Mark Hachman

SANTA CLARA, Calif.—Voice-over-IP services have reached the “tipping point,” executives said here Monday, shifting from international to domestic communications. Executives at the Voice On the Net show said that while users understand the advantage of IP calls that arent metered by distance, cable and especially DSL providers need to offer “naked” DSL service that allows […]

SANTA CLARA, Calif.—AT&T rolled out its do-it-yourself voice-over-IP service on Monday, allowing customers to add a VOIP phone to an existing broadband connection. The service includes a quasi-“presence” feature that will route calls to the appropriate phone. Initially, the CallVantage service will only provide residents of New Jersey local phone numbers to call other areas […]

Adaptec Inc. on Monday will launch a storage appliance that migrates personal backups into the SMB market. The Adaptec File Saver ESA1500 is a RAID 5 storage array that can accommodate from 1 to 4 terabytes. Adaptec said the appliance is being adopted by the Electronic Access Department of the Orange County, Fla., facilities management […]

University of San Francisco researchers are attempting to create a poor mans supercomputer cluster by linking desktop PCs and notebooks together through a conventional Ethernet network. Part social movement, part scientific effort, the “FlashMob” software is named after the short-lived social phenomenon of random people coming together for brief activities. John Witchel, a USF graduate […]

Officials at Dell Computer Corp. pulled an ad for an AMD Opteron processor that appeared on the companys Web site Wednesday, saying the posting intended for a select set of customers mistakenly reached the general customer base. Dell offered an Opteron 148 processor from Advanced Micro Devices Inc. in its public “Software and Peripherals” store, […]

An Intel Corp.-backed startup, SolarFlare Communications Inc., said Monday that it has developed a working prototype of a chip that will permit 10G-bps communications over standard CAT5e copper wiring. SolarFlares chip will be used as evidence that 10G-bit over copper can be done, in anticipation of a draft IEEE standard to be developed later this […]

Apple Computer said Tuesday that it had begun shipping its Xserve G5 server, after almost a months delay. A dual-processor version will ship in April. The updated Xserve will be offered in three base configurations, including single- and dual-processor models as well as one optimized for clustered computing. Available now is a $2,999 single-processor version, […]

Intel Corp. will begin to tone down the marketing message around the clock speed of its processors next quarter, a spokesman confirmed Friday, instead classifying them according to “series”. Intel will begin to roll out the new “series” scheme beginning in the second quarter, applying the new nomenclature a wide variety of processors: to the […]

BIOS vendor Phoenix Technologies Inc. on Thursday said it had developed a utility technology that will let users check their Outlook data on a notebook computer without needing to boot the machine. The Phoenix FirstWare Assistant will be marketed to notebook vendors and computer logicboard manufacturers as a way for them to differentiate their products […]

On Wednesday, Advanced Micro Devices launched an upgraded version of its Athlon XP-M mobile processor for notebooks. The 2100+ chip will be used by Fujitsu Computer Systems in a new LifeBook notebook. While AMD has migrated most of its processor lineup to the 64-bit Opteron and Athlon 64 chips, the Athlon XP-M remains the flagship […]

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz.—Robotics will drive the “third wave” of semiconductor innovation, Sony Electronics chief strategist said in a speech here Monday. Tsugio Makimoto, corporate adviser to Sony, said ASICs and flash memory—not general-purpose microprocessors and DRAM—will be the differentiating products of the third wave of innovation, which will replace personal computers. Makimoto, famous for the so-called […]

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz.—The semiconductor industry looks likely to enter a mild recession in 2005, an analyst firm said Monday, following a healthy recovery that will continue through this year. According to analysts here at the Semico Summit, the slowdown in chip sales will be triggered by a number of factors, including lower sales of consumer electronics […]