Business

Apple plans on leaving millions of consumers waiting for their new Mac OS "Leopard", as company representatives recently announced that the shipment for their operating system upgrade will not occur this June, as originally promised. The reason for ... the delay is that Apple is being forced to divert a number of resources from the Leopard project and use them for the successful and timely launch of their highly anticipated iPhone. Shortly after the announcement, Apple's stocks reflected the dismal news, dropping $2.69/share to $89.50. The company had opened the day trading $92.19 on the Nasdaq ... (view more)

In the beginning, there was Yahoo, Lycos, and even a little search engine 'that could,' called AltaVista. While each offered varying abilities in crawling the web, none could quite match the rise of Google. And although its roots were only modest, ... Google's impressive search capabilities quickly rocketed it to the top of the web, with the power to control the rise and fall of companies vying for space in the Internet community. Now, less than a year after buying YouTube, Google is flexing its muscle again, buying advertising firm DoubleClick for an astounding $3.1 billion. The sheer value of ... (view more)

Since last November and even before that, Microsoft has been aggressively hyping the features and virtues of Vista. We've all seen it talked about in the printed media, on television, and on web sites, including Infopackets. Is Vista the latest and ... greatest Windows operating system ever produced? The jury is still out on that. Even I, the local Linux 'geek', look upon Vista and can see where there are seeds of potential greatness, but only the potential. It's just too soon to say for sure if will attain greatness. Why So Much Memory? On the technical side, the reasons for the expanded ... (view more)

Since Vista was released early this year, there has been no shortage of analyses judging the success of sales of the new operating system. But months have passed, and there still doesn't seem to be a consensus on how Vista is doing. Even Microsoft ... CEO Steve Ballmer seems to have changed his mind a few times. A few weeks ago, Ballmer said: "We think in the next three months we'll probably sell five times as many copies of Windows Vista as we ever did [Windows 95] in the equivalent period of time... We'll probably go double what we did with Windows XP." But last week, it sounded like he changed ... (view more)

In what appears to be a last ditch effort to sell more of it's newest operating system (OS), Microsoft has notified computer manufacturers that by the start of 2008, they will no longer be allowed to ship PCs loaded with Windows XP. "The OEM version ... of XP Professional goes next January," said Frank Luburic, senior ThinkPad product manager for Lenovo. "At that point, they'll have no choice." "Dell recognizes the needs of small business customers and understands that more time is needed to transition to a new operating system," Dell said on its Direct2Dellblog . Dell plans to continue offering ... (view more)

Recently, I reported on the boom 2006 represented for semiconductor manufacturer AMD. The chipmaker, responsible for the mega popular Athlon line, reportedly increased its revenue by a staggering 86.1% from 2005. However, the numbers don't tell the ... whole story. AMD is still struggling to establish a stable existence in the chip market, strongly evidenced by its announcement that it will fail to meet sales expectations for this quarter. (Source: theinquirer.net ) Early predictions for AMD's first quarter placed revenue at an impressive $1.55 billion. This lofty goal may have been set when it ... (view more)

Google has recently added a new feature to Google Maps. MyMaps, an added sidebar to the Google Maps main page, allows users to create their own mashups. Users can personalize a map by marking places on the map or adding text, photos and videos. ... Further, users can choose to publish a map on the web or share a map with friends. (Source: franticindustries.com ) Some have elected to create mini-stories with the new feature. A Google employee even created a virtual tour of Google Headquarters with MyMaps. If you prefer, check out a world tour of the places where programming languages were invented ... (view more)

During the summer of 2006, the fortunes of major computer chip manufacturers Intel and AMD looked anything but promising. Both posted major losses for the period, with AMD desperately branching out into the graphics card market in order to gain ... some, or any, momentum. Although it resembled a captain frantically trying to right a sinking ship, it appears AMD knew what it was doing all along. The company posted impressive -- if not incredible -- year-end profits, with the entire industry's future looking bright thanks to the Far East. By glancing at the chipmaking industry's revenue for ... (view more)

Online advertising company DoubleClick is looking for a buyer, and many analysts speculate that Microsoft is going to spend the big bucks necessary to acquire the company. In 2005, the private-equity firm Hellman ... (view more)

Windows Vista took a long time to develop. Some 10,000 plus Microsoft employees worked on the new operating system, with the project -- codenamed "Longhorn" -- eventually expanding from a mere update to XP to something as radical as the epic Windows ... 95. With all of the pent-up hype over the new product, it's meant just as much anxiety for Microsoft's competition. That's the word right now, with reports that the release of Vista -- as delayed as it seemed to be -- has also prolonged the wait for Apple's new Mac OS X "Leopard". So, why the delay of Apple's operating system (OS)? One of the ... (view more)