Dell has assured users of its laptops that there is no danger from electrical jolts sometimes received from the cases of some of its systems.
Users, including some reviewers, have recently complained of receiving either a continuous electrical "tingling" or sharp shocks from some Dell laptops. The Dell machines involved include the 9400, and more recently, laptops with brushed-aluminium cases, such as the XPS M1330 and XPS M1530.
The reports have caused some alarm, coming after incidents such as batteries overheating and catching on fire. Dell recalled 4.1 million laptop batteries because of such risks in 2006; other major laptop makers, such as Acer, Lenovo and Toshiba, also recalled batteries.
In a knowledge base article published on Wednesday, Dell assured acknowledged that "a tingling sensation may be noticed when connecting devices to Dell notebook computers or printers and touching exposed metal parts of the devices being connected or the parent device", but denied that the "tingling sensation" is cause for alarm.
The jolts reported by some users are due to an electrical potential, or voltage, between exposed metal parts of the laptop and the earth, according to Dell. But this voltage can be found in any electrical device powered by an AC adapter without an earth.
"The voltage does not present any risk of injury to the user," the company said.
Earlier this year, users began noticing the voltage issue with Dell 9400 laptops. Other Dell users have reported the same issue with notebooks such as the XPS M1530 and other notebooks with aluminium cases.
A voltage test by one user showed that the surface of the XPS M1530 was giving off more than 100 volts of power.
Users have said they could also feel the voltage when connecting cables or accessories.
Dell acknowledged that users might feel a "tingling sensation" but said that the voltage is harmless.
"If conditions are right for the human body to be more conductive, such as having wet hands or standing barefoot on a concrete floor, the probability of sensing the tingling (electric current) increases," Dell said in the knowledge base article. "It is recommended to unplug the AC adapter from the parent device before attaching any cables or accessories, as this reduces the possibility of experiencing the tingling sensation."
Some users who have complained of the tingles or shocks have been supplied with a three-pronged - that is, earthed - power adapter, which solves the problem.
Dell has been shipping two-prong (unearthed) power adapters with the majority of its systems worldwide for more than a year and a half, Dell digital media manager Lionel Menchaca said in a recent forum post. As a result, the company isn't in a position to immediately supply all its customers with earthed adapters.
Dell is considering creating a program to sell earthed power adapters to users at a discounted price, Menchaca said.
Electrical devices can be designed in such a way that they do not need a safety connection to electrical earth, normally by using reinforced insulation or having two layers of insulation.
Users of non-Dell laptops, notably Apple's aluminium-cased Mac laptops, have reported a similar tingling sensation.
Saturday, January 19, 2008
China Net population tops 200 million, closes on U.S.
The number of Internet users in China soared past 200 million in 2007, a new report from the country's quasi-government Internet overseer said Thursday.
China's Internet population stood at 210 million at the end of last year, up 53 percent from the same time in 2006 when there were 137 million, the China Internet Network Information Centre said in its semi-annual report on Internet use here.
That figure puts China just 5 million users away from becoming the world's largest wired nation -- and with only about 16 percent of the population online. At its current growth rate, China will become the world's top Internet market sometime in the next few months.
The greatest growth came from users under 18 and over 30, CNNIC said. One of the most surprising statistics from the new report indicates that about 40 percent of users added over the last year, over 29 million, came from rural areas. Even in the January 2007 report, the vast majority of Chinese Netizens were based in major urban areas such as Beijing and Shanghai.
Also surprising among the new results is that China's most popular Internet application is online music, used by 86.6 percent of those surveyed, followed by instant messaging with 81 percent. E-mail placed only fifth, with 56.5 percent using it.
CNNIC's survey provides the most reliable information about Internet use in China, although its methodology is translucent at best. It does not reveal its sample size, nor does it reveal what consists of an Internet user except that the person used the Internet at least once in the month prior to when the survey was taken.
While the new statistics may seem impressive, it highlights how Internet usage in the country still lags behind mobile phone use, and how even greater usage could be spurred by more access through wireless devices. "China's admittedly impressive user statistics hide an important fact: only a fraction of those users have regular access to a PC," said David Wolf, CEO of Wolf Group Asia, a Beijing-based technology consultancy.
Despite limited PC access for some users, Chinese Internet users have embraced the Internet as a means of expression. "In addition to an increase in overall numbers, you also see a rise in the number of Netizens creating content on BBS and blogs, making Chinese Netizens some of the most active participants in the Web 2.0 phenomena in the world," said Sam Flemming, founder and CEO of CIC, an Internet word of mouth monitoring firm based in Shanghai.
China's Internet population stood at 210 million at the end of last year, up 53 percent from the same time in 2006 when there were 137 million, the China Internet Network Information Centre said in its semi-annual report on Internet use here.
That figure puts China just 5 million users away from becoming the world's largest wired nation -- and with only about 16 percent of the population online. At its current growth rate, China will become the world's top Internet market sometime in the next few months.
The greatest growth came from users under 18 and over 30, CNNIC said. One of the most surprising statistics from the new report indicates that about 40 percent of users added over the last year, over 29 million, came from rural areas. Even in the January 2007 report, the vast majority of Chinese Netizens were based in major urban areas such as Beijing and Shanghai.
Also surprising among the new results is that China's most popular Internet application is online music, used by 86.6 percent of those surveyed, followed by instant messaging with 81 percent. E-mail placed only fifth, with 56.5 percent using it.
CNNIC's survey provides the most reliable information about Internet use in China, although its methodology is translucent at best. It does not reveal its sample size, nor does it reveal what consists of an Internet user except that the person used the Internet at least once in the month prior to when the survey was taken.
While the new statistics may seem impressive, it highlights how Internet usage in the country still lags behind mobile phone use, and how even greater usage could be spurred by more access through wireless devices. "China's admittedly impressive user statistics hide an important fact: only a fraction of those users have regular access to a PC," said David Wolf, CEO of Wolf Group Asia, a Beijing-based technology consultancy.
Despite limited PC access for some users, Chinese Internet users have embraced the Internet as a means of expression. "In addition to an increase in overall numbers, you also see a rise in the number of Netizens creating content on BBS and blogs, making Chinese Netizens some of the most active participants in the Web 2.0 phenomena in the world," said Sam Flemming, founder and CEO of CIC, an Internet word of mouth monitoring firm based in Shanghai.
Wipro's profit growth down on higher wages and acquisition
India's third largest outsourcer Wipro reported a 32 percent increase in revenue in the quarter ending December 31, but profits grew by only 11 percent over the same quarter last year, reflecting higher salaries in India, and reduced margins as a result of its acquisition last year of U.S. IT services provider, Infocrossing.
Infocrossing's margins were lower than that of Wipro even before the acquisition, although the company said last year that it hoped to increase utilization at its data centers by offering the option of hosting in the U.S. to some of its outsourcing clients.
Wipro's revenue for the quarter was 52.36 billion rupees (US$1.33 billion) at the exchange rate on the closing date of the quarter, while its profits were 8.26 billion rupees. Wipro's revenue from its export business, Global IT Services and Products, was 36.14 billion rupees, up by 26 percent over the same period last year.
The U.S. economy, which is the largest market for Indian outsourcers, is facing challenges, but there has not been any impact yet on Wipro, Azim Premji, chairman of the company told analysts.
Indian largest outsourcer, Tata Consultancy Services, and second largest outsourcer, Infosys Technologies, both reported strong revenue growth for the quarter, despite concerns that the Indian outsourcing industry was likely to be hit by the weakening of the U.S. dollar. The U.S. is the largest market for Indian outsourcers, accounting for about 66 percent of export revenue, and the rupee has appreciated by about 12 percent against the dollar from the beginning of this year.
The appreciation of the rupee against the U.S. dollar pushes down rupee realizations for revenue earned in the U.S. by Indian companies, even as staff costs in India are going up.
Wipro got better prices for its services during the quarter, and added 39 new clients, which helped push up its top line. Improved price realizations and productivity also helped counter the impact of the weakening dollar, said Suresh Senapaty, Wipro's chief financial officer. "We have a healthy pipeline of large deals going forward," Premji said.
The company had 79,832 employees as of December 31, which included 59,925 employees in its IT Services and products business and 19,907 employees in its BPO (business process outsourcing) services business.
Infocrossing's margins were lower than that of Wipro even before the acquisition, although the company said last year that it hoped to increase utilization at its data centers by offering the option of hosting in the U.S. to some of its outsourcing clients.
Wipro's revenue for the quarter was 52.36 billion rupees (US$1.33 billion) at the exchange rate on the closing date of the quarter, while its profits were 8.26 billion rupees. Wipro's revenue from its export business, Global IT Services and Products, was 36.14 billion rupees, up by 26 percent over the same period last year.
The U.S. economy, which is the largest market for Indian outsourcers, is facing challenges, but there has not been any impact yet on Wipro, Azim Premji, chairman of the company told analysts.
Indian largest outsourcer, Tata Consultancy Services, and second largest outsourcer, Infosys Technologies, both reported strong revenue growth for the quarter, despite concerns that the Indian outsourcing industry was likely to be hit by the weakening of the U.S. dollar. The U.S. is the largest market for Indian outsourcers, accounting for about 66 percent of export revenue, and the rupee has appreciated by about 12 percent against the dollar from the beginning of this year.
The appreciation of the rupee against the U.S. dollar pushes down rupee realizations for revenue earned in the U.S. by Indian companies, even as staff costs in India are going up.
Wipro got better prices for its services during the quarter, and added 39 new clients, which helped push up its top line. Improved price realizations and productivity also helped counter the impact of the weakening dollar, said Suresh Senapaty, Wipro's chief financial officer. "We have a healthy pipeline of large deals going forward," Premji said.
The company had 79,832 employees as of December 31, which included 59,925 employees in its IT Services and products business and 19,907 employees in its BPO (business process outsourcing) services business.
Greenpeace applauds MacBook Air
Greenpeace has applauded Apple's introduction of the MacBook Air as being "a winner" because of Apple's focus on making it an environmentally-friendly PC.
"For us though the highlight of the show, was Steve talking about the environment in his keynote speech for the first time. It's a big step for Steve and we would like to congratulate all the Apple fans who helped us with our greenmyapple campaign," the environmental campaigners said.
Greenpeace went on to observe Apple's commitment made last year to phase out toxic chemicals Brominated Fire Retardants (BFRs) and Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) by the end of 2008.
"The MacBook Air is a strong entry in the race to build a green PC. As a mercury and arsenic free laptop it exceeds European Standards (RoHS directive exemptions) and raises the bar for the rest of the industry. The BFR and PVC free printed wiring on the motherboard is a big step forward, but not a first. Sony achieved that last November," Greenpeace said.
The organization urged Apple to make environmental leadership the theme of all its products, putting green design as standard right through the product line and making a global commitment to take back and recycling.
"For us though the highlight of the show, was Steve talking about the environment in his keynote speech for the first time. It's a big step for Steve and we would like to congratulate all the Apple fans who helped us with our greenmyapple campaign," the environmental campaigners said.
Greenpeace went on to observe Apple's commitment made last year to phase out toxic chemicals Brominated Fire Retardants (BFRs) and Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) by the end of 2008.
"The MacBook Air is a strong entry in the race to build a green PC. As a mercury and arsenic free laptop it exceeds European Standards (RoHS directive exemptions) and raises the bar for the rest of the industry. The BFR and PVC free printed wiring on the motherboard is a big step forward, but not a first. Sony achieved that last November," Greenpeace said.
The organization urged Apple to make environmental leadership the theme of all its products, putting green design as standard right through the product line and making a global commitment to take back and recycling.
Skype flaw turns videos into weapons
A programming error in eBay's Skype communications software could give cyber-criminals a new way to sneak their malicious software onto a victim's PC.
The flaw, which was reported Thursday by security researcher Aviv Raff, has to do with the way that Skype makes use of a Windows Internet Explorer component to render HTML. Because Skype does not apply strict security controls to the software, an attacker could run scripting code on the victim's system in a dangerous fashion and ultimately install malicious software.
The problem is that Skype runs the IE component with the less locked-down "Local Zone" security setting. Because of this attackers are able to do "all sorts of things... [such as] reading/writing files from the local disc and launching executables," wrote security researcher Petko Petkov, in a Thursday blog post about the issue.
For an attack to work, the bad guys would first need to find a trustworthy Web site that contained a common programming flaw called a cross-zone scripting error. This bug would give them a way to trick Skype into running their malicious script as if it came from a trusted Web site.
In a video posted to his blog, Raff showed how a cross-zone scripting flaw on the Dailymotion.com Web site could be exploited to launch the calculator program in Windows, using Skype's "Add video to chat" feature.
"The user simply needs to visit DailyMotion via Skype’s 'Add video to chat' button and stumble upon a move which contains the cross-site scripting vector," Petkov wrote.
Worse, attackers could flood the site with maliciously encoded advertisements in order to boost their likelihood of infecting a victim, he said. "This type of attack is very easy to pull and it requires almost zero preparation."
The flaw affects the latest version of Skype -- version 3.6.0.244 -- Raff said. Older versions of the software may also be at risk. "Until the Skype guys fix this vulnerability, I recommend that you stop searching for videos in Skype," he wrote.
Skype representatives could not be reached immediately for comment.
The flaw, which was reported Thursday by security researcher Aviv Raff, has to do with the way that Skype makes use of a Windows Internet Explorer component to render HTML. Because Skype does not apply strict security controls to the software, an attacker could run scripting code on the victim's system in a dangerous fashion and ultimately install malicious software.
The problem is that Skype runs the IE component with the less locked-down "Local Zone" security setting. Because of this attackers are able to do "all sorts of things... [such as] reading/writing files from the local disc and launching executables," wrote security researcher Petko Petkov, in a Thursday blog post about the issue.
For an attack to work, the bad guys would first need to find a trustworthy Web site that contained a common programming flaw called a cross-zone scripting error. This bug would give them a way to trick Skype into running their malicious script as if it came from a trusted Web site.
In a video posted to his blog, Raff showed how a cross-zone scripting flaw on the Dailymotion.com Web site could be exploited to launch the calculator program in Windows, using Skype's "Add video to chat" feature.
"The user simply needs to visit DailyMotion via Skype’s 'Add video to chat' button and stumble upon a move which contains the cross-site scripting vector," Petkov wrote.
Worse, attackers could flood the site with maliciously encoded advertisements in order to boost their likelihood of infecting a victim, he said. "This type of attack is very easy to pull and it requires almost zero preparation."
The flaw affects the latest version of Skype -- version 3.6.0.244 -- Raff said. Older versions of the software may also be at risk. "Until the Skype guys fix this vulnerability, I recommend that you stop searching for videos in Skype," he wrote.
Skype representatives could not be reached immediately for comment.
Sprint Nextel to lay off 4,000 after customer losses
Sprint Nextel will lay off about 4,000 employees and close about 125 retail outlets after it suffered a net loss of more than 100,000 customers in the fourth quarter of 2007, the company said Friday.
The layoffs and other cost-cutting measures are expected to save the company $700 million to $800 million a year, the company said in a news release.
The company reported a net gain of 500,000 subscribers through wholesale channels, growth of 256,000 Boost Unlimited users and net additions of 20,000 subscribers within affiliate channels. These gains were offset by net losses of 683,000 post-paid subscribers and 202,000 traditional prepaid users.
At the end of the year, Sprint had 53.8 million subscribers, including 40.8 million customers of its traditional post-paid service.
In addition to the layoffs, to come in the first half of the year, Sprint plans to close about 8 percent of its company-owned retail locations and eliminate more than 4,000 third-party distribution outlets, the company said. Sprint now has 20,000 total distribution points, including nearly 1,400 company-owned retail locations.
Sprint will announce its full fourth-quarter results on Feb. 28.
The layoffs and other cost-cutting measures are expected to save the company $700 million to $800 million a year, the company said in a news release.
The company reported a net gain of 500,000 subscribers through wholesale channels, growth of 256,000 Boost Unlimited users and net additions of 20,000 subscribers within affiliate channels. These gains were offset by net losses of 683,000 post-paid subscribers and 202,000 traditional prepaid users.
At the end of the year, Sprint had 53.8 million subscribers, including 40.8 million customers of its traditional post-paid service.
In addition to the layoffs, to come in the first half of the year, Sprint plans to close about 8 percent of its company-owned retail locations and eliminate more than 4,000 third-party distribution outlets, the company said. Sprint now has 20,000 total distribution points, including nearly 1,400 company-owned retail locations.
Sprint will announce its full fourth-quarter results on Feb. 28.
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