Cheaper PDAs to arrive courtesy of Microsoft

Manufacturers of PDAs that license Microsoft's CE environment, as opposed to the more expensive Pocket PC OS, are in the position to put much cheaper devices on the shelves. Microsoft is still quietly offering Windows CE 3.0 while aggressively promoting Pocket PC. ...more

Toshiba lines up entry-level widescreen projector for Christmas

Ready for the Christmas market, Toshiba has introduced its first widescreen Digital Light Processing (DLP) home cinema projector for less than ?1,000. Priced at ?999 and aimed at those wanting to view big matches or blockbuster movies in the comfort of their own home, the entry-level MT200 can produce a picture up to 290 inches in size (measured diagonally). The spec, in more detail, is an aspect ratio of 16:9 / 4:3, a resolution of Real WXGA, a brightness of 700 ansi lumens and a contrast ratio of 2500:1. ...more

Microland goes into liquidation

It has been officially announced that the Stockport-based PC builder Microland Technology PLC is going into liquidation. 'We have been instructed to call meetings to place the company into Creditors Voluntary Liquidation and these are to be held on Monday 31 January 2005,' said Ian Millington, a partner in the Bolton-based Unity Corporate Recovery & Insolvency After these meetings the company's assets will be sold (those interested should visit www.ubsg. ...more

Fujitsu drives in a spin

Fujitsu has introduced its MAM series of hard drives for high-end workstations and servers, spinning at 15,000rpm. With current drive speeds at the 7,200rpm mark, this more than doubling of speed allows a much greater data transfer rate, as much as 88.9Mbytes/sec. ...more

Warner Brothers combines Blu-ray and HD DVD

A research team from Warner Brothers has come up with a possible solution to the high definition DVD wars that are threatening to scuttle the whole transition to a new format: support both Blu-ray and HD DVD formats, along with the standard DVD format, on a single disk. The engineers at Warner Brothers have filed a patent for the solution to what appears to be an insurmountable compatibility problem between the two formats - they store their information in 'pits' on the disks at different depths. Blue-ray discs store information only 0. ...more