Once you have been used to get your emails updated on your iPhone while being on the move, it becomes difficult to disable this option, or for some to stop using it. However, when traveling in other countries this feature can become quite expensive. AT&T was charging 20 USD per MB of data for oversea usage, so in other words 20,000 UGD for 1 GB!
In order to please iPhone owners who are traveling to different location outside USA, the carrier now offers new option, kind of Roaming Options for 100 or 200 MB of data, costing respectively 120 USD and 200 USD. If it remains expensive, it might become acceptable for professional usage. It would be nice to see other carriers to follow on this idea.
Following yesterday's PR, confirming that Orange's 3G network speed is currently limited to 384 Kb/s, the iPhone exclusive distributor in France announces it will further increase speed for 3G+ network for the iPhone. While originally expected to top at 1 MB/s from September 15th, it will in fact be increased till 1.8 Mb/s at that date for current customers, and starting from today for new clients. This data transfer speed is about 4 times slower than the theoretical one which could be reached by the 3G+ network protocol and the iPhone hardware. So, this is the limit currently available on Orange network, till the time the carrier has completed work on its infrastructure to further enhance performance.
Such quick move from the carrieris coming to avoid any legal action to be launched by unsatisfied client or consumer groups as it was not stated in Orange ads for the iPhone that the data transfer speed will be intentionally limited by the carrier independently of the reception quality of reception.
The annual NVidia conference, known as
NVision is currently taking place, and it is a mix between joy of success and fears for the future.
On the bright side, the CUDA and the first applications to benefit from this technology are of course celebrated. The best example is most likely the software TMPGEnc 4.0 (for Windows) whose encoding has been speed up 4.5x thanks to the use of a GeForce GTX 260, compared to the result obtained with a Core 2 Quad 2.66 GHz.
On the dark side, the company is facing the issue originating from its defective material used in recent generation of GPUs. At the entrance of the NVision, a group of users were distributing prospectus:
This group asks NVidia to launch a general recall for all defective GPUs-based hardware. According to the last information about this issue, the problem is originating from the material used to solder the silicon chips to its substrate and its support used as the interface with the motherboard. Due to temperature variation, this material could be aging much faster than expected, cracked and lead to GPU death.
All chips manufactured till the end of July are plagued by this defective material, as NVidia only changed it for a new one (fully validated?) from beginning of August. All GPUs dedicated to desktop or notebook are affected, in other words 75 millions units. However, the problem might be a serious issue mostly for notebook-dedicated models, so potentially for 15 million units. Exchanging the defective GPU will cost computer company between 150 and 250 USD. By budgeting only 200 million USD, NVidia is expecting to have to cover for only 1 million defective GPUs. Let's hope it will be true, otherwise, this issue might simply send the company to bankruptcy.
OEM and other users of NVidia GPUs are not fully convinced that the new material will be problem-less in the future, especially considering that it might not have been fully validated, and current issues might re-appear in couple of months/years.
A new case has just
increased the water flow to our mill.
Someone bought on eBay a server for the derisory sum of 35 pounds sterling and had the surprise of finding on the hard disk of the machine the confidential files from the Royal Bank of Scotland. This contained the complete personal data of 1 million customers including the email addresses, signatures and even account numbers.
Fortunately for the bank, the purchaser immediately contacted them to return these sensitive file.
One can imagine that whoever put this machine on sale will be in very hot water.
We had not announced the release of version 2.0.3 of PWnage Tool which is now compatible with firmware 2.02. of the iPhone.
However we do this for the 2.0.3.1 version that corrects some bugs found in the preceding version such as the impossibility of saving passwords and Wi-fi keys on the iPhones.
We thus advise with all those which already used the previous version to start again.
Attention: there are still bugs with the iPod Touch.
