CompUSA store chain to soon become history
CompUSA, an early success story among computer retailers, will now cease to exist as a store chain by the end of this year. Meanwhile, rivals Best Buy and Circuit City only keep coming on stronger.
Although overall PC sales keep rising worldwide, US-based computer retail chain CompUSA will be shutting down all its remaining stores at the end of the December holiday season. As announced on Friday, the new owner of CompUSA, a Boston-based restructuring and investment firm known as the Gordon Brothers Group, is also looking to sell CompUSA.com, along with CompUSA's TechPro technical services business.
AOL debuts new desktop software for Windows
After its OpenRide software was not well received, the ISP went back to the drawing board. The result was AOL Desktop, which released Friday.
"Helix," as it was called in beta, follows the general gist of OpenRide, but also continues a path the company has been following for the past several years, including its Communicator, Fanfare, and AOL Suite projects.
LG's dual-format disc player hits stores
LG said Monday that its second try at a dual-format next generation disc player is now available at retailers.
Unlike the company's previous player, this unit has been certified by both HD DVD and Blu-ray, and will be upgradeable to the new BD Profile 1.1 when those discs become available next year. Like its predecessor, the BH200 will retail for $999 and support up to 1080p resolution. LG's announcement follows that of Samsung, whose player will sell for $200 less when it becomes available later this month.
Toshiba enters the solid-state disk arena
Nearly a full year after leading flash memory producer Samsung presented its first solid-state drives, flash producer Toshiba plans to follow along behind with three models that take advantage of its exclusive design.
By next February, Toshiba plans to begin sampling 32 GB and 64 GB embedded solid-state disk drives for small, portable equipment. After having stayed out of the market to this point, the manufacturer plans to ramp up production quite rapidly from there, with a goal of producing 128 GB SSDs in the 1.8" and 2.5" form factors by next May.
Palm to miss revenue targets by a substantial margin
The handheld manufacturer expects to post revenues some $30 million less than its original forecast due to shipping delays in a unnamed product.
Revenues are expected to be between $345 to 350 million dollars, well off of its $370 to 380 million estimate in October. Analysts believe the "product launch" was a wider rollout of the Treo 755p.
Symantec update removes Web filtering program
An update for the company's Norton Antivirus software has yet again caused problems with its customers' computers.
While Symantec is saying it was just a mistake involving a routine software update, the problems caused by the mixup had likely cut off the Internet access of tens of thousands of customers of Solid Oak Software.
Office Live Workspace beta goes public
Since October, Microsoft has been busy working to hang its Office shingle in "the cloud," where users can save documents somewhere to the Web. Now it's ready for the general public to try out the cloud.
The consumer side of Microsoft's hosted service strategy steps up to the next gear this morning, as it unveils the official beta of its Office Live Workspace service to the general public. Unlike its Office Live Web-based applications, the Workspace service creates a Web location for storing traditional Office documents, as a way of ensuring portability.
Netflix envelopes anger Postmaster, Postal Service balks
The US Postmaster General issued a report to the Postal Service recommending it either change its First Class mailing standards to disallow Netflix mailers, or start charging the company a 17 cent handling fee per envelope.
Apparently the two-way Netflix mailers were brought up in audit because approximately 70 percent of them have to be processed by hand. Automatic processing was found to damage either the DVDs or the sorting equipment, and the design of the envelope was reported to cause obscured return addresses and missorts.
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SourceForge launches commercial 'marketplace' for open source software
Upon posting a loss for its most recent financial quarter, open source foundry SourceForge has launched an auction-based service that charges commissions to developers. Coincidentally or not, SourceForge got hacked this week.
After reporting a fiscal first-quarter operating loss of $1.1 million at the end of November, software foundry SourceForge this week instituted a new revenue stream by rolling out a commercial marketplace for sales, service and support of open source software.
Dell throws an Armani bash for the XPS One
At a customer event at an Armani store in New York last night, the company officially launched the XPS One, a PC/high-def TV which is Dell's answer to the Gateway One and Apple's iMac.
NEW YORK CITY (BetaNews) - Armani Casa, an exclusive home furnishing shop in Manhattan's trendy SoHo neighborhood, isn't a conventional location for a computer product rollout. But the unusual setting made real sense for last night's customer celebration of the launch of Dell's design-oriented XPS One, the latest entry into a category of all-in-one desktop units already populated by Apple and Gateway.
EchoStar becomes DISH, spins off most non-sat TV holdings
Ohio politician proposes sex offender tracking device
An Ohio lawmaker is proposing his state help its citizens track the locations of registered sex offenders by using RFID technology.
The technology, known as "Offendar," was developed by a company in the state. A tracking chip is placed in the monitoring bracelet of sex offenders, and when one is within 50 yards of a special key fob, the device vibrates.
Macrovision seeks to own digital TV gateway with Gemstar purchase
A company known more for its digital rights management technology, and which just last month purchased not only the BD+ DRM scheme outright but also a larger stake in set-top boxes, is about to become the publisher of TV Guide.
Macrovision, whose history extends back to the famous "Macrovision stripe" that made copying of VHS tapes such a pain in the 1980s, announced this morning its intent to purchase Gemstar, the technology company that happens to publish TV Guide. It's probably not the magazine that Macrovision is interested in, but instead the nation's leading brand in program scheduling -- a brand that's found on many STBs today, and will now likely be found on more.
FiOS routers at center of latest GPL lawsuit
The Software Freedom Law Center has sued Verizon on behalf of the developers of BusyBox, saying the routers for its high-speed service infringe on the General Public License.
UPDATED The group is asking for an injunction preventing the sale of the Actiontec MI424WR wireless router, as well as unspecified damages and court costs.
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