Web-based form to report on classmates who might appear depressed or angry -- or who just scare them."

[04/Apr/2000] Samsung Preps 1.6-GHz Alpha

"Samsung Electronics, in Seoul, South Korea is developing an Alpha microprocessor that will compete with the 64-bit processors of Intel and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) and feature a clock speed as high as 1.6 GHz."

[04/Apr/2000] Court: Programming languages covered by First Amendment

"A federal appeals court today cleared the way for a law professor to post previously banned encryption software on the Internet, finding that computer code qualifies as speech protected by the First Amendment."

[04/Apr/2000] Silicon Graphics plans 64-bit overlay to Linux

"SILICON GRAPHICS (SGI) plans to develop an overlay to Linux that will enable the operating system to scale up to 64 Intel IA-64 processors in a multiprocessing environment."

[03/Apr/2000] Judge rules Microsoft violated antitrust laws [Full Ruling]

"A federal judge has concluded that Microsoft violated antitrust laws by leveraging its monopoly position in operating systems to capture the market for Web browsers."

[30/Mar/2000] Sony's PlayStation 2 Hopes Are High

"Sony Computer Entertainment (SCEI) has high expectations for its PlayStation 2 game console, already in high demand in Japan and still yet to sell in the United States. SCEI expects to sell 10 million units of the machine around the world in its next fiscal year, which starts in April."

[30/Mar/2000] Seagate is sold

"Seagate, maker of hard drives and storage management software and solutions, has agreed to be acquired by Veritas Software in a deal valued at around US$20 billion."

[28/Mar/2000] Cisco now can lay claim to No. 1 on stock market

"Cisco Systems Inc. became the world's most valuable company Monday, overtaking Microsoft Corp. and showing that investors place more value on the future of the Internet than on a company that symbolizes the power of the personal computer."

[27/Mar/2000] Hackers Steal Gates' Credit Info

"A teenager arrested in Wales for allegedly hacking into e-commerce websites had obtained the credit card details of Bill Gates, head of Microsoft and the world's richest man, newspapers said on Sunday."

[27/Mar/2000] ESTHER DYSON: Privacy in the age of the Internet

'"I made a mistake." With those words, Kevin O'Connor, founder and chief executive of DoubleClick, the Internet's biggest supplier of advertising banners, tried to reclaim his company's good standing.'

[26/Mar/2000] [US] Government unimpressed with Microsoft settlement offer

"Skeptical government lawyers consider an 11th-hour offer from Microsoft to settle its antitrust trial so inadequate in important areas that there were no immediate plans to resume negotiations in Chicago, people close to the case said yesterday."

[26/Mar/2000] China bans sales of audiovisual products online

"In its latest attempt to impose control over freewheeling electronic commerce, China has announced rules banning online sales of imported music and videos and excluding foreign invested Internet companies from selling any audiovisual products."

[24/Mar/2000] Cisco Tops Microsoft As Most-Valued Company

"Cisco Systems Inc. Friday topped Microsoft Corp. as the world's most valuable company, holding its lead through much of the session after briefly taking it for the first time Thursday."

[21/Mar/2000] Net Speed Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet

"Scientists at leading research labs are starting to push the data-transmission capabilities of fiber-optic cable into the realm of the mind-boggling. Setting a new record, researchers at Lucent's Bell Labs have for the first time managed to push an astonishing 3.28 terabits per second of data over a long stretch of fiber-optic cable."

[20/Mar/2000] IBM on road to molecular-level digital storage

"IBM technology named after an insect has the potential to deliver ultra-high-density storage capacity to storage devices the size of a fingertip, according to scientists at IBM's Zurich Research Laboratory."

[20/Mar/2000] Hardware hack turns Netpliance device into Linux machine

"Shares in newly public Netpliance sank today, after an engineer in Las Vegas discovered a way to turn the company's $99 Internet appliance into a Linux-powered PC."

[20/Mar/2000] 3Com to shed high-end networking, modem lines (It acknowledges inability to compete with rivals like Cisco)

"3Com Corp. announced a dramatic transformation Monday, shedding its lagging high-end networking and modem businesses to concentrate on the broadband and wireless Internet market."

[20/Mar/2000] Linux vs. Linux

"Wall Street analysts and information technology managers are watching to see if Linux reaches a fork in the road - with incompatible versions of the popular free operating system competing for adoption at small and large corporations. If branches emerge, the value of the open source operating system is likely to plummet."

[19/Mar/2000] French Paraplegic Walks for First Time

"A paralyzed Frenchman took his first steps for ten years after a revolutionary operation to restore nerve functions using a microchip implant, newspapers reported Sunday."

[18/Mar/2000] Intel Uses Pricing Clout To Land X-Box Deal

"In what industry observers are calling a late-round TKO, Intel this week beat out Advanced Micro Devices as the supplier for Microsoft's upcoming X-Box game console."

[18/Mar/2000] WebTV's 'Non-Virus' Virus

"Although it prefers to call the trouble a "malicious code," WebTV has experienced its first virus."

[18/Mar/2000] Computing's strides coming exponentially

(Dan Gillmor contemplates the implications of a variety of technologies all exponentionally improving, and the impact this may have on our lives)

[17/Mar/2000] IBM Announces Breakthrough in Data Storage

"IBM Corp. said on Friday it had made a breakthrough that may one day allow computer hard disks and other data-storage systems to store more than 100 times more data than today's products."

[17/Mar/2000] Nasa pulls back from Mars

"he United States is to abandon its ambitious plans to bring back rocks from the surface of Mars before the end of the decade. It is a decision that could set back hopes of an astronaut landing on the Red Planet by many years."

[16/Mar/2000] Intel Examines Next Era Of Computing

"In the future, computers will become integrated into our daily lives, right down to our shoes, researchers predict."

[15/Mar/2000] Hard Drives Hit 75 GB

"IBM on Wednesday unveiled two disk drives that the world's largest computer maker said set records for data storage, including one that can hold information from a stack of documents more than two miles high."

[14/Mar/2000] How IBM plans to change the chip world

"If you had a hard enough time getting used to the idea that a 1GHz processor would one day power regular computer systems, how does the prospect of 2GHz chips grab you?"

[24/Feb/2000] Seagate 15,000 RPM drives

"Seagate has announced its intentions to produce a line of SCSI hard drives dubbed the Cheetah 15X. The drives will spin at 15,000 revolutions per minute (RPM). This is a 50% improvement over the previous top spin speed of 10,000 RPM that Seagate and several other vendors have available in their SCSI hard drive lines. IDE drives still top out at 7200 RPM."

[24/Feb/2000] A Microscope that Eyes the Atom

"Using highly reflective mirrors, scientists said on Thursday they had created a kind of microscope that can trap and observe a single atom at a time."

[21/Feb/2000] Seoul company turns tables on Microsoft in trademark battle

"A stationery company threatened Saturday to block Microsoft from using its Windows operating system trademark in its software manuals in South Korea. "

[14/Feb/2000] Tech hypocrisy running rampant

"If hypocrisy were an Academy Award category, the technology industry would vie with politics for the Oscar. Witness the latest news from some prominent players ..."

[07/Feb/2000] IBM Announces Chip Design Breakthrough

"IBM today disclosed a breakthrough in chip design technology that has resulted in experimental computer circuits running at 3.3 GHz to 4.5 GHz, or up to five times the speed of today's fastest ICs. IBM researchers also believe the design technology could cut power consumption in half."

[07/Feb/2000] IBM Shows Designs For Super-Fast Chips

"Researchers at IBM this week plan to show designs of computer chips that they said will be the world's fastest."

[07/Feb/2000] Taking chips to 10GHz ... and beyond

"Imagine if your home PC had as much giga-happy grunt as a mainframe. A desktop that's 100 times more powerful than a 1,000MHz PC, operates as your personal server, networks all your electronic appliances and responds to your voice commands."

[07/Feb/2000] Toshiba To Detail Video Cell Phones

"Aiming to seed a new class of video cell phones, Toshiba this week will detail an ultralow-power MPEG-4processor targeting third-generation cellular handsets that could ship in Japan early next year."

[13/Dec/1999] World's smallest tweezers

"Scientists have made a pair of tweezers capable of picking up objects just 500 nanometres (billionths of a metre) across."

[30/Nov/99] Plenty of Power, Nowhere to Go?

"AMD just pushed its Athlon processor to 750-MHz and one Gigahertz chips are around the corner. But do we really need all this processing power?"

[15/Nov/99] CDs Get Small

"Compact discs pack an impressive amount of information into a small space, but to Stephen Chou they seem as primitive as reel-to-reel tapes. The Princeton University electrical engineer has created CDs that can concentrate data 800 times more efficiently than current discs."

[08/Nov/1999] Carbon tubes could store hydrogen fuel

"Chinese and American scientists have developed a method of storing high quantities of hydrogen inside tiny tubes of carbon just two nanometres (billionths of a metre) across."

[16/Sep/99] Biotech Breakthrough? 'Buckyball shards' show promise for chemical separations, Science paper suggests

"Featuring "shards of soccer-ball shaped molecules jumbled in space and linked together," a new material shows promise for more efficiently producing nitrogen and oxygen--a multibillion industry, DuPont Co. and University of Delaware scientists report Sept. 17 in Science."

[16/Sep/99] NASA puts money on air scooters

"It almost sounds too futuristic to be true, but NASA and a Silicon Valley engineer are developing a one-person air scooter that can buzz far over gridlocked streets."

[16/Sep/99] Russia to abandon Mir, focus on international projects

"The Mir space station will be discarded next year as planned and Russia will switch to contributing to international projects in space exploration, a top space official said."

[16/Sep/99] A Step Toward Fusion Fire: Concept For Rapid-Fire Thermonuclear Explosions Proposed By Sandia Scientists

"A simple theoretical concept to solve the staggeringly difficult problem of maintaining intact electrical transmission lines to produce rapidly repeated thermonuclear explosions for peacetime purposes has been proposed by researchers at the Department of Energy's Sandia National Laboratories."

[16/Sep/99] Robots May Fight Future Wars: British Expert

"Future wars could be fought by robots commanded by humans, a specialist in robotics told Britain's leading science conference Thursday."

[16/Sep/99] Intel battles customers on Rambus, loses clout

"Just one week away from Intel's launch of its first product to use the Rambus memory architecture (RDRAM), the religious debate over the future of PC memory architecture is casting doubt over the future of Rambus, and over Intel's overall ability to dominate the PC market as it once did."

[12/Sep/99] Optical technology seen as future of the backbone

"Attendees of Networld+Interop in Atlanta this week will hear a common message from equipment providers and data carriers heralding the movement toward optical networking in carrier backbone networks."

[09/Sep/99] Nvidia Demonstrates 256-Bit 'GPU'

"Breaking new ground in PC graphics, Nvidia Tuesday demonstrated a 256-bit "graphics processing unit."

[07/Jul/99] Relativistic effects play major role in neutron star mergers

"A powerful numerical simulation developed at the University of Illinois has revealed that gravitational waves -- ripples in the fabric of space -- play a major role in coalescing neutron stars. The results of the simulation may aid in the future detection of gravitational waves."

[07/Jul/99] Simulation uses quantum mechanics to understand nanoelectronics

"A computer simulation developed at the University of Illinois is helping scientists better understand the strange world of nanoelectronics -- where a single electron can control a device, but quantum mechanics is required to describe the behavior of that electron."

[07/Jul/99] Search engines biased, out-of-date, and index no more than 16% of the web

"A new NEC Research Institute study analyzes the accessibility and distribution of information on the web. The study was conducted by Dr. Steve Lawrence and Dr. C. Lee Giles and will appear in the July 8 issue of the journal Nature."

[07/Jul/99] Sandia Researchers Develop World's Fastest Encryptor -- Soon Will Protect Classified Computer Information

"The world's fastest encryption device, developed at the Department of Energy's (DOE) Sandia National Laboratories, should soon be protecting data being transmitted from supercomputers, workstations, telephones and video terminals. It encrypts data at more than 6.7 billion bits per second, 10 times faster than any other known encryptor."

[02/Jul/99] Computing Device To Serve As Basis For Biological Computer

"The first general- purpose mechanical computer designed for biomolecular and pharmaceutical applications has been developed by Prof. Ehud Shapiro of the Computer Science and Applied Mathematics Department at the Weizmann Institute of Science. The mechanical computer will be presented today at the Fifth International Meeting on DNA-Based Computers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology."

[30/Jun/99] Harnessing Nuclear Energy On A Truly Tiny Scale

"Extremely small amounts of radioactive material already perform functions in smoke detectors, photocopiers, pacemakers and other devices. Now a trio of University of Wisconsin-Madison engineers envision tiny batteries turning a single microscopic gear."

[30/Jun/99] Engineers Way To Faster, Less-Costly Computer Chips

"Engineers at Purdue University have developed a method to make smaller, faster computer chips by stacking electronic devices -- such as transistors 50 times smaller than a human blood cell -- in a virtually unlimited number of layers, as opposed to conventional single-layer designs. The vertically connected layers may increase the speed and the number of transistors in a computer chip."

[29/Jun/99] New Luminescent Films May Be A Key To Photonic Computers

"Materials chemists at the University of Toront have created a new kind of silicon film that could lead one day to entirely photonic computer and telecommunications systems."

[28/Jun/99] Samsung To Ship 1-Gbit DRAM Samples This Year

"Samsung Electronics announced it has developed a 1-gigabit Double Data Rate synchronousDRAM, which operates at 350 MHz."

[28/Jun/99] Congress Set To Boost Nanotechnology Funding

"Congress is poised to double federal spending for nanotechnology research over the next three years."

[23/Jun/99] Algorithm Hides Data Inside Unaltered Images

"Information can be hidden inside images without altering their appearance, according to University of Maine professor Rick Eason."

[22/Jun/99] I Think, Therefore I Move

"A team of neurobiologists has hard-wired a robot's arm directly into the brains of laboratory rats, allowing the rats to use the power of thought to feed themselves water."

[22/Jun/99] Cyber criminals feel the heat

"A national cyberforce of computer specialists is needed to combat a rising tide of online crime, according to a major report by the UK National Criminal Intelligence Service (NCIS)."

[22/Jun/99] U.K. Plans Extended Net Surveillance Powers

"The U.K. government unveiled plans on Tuesday to extend communications interception powers to include lawful access to private networks and better access to Internet and mobile phone transmissions."

[18/Jun/99] Compaq to breathe new life into Alpha

"Compaq Computer Corp. (CPQ) is finally committing to its Alpha technology with new systems and a CPU road map."

[17/Jun/99] First cloned human embryo revealed

"Details of the first human embryo to be cloned have been released."

[16/Jun/99] Music industry loses MP3 appeal

"A US appeal court has ruled that the hand-held Rio MP3 player, on which users can download music files from the Internet and play them at home, does not break piracy laws."

[16/Jun/99] Small disks aim big

"A hard disk drive not much bigger than a postage stamp and a mini-removable disk are competing as new storage solutions for mobile professionals."

[04/Jun/99] Flying Car Set for Takeoff

"Meet George Jetson's car: The world's first flying car will make its maiden flight later this month."

[03/Jun/99] Samsung Will Build New 256-Megabit DRAM Line

"Samsung Electronics plans next year to construct a 256-megabit DRAM production line in South Korea, a company spokesperson said Thursday."

[03/Jun/99] U.K. Crypto Policy May Have Hidden Agenda

"Despite its abandonment of key escrow, the U.K. could be counting on the ignorance of new Internet users to provide law enforcement easy access to private communications, according to privacy campaigners."

[02/Jun/99] Biological computer born

"A computer made of neurons taken from leeches has been created by US scientists."

[17/May/99] Plans for virtual human

"Two companies are teaming up to develop a virtual human body that will be used in the development of new drugs."

[17/May/99] Metal's Superplasticity Stretches Envelope

"Superplasticity. The mere sound of the word makes you want to dance, right? Well, maybe not, but chances are that manufacturers are going to be singing its praises more and more in the coming years. "

[16/May/99] World's first hand-transplant patient writes thank-you letter to surgeons

"The world's first hand-transplant patient, Clint Hallam, has written a letter of thanks to his surgeons with his new right hand, the Perth Sunday Times reported."

[13/May/99] China to test 'space shuttle' in October

"The Chinese space programme will try to launch its first spacecraft designed to carry astronauts on 1 October. Officials quoted in the Yangcheng Evening News said preparations of a recoverable capsule were far ahead of schedule. If the date can be achieved the flight would coincide with the communist state's 50th anniversary celebrations. "

[12/May/99] IBM claims data storage record

"IBM Corp. claimed a digital storage record by packing 20 billion bits of data into a square inch, twice the previous record and more than three times that of any disk drive shipping today."

[10/May/99] Optical Race Hits A New Pace

"In the latest round of "Can you top this?" for fiber-optic network capacity, Nortel Networks last week unveiled an optical amplifier that can send 1.6 terabits of information per second through a single strand of fiber. The next big question is how long it will take router technology to catch up so that network operators can make use of that bandwidth."

[02/May/99] Robot space plane arrives

"A new reusable, robotic space plane was revealed in California on Friday."

[15/Apr/99] New solar system discovered

"Astronomers have discovered the first solar system other than our own. It has three planets orbiting a star that is 44 light years away."

[15/Apr/99] Exotic Technologies Finish Road Test On Cosmic Highway

"NASA's Deep Space 1 mission has successfully demonstrated most of its exotic technologies in space -- including an ion engine that is expected to be 10 times more efficient than conventional liquid or solid rocket engines -- proving they are ready for use in science missions of the 21st century."

[15/Apr/99] Neutrons Provide Clues To High Temperature Superconductivity

"More than a dozen years after the discovery of high temperature superconductivity, the microscopic mechanism responsible for this phenomenon is still mysterious."

[14/Apr/99] First evidence of 'hypernova' explosion

"Astronomers at Northwestern University and University of Illinois have detected the first observational evidence for the remnants of hypernovae, explosions a hundred times more energetic than supernovae and the possible source of powerful gamma ray bursts (GRB), making them the most energetic events known in the Universe other than the Big Bang."

[14/Apr/99] In Space, No-one Can Hear You Speak--And Noise May Drown Out Alarms

"The International Space Station will be so noisy that astronauts may struggle to communicate, suffer poor health, and even miss crucial warning tones that signal an emergency."

[14/Apr/99] Magnetically levitated train breaks world speed record at 343 mph

"A magnetically levitated Japanese train manned by engineers broke its own world speed record on a test run Wednesday, clocking 343 mph, the train's developer said."

[14/Apr/99] Astronomers Discover "Middleweight" Black Holes

"The field of black holes, formerly dominated by heavyweights packing the gravitational punch of a billion Suns and lightweights just a few times heavier than our Sun, now has a new contender -- a just-discovered mysterious class of "middleweight" black holes, weighing in at 100 to 10,000 Suns."

[13/Apr/99] Rambus Adds 700-MHz Spec To Help DRAM Makers Improve Yields

"Rambus has added a 700-MHz speed grade to its Direct Rambus DRAM specification in a move to help DRAM suppliers improve early yields of the device."

[30/Mar/99] RSA Lands on British Shores

"Continuing a strategy of bypassing export restrictions, a San Mateo, California crypto software company opened a European sales and support office Tuesday."

[30/Mar/99] Europe signs Mars deal

"Anglo-French company Matra Marconi Space (MMS) has signed a 60m euros (40m UKP) contract with the European Space Agency (Esa) to send a probe to Mars."

[30/Mar/99] Freedom Helps, Not Harms, Kids

"A "political and media frenzy about cyberporn" is exaggerating the supposed threat of Internet content to children, says Nadine Strossen, president of the American Civil Liberties Union."

[30/Mar/99] Los Alamos Researchers Charge Ahead In Ultracapacitors

"Researchers at the Department of Energy's Los Alamos National Laboratory have developed an ultracapacitor with the ability to deliver millions of discharge cycles. This development has the potential to impact nearly every domain of electrical energy use, from transportation to communications and computing."

[29/Mar/99] Keeping Your Private E-Mail Private

"It appears likely that S/MIME will emerge as the industry standard for commercial and organizational mail encryption -- a subject on which Stallings literally wrote the book. Learn what S/MIME is, what it does, and how it works."

[29/Mar/99] Military Reels As Latest LCD Maker Falters

"The looming sell-off or shutdown of active-matrix LCD maker dpiX by Xerox is sending military-system suppliers reeling once again. The announcement comes just six months after Guardian Industries pulled the plug on Optical Imaging Systems (OIS), leaving dpiX as the sole U.S. supplier of AM LCDs for military applications."

[29/Mar/99] Lift off for rival DNA technology

"The Anglo-Swedish company Amersham Pharmacia Biotech has signed an exclusive deal to develop a rival technology to PCR (Polymerase Chain Reaction), which has become one of the fundamental tools of molecular biology."

[26/Mar/99] Net legal precedent set

"A judge ruling in the first libel action against a UK Internet Service Provider has struck out a special "Internet defence" relied on by ISPs in defamation cases."

[25/Mar/99] Interdisciplinary Group At UCSD Uses Laser- Generated X-Rays To Watch Atoms Move

"Atoms move about and bond with each other at a speed that's generally out of our grasp: one trillion times faster than the blink of an eye. But now a group of chemists, physicists and engineers at the University of California, San Diego, has devised a laser-based method for probing into the high-speed world of atoms to directly observe what happens when they move. "

[25/Mar/99] Tiny Biochip For Sequencing DNA Described

"It could be a scene from a movie: A doctor puts a drop of blood into a small hand-held device and instantly reads out a complete DNA analysis. But it would have to be a science fiction movie, because in real life, machines that analyze DNA are about the size of a refrigerator. And hundreds of them, working for the past 10 years, haven't been able to map the equivalent of one person's DNA. But Cornell University researchers are working on a "biochip" -- an "artificial gel" made of silicon -- that might be a step toward the science fiction dream."

[25/Mar/99] Gamma-Ray Burst Amazes

"The first gamma-ray burst that astronomers got to watch "live" was the biggest explosion ever seen, second only to the Big Bang that gave birth to the universe."

[25/Mar/99] Table-Top Fusion

"A decade to the day after two chemists in Utah made their dubious announcement of "cold fusion," Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory scientists unveiled another incredible-sounding claim: table-top fusion. "

[09/Mar/99] Silicon Graphics Details MIPS Road Map

"Silicon Graphics executives reaffirmed the company's commitment to the MIPS architecture in Tokyo on Tuesday, adding details to its earlier announcement of plans to extend MIPS CPUs to speed grades of 800 MHz."

[08/Mar/99] Polymer Mimics Special Properties Of Human Retina

"Two University of Southern Mississippi polymer scientists have helped develop a new material for repairing torn retinas, which are a major cause of blindness."

[05/Mar/1999] World's smallest scales weigh in

"The smallest weighing machine ever made has sized up a speck of soot to the nearest million billionth of a gram."

[04/Mar/99] Weighing The Invisible: "Nanobalance" Based On Carbon Nanotubes Shows New Application For Nanomechanics

"A "nanobalance" small enough to weigh viruses and other sub-micron scale particles is one application for newly-discovered electronic and micromechanical properties of carbon nanotubes."

[00/Mar/99] ELECTRONICS: New theory provides better understanding of transistors

"CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- The p-n junction diode is the basic element in nearly all semiconductor devices. Trillions of these diodes -- which permit current to flow only in one direction -- are produced daily. More than 10 million p-n junction diodes can be found in a typical personal computer. However, since the invention of the transistor 50 years ago, certain characteristics of the p-n junction have been poorly understood and improperly described in textbooks. Now, a new theory of p-n junction performance promises to resolve past misconceptions, says a University of Illinois researcher."

[05/Mar/99] Computer Security Threat On Rise - U.S. Survey

"Forget the stereotype of the teen hacker. Sophisticated cyber crooks caused well over $100 million in losses last year, and the trend toward professional computer crime is on the rise."

[04/Mar/99] NEC, Fujitsu lose supercomputer ruling

"The U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) this week ruled that the U.S. is 'threatened with material injury' by imports of vector supercomputers sold below cost by Japanese vendors NEC Corp. and Fujitsu Ltd."

[04/Mar/99] Sony And Toshiba Team Up On 128-Bit CPU

"Sony and Toshiba have formed a joint venture to produce the new 128-bit CPU for the next-generation Sony PlayStation-II electronic game machine."

[04/Mar/99] PlayStation Creator Courts Serious Fun

"After nearly 25 years of hard work that included a product flop, a failed alliance, and plenty of grunt-level design engineering, Ken Kutaragi has become something of a celebrity in Silicon Valley."

[04/Mar/99] PS2: The Heart of the PlayStation 2

"The official specs of Sony's next console, and what they mean for the gamer."

[22/Feb/99] Silicon Graphics Brings Powerful 300 MHz MIPS R12000 Processor to its OCTANE Workstation Line

"Silicon Graphics, Inc. (NYSE: SGI) today introduced new high-performance 300 MHz MIPS R12000 processors for its mid-range OCTANE visual workstations, reaffirming its commitment to UNIX customers. The new CPU enables the OCTANE systems to deliver 35 percent better performance based on industry-standard benchmarks at no added cost to customers1. This performance surpasses that of a Sun Ultra60 360 MHz by as much as 17 percent."

[19/Feb/99] The Cold War Yields a Superchip

"A team that built supercomputers for the Soviet military in the Cold War has reportedly designed a chip that promises to be more powerful than anything the West can muster."

[19/Feb/99] Biochips May Restore Eyesight, Movement

"The possibility of using RF-powered electronic implants to stimulate the nerves of paraplegics and the retinas of those with certain eye diseases arose this week in a session on emerging technologies at the International Solid-State Circuits Conference here in San Francisco."

[28/Jan/99] Chipmakers outline 600-MHz plans

"The latest in super-fast silicon from Intel, AMD, IBM, Hewlett-Packard, and Toshiba will be previewed at one of the industry's leading chip gatherings next month."

[27/Jan/99] SGI and HP Pick Up Linux

"Hewlett-Packard and Silicon Graphics will join the Linux parade and offer the free, Unix-based operating system on some of their computers."

[25/Jan/99] High Definition Comes Into Focus

"Sunday's Super Bowl XXXIII is the first NFL championship game in the digital-television era."

[21/Jan/99] Hitachi, Toshiba Drives Set Density Record

"Storage densities of mobile hard drives continue their upward march with Hitachi's announcement Monday of a 10GB drive packing more bits per square inch than any previous notebook or desktop drive. Toshiba also announced similar drives on Monday, and IBM expects to begin volume shipments this month of a 14.1GB (but lower-density) drive unveiled last October."

[20/Jan/99] Arthur C. Clarke Warns Of Y2k Bug Chaos

"Science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke, at pains to point out that the new millennium does not start until 2001, says the so-called millennium bug could cause chaos in 2000."

[19/Jan/99] Code-Breaking Record Shattered

"'See you in Rome (second AES Conference, March 22-23, 1999)'. At 7:15 am Tuesday, that short message was worth US$10,000 to the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Sneaking in just under the deadline, the group's EFF Data Encryption Standard Cracker machine cut its own record in half and deciphered the message in 22 and a half hours."

[19/Jan/99] Apple Ignites FireWire Fury

"Apple is seeking royalties of $1 per port from chip and system makers using the 1394 interface, which was born at Apple as FireWire. The move has sparked high-profile protests, including a call from a senior Intel vice president to Steven Jobs, interim CEO at Apple."

[15/Jan/99] Consortium Tackles 3-D Memory Packaging

"Dense-Pac Microsystems is forming a consortium with the University of Maryland's Computer Aided Life-Cycle Engineering (CALCE) group in the hope of advancing the art of three-dimensional IC packaging. The organization will explore advanced methods for stacking and interconnecting memory chips, a technique that addresses the growing demand for dense memory modules."

[15/Jan/99] Iomega Feels Pressure To Modernize

"New technological advances in the removable-storage market could soon spell trouble for market leader Iomega."

[13/Jan/1999] New twist for nanotechnology

"It's one small step for DNA, one vast leap for nanotechnology. Scientists in New York have created a nanometre-sized moving arm from synthetic DNA. This kind of mechanical device, which operates on an molecular scale, is seen as the precursor for nano-robots which will manufacture or repair molecules, possibly within the human body."

[08/Jan/99] A bubble-blowing black hole

"They look like wisps of smoke from a dying candle. But in this case the candle is a supermassive black hole at the heart of a distant galaxy."

[07/Jan/99] Apple Ignites Firewire At Macworld

"After smoldering for more than a decade, Firewire, the high-speed serial bus, is all the rage at Macworld where more than 20 new products that feature it are on display."

[07/Jan/99] The time and the place

"Christmas may be almost a year away but how about this as a present for the man or woman who has everything. The Casio Computer Company has unveiled a prototype wristwatch with built-in global positioning system (GPS)."

[07/Jan/99] Toshiba claims smallest memory chip

"Toshiba said it has developed the world's smallest memory chip [0.175 micron technology], in cooperation with International Business Machines and Siemens."

[07/Jan/99] Sandia Photonic Crystal Confines Optical Light: 'Very Important Work,' Says Physics Nobel Laureate

"In their greatest success, researchers Shawn Lin and Jim Fleming at the US Department of Energy's Sandia National Laboratories have created a microscopic three-dimensional lattice that confines light at optical wavelengths."

[07/Jan/99] Digital Michelangelo Project: Creating Virtual Sculpture

"Through the magic of advanced computer graphics, art lovers soon may be able to examine highly realistic, three-dimensional images of the statues of Michelangelo on display screens at their local art museum, or even on their personal computers. The technology will make it possible to view a sculpture from different angles, zoom in on details as small as chisel marks, change lighting conditions to see how they affect a statue's appearance, and maybe even animate the classic figures."

[06/Jan/99] Nanoimprint Lithography Defines New Laser

"Lucent Technologies Bell Laboratories has forged a flexible approach to fabricating lasers by combining nanoimprint lithography methods with organic light-emitting materials. The lasers can be built in non-standard, non-rectangular geometries to create an organic laser."

[04/Jan/99] Transistors For The Next Century

"ONR-sponsored scientists at Cornell University are developing a new generation of transistors based on gallium nitride."

[04/Jan/99] Helicopter Pilots Face Virtual Reality

"A flight simulator developed at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, Calif., is giving helicopter pilots valuable cockpit time while still on the ground."

[04/Jan/99] Here A Beam, There A Beam

"Physicists at the California Institute of Technology recently succeeded in transporting a quantum state of light from one side of an optical bench to the other without it traveling through any physical medium in between."

[04/Jan/99] Silicon Graphics CEO Rallies For Comeback

"Closing out his first year on the job, Silicon Graphics Inc. CEO Rick Belluzzo is rallying the troops and the industry for what SGI hopes will be a big comeback."

[22/Dec/98] Silicon Research Promises Better, Stronger Computer Chips

"A team of Mississippi State University electrical engineers is turning sand into the next generation of semiconductors."

[18/Dec/98] First Demonstration Of Laser Action In A Powder

"Scientists at Northwestern University have provided the first demonstration of lasing in a simple powdered material, suggesting that semiconductor lasers -- which are brighter and more efficient than the more familiar light emitting diodes, or LEDs -- could be made cheaply enough to replace some of the estimated 30 billion LEDs made each year for use in cell phones, calculators and other luminescent displays."

[16/Dec/98] New Memory For Computers -- University Of Utah Researchers Developing Nonvolatile Ram Technology

"University of Utah researchers have announced a major breakthrough in the development of a new type of memory aimed at revolutionizing the computer industry and related fields."

Tiny Computers Of Carbon? Nanotubes That Conduct Huge Currents Without Heating Could Be Basis For New Electronics

"A report to be published in the June 12 issue of the journal Science moves researchers one step closer to a practical application for electron wave effects in extremely small-scale circuits."

Scientists Unveil Simple Hi-Tech Mirror

"Scientists said Thursday they have made a breakthrough with special light-filtering mirrors that may open up their use from energy-saving windows for the home to heat-deflecting coating for the space shuttle."

Control Of Chemical Reactions By Laser Coming Closer

"For more than 30 years, chemists have attempted to control chemical reactions by using the pulse of a laser, often with discouraging results. Recent experiments at the University of Illinois indicate scientists may at last be close to achieving their elusive goal."

Surf's Up: Computer Wavelet Tool Filters Information

"The amount of information available to businesses, governments and scientists today is unprecedented. Businesses must pay close attention to marketing plans, strategy reports and government regulations. Governments must analyze satellite data, news and intelligence reports quickly and thoroughly."

Toshiba, Fujitsu team on new DRAM chip

"ng Japanese chipmakers Toshiba and Fujitsu today announced plans to jointly develop and launch one-gigabit dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) chips by the end of March 2002."

Deep Space 1 Ion Propulsion System Starts Up

"The ion propulsion system on NASA's Deep Space 1 spacecraft came to life Tuesday, Nov. 24, and has continued running smoothly since."

Lucent Technologies' Bell Labs Scientists Demonstrate High-Power, Multi-Channel Semiconductor Laser

"Scientists at Bell Labs, the research and development arm of Lucent Technologies, have demonstrated the first semiconductor laser that can simultaneously emit light at multiple widely separated wavelengths."

MIT Team Develops New Way To Create Microscopic Patterns On Surfaces

"The microscopic 3-D stripes of material that Assistant Professor Paula T. Hammond is depositing on thin gold wafers represent a new technique for creating patterns--and structures--on surfaces. The technique, which Professor Hammond pioneered some two years ago, involves "printing" a pattern onto a surface, then taking advantage of a material's electrical properties to build up layers of that material over the pattern."

Laser draws 'surgical map'

"Thousands of patients in the UK suffering from burns could benefit from a new laser scanner."

Intel Faces Stiff Competition

"Buyers will get more choices in PCs, and Intel will get more paranoid, as CPU competitors field an array of chips in 1999--some of them more capable than Intel's high-end offerings."

AOL snaps up Netscape

"America Online (AOL) has bought Netscape Communications for $4.21bn in a deal that promises to transform the Internet industry and poses a significant threat to Bill Gates' Microsoft."

Copyright Issue Grows With Recording

"The copyright-protection issues pushing a thorn into the side of Diamond Multimedia may also prod Sony Electronics and Creative Labs, as they develop similar MP3 devices for listening to music."

NYU Computer Lab Is Working On Challenge Of Bringing EPIC Technology To Embedded Systems

"Krishna V. Palem's ReaCT-ILP Lab is Working on Challenge of Bringing EPIC Technology to Embedded Systems."

Yankee Ingenuity: Dartmouth Physicists Convert A Microcope Into A Free-Electron Laser

"A team of researchers led by a Dartmouth physicist has built the first table-top free-electron laser capable of producing a bright, tunable beam of infrared light."

Most Accurate Telescope To Do Short Wavelength Studies

"Astronomers will soon make observations at the shortest, highest-frequency submillimeter wavelengths ever detected from Earth -- with a telescope that satellite holography recently proved to be the most accurate of its kind in the world."

The Scramble for a `Post-optical' Chip

"A darkness is descending on Silicon Valley. The lights that carve microchip components on Frisbee-sized wafers of silicon are about to be extinguished."

Silicon Graphics ready to claim title of fastest supercomputer

"Silicon Graphics Inc. is set to unveil Tuesday a new supercomputer that it says offers the fastest performance in the world, a spokeswoman said."

A Baby Step for Nanotech

"Imagine a tiny machine travelling along inside the capillaries of your hand, entering and repairing damaged cells as it rides along on a current of blood."

Subatomic breakthrough could lead to high-speed computers

"In a 'Star Trek'-like achievement, scientists in New Mexico say they have successfully transported an atom's nucleus from one area in a molecule to another without moving matter."

Asci Red king of supercomputers

"Asci Red, a supercomputer created by Sandia National Laboratories and Intel, has retained its position at the top of the list of the world's fastest computers, although the overall leader in supercomputing still seems to be Silicon Graphics."

Plextor Spins Up CDs

"Plextor has rolled out its latest high-performance SCSI CD-ROM drives, including 40X models the company claims are the fastest CD-ROM drives you can buy."

Business world exploring CAVEs

"While a lot of people are preoccupied with the launch of high-definition TV this week, want a glimpse of what might come next?"

A new force in space exploration

"A new force is being unleased in space with the launch of Deep Space One. Deep Space One is no ordinary spacecraft. When it gets into space it will ignite a revolutionary form of propulsion that some scientists say is the key to exploring the solar system."

IBM Unveils SCSI Drives

"IBM on Monday announced a trio of new SCSI hard drive additions to its Ultrastar line. The company says all its new hard drives incorporate novel reliability and performance-enhancement technologies."

Education: Software sex bias 'puts girls off'

"Research suggests schoolgirls would be just as good as boys in computing if the software were made 'gender neutral'."

Sci/Tech: Not quite beam me up Scotty!

"Let's be clear. There has been no breakthrough in building a Star Trek style 'transporter'. But what has got some scientists buzzing is the demonstration of a very weird effect of the sub-atomic world."

HP Unveils Third-generation 64-bit PA-8500 Processor

"Here at Microprocessor Forum, Hewlett-Packard Company today announced availability of its third-generation 64-bit PA-8500 processor, combining leading performance, 1.5MB of on-chip cache and increased scalability for HP's enterprise-class workstations and servers."

Roomier and Faster

"New versions of Seagate's Cheetah and Barracuda drives provide the ultimate in PC storage speed and capacity."

Penn Researchers Develop 'Smart' Intensive Care Unit System Using Advanced Computer Intelligence

"Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania Medical Center have developed a 'smart' intensive care unit (ICU) system that improves vital-sign monitoring of critically-ill patients."

IBM shows SiGe parts

"IBM on Monday introduced the first standard, high-volume chips built using the company's silicon germanium (SiGe) manufacturing process."

Advanced Chip Sparks Electric Car

"Jian H. Zhao is developing a technology that could radically improve the efficiency of electric vehicles in the future, but to get where he is today he had to solve a problem that has been confounding scientists and engineers for 35 years."

UH Research Paves Way for Better Lasers, Thin Film Devices

"A joint research team from the University of Houston, Applied Optoelectronics Inc. (AOI) and Cornell University has won an intense race to develop a better way to build lasers and other optoelectronic devices."

Discovery of the first X-ray emitting brown dwarf

"Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics and at the European Southern Observatory in Garching/Germany reported not only the first X-ray detection of a brown dwarf, but also the discovery of the youngest brown dwarf known so far (Science, Vol. 282, 2 October 1998)."

Watching a star die

"When they are completed, the four large telescopes at the Paranal Observatory in northern Chile will be the most powerful in the world. Already, with just one telescope working, the observatory is producing some of the most spectacular astronomical pictures."

Details of new chips emerging

"Advanced Micro Devices will provide the details surrounding its next generation microprocessor, the K7, next week at the Microprocessor Forum in San Jose, California, and in all likelihood ignite a debate on whether the company has come up with a way to expand into the performance computing market."

Sony Introduces the First 200MB Floppy

"Sony Electronics announced Thursday that a parallel port version of its new High Capacity Floppy Disk Drive (HiFD), which reads and writes to a new 200MB Sony disk as well as the traditional 1.44MB floppy disk, will be shipping to computer retailers by the fall Comdex show. It will be followed by an internal EIDE version available to consumers and PC makers shortly after the New Year."

AMD selects Direct Rambus DRAM for K7 chips

"Advanced Micro Devices announced Thursday that it has licensed Rambus memory technology and will support Direct Rambus DRAM with core-logic chips for its forthcoming K7 processors."

Japanese Chip Makers Show First DDR DRAMs

"As if on cue, three of Japan's memory suppliers have announced 64-megabit double-data-rate (DDR) dynamic RAMs, adding to the mix of high-speed DRAM types that will start to ramp later this year."

Visible Humans and the practice of medicine

"Doctors in training to use a bronchoscope soon will be able to have 30 or more of the procedures under their belts before they ever touch a human patient."

Computer graphics pioneer David Evans dies at 74

"David C. Evans, a pioneer in the use of computers simulations, has died after a long battle with Alzheimer's disease. He was 74."

Sony And Pioneer Join Blue-Laser Race

"Two major disk-player suppliers, Sony and Pioneer Electronic, have joined the race to develop a blue laser based on gallium nitride (GaN). Both trail the current leader, Nichia Chemical Industries. Blue lasers or shorter-wavelength violet lasers will be in big demand for next-generation storage and communications systems."

Compaq sees life in Alpha chip

"FRANKFURT--Compaq Computer said today that it planned to continue using Digital Equipment's high-powered Alpha processor for another ten years even as Intel nears the release of its competing Merced chip."

A look at the advantages of XML

"The computing press has found a new savior for the ills that afflict computing and the Web: Extensible Markup Language. XML is new, it's exciting, and it's got to be good, because the specification for it looks indecipherable."

UD Computer News: Future Looks Bright For Tunnel Diodes, Promising Faster, More Efficient Circuits

"When Nobel Prize winner Leo Esaki discovered the tunnel diode in 1957, the super-fast, current-switching device was touted as a kind of Holy Grail for computer chip makers, but technological obstacles have so far hindered its widespread use in conventional, silicon-based circuits."

Magnetic Levitation Could Slash Cost Of Space Travel

"NASA and industry partner PRT Systems Inc. of Park Forest, Ill., are teaming with an amusement ride manufacturer and a British university for research into magnetic levitation -- or maglev -- that could help launch spacecraft into orbit using magnets to float a vehicle along a track."

Semiconductor Nanocrystals: The Next Thing In Fluorescent Probes

"BERKELEY, CA -- Some of the more shadowy secrets of biology may soon be illuminated through the use of a new type of fluorescent probe developed by scientists with the U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of California at Berkeley."

Massively Parallel Processors Underlie Astronomy Advance

"Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energys (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) reported a major advance in the computer modeling of fusion plasmas in the September 18 edition of Science magazine."

MIT lab thrives 'out on a limb'

"CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- The Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Laboratory is drawing together some of the best minds to chase the future. They have invented robots that "think" and they're developing smart furniture and even smarter kitchen appliances. While this may sound frivolous, it's the foundation for such breakthroughs as quantum computing to overcome the current limits of silicon, personal health monitoring systems to provide early warning of illness and new horizons in childhood education. And all are part of the lab's evolving goal: to expand the vision and ambition of a future generation of engineers, social scientists and artists."

Samsung speeds graphics chip

"South Korea's Samsung Electronics said today it has begun shipping commercial samples of a super-fast graphics memory chip to graphics controller makers."

China Tests HDTV Prototype

"BEIJING -- The trial run of a prototype High Definition TV (HDTV) system announced by the Ministry of Science and Technology here could give a big boost to China's fledgling TV industry and to a government drive to build a base in intellectual property for emerging digital technologies."

Working Photonic Lattice, A Dream For A Decade, Fabricated At Sandia

"Lincoln Log-Like Structure To Improve Infrared And Optical Communications, Optical Computers"

Ultra160/m SCSI Will Double Current Transfer Rates

"A storage industry consortium Monday announced the Ultra160/m SCSI standard, which is expected to spawn a new generation of faster hard drives by sometime next year."

Laws of gravity may be wrong

"Gravity may not be working as advertised. Spacecraft hurtling through the Solar System have been behaving so bizarrely that some scientists wonder whether our theories of gravity are wrong."

Ion propulsion now a practical reality

"A motor that uses jets of ionised gas to keep spacecraft in their allotted place in the sky could revolutionise the economics of satellite TV and communications. "

Nanoshells May Be Key To Next Wave Of Light-Based Technology

"HOUSTON, Sept. 8, 1998 -- Nano-sized metal spheres may be the key to the next wave of light-based technologies. Rice University researchers, led by Naomi Halas, professor of electrical and computer engineering, developed metal nanoshells--particles with an insulating core coated by a thin shell of gold--the 'malted milk balls' of the nanoscale world."

Fusion In Our Future

"Nuclear fusion, the same reaction that fuels the sun, holds the potential for providing humankind with a clean and limitless supply of energy."

Anti-Matter Factory Is No Star Trek Mission

"CARDIFF, Wales--Swiss-based scientists said Thursday that they had manufactured anti-matter, one of the staple substances of science fiction, but in such tiny amounts it would be of little use in powering a Star Trek spaceship."

Flat panel has 4 times the pixels

"cientists at IBM say they have developed a new flat-panel computer display that allows users to see text and images with 200 pixels-per-inch clarity, a resolution virtually indistinguishable from the printed page."

IBM to Produce Smallest, Lightest Hard-Disk Drives

"International Business Machines Corp. says it's created the world's smallest and lightest hard drive, a device designed for digital cameras and handheld computers that uses disks the size of a quarter."

Government Computer Code Cracked

"For years, cryptographers have warned that the Data Encryption Standard, a 56-bit code standardized by the U.S. government and used widely by private businesses, could eventually fall against a brute-force effort to crack it. This week, it fell in record time - less than three days."

Building a Better Molecule

"Computer systems born from droplets of DNA computing hold the promise of tackling the most complex problems, yet the very design of these processors provides the developers with a puzzle of their own: how to control the system?"

Fujitsu invents faster DRAM

"Fujitsu has developed a new type of memory, called Fast Cycle Random Access Memory (FCRAM), that is Zalmost four times faster than today's DRAMs."

Toshiba Ships 800-MHz Rambus Dynamic RAMs

"Toshiba America Electronic Components in Irvine, Calif., Monday announced it has shipped functioning direct Rambus dynamic RAM (RDRAM) silicon that runs at 800 MHz."

Tiny Computers Of Carbon? Nanotubes That Conduct Huge Currents Without Heating Could Be Basis For New Electronics

"A report to be published in the June 12 issue of the journal Science moves researchers one step closer to a practical application for electron wave effects in extremely small-scale circuits."

New computer fixes itself

"American scientists say they have developed a computer that can mend itself. Although a single fault on most computers could stop them from working, hundreds of thousands of defects on the machine known as Teramac have no effect at all. Roland Pease of the BBC's Science Unit reports."

New Blue Laser Triples DVD Capacity

"TOKYO -- Japan's Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. announced Monday the world's first 15-milliwatt blue laser, clearing the way for next-generation high-definition digital video disks with a single-sided storage capacity of 15 GB or double-sided capacity of 30 GB."

Holographic Material Lends Hope For Storage

"A new holographic material based on polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) holds out hope for very dense read-only data-storage applications. Invented in the former Soviet Union and now being developed at both the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and CalTech, the material is said to offer low-expense, high-diffraction efficiency and no shrinkage."

Samsung to mass produce Rambus

"SEOUL--South Korean chipmaker Samsung Electronics said today it had completed development of the 64-megabit Rambus memory module and was set to begin mass producing the device."

Chipping Away at Nanotechnology

"Shmoos, the cuddly critters in Al Capp's comic strip "Li'l Abner," epitomized utopia. They loved to please humans and would turn into anything -- filet mignon, caviar, chocolate cake -- upon request. In the real world, scientists are seeking to create molecular Shmoos, of sorts, that would rejigger molecules to build such things as small microprocessors, robots, and even little war machines. "

Quantum Announces Super Digital Linear Tape

"Quantum said Monday that it is already demonstrating to key customers the technology for its next generation of digital linear tape (DLT)."

Samsung has 256-megabit memory

"it has produced and shipped to major PC makers samples of a 256-megabit DRAM (dynamic random access memory) chip, which offers 16 times the capacity of the memory chips commonly found in today's personal computers."

NEC to make advanced chips

"In Tokyo, NEC said on Thursday that it would start mass production of next-generation chips using advanced manufacturing technology. NEC said the chips would be made using .15- to .18-micron technology, starting in early 1999. These production processes will allow the company to deliver more powerful chips at lower costs. "

The Quantum Computer -- Too Weird for Einstein

(Charles Arthur discusses the emerging field of quantum computing)

Scientists Demo a Quantum Computer

"American scientists have demonstrated a computer that thinks laterally -- solving problems by, in effect, jumping instantly to the conclusion rather than working through successive steps to the answer. Though only in their early stages now, during the next century ``quantum computers'' which use the mysterious nature of fundamental particles such as protons, could produce machines capable of instantaneously solving prodigious mathematical problems, where a conventional supercomputer would labor for centuries. "

"By the early twenty-first century, our beloved silicon microprocessors will likely be economically and physically redundant, spoken of wistfully by sentimental parents tucking in sleepy children with stories of technology past. Science fiction, you say? Science fact -- driven by the basic laws of economics and physics. "

Smoothing the Path to Faster Chips

"In the race to develop faster semiconductors, Melissa Hines thinks the playing field needs to be leveled. And so Hines and fellow Cornell University chemists are developing a new manufacturing process for computer chips that would make each microprocessor "perfect," or devoid of surface flaws that degrade performance."

New Microchips to Shrink

"A microchip company claims to have created a new generation technology that will significantly shrink the size of modern chips - enabling much smaller electronic devices to be built.

Mobile phones could be shrunk to fit into the ear, hand-held computers talked to instead of typed to, and many other products made more cheaply, say LSI Logic.

Called G12, the technology allows for 223 million usable transistors to be mounted on a chip the size of a postage stamp."

Ultrasmall storage device debuts

"update Ioptics today introduced a new storage technology designed for use in handheld and portable computers. Dubbed OROM, the patented technology holds up to 128MB of information on a data card around the size of a business card, according to the company. "

(11/Mar/98) Simple Transistor May Yield Dense, High-Speed Circuits

"Researchers at Sandia National Laboratory are working on a device architecture that could pack high functionality into dense circuits running at record speeds. Called a Double Electron Layer Tunneling Transistor, the device uses a simple vertical, double quantum-well transistor to implement a mode of operation known as resonant tunneling."

Plastic TV display to be unveiled

"Cambridge Display Technology Ltd. says it will unveil the world's first plastic TV display on Monday, a move which could eventually see the demise of the standard television set."

Digital's Alpha to remain fastest chip?

"Digital Equipment (DEC), making its first major announcement since last week's declaration of a planned merger with Compaq (CPQ), said that the newest version of its 64-bit Alpha processor will break the 1,000-MHz barrier by the year 2000, a goal which may put Digital's chip and Intel's upcoming Merced processor on a collision course."

20/20/LCD Vision

"Turning any pair of eyeglasses into a video display, a new LCD (liquid crystal display) device may drop computer information into the field of vision of surgeons, pilots, and others needing access to data while going about their work. "

Las Vegas electronics show features flat TVs, bicycle phones

"Thomson S.A. (THMP.PA), which sells its products under the RCA brand, is showcasing a 61-inch digital television that will retail for about $8,000."

IBM breaks the 1000 MHz microprocessor barrier | [OD]

"On February 4, IBM researchers announced they have demonstrated the world's first experimental CMOS microprocessor that can operate at one billion cycles per second (1000 MHz or 1 GHz)."

Intel to unveil "Slot 2" chip design

"Later this week, Intel will publicly reveal details of its upcoming "Slot 2" Pentium II chip design for the first time and also give an overview of the 450-MHz Pentium II "Deschutes" processor, two product innovations that will likely be seen in servers and workstations in the second half of the year."

NEC develops new memory chip

"NEC Corporation today said it has developed a new memory architecture that improves the graphics and multimedia processing capabilities of personal computers and workstations without depending on increases in memory speed or the number of signal pins."

IBM shows off experimental 1,000MHz chip

"IBM's Austin Research Lab unit today will give the world a first look at its experimental 1,000MHz computer chip, the first ever to hit the billion-cycles-per-second performance mark."

500 MHz 21264

"Digital Equipment Corporation today introduced the Alpha 21264 family, a new generation of the 64-bit Alpha architecture that will break the GigaHertz (1,000MHz) speed barrier and continue Alpha's industry performance leadership over all other architectures."

Samsung plans 1-GHz Alpha for new Windows NT systems

"Samsung Semiconductor Inc. here today said its 1998 roadmap for Alpha processors includes a 1-GHz RISC chip with a 100 SPECint95 rating for the newest version of Microsoft Corp.'s Windows NT operating system."

Chip Design Reaches for Light Speed

"Experiments financed by the Office of Naval Research (ONR) and the Army Research Office (ARO) are examining the ability of silicon wafers to conduct photons (commonly called light waves) in the hope of someday creating a ultra-fast computer chip that operates at the speed of light - or about 100,000 times faster than current semiconductors."

Hitachi to release 128MBit DRAMs and SRAMs

This is just a short announcement, with a bulk price quote.

Sun Announce 300MHz UltraSPARC IIi

"At 300 MHz with 512Kbytes external cache, the UltraSPARC-IIi processor-based module provides a SPECint95 of 12.1 and SPECfp95 of 12.9."

Gigabit Ethernet Gears Up

"Screaming 1000-Mbps Gigabit Ethernet solutions will answer the increasingly loud cry for more bandwidth in late 1998." (Byte, Jan 1998)

Memories of Things to Come

"Too many RAM technologies on the market at once could confuse system upgraders." (Byte, Jan 1998)

DVD Stands for DiVideD

"Political wrangling over incompatible DVD formats keeps "standards" out of reach." (Byte, Jan 1998)

Drives Get Bigger, Faster, Cheaper

"9.1-GB drives spinning at 7200 rpm will soon enter the mainstream." (Byte, Dec 1997)

Beyond Pentium II (Relevant Editorial)

"Here's the first detailed look at the new breakthrough microprocessor architecture from Intel and Hewlett-Packard - and what it will mean for developers and users." (Byte, Dec 1997)

Consortium to pursue superchip

"The Department of Energy, Intel, AMD, Motorola and the premier U.S.-owned research labs have formed a company that will seek to devise a new semiconductor manufacturing process resulting in smaller, faster processors by 2002."

(11/Sep/97) NEC Research Promises Terabit Memory Chips

"TOKYO -- NEC said Thursday its researchers have invented a new type of transistor that can propel the dynamic RAM memory industry into the 10-terabit (10 trillion-bits) era sometime during the next decade."

IBM wins funds for X-ray chips

US Govt. to help IBM with X-ray lithography research.

Clinton touts 'supercomputer on a chip'

Federal funding for billion-transistor chip research.

Transistor Technology Takes a Quantum Leap

Sandia Labs demonstrates a quantum transistor.

Meet the Transistor of the Future

Bell Labs demonstrates faster transistor technology.

Surfin' the Plasma Waves

Plasma Transistors discussed.

Teensy Transistors Get Even Smaller

University of Minnesota demonstrates single-electron transistor.

Silicon-Opto Integration Nears Reality

"Insights into how photons and electrons interact with silicon are stimulating new directions in optoelectronic research that could lead to a fully integrated optical technology within a few years."

Samsung cranks out 700-MHz Alpha CPU | [OD]

Samsung is ahead of the game with a 700MHz 21264 using its own 0.25u CMOS process, thought it still intends to release the CPU at the same time as Digital which has delayed the release perhaps until the 2nd half of 1998.

Intel, IBM, Digital to unveil new CPUs at ISSCC in Feb 98

Intel's Pentium II at 450MHz, IBM's single-issue PowerPC at 1.1GHz and dual-issue at 500MHz, Alpha's 600MHz 21264 and 200MHz StrongARM.