32-BIT VERSION OF WINDOWS VISTA NOT SUPPORTING HD-DVD OR BLU-RAY

The MPAA (if that was who indeed stomped on this) has stomped on innovation and on the pocket-books of people once again.

This comes from an interview with Steve Riley when he announced that Windows Vista 32-bit edition will not play any of the next generation high-definition formats.

The people (I assume the MPAA) said that it is too easy to get around the copy protection with 32-bit processors and believes that the only way to protect their content is to use 64-bit processors.

This is bad news for the consumers that have purchased their computers with Intel Pentium and AMD Athlon (and even Sempron) processors thinking that they would just upgrade to Vista 32-bit edition. Now consumers will have to buy a completely new computer. Which begs the question:

How many of us really want and need this next generation format?

Doing this not only means spending money on not just the drive but also a brand new mid-range computer. THIS SUCKS! (unless you like to spend all your money)

Now to clarify, this wasn't Microsoft's fault (however they could have stood up for the consumer a little better) but Microsoft was told that if they want their operating system to run these new mediums of storage they need to use 64-bit technology.

Later, Microsoft released that you will still be able to use the drive as a back-up device but not play any of the movies released by either HD-DVD or BLU-RAY, which kind of defeats the purpose since we can buy external hard drives a heck of a lot cheaper.

Do we really want these new high-definition formats? Or do we just want an easy way to watch content at high quality play-back? IPTV is looking better and better all the time.

APPLE RECALLS 1.8 MILLION BATTERIES

Apple is the second in the not so distant past to recall 1.8 million of their own Li-Ion batteries.

The surprising thing to note is that the batteries included in this recall are made by Sony.

If you didn't read the story I posted a bit ago about the Dell battery recall here is the significance:

Both companies batteries are made by Sony.

Sony has been under attack for many things as of late including their batteries and the now famed "rootkit". Their own Playstation 2 had a recall on it power adapters a year or so ago.

What is Sony up to creating crappy parts? Are they too busy with the Playstation 3 or are we to expect and thrid-rate product from them for their next console as well?

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DELL RECALLS CRAPPY BATTERIES

Batteries have been in the news for the past months with stories of explosions and fires. Dell is the latest company to be bothered with the possibility of laptop batteries exploding.

Sony makes the batteries that are in current recall, which includes 4.1 million batteries from thirty-three laptops in Dell's manufacturing line.

Lithium is a fairly dangerous element and anything that has to do with Lithium should not be taken lightly.

Many people blame the fact that since most parts for laptops, and computers in general, are crappy due to them being built in China.

Dell is reassuring consumers that the only way this happens is if there is a short circuit and that only happens in rare circumstances.

Dell isn't the only company that has been having problems with batteries lately. The first we started hearing reports of bad batteries was with Apple's new MacBook Pro. This has been photoed and you can find photos on the internet of swelling and exploding batteries.

Best advice for now? Keep your laptop off your lap and turn it off when you don't use it. Dell says for their computers in particular to shut down the laptop, take out the battery, and plug in your laptop to use it.

Who's next? HP/Compaq? Sony? Acer? Time will only tell.

APPLE RELEASES NEW INTEL DESKTOP

Apple has just released the last of it's Intel computers with the new Mac Pro.

This system promises to be very powerful with options of two 2GHz to 3GHz Dual Core Zeon processors, up to 16GB of DDR2 RAM, up to four hard drives with a total of 2 terabytes to local storage, 4 nVidia GeForce 7300 GT cards, as well as an option for 2 superdrives.

I think this system really puts Apple on the top end as far as desktops go. You can even get an optional fibre channel card.

If what everyone has been saying about the new Intel chip is really true this is the fastest computer on the market now.