![[AskAboutComputers.com]](logo_com_305x118.gif){kind=logo}
Tid-bits
11/22 - Apple is wisely not putting all of its eggs in one basket and has forged long-term contracts with not one, not two manufacturers of NAND flash memory for its iPod, but five NAND manufacturers! Two of the companies are Intel and Micron, who have agreed to go so far as to create their own company! NAND powers today's mobile phones, digital cameras, and portable music players. NAND may in fact someday replace some hard drives in laptops. Less energy translates into longer battery life, not to mention lighter and smaller notebooks. Flash memory "uses far less energy than hard drives" (Reuters).
For years the industry has been eagerly awaiting the next killer application. But perhaps the next killer app has been staring us in the face all along. Perhaps the next killer app is simply search: "figures place search engines second only to email as the key Net application".
The fewer applications one runs, the better. Microsoft and others have done a good enough job patching vulnerabilities in their OSs (operating systems) that hackers are now focusing more on applications. "Now the bad guys are ... going after the applications".
The authors of the book Hacking Exposed have received recognition for their work. Hacking Exposed teaches network security by teaching how to hack. George Kurtz and Stuart McClure were "named to silicon.com's Agenda Setters 2005 Top 50 List".
Following on the heels of the release of AOL's AOL Pictures, Hewlett Packard seemingly not to be outdone is offering digital photography software that enable consumers to print high-quality photos at home. The first one of these offerings is free. Software is "optimized for HP printers", but it does not say that it will not work with non-HP printers. Photosmart Essential 1.9 and free plug-ins are available at http://www.hp.com/go/pse .
Dell is offering certain notebooks and desktops "specially priced". I'll say. One notebook retails for around $400 and a desktop for about $300.
For those who wish to have their cake and eat it too, there is the ATI All-In-Wonder(R) X1800 XL. R stands for Radeon. "All-In-Wonder X1800 XL offers something for everyone - from the home theater aficionado, to photo and video editing fans, to the adrenaline filled gamer".
The target market for the Seagate Barracuda hard drive is just about everything. The Barracuda "targets mainstream and high-performance PCs, low-cost servers, PC gaming systems and media PCs."
Maxtor has released a FireWire 800 version of its OneTouch II external storage device (although it also contains a USB 2.0 interface). The drive is compatible with Macs. FireWire always was a Mac technology. And a very good technology, too. "Maxtor OneTouch II drive is fully bootable on a Mac computer running OS X".