Lenovo confirms flaming ThinkPad incident

Lenovo has confirmed that a ThinkPad T43 laptop burst into flame at Los Angeles' international airport last weekend. The Chinese company is investigating the incident and was not prepared to say whether it contained a Sony battery. Three laptop manufacturers, Apple, Dell and Toshiba, have recalled more than four million Sony batteries because they may overheat causing burns and, in extreme cases, catch fire. ...more

Microsoft stepped out of antitrust line

Microsoft momentarily stepped the wrong the side of the antitrust settlement terms according to the latest court documents detailing the software company's compliance. In the latest of the six-monthly reports on the progress Microsoft is making in complying with these terms, it notes a complaint whereby Microsoft offered to supply manufacturers of portable digital music players with a CD containing the Windows Media Player among other software. However, a draft agreement on this distribution specified that it was exclusive - that no other media player was to be shipped with the product. ...more

Slew of critical security alerts announced by Microsoft

Anyone who hoped that Windows XP Service Pack 2 would bring an end to the monthly blizzard of security patches is going to be disappointed. This month, Microsoft has issued a whole slew of 'critical' and 'important' patches to its software. All in all the bulletin is reporting seven 'critical' problems found with its software and three 'important' vulnerabilities. ...more

Apple announce G4 iBooks

Apple has unnveiled its first ever G4 iMacs, and condemned the six-year-old G3 processor to history. The range has been trimmed from four models to three, with only a single 12in option available. Apple noted last week that the success of the PowerBook 12in have 'cannibalised' iBook sales The three new models are as follows: ? 12in: 800MHz G4, 256K L2 cache, 256MB DDR266 memory, 30GB Ultra ATA hard drive, combo drive (DVD/CD-RW), ATI Mobility Radeon graphics with 32MB of video RAM - ?849. ...more

Media pressure forces YouTube delete

YouTube has deleted almost 30,000 video clips following a complaint by a Japanese rights organisation. The Japan Society for Rights of Authors, Composers and Publishers said that it had found 29,549 video clips including television shows, music videos and movies posted on the site without permission of the copyright holders, in this case 23 Japanese TV stations. YouTube quickly complied with its request, in line with its stated policy of removing any copyright material as soon as it is asked to do so. ...more