Thursday May 29, 2008

- Dell annouces a mini pc at a mini price. - Lionel - 22:28:34

Source : Gizmodo

With its EEE PC, Asus succeeded in creating a new computer markett, which has not happened for a long time. Since then, other manufacturers have tried to take the same step. Thus Dell, in its turn, present its " Inspirion" mini;.

This computer will have a screen of 10" and should have a price below the new psychological bar of $500.
If Apple were to manufacturer a similar PC. there would not be the slightest doubt that they also announce a machine that would look the same.
But Apple is always different. To market such a product, it would oblige them to reduce their margins, and also know that it would be likely to canibalise the sales d' other products like MacBook or to a lesser extent MacBook Air.
However, to ignore this market segment is likely to harm their new ambition of increasing their market share.

[translation by crispin]

- A last-minute competitor to Blu-ray? - Lionel - 15:41:22

Source : CDR Info

We thought that the war was over; however it could be starting again with China pushing its own format called Red-ray. This format will now have to show enough progress in term of capacity for it to be considered as a credible competitor, at least for the Chinese market.
It should be said that they see Blu-ray with a very evil eye. They manufacture 94% of DVD readers, however these new Blu-ray products are still manufactured elsewhere, and they will have to pay substantial royalties to be able to produce them.
The cost of course plays an important role. Blu-ray is very expensive whereas Red-ray is based on components close to DVD readers, which are cheap.
For their format to succeed the Chinese will have to convince the content producers to believe in their format, however even for a market of more than a billion consumers they will be wary due to the lax laws on the hacking.
It will however it is necessary to take account of the new orientation taken by China. Previously they were satisfied to produce products designed by others at a cheap price; now she wants to now impose her own inventions.
Previously, Japan, then and Taiwan followed the same route successfully.

[translation by crispin]

- MacOSX 10.5.3 update fixes Time Machine backup of Aperture's Library - moose - 10:03:37

YES!
The 10.5.3 update to OSX finally fixes the problem where the Aperture Library would get backed up from scratch multiple times.

In previous versions of OSX, if you had Aperture open while a backup started, Time Machine would skip the Aperture Library until you closed Aperture. Then, the next backup would do a complete copy of your Aperture Library. yes, the WHOLE Library, not just the changed files... like I explained in this post on the HArdmac blog (and as Apple explained in a KBase post).

So, yesterday, after reading that the 10.5.3 update "Addresses compatibility issues with Aperture 2." I decided to give it a go: I removed my Aperture Library from Time Machine's exclusion list and let it get backed-up (that's about 37GB). As soon as the first backup was done, I launched Aperture and let it open until the next backup started. After the second backup was complete, I quit Aperture and had a look at the backupd logs for the third backup... and voila! it only backed up a couple new pictures I had added to Aperture.


Thanks Apple, it took you an awfully long time to fix this (and why the bug was there in the first place, when they control the whole OS/apps/hardware???) but finally it is fixed.

- Facial recognition on laptops - Lionel - 09:59:47

Source : http://www.01net.com

Now that the majority of all laptops have a built-in webcam, manufacturers are no longer developing new digital fingerprinting authentication methods, but they've started working on facial recognition software.
Toshiba is expected to propose this sytem on its laptops soon, and it will only take seconds to identify a user.
One could also imagine that Apple will add this functionality in the next version of Mac OS X, thus linking a face to a user account.
This new method obviously introduces some new security issues which, according to certain experts, makes this system less reliable than other authentication methods.
But one thing is for sure: we are definitely going to need high-resolution cameras that will be able to take photos of an iris that will not be reproducable on a standard A4 printed photo.

[translation by xavier]

- 2.6 Billions Euros: The EC Denies to Have Taken Decision on Intel Probe - Lionel - 09:19:29

Couple of days ago, some sources were indicating that the European commission was going to announce a fine of 2.6 billions Euro regarding Intel probe. The EC was recently raiding Intel European HQ as part of EC investigation for monopoly and unfair competition.
This rumor has been officially denied by EC representatives who indicated that the final decision has not been taken yet, and the 200 millions pages of documents are still under review.

[translation by Linathael]

- TV Shows on the French iTunes Store - Eric - 08:53:09

While over the last couple of days rumors were indicating such introduction for a very near near future, it is now a reality, and the French iTunes Store features a category entitled "Programmes de Télévision" ("TV Show"). One can find US TV series such as Lost, Desperate Housewives, South Park, but also French series as "Chez Maupassant" displayed on France 2 channel and "Les Maîtres du Zodiaque" belonging to the private TF1 channel.

However, the prices are rather high when considering it is "only" a TV show or a series: from1.99 € to 2.49 €. But the French iTS might not be as competitive as other local VOD services, and TF1 Vision service charges 1.99 € for each Lost episode, while the same episode will cost you 2.49 € on the iTS. In addition, the video quality is not really good, and we are far from having the HD quality available for some series (such as Lost) in USA.


(To look at this new category, follow this link)

Based on the current price and quality, the iTS offer will not be competitive to the VOD services already available in France and in Europe. The French ADSL carrier Free, for example, is already running an HD movie service since years. Apple will have to provide similar quality levels than in USA to have a chance on the European market; and considering that in most EU countries, broadband internet is much more common than in USA. Apple should rather try to test a true HD video online store in Europe instead of pushing hard in USA where infrastructures are not in place to make such HD movie offer available for the largest number of potential customers.

- Massive Release of Updates - Eric - 08:41:23

It could be the first signs of new product annoucements at teh WWDC, Apple has released numerous updates during the night. Beside the security update and the iPhone SDK, herefater are some additional ones:

Server Admin Tools 10.5.3

The Server Administration Software installer package contains tools for remote server administration. These applications require Mac OS X version 10.5 or later. If you received this administration tools disc with an Xserve, the Apple Xserve Diagnostics software is also available for diagnosing certain Xserve hardware issues.

Logic Express Update 8.0.2

Logic Pro 8.0.2 addresses specific customer and compatibility issues of Logic Express 8.0.
This update is recommended for all Logic Express 8.0 users.

Digital Camera RAW Compatibility Update 2.1
Apple released an update aiming to improve digital camera RAW compatibility with Aperture 2 and iPhoto '08, as well as bringing support to new digital camera models.

This update extends RAW file compatibility for Aperture 2 and iPhoto ’08 for the following cameras:

Canon EOS Digital Rebel XSi/Kiss Digital x2/450D
Epson R-D1
Leaf AFi 7
Leaf AFi 6
Leaf AFi 5
Pentax K200D
Pentax K20D

- Security Update 2008-003 Released - MacEnsteph - 08:37:34

Following the Mac OS X 10.5.3 update, Apple released the third security update for 2008 dedicated to both Mac OS X Panther and Leopard.

Security Update 2008-003
Security Update 2008-003 is recommended for all servers and improves the security of Mac OS X. Previous security updates have been incorporated into this security update.

For additional information, please visit: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1897

[translation by Linathael]

- Hitachi to Bring Low-power Consumption HDs to Consumer Electronic Market - Lionel - 08:36:48

Source : TGdaily

Hitachi decided to follow Western Digital and to offer low-power consumption HDs.
The Cinemastar 5K500 is a 500 GB 3.5" HD consuming only 2.7 to 3.2 W, representing a power saving of 50%. The notebook version, named Cinemastar 5K320 should allow 10 to 20% power saving while offering 320 GB of storage space.
Such low power consumption HDs, with also lower performance levels, will be dedicated to standalone recorder or other HD-based multimedia centers for which heat release might be an issue.


[translation by Linathael]

- TSMC will increase the fabrication cost of certain products - Lionel - 07:36:07

Source : eweek

TSMC, one of the larger made-to-order chipmaker announced its intention of soon increasing its tariffs on the production of the chips using its latest technologies.
In addition to the increase in the raw materials, this tariff increase is justified by the explosion of the costs of installing new production equipment.
If the base-line chips are not be impacted, the top-of-the-range products such as the graphics chips will see their price increasing.
No order of magnitude was communicated on this tariff rise but if' one adds it with those already announced by other computer components, our computers are likely to cost us more in the near future.

[translation by crispin]