AMD boosts Opteron server range

AMD has added two- and eight-way server processors to the 64-bit Opteron range. It claims the Model 252 and 852 processors now represent 'the world's highest performing processors' for servers and workstations. Part of the announcement includes AMD chipset support for PCI-Express I/O, in the form of the AMD-8132 HyperTransport PCI-X 2. ...more

Napster hires bank to look into sale options

Napster has appointed a major US bank to investigate its options in the wake of renewed takeover interest. UBS will look into the possibilities of either selling the digital music service or forming partnerships with other companies. Chris Gorog, Napster's CEO, said that interest in a possible acquisition had risen following an upsurge in the company's performance, notably after its launch of a free, advertising-supported music service saw it cut its losses by $10 million in the last quarter. ...more

Microsoft set to release disk based back up system

Microsoft says that its first disk-based data backup system will be released to manufacturing within the next 30 days. The Microsoft System Centre Data Protection Manager (DPM) aims to allow IT departments to back up their information on fast hard disk systems rather than the familiar tape based systems. DPM also has the benefit of allowing end users to retrieve lost or corrupted files on from their own desktop without having to bother the IT department. ...more

Slammer and Blaster slam and blast from the past

One might think that talk of the Slammer and Blaster worms was restricted to security researchers reminiscing over the virus-heavy years of 2002 and 2003, but according to the latest figures from Kaspersky, the attacks are still being heavily used across the Internet today. Kasperky's Costin Raiu, Head of Research & Development, writes in the report 'Internet Attacks 2005' that the buffer overrun vulnerability discovered in SQL Server 2000 back in 2002 was the most used vector for attack last year. The three-year-old Slammer Internet worm exploits this flaw and was the fourth most prevalent attack or probe of 2005. ...more

Thomson extends SpeedTouch wireless range

Thomson has unveiled the latest additions to its SpeedTouch range of ADSL routers and wireless access hardware. The SpeedTouch 580 is combined Ethernet and 54Mbps wireless router. It has four 10/100MBit Ethernet ports, while the 802. ...more