Dell does do Viiv

I'd like to clarify Dell's position on Viiv. We do sell Viiv-enabled systems, all of which feature the Core2Duo processor. Our Dimension E520 and XPS410 are the two most popular models we sell.

The reason Viiv is currently less prominent on our site is simply a function of our recent site redesign. One of the final details that the team is tending to is replacing the Viiv logos and educational content on the new site.

Those should be in place in the next few days, and in plenty of time to help holiday shoppers learn more about Viiv.

I'd be grateful if you could help us set this story straight.

Thanks in advance.

Ira Williams
Dell

Subject: GooTube

Hey guys,

I noticed today that a lot of videos are being taken down on youtube and replaced with "This video has been removed due to copyright enfringement"

Especially noticeable if you look for 'Robot Chicken' episodes.

Cheers,

Bri.

Subject: Radeon 1950 PRO launch on October 17th

(please note, I'm canadian when you read this)

Made a mess of their roadmaps? Yeah. I believe it big time. Focken Canadians eh? We should go beat up those lazy igloo mounties and ride their moose. MOOOO! Moosy! MOOO!

~The Dude

Subject: Power buttons are "useless" to find

That the power button is difficult to find could be argued -- is that the power button or the reset? Did I turn it off or is it restarting itself ... let's sit for a minute and see if the screen flashes the BIOS load or just stays blank. I would tend to agree that finding the power button to turn a device on does set the intelligence bar to a certain level, but finding that same power button to turn a device off and finding that it doesn't ... LOWERS the intelligence level. When is a power button not a power button? When it is on a PC.

Personally, I'm ready to start a class-action law suite based on two incidents I've had in a couple of years. One involved opening the case under a desk to fit an iOmega Zip drive in to read an old cache of disks I'd found.

I was working mostly upside-down and put the power supply plug on right-side up -- which of course was upside-down once _I_ was right-side up (one of those miserable little floppy disk power plugs whose inventor that the charming idea of shaping a female receptacle for the male plug ... but hardware vendors decided it was more economical just to have four evenly space pins sticking out and allow YOU to figure out if it was right or wrong). Pressing the power button produces an amount of smoke and flames, and like any quick thinking semi-intelligent person I hit the power button to shut the thing off. OOPS! Nothing happened!

Frantically pressing the button repeatedly left me staring at a PC still attempting to boot while the smoke was getting thick enough that I could no longer _see_ the power button. Reaching around the back and finding _that_ power switch worked. This event was reminded to me when working on a friends PC. I tried loading video card drivers from a floppy disk and found the operating system complaining that there was no floppy disk. How could that be, I'm looking right at it? Well, remove the side cover and find that the power plug was dangling free. No problem, plug it it and hit the power button for a second attempt.

This one brought forth a spectacular display of lightening and flames jumping out of the power supply. As my right hand moved quickly to the power button on the front of the case my mind sent the signal that that was a useless gesture and we would not repeat it. My left hand instantly reached for the back of the case to find the true power switch, but a terrible thought passed through my head -- do you really want to rub your hand on the back of a metal PC case looking for a power switch that is directly attached to the part of the PC that is currently putting on such a spectacular light show and producing plumes of smoke?

I ended up grabbing the power cord and pulling it from the case. Lucky for me the cord was not involved in the melt-down and the electricity flowing through it did not decide that my arm was the quickest path to ground.

Whoever decided that powering off a PC by pushing the power button was strictly "optional" for the computer to decide -- I'm going to find him and poke him in the eye with a sharp stick!

rdsutton

Subject: Great idea

"The idea is you store this data for an appropriate number of times"

Sure. So all those multinational companies that already have to manage terabytes of data just to try and keep up are now going to have to triple or quadruple their vast storage arrays in order to track down a lousy email subpoenaed from two years ago ?

I think not.

Pascal.

Subject: Wspencer's election letter

Wspencer puts out a simple minded proposal and fittingly closes it with "What am I missing?" He is missing a lot:

First, allowing voters to keep a receipt allows for vote buying or pressure from spouses, bosses, union leaders, church leaders, etc.

Secondly, ignoring that, the big database of receipt numbers and votes is fine, except your privacy is gone if you search it to find yours -- whether you enter a receipt number or have a "simple menu at the top" to drill down one digit of your receipt number at a time. The web site itself, your ISP, the government getting your ISPs records of what URLs you surf (the AG is on record as wanting this) All can figure out your receipt number and know how you voted.

He spent about 2 minutes thinking about it to come up with this lame idea. There are some very smart people who have spent YEARS thinking about this, and a solution that's foolproof, prevents vote selling, protects privacy and is simple enough for the average doofus voter who can't even work a punch card correctly still eludes them.

Doug

Subject: Hitachi takes ¥77.3 billion "extraordinary" hit

77.3 billion yen, sounds more impressive than £386.5 million, or $695.7 million. Didn't AMD make those sort of losses year on year in the past, or between now and the processor not called K8L?

Morgan.