Macromedia drops FreeHand from Studio

Macromedia has dropped FreeHand from the new version of its Studio software suite, adding to fears that the vector drawing application will be phased out when the company merges with Adobe later this year. The company denied that the application would be dropped altogether, saying that it continues to be a successful product and available separately. Following the announcement of the merger, most commentators supposed that FreeHand would be abandoned in favour of Adobe Illustrator. ...more

AMD tops off $2.5bn Dresden manufacturing plant

AMD 'topped off' its new manufacturing plant in Dresden in Germany yesterday. Fab 36 is expected to produce 300mm wafers ready to build AMD 64-bit chips in two years' time. The company expects the plant to turn out the first 300mm silicon test wafers in the middle of next year with the commercially produced chips due in the first half of 2006. ...more

HP recalls notebook batteries

The US Consumer Product Safety Commission along with Hewlett Packard has issued a product recall on 135,000 batteries - 50,000 of which have been sold outside the US - for a range of Compaq and HP badged notebooks. The Commission says there is a danger of a short circuit in the battery packs that may lead the cells to overheat and melt or char the plastic case resulting, potentially, in a burn or fire hazard. Hewlett Packard says that it has received reports of sixteen batteries overheating, twelve of which were outside the US. ...more

Hi-Grade DMS II 3400 update

In our review of Hi-Grade's new Media Center PC, the DMS II 3400 (see issue 126, p62), we didn't specifically mention the availability of digital TV tuner options. We realise many readers would like to buy the DMS II with digital tuners, rather than the analog versions, so here's the update you've been waiting for. Hi-Grade assures us that customers will be able to order the DMS II with a single digital tuner from the end of March 2005, with delivery by the end of April. ...more

Treo 700p leads PalmOS revival

Palm has revived the Palm platform for its latest Treo launch, having felt the Windows Mobile pull for the Treo 700w. The Treo 700p smartphone runs PalmOS 5.4. ...more