Latest Hi Tech News

I’ve written about the official launching of 64bit Windows XP Professional, as well as the news of Microsoft Servers Migrating To 64bit last week. Unfortunately there are still some obstacles for Windows users to migrate to 64bit, One of the obstacles is lack of support from atleast 2 major antivirus vendors like Symantec and McAfee.

In a statement released to Ziff Davis Internet News, Symantec said it would be “monitoring the adoption of x64 very closely” but confirmed that virus protection on x64 was not yet available.

According to some users of Norton Internet Security 2005 under the newly released 64bit Windows XP Professional, they reveived error message saying “Symantec currently does not sell any consumer products that are certified to be compatible with 64-bit processors and operating systems.”.

The company said its Symantec AntiVirus Corporate Edition 10.0 will eventually support Windows XP Professional x64 Edition and Windows Server 2003 x64 Editions, but no timeline for full support was provided.

Whereas for McAfee, they have the same idea of 64-bit computing is not mature enough to justify a full anti-virus rollout yet.

Marc Solomon, senior product manager McAfee’s consumer strategy and market group, said the Windows XP Professional x64 Edition is initially geared only towards developers, gamers and early adopter enthusiasts. “We’ll go to market as the business dictates. We don’t see consumer adoption for 64-bit operating systems starting very soon,” Solomon said in an interview.

McAfee also do not think the 64bit market will mature until Longhorn ships or a bit after. At that time, there will be more drivers and software targeted at the consumer segment. However, on the enterprise side, McAfee does offer limited support for 64-bit systems. Unfortunately full anti-virus support isn’t expected until 2006.

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While 64bit is lacking of antivirus protection, fortunate enough we still atleast have 64-bit firewall for Windows. :)

Ok, usually I don’t write about sports here, but I just can’t stop myself to express my happiness to Chelsea achievements so far.

Chelsea Football Club, the club that i supported since I was 15 years old, when Gianfranco Zola (My all time favourite football player !) joined the Stamford Bridge club from Lazio. His skills attracted me to love Chelsea FC since then.

Today, Chelsea have been crowned champion of English Premier League after securing the last 2 points they needed so badly after waiting for 50 years since they last won as a champion back in 1955. There are still 3 matches to go for the season 04/05, but they have enough points to drop to emerge as the champion at the end of this season eventually. In other words, they have 88 points already in their pocket now, even the closest rival, Arsenal, can win all their 4 matches remaining, the most they can earn is only 86 points in total, so mathematically, Chelsea is the Champion Of English Premier League Season 04/05 !!

Chelsea have already won the Carling Cup and the English Premier League in this season. Their current aim will be winning the Champion League because this is the most prestigious tournament among European football clubs. They are now inches away from winning the Champion League, as they already in the semi-final second leg. I wouldn’t say they will certainly win the second leg, but a score line of atleast 1-1 will be good enough to send them to Istanbul for the Final !!

So, 2 down, 1 to go, chelsea will be the treble champion eventually !!
Go Chelsea, go !!

Yeah !! Firefox has just surpassed the 50 million download mark recently !! <:-P Well, thanks to all your supports to Firefox !!

I always believe people will always appreciate the thing if it is good, or better than the rest. :)

So, now who dares to say IE is enjoying more than 90% of the Web Browser share (like what the web developer said in my class)?

OneStat.com said that since November, IE’s worldwide usage has fallen 1.62 percentage points to 87.3 percent market share. Firefox, meanwhile, increased by one percentage point to an 8.5 percent global market share.

Remeber, that is last November’s statistic. :)

If you still dare to say, please read this article, IE market share is going downward.

With its first full-fledged release last November, Firefox has shaken up a Web browser market that most analysts had deemed almost wholly mature. For the first time in years, the market share of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer has begun inching downwards as Firefox adoption rises.

[Source]

Really really glad to hear this fascinating news !! Go Firefox, go !!

While we are realizing the next computer world will be 64bit enabled soon, Microsoft is migrating many of its internal servers to the new 64bit version of Windows Server 2003.

“Our MSN search engine is actually built on several thousand systems running the x64 version of Windows,” Danny Beck, Microsoft Windows client senior product marketing manager said. In addition, “the entire Microsoft.com site has been migrated, and we serve 30 million unique visitors every day.”

It’s to believe that 64bit system can definitely improve overall performance of their services. As Beck said, performance of the MSN Messenger servers has improved 10 times since they went 64bit. (But how come I always don’t receive email-received notification? :p )

However, some application like Outlook Express and Windows Media Player will not have 64bit version anytime soon. This is because some applications such as non-memory intensive applications, do not necessarily benefit customers by being 64bit native.

Furthermore, Microsoft’s Beck said most Microsoft applications such as the Office suite will not be available in 64-bit versions until the end of 2006, when the company’s next-generation operating system, Longhorn, is due for release.

[Source]

What are you going to do in the aiplane for the next couple hours if you are taking a long distance flight?
Read magazines? Watch movies? Sleep?

Well, now you can online on the air !!

Connexion by Boeing wants to turn your on-plane boredom and downtime into productive time by pumping in a high-speed broadband Internet connection via satellite. The Connexion service has been in the works for years, and almost faltered after September 11 caused a downturn in domestic U.S. airline sustainability and worldwide business activity.

However, the division retooled its efforts, refocused on long-haul flights, and has brought an Internet service to market that, so far, appears to deliver on its promise based on a test flight that I took in the Seattle, Washington area, and on the experiences of several travelers, including one of Toms’ own editors.

There are certain planes and routes are providing this service currently, including Lufthansa, Singapore Airlines, SAS, ANA, and Japan Airlines. While airlines like China Airlines, El Al, and Korean Air, will have that service soon.

[Source]

Don’t be silly, I’m not saying an open-sourced version of Windows. :D

I’m actually refering to Microsoft’s move to support Open Source software as they have extended an olive branch to the open-source community, calling for a sit-down to discuss how they can better work with the open-source world.

At a recent conference sponsored by the Association for Competitive Technology (ACT) in Cambridge, Md., Brad Smith, Microsoft’s general counsel, called for bridge building between Microsoft, its competitors and the open-source community.

“We’re going to have to figure out how to build some bridges between the various parts of our industry,” he continued. “We’re going to have to figure out how we can bring the various parts of our industry closer together. Not necessarily in the sense of changing the way software is developed, but building bridges so that we all have the ability to collaborate with each other. And that will mean we will need some new rotations, I think, in how we work together, in how we license, in how we share technology or intellectual property rights with each other.”

Now Microsoft realizes the fast growing open source software community is another playground for them to tap in. Anyway, for the sake of every computer user, this bridge between Microsoft and open source software is no doubt a good one, as some of their secretly kept information will have to be shared to others like :-

“But, realistically, they could do some important things. One, open up their file formats. That is, fully document things like the Microsoft Word and Windows Media formats, and make a binding promise not to sue people who write software to interoperate with them,” he said. “Two, put down the patent weapon. Do as IBM has, and offer their software patents under royalty-free, paperwork-free license to open-source projects. Three, support open technical standards, rather than sabotaging them. Microsoft has a history of destructive meddling at organizations like the IETF and W3C, and of attempting to hijack standards like Kerberos by making them dependent on proprietary ‘extensions.’ Simply not doing this would be a huge improvement.”

[Source]

All in all, it’s a great news to hear that Microsoft is taking the first step into open source world. :)