Dell bucks industry trend with sales boost

Dell Computer, the number two PC hardware manufacturer, blew away the gloom surrounding the rest of the computer business with an 18% rise in worldwide product shipments in the second quarter. This compares with an industry average decline of 4%. The rise in shipments was led by an 18% rise in PowerEdge servers and 17% rise in notebooks. ...more

Adobe plugs free 3D content into Photoshop Extended

Adobe has released a free plug-in that enables users of the new Extended version of Photoshop to find and download content from Google's collection of 3D models. Google 3D Warehouse is a free online repository for 3D models and content and the plug-in will enable this content to be placed, manipulated and used in composites with the new 3D tools in Photoshop CS3 Extended. The content is generated by users of the SketchUp application that Google acquired in March 2006 and has since made freely available. ...more

Microsoft wins European city contracts

Microsoft has won three contracts in cities in Germany and Finland - where the open-source force is strong - and in Latvia. Microsoft said of the wins: 'Microsoft is always willing to discuss with government or organizations how we can help bring higher-value, stable, easy to use Microsoft solutions to the benefit of government agencies, consumers and businesses alike. Microsoft government customers across Europe. ...more

EMI seeks Roxio's security

EMI has announced that it has signed a strategic partnership with digital media company in order to produce a secure system that will allow customers to burn their own CDs using permitted music files downloaded or purchased from the Internet. Through this relationship, Roxio will provide its technology and multiple distribution channels while EMI will provide strategic guidance and advice. The two companies will work towards creating solutions designed to protect against the unauthorized reproduction of copyrighted content. ...more

Mozilla speeds up for version 1.7

Mac users get a host of improvements: the new version includes crash reporting feedback for the platform as well as Windows and Linux, and also improved date handling. The email component also includes improvements to the way it displays attachment names, and large image files. The key email additions include the ability to set up multiple identities on the same email account. ...more