Chutneytech | UK Technology News

More and more, we are being told that the more bandwidth we have, the better are online experience will be, But what exactly is bandwidth, and how does it affect you?

The bandwidth of your connection, to make a simple analogy, is how big the pipe is that brings the information to your computer. If you imagine the data you are transferring from the internet to your home PC is water, the wider the pipe, the more water can be transferred in the same amount of time.

Now obviously, with the success of things like BBC’s iPlayer and Youtube, more and more information is available to be streamed directly to you at home; and at higher and higher resolutions as well – meaning that they take up more and more bandwidth as they do so. moneysupermarket.com says: ““These high speed services are particularly useful for anyone streaming high definition content from the web, for example those playing games or watching high definition catch-up TV.”

Bandwidth also affects your ability to multitask as well – for example, if you’re downloading music from iTunes and watching a video on youtube while your children play video games online, you may notice that all of these things are slow, unresponsive and not working properly – this is because of bandwidth limitations.

A higher bandwidth allows more information to flow through to your computers, but at the same time means that you can quickly rack up large amounts of data usage – many internet providers apply caps on this sort of thing, and will charge large amounts of money should you go over this.

Should your internet provider offer you an increased bandwidth (or broadband speed, as it is more commonly known), you should make sure you check what your download limits are. You may find that a higher bandwidth means that you will download far more information than you were before hand. moneysupermarket.com offers a great price comparison service that can help you find the best deals on your broadband both quickly and easily, meaning that you can spend more time browsing!

The Windows 7 ‘black screen of death’ is being blamed on malware.

The problem arises when users are confronted by a totally black screen when they log on to their computer.

Initially it was thought that Microsoft’s own security update could have caused the problem but that has now been ruled out.

The company that made the suggestion that the security update was the problem has apologised for its claims and reports are suggesting that the problem affects Windows Vista and XP, too.

Microsoft revealed in a blog on its security site that it was looking into the claims and “found that our November Security Updates are not making changes to the system that these reports say are responsible for these issues”.

Microsoft believe that the issue was probably due to malware, such as Daonol.

Amid the confusion over the cause, software company Prevx had said the November update may have been to blame, but have retracted their statement, saying it had been a “challenging issue” to identify the cause of the problem.

The firm announced on their website that “having narrowed down a specific trigger for this condition we’ve done quite a bit of testing and re-testing on the recent Windows patches including KB976098 and KB915597 as referred to in our previous blog”.

“Since more specifically narrowing down the cause we have been able to exonerate these patches from being a contributory factor.”

Prevx issued an apology to Microsoft “for any inconvenience” its initial claims may have caused.

Prevx has offered a fix for the problem, which it says could affect “millions” of computers worldwide.

David Kennerley, an employee for Prevx, wrote in a blog post that “users have resorted to reloading Windows as a last ditch effort to fix the problem”.

“We hope we can help a good many of you avoid the need to reload.”

Although Prevx don’t believe that the fix will always work, with Mr Kennerley stating that “there can be many causes”.

“But if your black screen woes began in the last two weeks… or after running any security program (including Prevx) to remove malware during this time, then this fix will have a high probability of working.”

“At least 10 different scenarios which will trigger the same black screen conditions,” according to Mr Kennerley.

“These appear to have been around for years now”.

Prevx believe that the black screen of death can affect Windows 7, Vista, XP, NT, and Windows 2000.

Microsoft would like all those that experience problems should get in touch with their customer service line.

The “black screen of death” is a pun based upon “the blue screen of death” which is displayed when Windows experiences a system failure.

It has been confirmed that computing giant Microsoft is looking into a problem described as the “black screen of death”, which is a growing problem for users of its latest operating system, Windows 7.

The problem has caused many users of Windows 7 to be shown a completely black screen after logging on to the system.

Microsoft has said it is looking into claims that suggest the latest security update, released on 10 November, was the root of the problem.

However, according to reports, the error also affects Vista, XP and other systems.

Major software company Prevx, which has created a download to remedy the problem, says “millions” of people may be affected.

David Kennerley, an employee at Prevx, revealed that “users have resorted to reloading Windows as a last ditch effort to fix the problem”.

“We hope we can help a good many of you avoid the need to reload.”

Prevx announced that although the cure to the problem worked in many cases, it did not work in all.

“There can be many causes,” said Mr Kennerley.

“But if your black screen woes began in the last two weeks after a Windows update or after running any security program (including Prevx) to remove malware during this time then this fix will have a high probability of working.”

Mr Kennerly went on to reveal that “at least 10 different scenarios which will trigger the same black screen conditions”.

“These appear to have been around for years now,” he said.

According to Prevx, the problem affects editions of Windows 7, Vista, XP, NT, and Windows 2000.

Those who have been affected by the problem have been advised to contact Microsoft’s customer service line.

A Microsoft spokesperson declared that reports did “not match any known issues” that had been recorded by the company previously.

Many are concerned that Microsoft has yet to issue a fix for the problem, which, according to reports, causes the desktop, task bar, system tray and side bar to disappear.

The “black screen of death” term is being used by many to describe the problem and is based on the “blue screen of death” pun, which is visible when Microsoft operating systems crash.

The following is a list of the five best mobile phones that we give a rating of 5 stars, including the Samsung Tocco Lite, Samsung Jet, Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, Samsung Genio Touch and Apple iPhone 3G S.

Samsung Tocco Lite. Available in black or pink, the Samsung Tocco Lite is seen as a response to the LG Cookie. The touchscreen mobile phone is great value for money, but lacks 3G. All the features you would expect from a modern mobile phone are included, with easy access to popular websites such as YouTube and Facebook, a 3.2 megapixel camera, FM radio with RDS, video recording, music player, Bluetooth and a memory card slot. It’s available for free on contract with a range of free gifts, such as a laptop, free line rental or an X-Box 360!

Samsung Jet. This attractive slimline phone is extremely fast and responsive. Not only does it deliver a lot of features and good quality, but it comes at a middle-of-the-road price. It delivers access to a range of online widgets, fantastic web browser, multi-tasking and a fast processor to handle it all. It comes with a 5 megapixel camera with flash and autofocus, FM radio with RDS, music player and a fantastic AMOLED display. This great phone comes packed with incredible features.

Nokia 5800 XpressMusic. Available in Black, red and blue, the first touchscreen phone to be released by Nokia is very impressive. Some may say that the list of great features make it better than the iPhone, even if the iPhone seems more polished. The benefits include a 3.2 megapixel with Carl Zeiss optics, 3G video calling, a Flash supported web browser, and the touchscreen offers an extremely high resolution with 16 million colours. In addition, a music player with FM radio, GPS positioning, WiFi, Bluetooth and an 8GB memory card!

Samsung Genio Touch. Similar to the Tocco Lite, this touchscreen mobile phone is ideal for those looking at entry-level. The camera is more basic than the Tocco Lite, and the screen smaller, but MySpace, Facebook and Twitter are easily accessible. With its bargain price-tag, the Genio Touch is an all-round great phone.

Apple iPhone 3G S. Last, but by no means least, the iPhone is the best known and quite easily the greatest phone to ever be released. This isn’t just a phone, but equally a media player and internet device, too.  Also included are GPS, a digital compass, WiFi, extremely fast web browsing and there are thousands of applications available. Complete with 32GB of memory, a mountain of music storage is possible. The only problem is that most of us will have to wait for the high price to drop!

The EU is encouraging its members to occupy the same airwaves for mobile broadband In an attempt to reach its 2013 target of 100% broadband coverage.

As members change from the traditional analogue to the new digital broadcasting method, the spectrum will be made available.

The change will make it much simpler to use devices “across borders” and permit consumers to use “roaming” services.

The plan is being likened by some to the rise of GSM mobile phones in the 1990s.

Using a common frequency as planned would be of significant benefit to rural communities as it travels over long distances.

The EU revealed that approximately 30% of its rural population is currently without high-speed internet access.

The development will use the 790-862 MHz sub-band radio spectrum  which is part of the “digital dividend” which was made available from the digital switchover.

However, during the changeover, the EU will be determined that all of its members agree on its technical standards.

 Without such agreements, different states may allow different uses for the spectrum which could cause interference, revealing that “radio spectrum knows no borders.”

A bonus for mobile broadband users is that the 790-862 MHz spectrum can easily penetrate buildings.

According to the commission, it is feasible that “3G and 4G mobile phone services that allow video streaming, full web browsing and fast downloads on a mobile handset,” could be used.

This would enable “high-speed broadband coverage of 100% of the EU population by the end of 2013.”

This switchover would need to be made by 2012 according to the EU and the developments are being encouraged by British broadcasting regulator Ofcom, who will study the proceedings with the government.

A spokesman announced, “the spectrum could deliver benefits such as mobile broadband or any other suitable services to EU citizens.”

An open auction for the frequencies made available by the switchover will be held in the UK, with many groups interested, such as broadcasters who could use some frequencies for high-definition services.

The EU has several “strategic objectives” to take advantage of the digital dividend, including a European-wide agreement on how the frequencies should be used and meeting targets on the technologies that will be allowed to use them, too.

By making agreements over the use of the frequencies, up to £45bn could be generated as a result.

Viviane Reding, the EU commissioner for information society and media declared that “The digital dividend is a once in a lifetime opportunity to make ‘broadband for all’ a reality all over Europe and boost some of the most innovative sectors of our economy.”

“Europe will only make the most of the digital dividend if we work together on a common plan.”

The internet is all set for the onset of what is seen by many to be the “biggest change” since its invention 40 years ago, according to regulator Icann.

Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann) announced that coming to the conclusion of plans to allow non-Latin characters to be used in website addresses as Internationalised Domain Names (IDNs).

Initially accepted in 2008 , the change will see domain names written in Arabic and other Asian scripts.

The regulatory body revealed that applications would begin to be considered for approval by 16^th of November if granted for approval on 30 October.

The president of Icann, Rod Beckstrom, believes that the first IDNs could be in use by “mid 2010.”

Beckstrom continued, “Of the 1.6 billion internet users today worldwide, more than half use languages that have scripts that are not Latin-based.”

“So this change is very much necessary for not only half the world’s internet users today but more than half, probably, of the future users as the internet continues to spread.”

According to Peter Dengate Thrush, chairman of the board which has been set the duty of reviewing the change, IDN plans were approved in June 2008 but the system has been undergoing rigorous testing for much longer.

Dengate Thrush is pleased with the developments, stating that “you have to appreciate what a fantastically complicated technical feature this is.”

“What we have created is a different translation system.”

The alterations will be applied to the internet’s Domain Name System, which works in a similar way to a phone book, translating web domains names such as google.com into a series of numbers, more commonly known as IP addresses.

The modifications are due to allow this current system to understand and translate non-Latin characters.

Dengate Thrush added, “we are confident that it works because we have been testing it for a couple of years.”

“We’re really ready to start rolling it out.”

In China and Thailand, internet users can already access websites using their own language, as the website owners have used special work around techniques. However, these website addresses don’t work on all computers and are not internationally approved.

The meeting will take place in South Korea and include talks on the introduction of generic Top Level Domains (TLDs), such as .uk or .com.

The organisation allowed a relaxation on the rules regarding TLDs last year so that businesses could use their brand as a website address and individuals could use their names.

The US government founded Icann in 1998 in a big to control regulations on the internet, but has undergone years of criticism, leading to the relaxing of its control over the non-profit body.

Autonomy was provided to Icann when the US government signed an agreement on 1 October.

Finland’s mobile phone giant Nokia is planning to sue Apple for their failure to pass on royalties from their sales of the immensely popular iPhone.

Apple are said to have infringed upon Nokia’s mobile phone technology patents when developing the iPhone.

How much Nokia will be seeking has not yet been confirmed, but expert analyst Gene Munster from Piper Jaffray predicts that Nokia will seek 1-2% from every iPhone that is sold.

Over 30 million have been sold to date which would generate between $6 and $12 per iPhone, potentially totalling $400m.

Apple has recently announced third quarter profits of £1bn with the iPhone delivering a 7% growth, having to pass on 1-2% of its iPhone royalties would be relatively insignificant.

On the other hand, Nokia revealed a loss for the last quarter due to a downturn in sales; the first in a decade.

Nokia has confirmed agreements with approximately 40 companies, which included the majority of mobile phone handset makers, allowing the use of its technological advancements, but Apple had not signed the agreement.

Ilkka Rahnasto, vice-president of legal and intellectual property at Nokia explained, “the basic principle in the mobile industry is that those companies who contribute in technology development to establish standards create intellectual property, which others then need to compensate for.”

“Apple is also expected to follow this principle.”

Mr Rahnasto went on to say, that Nokia has actually invested over £36bn on research and development in the past two decades.

Highly respected Apple expert Mr Munster has confessed that a sum of $12 per phone was “unlikely,” but if Nokia did manage to prise such a high figure out of Apple, it “would not change our positive thesis on the iPhone and Apple.” He went on to add, that “ultimately, the resolution is uncertain.”

The BBC sought further information from Apple, but a spokesman for the technology giant revealed that the company didn’t comment on pending litigation.

Nokia have alleged a total of 10 patent infringements, applying to all models from the iPhone range since its 2007 launch. Some of the patents that have been allegedly breeched include wireless data technology, speech coding, encryption and security. Nokia went on to accuse Apple of “trying to get a free ride on the back of Nokia’s innovation.”

The brand new Windows 7 operating system (OS) is set to deliver “better battery life and quicker boot times,” according to Microsoft and Intel.

The statement was made during a press conference in San Fransisco, where engineers gave the new OS a stringent test.

Microsoft will be expecting Windows 7 to avoid the negative exposure generated through the release of Windows Vista, and joined Intel in saying they have never worked as closely and have released a product that “they are proud of”.

Mike Angiulo from Microsoft told the BBC, “we both made a larger investment than ever before on the engineer side to improve on the hardware and software.”

Collectively known by some as Wintel, the two companies began the day after Windows Vista was released over two years ago and used hundreds of engineers in the process of development.

Steve Smith, the vice president at Intel’s digital enterprise group “we have spent 20 years getting to know each other and have businesses that are very well aligned.”

Dean Takahashi from VentureBeat, the popular internet technology blog, believed that Windows Vista needed drastic improvement.

He went on to say, “the collaboration was in the name of making Windows 7 better and more bug-free than the January 2007 launch of Windows Vista, which was broadly criticised in the industry and was one of the best advertisements for buying a Mac in history.”

Engineers have looked into the technological advances made by Microsoft and Intel, such as improved energy efficiency, security and performance.

One demonstration involved two identical Lenovo T400 laptops playing the same video, one using the Windows 7 OS and the other using Vista. Microsoft reported that the machine that ran Windows 7 experienced a 20% improvement in power efficiency due to “timer coalescing,” a design that extends battery life by holding the processor in low power states.

Ruston Panabaker, Microsoft’s head programme manager wouldn’t comment on how much battery power Windows 7 would save computers, stating “we’re achieving a very significant amount of battery savings.”

Engineers at Microsoft and Intel believe that end performance was dependant upon how manufacturers configured their machines.

Engineers were capable of boot up a system running Windows 7 in just 11 seconds. Intel’s Mr Smith told that “what we showed today was real capability in actual scenarios.”

CNET’s Ina Fried had reported on Microsoft for over 5 years and felt that this was a hurdle that both Microsoft and Intel needed to cross.

Ms Fried insisted, “in order for the computer users to get the benefit of all this work, it’s down to what choices the PC maker makes. It requires them all to be talking to one another all the time.”

“In the Vista time-frame, we saw not necessarily the kind of communication that leads to happy users and I think they have really tried to address that this time.”

“We will see how far they have really got when we see those Windows systems shipping in October.”

Thursday, 22 October sees the highly anticipated arrival of Microsoft’s Windows 7 operating system, with many believing that the future of the world’s largest software company will depend on its success.

The enormous scale of Microsoft’s grip on the market becomes clear when told of the 90% of computers relying on its Windows operating system, and over 1 billion people using it.

Microsoft’s last financial year saw a £35.7bn turnover with a net profit of approximately £9bn. Over half the profits generated were reliant upon Windows.

Experts have predicted that Microsoft’s stranglehold over the market was due to drop, with competitors Linux and Apple waiting to jump in. Many experts predict that software will be shifted to the “cloud,” where people connect to remote servers to access their software in a revolution to worldwide computing.

Microsoft brought about the attention of regulators at the US Department of Justice and the European Commission with ruthless actions towards competitors.

The release of its Vista operating system 3 years ago rendered many of its first users with unusable hardware and software; a crushing blow and seriously damaged its reputation with software developers and customers alike.

Most people still prefer Windows XP, Vista’s eight-year-old predecessor, with estimates suggesting that Vista has between 18.6% and 35% hold on the market.

Annette Jump, research director at technology firm Gartner, believes that “Vista is the worst-adopted operating system” whilst Microsoft International’s Jean-Philippe Courtois thinks “we don’t feel great about Vista adoption.”

This could be the only chance for Microsoft to regain the confidence that took a blow during the Vista period. Many Microsoft executives feel that they learnt a lot from what went wrong with Vista.

Windows 7 looks set to be released in good time, just 3 years after the release of Vista. Those that have tested it have reported it to be fast, secure, reliable, and easy to use. Microsoft have made big steps to avoid making the mistakes experienced with Vista, and prepared its partners for the release.

Mr Courtois believes that “the Windows ecosystem is the broadest in the world, and we have to take care of that,” with Alex Gruzen from Dell Computers surprised at how “the preparations for Windows 7 have been a remarkable step up from the days of dealing with Vista.”

He continued by revealing that “in the past, Microsoft looked at its operating system in isolation, and gave it to [manufacturers] to do whatever they wanted. Now they collaborate, help to figure out which third-party vendors are slowing down the system, help them improve their code.”

After releasing their third-quarter (Q3) results, Sony Ericsson’s sales are down to €1.619 billion, a massive drop of 42%.

Handset shipments and revenues are also struggling at Sony Ericsson. Their Q3 results show that just 14.1 million units were shipped, a 2% shortfall on Q2 results and a 45% slump in comparison to the same quarter results from last year.

Sony Ericsson will be most hurt that their sales figures are 42% down to £1.48 billion, 4% lower than Q2. The average selling price of Sony Ericsson units is down from €122 in Q2 to €114 in Q3, but up from last year’s Q3 figures of €109.

The mixture of products and difficult market conditions was blamed for the lower average selling price of handsets.

According to a statement made by Sony Ericsson, improvements were made on gross margin, but dropped annually due to foreign exchange inconsistencies and lower sales. However, improvements in volume and percentage rate were seen in the success of the W995 Walkman phone and a series of cost cutting measures.

President of Sony Ericsson, Dick Komiyama, stated “Our business in the third quarter started to show the effects of our ongoing transformation programme. Having refreshed our brand we are now better positioned to support the launch of new products such as Aino and Satio in Q4 2009. We have cleared channel inventories, and have continued to realign internal resources and improve efficiency.  We have also arranged external financing to strengthen the company’s financial position.

“Transforming the business for future growth and returning Sony Ericsson to profitability is the focus of the senior management team and will continue under the new leadership.”

Sony Ericsson set out last year in a bid to reduce their annual operating expenses by €880 million; efforts that are set to continue. The benefits from these cuts are due to be seen towards the end of 2010.

Sir Howard Stringer, chairman, chief executive and president of Sony and member of the Sony Ericsson board, succeeded Carl-Henric Svanberg on 15 October, with Bert Nordberg becoming president at Sony Ericsson in place of Dick Komiyama. Mr Komiyama will remain as an executive advisor until the later stages of 2009.

Experts believe that the world mobile phone handset market for 2009 will shrink by approximately 10% from the 1.19 billion units sold in 2008. Sony Ericsson believe that for unit sales during Q3, they hold approximately five per-cent of the world market.