Tag: vanity-fair

Apple updates iPad with Lightning, A6X, “global” LTE support

At a special media event on Tuesday, Apple announced that it would begin shipping a new fourth-generation iPad on November 2. The updated device features Apple’s new Lightning connector introduced on the iPhone 5 and fifth-generation iPod touch. In addition, it will also include a custom-designed A6X processer and a newer Qualcomm 4G LTE baseband chip that is compatible with more LTE networks around the globe. The revision comes just six months before Apple typically launches new iPad hardware around late March or early April. However, Apple CEO Tim Cook said Apple was “putting its foot on the gas” and revising the iPad even faster than before. Jacqui Cheng The new A6X processor is built around the custom ARM core Apple designed for the iPhone 5, which offers twice the processing performance of the A5X. However, it has apparently included some changes to the graphics cores used, as Apple claims it also has double the graphics performance as well. Read 4 remaining paragraphs | Comments

Link:
Apple updates iPad with Lightning, A6X, “global” LTE support

US federal agency dropping 17,000 BlackBerrys in favor of iPhones

It’s no secret that Research In Motion, the maker of the fabled BlackBerry, is on the decline . If falling subscriber numbers last month weren’t bad enough, last week, the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE) said that it will end its contract with RIM , replacing over 17,000 employees devices with iPhones in a deal worth $2.1 million. “The RIM technology, however, can no longer meet the mobile technology needs of the agency,” the agency wrote in a 10-page document , adding that “no other company’s products can meet the agency’s needs.” Read 3 remaining paragraphs | Comments

More:
US federal agency dropping 17,000 BlackBerrys in favor of iPhones

Dept. of Veterans Affairs spent millions on PC software it couldn’t use

Rolling out new software to a few thousand users is an involved process for any organization. But installing software that affects hundreds of thousands of PCs as part of a response to a data breach while under embarrassing scrutiny is a task that would challenge even the most well-managed IT departments. And, apparently, the Office of Information Technology (OIT) at the Department of Veterans Affairs’ answer to that challenge was to sweep it under the rug. After removable hard disks containing unencrypted personal identifying information of  26 million military veterans  were stolen from the home of a VA employee in 2006, then-Secretary of Veterans Affairs   R. James Nicholson mandated that the VA’s Office of Information Technology install encryption software on all of the department’s notebook and desktop computers. But while the VA purchased 400,000 licensees for Symantec’s Guardian Edge encryption software, more than 84 percent of those licenses—worth about $5.1 million, including the maintenance contracts for them—remain uninstalled, a  VA Inspector General’s audit  has found. The VA’s OIT purchased 300,000 licenses and maintenance agreements for Guardian Edge in 2006 and continued to pay for maintenance on those licenses for the next five years. And in 2011, the VA purchased 100,000 more software licenses from Symantec and extended maintenance on all 400,000 licenses for two years. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

Excerpt from:
Dept. of Veterans Affairs spent millions on PC software it couldn’t use

Analyst calls AMD “un-investable,” downgrades rating

Another day, and AMD inches even closer to irrelevance . Just one day after the company posted pretty terrible quarterly earnings (“Net loss $157 million, loss per share $0.21, operating loss $131 million”), followed by a 16 percent drop in the company’s stock price and job cuts of 1,800 (15 percent of its global workforce), two financial analysts have now downgraded the company. It certainly doesn’t help things that the company’s CFO resigned abruptly last month, either. In a financial analysis report released Friday, Bernstein Research‘s Stacy Rasgon wrote: Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

More:
Analyst calls AMD “un-investable,” downgrades rating