Microsoft releases beta 3 of IE7

Microsoft has posted Beta 3 of Internet Explorer on its website. The new version which supersedes the last Beta posted back in April is being touted as stable enough for anyone to download and play with. Beta brings the standalone version into line with that shipped with the Vista build, No. ...more

Viiv almost alive

We can expect the arrival of Viiv, Intel's platform for home-based digital media entertainment, early in the New Year, and a number of Taiwan PC companies will be in the vanguard. Small-form-factor specialists AOpen and Shuttle and the likes of Acer, Gigabyte Technology, and MSI will be in on the launch, with mass production slated for early February, reports Digitimes According to its sources, the officially-sanctioned Viiv platform will consist of a dual-core Pentium D 800/900, 945 and 955 chipsets and Intel Pro/100 PM/PL/VE/VM network cards. Expected in Q1 2006, the official launch will be on 9 January, according to Digitimes. ...more

Sony DRM burrows into rootkit code

DRM software included on some Sony CDs includes a monitoring utility that is difficult to discover, almost impossible to remove and offers an easy hiding place for malicious code. Mark Russinovich, writing in the Sysinternals blog, details how he uncovered rootkit code on his computer that originated from a Sony music CD he owned. A rootkit installs itself in Windows systems in such a way that it tells the operating system to quite literally blindly accept its activities. ...more

Music downloads drive sales, says report

Most music fans who download album tracks from the Internet go on to buy the full CD, according to new research by Music Research and Programming (MRP). The company claims its research shows that, 'far from damaging the music industry, downloading music from the Internet can be a useful and significant marketing tool for record companies.' MRP's survey found that of the 87 per cent of respondents to the survey buy albums on the back of downloading individual tracks. ...more

NTL swallows Virgin.net

NTL has acquired the 51 per cent of shares in Virgin.net that it did not own to become the sole owner of the ISP. Best known for its cable broadband and TV, NTL has made no secret of its intentions to expand into the ADSL arena. ...more