Wednesday December 21, 2005

- Seagate to buy Maxtor - Lionel - 23:54:51

The 2nd largest hard drive manufacturer, Seagate, has just offered to buy the 3rd, Maxtor, for $1.9 billion in stock.
As usual in this case, this merger will allow the economies of scale to level the R&D costs, which is very expensive as the competition forces constant inovation to be made in the manufacturing of disks.

[translation by jwa]

- A new successor for DVI - Lionel - 23:39:06

Source : Hardware.fr

The arrival of the 30" Apple display has shown the limits of the DVI port. To circumvent this problem, Apple uses two DVI connections in one.
Last may, we told you of the DisplayPort standard proposed by the Vesa group which is intended to replace the aging DVI.
This starndard will be in competition with another standard which has been christened UDI. Bandwidth will reach 16 Gbit/s compared to 5 Gbit/s for DVI. The 1.0 specifications for this standard is expected sometime during the summer in 2006. Knowing that Apple is a member of the group setting the standard, it is highly likely to see these connections on our Macs in the relatively near future.

[translation by jwa]

- QT/iTunes security flaw - Lionel - 23:24:22

Secunia published a moderate security advisory relating to Quicktime 7.x and iTunes 6.x.
An error in the headers of a .mov file could make it possible to cause a denial of service and then allow the execution of malicious code.
The only means of protection at the moment is to not open mov files from dubious sources.
http://secunia.com/advisories/18149/

[translation by jwa]

- Onyx 1.6.6 - Lionel - 23:16:06

Onyx, the system cleaning utility which every Mac user should have in their toolkit, has reached version 1.6.6.
This new version corrects some bugs and brings some interesting new features:

What's New in OnyX 1.6.6?

- Delete the recent items of QuickTime run correctly now.
- Bug of the Restart dialog corrected (OnyX menu is OK when click on Cancel).
- More temporary files deleted while cleaning (Thanks Blackjmac!).
- More Caches deleted (Cleaning and Automation panels).
- You can choose to remove the Software Update log (Cleaning panel).
- Help button in each panel.
- Error managment improved.
- Display the Software Update.log (Logs panel).
- Deleting the recent searches of Web browsers and the FullCircle folder (Cleaning panel).
- Help updated and improved.
- Choice between current account or all accounts (Cleaning and Automate panels).
- Enabling the Dashboard's Developer Mode.
- Window Log OnyX modified.
- New icon.
- Bug corrected while creation/modification of maintenance logs (.out files).
- Misc bugs corrected.

http://www.titanium.free.fr/pgs/english.html
P.S. Think about making a donation if you find this software useful

[translation by jwa]

- Toast Update - Lionel - 23:09:27

The indispensable Toast has made it to version 7.0.2


This new version corrects bugs and now supports encoding for the iPod. Spin Doctor and Motion Pictures HD have also been updated.
To learn more:
http://www.roxio.com/

[translation by jwa]

- Expensive Mac Memory - Lionel - 23:04:25

Apple has always sold memory in it's store at a price much higher than market pice. It had been explained to us that it was because of the long term contracts signed by the manufacturer to ensure a regular supply for price stability over a long period. But the end of 2005 will probably be known as having the greatest difference ever recorded.
Thus, a stick of 2GB DDR for an iMac G5 will set you back 1260 Euros. 8 sticks of 2 GB (DDR2 non-EEC) for a PowerMac G5 costs a trifling 9500 Euros to replace the very insufficient two sticks of 256 Mb.
At the same time, our partner, Macway, should receive sticks of DDR non-ECC of the same capacity by the end of the week but costing 199 Euros.
That is a ratio of 1/6, which has to be the record.
Although 16 GB will probably more than the majority of users need, in an iMac G5 a stick of 2Gb ensures a serene future, knowing that it only has one spare slot for ram.

[translation by jwa]

- Virgin invited in the Assemblée nationale - Lionel - 10:27:30

Source : PC Inpact

Yesterday night, during the discussion of the DADVSI bill (see yesterday news), our "députés" (members of Parliament) were surprised to be offered 10 Euros vouchers by Virgin, in order to test their legal music donwload platform.
Members of this company had been invited by the President of the Assemblée and the minister of Culture to show the députés what kind of legal offers are currently available.
It is quite shocking to see such a mix between commercial interests of an enterprise and the temple of our democracy.

[translation by Kalomir]

- Blu-ray: it will include region code restrictions... - Lionel - 07:50:57

Source : CDR Info

The Blu-ray association was initially announcing that the Blu-ray will not include region code as it is the case today with the DVD.
Well it was obviously a dream... the world will be once more cut into 3 regions:
Region 1: North and South America, Asia excluding China.
Region 2: Europe and Africa.
Region 3: China, Russia and the rest of the world.
The Association is claiming that Asian pirates groups without such protection could propose copies to the entire world.
But does it mean that:
- the region-code will be so robust that making copy will be impossible?
- Asian manufacturing partners are so much unreliable that the Majors are afraid that those partners could produce "true" copies.
- will it be really complicated to generate different region-code copies for pirates?
Not all movie Majors are supporting this region code restrictions, Warner Bross is against and claims that it has proven to be ineffective for the DVD.


[translation by Eric]

- Movie trailers in iPod compatible formats - Lionel - 07:41:33

The screen of the iPod 5G does not really allow the users to watch an entire movie in an optimal conditions (not meaning that it is not possible, but it remains a better alternative to do it in you sofa, watching the movie on TV); but for sure the iPod 5G is the perfect device to watch movie trailers, and maybe make your choice for the next time you go to the cinema.

The French websites Allociné andComme au cinéma are proposing iPod-compatible movie trailers. You simply need to register to their Podcast to get free access to all available movie trailers that will be stored in iTunes.
Podcast d'Allociné

Podcast 1 Comme au Cinéma and Podcast 2


[translation by Eric]

- MacIntel or not MacIntel ? iBook 12" is EOL - Lionel - 07:33:31

For the end-of-the-year period, Apple's name is associated to 2 main subjects. The first one is of course the most wanted Christmas gift, the iPod. But we will not talk about it as it starts to be too much advertised as “Apple=iPod” to our point of view.
The other subject is of course the MacIntel. Every rumors-dedicated websites is providing its piece of information, imagination, and hypothesis on this subject. We also do it from time to time when there is not much news regarding Apple's products beside the iPod-"mania".
Hereafter is a screenshot taken from the French electronic customers giant, the FNAC:


The iBook 12'' is simply quoted as "End-of-Life"!
That's the first real proof of some new product to come.
The buzz around the iPod is also affecting the communication around other Apple's products such as the last iMacG5 and especially the PMG5 Quad, both models being really the example of Apple's expertise for powerful and easy-to-use computers. It seems that one can get more information and benchmarks for those models from PC-dedicated websites... it is particularly true for the PMG5 Quad.

But we have to remain optimistic, the communication around apple hardware will start again as early as in January when a new iBook will be introduced. We will finally have Intel-based Apple's hardware in our hands to be tested. This is a new environment that we will have to adopt , control manage, and of course try to modify and improved :) (the meaning of "bidouille" in French ;) )


[translation by Eric]

- Battle between right owners and Majors - Lionel - 00:23:33

Source : PC Inpact

Before to say more on this matter, we remind you that it's today our "Assemblée nationale" (French
Parliament) will begin examining the DADVSI bill, mostly written by Majors in order to defend their interests against every individual rights.

The Majors via the SNEP syndicate (Syndicat national des éditeurs phonographiques, easy to translate isn't it ?) are currently confronting right owners (artists) and their representation, the SPEDIDAM (société de perception et de distribution des droits des artistes-Interprètes de la musique et de la danse : society that perceives and distributes rights to artists in music and danse professions).
Those two lobbies defend interests that significantly diverge. The Majors defend their sales, gross income and indirectly their artists which are their work tool. The SPEDIDAM will only defend artists by collecting remunerations that will then distributed to them (private copy right, among other French specific mechanisms ....)

If the Spedidam is in favour of a monthly fee for Internet users that would bring them an official access to protected files on the Internet without they fear law action, the SNEP is opposed to it, arguing that this fee wouldn't compensate for the enormous losses they say illegal downloads cost them.
And this is where the problem is. While some would like fair compensations for artists, some others would like tohave it for their beloved gross income.

Let's go back to DADVSI law. Urgence has been declared for votingt this bill, which rendered the situation quite uncomfortable for everyone, including the politics, as many amendments proposed in every direction were written as fast as the text was in the first place. Actually, this monthly compensation, should it be adopted, would be a great blow to Majors, who expect this law should guaranteee them long term comfortable incomes without that they have to move or be imaginative in front of new distribution channels. This won't prevent this law from turning France a bit more into a legislative and repressive bunker.
A lost word to those who, on the purpose of defending this law, remind that it is only a "transposition from a European directive". This law goes way further than what Europe requires.

[translation by Kalomir]