IN THE PAPERS
In The Papers 8 January
08-01-2010
by Sylvia Leatham
DCU hosts WiMax trial | Intel demos next-gen chips
The Irish Times reports that companies at the CES tech trade show in Las Vegas were keen to show off tablet and slate devices before Apple launches its own version, expected later this month. The new generation of tablets will look more like e-book readers such as Amazon's Kindle but will have a touchscreen. Microsoft showed off a slate PC from HP that uses Windows 7 and runs the Kindle e-book software. Chinese PC maker Lenovo presented the IdeaPad U1, a notebook with a detachable screen that can operate as a tablet on its own. Read more on Apple's tablet in ENN's Weekly Digest.
The paper also says that Nokia is to hold an event in Dublin next week aimed at attracting developers to its online application store, as reported by ENN on Monday.
The same paper reports that TerminalFour has secured EUR1.6 million in equity finance. Read more on this story on ENN.
The paper also says that a trial of WiMax wireless broadband technology is currently under way in Dublin City University as part of a HEAnet strategy to develop Irish colleges’ broadband networks. The trial has been running since October 2009 and is being supported by AirSpeed Telecom, with 60 users from the college’s staff and students. The aim of the trial is to see how well WiMax can be integrated into a college’s existing network infrastructure, particularly when it comes to its security and user-authentication systems. HEAnet has been granted a temporary licence by ComReg to run the trial and recently secured an extension until June.
The Irish Independent says that cinema group Cineworld has said that releases of 3-D movies such as 'Avatar' and 'Monsters vs Aliens' helped to attract more viewers to its screens during 2009. In a trading update prior to the March release of full-year figures, Cineworld said revenue for the 53 weeks to the end of December across its activities in the UK and Ireland rose 11.4 percent, even though screen advertising revenues slumped 27.3 percent in the period.
The Wall Street Journal reports that chip giant Intel has demonstrated gains in power efficiency and computer speed with its new generation of chips, which are designed to bring better graphics to laptops and more features to ATMs and other business machines. In a presentation at the Consumer Electronics Show, Sean Maloney, head of Intel's chip product business, demonstrated new features that allow tasks running on PCs to be passed between different segments of the processors, known as cores. "You get the power efficiency and you get the graphics," said Maloney. He said the new line of Intel's Core brand also contains 12 new chips for embedded uses, including digital signs and banking machines with facial-recognition capabilities.
In more news from the CES, the paper says that more than half a dozen new players have entered the growing e-reader market, ranging from start-ups like Spring Design to tech heavyweights like Samsung Electronics. Research firm iSuppli estimates that global sales of e-readers topped 5 million in 2009 and will rise to 12 million this year. Several of the new e-readers offer larger and sturdier black-and-white electronic-paper touchscreens. E-paper screens reflect light, and some readers say they are easier on the eyes for long-form reading. They also use power only when readers turn pages, so they last longer between charges.
According to the Financial Times, Sony sold 3.8 million PlayStation3 games consoles worldwide in the final five weeks of 2009, a 76 percent increase on last year. A hefty price cut and a new model console appear to have fuelled the record holiday-period sales. The company said its PlayStation Network, the online gaming service that can be accessed from the PS3, now has 38 million registered accounts.
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