Google, Yahoo, Microsoft - Only Problem is ..

Only Problem with Google, Yahoo, Microsoft Search Is It's Awful

Search engine experts at the Defrag conference say they believe the future of search engines and corresponding Web services will involve semantic technologies and the social graph. But will this mean the gradual fading of general search results pages as we know them from Google, Yahoo and Microsoft? What will searches look like to users if this is the case?

DENVER—The search engine market is on the precipice of some great innovation, but no one knows exactly what next-generation search engines will look like, four search experts concluded during a panel on the future of search at the Defrag conference here Nov. 5.

The conversation, which included Yahoo's Tom Chi, Siderian Software's Bradley Allen, Thomson Reuters' Tom Tague (for the OpenCalais Web service) and Isys Search Software's Derek Murphy started with the basic agreement that current search engine results from Google, Yahoo and Microsoft are flooded with too much noise.

This is noise in search: Allen said while running he heard two women talking about doing Google searches and not knowing what to do after receiving millions of results. "It's wonderful technology and when it works it's great, but there is no guidance" as to what to do if users can't find what they need within the first 10 blue links, he said.

Chi, whose company is the second-leading search engine behind Google and has drastically overhauled its process to change that, was less kind about the current state of search. "The only problem with search is that it's awful, but other than that it works pretty well," he said.

That blatant oxymoron aside, Chi said search is generally stupid. When he checks search logs, he said, he notices that people are still doing navigational searches for Ebay.com, which is "ridiculous."

But rather than take steps to make search more intelligent on behalf of users, Chi said, major players—Google, Yahoo and Microsoft—are not highly motivated to do this because if a user spells eBay wrong and does a spelling correction to get other results, search engines still profit from those mistakes thanks to online advertising clicks.

Yahoo is positioning itself to change this by attempting an ambitious broad stroke. Yahoo earlier in 2008 opened up its search platform, which it calls SearchMonkey, to let objective outside programmers build applications that augment search for users.

Source - eweek.com/c/a/Search-Engines/The-Only-Problem-With-Google-Yahoo-Microsoft-Search-is-That-Theyre-Awful/

AMD Slashes Another 500 Jobs to Save Costs

Advanced Micro Devices, which has been struggling to regain its financial standings for nearly two years, announced that it will cut another 500 jobs as its looks to "break even" by the start of 2009. The additional job cuts come after AMD already announced that it would reduce its work force by 10 percent earlier this year. In addition to these cost savings, AMD has spun off its manufacturing division into a new company has sold underperforming divisions within the company.

Advanced Micro Devices is eliminating another 500 jobs, including more than 150 positions at its Austin, Texas, facility, as the company looks to regain its financial standings after nearly two years of losses.

In a statement released Nov. 5, an AMD spokesman announced that the chip maker decided to slash an additional 500 jobs from its payroll. Earlier this year, AMD announced that it will eliminate 10 percent of its global work force to reduce costs and make the company more competitive against larger rival Intel. After the current cuts, AMD will now have about 15,000 employees worldwide.

The cost cutting comes just a month after AMD announced it will spin off its manufacturing division into a new company, which should save the company millions of dollars in costs. While this week’s job cuts are not directly related to the spin-off, it shows that AMD is doing all it can to save money while rebuilding its business around its core strengths of CPU and graphics design.

AMD is also eliminating underperforming parts of the company. In October, AMD announced that it had sold its Digital Television division to Broadcom for $141 million.

Michael Silverman, an AMD spokesman, wrote in an e-mail that these layoffs are aimed at helping AMD achieve its $1.5 billion “break-even” revenue point. As 2009 approaches, Silverman wrote that AMD is looking at other ways to save even more costs.

“Today’s announced headcount reduction is an unfortunate but necessary part of this process to help us align our people with the focused programs that achieve our objectives, eliminate duplication of efforts and allow us to operate more efficiently,” Silverman wrote.

“As we prepare for 2009, we will continue to assess AMD’s programs, activities and staffing needs, in order to ensure that we align with our global market realities, and set the company up for consistent profitability,” Silverman added.

In October, AMD reported another round of disappointing financial results. In the third quarter, the company reported a loss of $67 million, or 11 cents per diluted share. The company’s net revenue stood at $1.78 billion.

While AMD is cutting workers, Dell announced earlier this week that it will look to reduce costs by asking employees to take voluntary, unpaid vacations and the company will offer a series of buyouts for other workers. Dell is also starting a hiring freeze that could save additional costs.

Source - eweek.com/c/a/Desktops-and-Notebooks/AMD-Slashes-Another-500-Jobs-to-Save-Costs/

Intel's Atom Chip Propels Worldwide Processor Market

Intel's Atom Chip Propels Worldwide Processor Market in the Third Quarter

A new report from IDC finds that Intel’s Atom processor, a chip designed to create a whole new market of low-cost desktop and notebooks, helped propel the entire microprocessor market in the third quarter of 2008. The results meant that Intel kept its dominance in the overall market. AMD, meanwhile, watched as its market share of notebook processors shrank, but the company did gain back some momentum in the server and workstation segment thanks to its quad-core Opteron processor.

Intel’s Atom processor is starting to have a significant impact on the overall microprocessor market, as shipments of the chip for a series of low-cost notebooks and desktops helped the world’s processor market grow in the third quarter of 2008, according to a new IDC report.

Overall, shipments of microprocessors for PCs and servers grew 15.8 percent in the third quarter of 2008 compared with same time period a year ago. Revenue from chip sales increased about 4 percent for a total of $8.3 billion. Without the Intel Atom processor, shipments would have only increased about 8 percent, according to the Nov. 3 IDC report.

The IDC report did note that while shipments and revenue increased in the third quarter, the fourth quarter remains difficult to calculate since the financial crisis and credit crunch in the United States started to intensify in September. On Oct. 31, Intel issued a warning that the credit crunch could begin having an impact on its business, since its enterprise customers might have trouble financing the purchases of new PCs and server systems.

Intel has called for its fourth-quarter revenue to fall between $10.1 billion and $10.9 billion, which is below seasonal averages.

In the meantime, Advanced Micro Devices, Intel’s main rival in the x86 chip market, watched its share of mobile processors slip, but the company did manage to increase its share of the server and workstation market thanks to its quad-core Opteron processor.

“Not considering the effects of Atom, the overall market still grew at a decent pace in [the third quarter of 2008],” Shane Rau, an analyst at IDC, wrote in a statement. “Intel’s and AMD’s shipments grew at a rate only slightly slower than typical for a third quarter; seasonal demand appeared reasonable up until September. By segment, while the mobile processor segment grew aggressively, the server segment was soft.”

The influence of Intel’s Atom processor for low-cost notebooks, or “netbooks,” was on display in the last week of October, when Dell, Lenovo and Hewlett-Packard all released new laptops built around the Atom chip. By the end of 2008, shipments of low-cost notebooks are expected to top 10 million units, with some of the biggest sales coming in the United States and Western Europe.

In the overall x86 market, Intel’s share of microprocessor shipments topped 80 percent, an increase of 1.1 percent from a year ago. AMD lost 1.2 percent of its market share for a total of 18.5 percent. Via Technologies, which makes low-watt processors for netbooks, only accounted for less than 1 percent of the total market.

Intel controlled about 87 percent of the world’s mobile chip shipments, while AMD accounted for about 11.5 percent, a decrease of about 1 percent from 2007. Via accounted for about 1.2 percent of the market. On the desktop side, Intel controlled about 73.5 percent, while AMD held 26.4 percent.

The one area where AMD gained market share from Intel was within the server and workstation market. Here, AMD’s market share stood at about 14 percent, a gain of less than 1 percent from a year ago. Meanwhile, Intel lost about 1 percent of its share, and the company now accounts for about 85 percent of chip shipments to this market.

While the positive news through the first three quarters of 2008 has meant that IDC will raise its chip forecast for the year to 18 percent growth, the research firm believes that the overall economy will have a significant impact on the market in 2009. Researchers now plan to lower their forecast for next year.

Source - eweek.com/c/a/Desktops-and-Notebooks/EMBARGO-1201AM-EST-113-Intels-Atom-Chip-Propels-Worldwide-Processor-Market-in-the-Third-Quarter/

Feds Charge Ex-Intel Employee..

Feds Charge Ex-Intel Employee with Taking $1 Billion in Trade Secrets

A former Intel employee, who had just taken a job with rival Advanced Micro Devices, has been indicted by federal prosecutors and charged with taking about $1 billion in trade secrets as he left Intel for AMD. In a statement, AMD said the man no longer works for the chip maker and AMD is cooperating with the FBI and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Massachusetts.

A former Intel employee, who has left for another position with rival Advanced Micro Devices, has been charged by federal prosecutors with taking nearly $1 billion in processor trade secrets from the chip giant, according to published reports.

The five-count indictment charges that Biswamohan Pani downloaded about a dozen technical papers from Intel as he prepared to leave for another job at AMD. All together, the papers held about $1 billion worth of research and development secrets, including designs for microprocessors, according to a Nov. 6 report in the Associated Press.

The case is being handled by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Massachusetts and the FBI. Pani’s attorney denied the charges, according to the Associated Press. If convicted, Pani could face a maximum sentence of 10 years for taking the trade secrets, plus an additional 20 years for wire fraud.

The indictment was handed down the week of Nov. 3. Pani appears to have downloaded the documents during a four-day period in June,

In a statement, AMD spokesman Michael Silverman wrote that Pani is no longer working with AMD. AMD is cooperating with federal prosecutors and the FBI. The Associated Press reported that AMD did not know that Pani took the papers from Intel as he waited to join the company.

“AMD is cooperating fully in the FBI investigation into this matter,” Silverman wrote in an e-mail to eWEEK. “AMD has not been accused of wrongdoing, and the FBI has stated that there is no evidence that AMD had any involvement in or awareness of Mr. Pani’s alleged actions.”

Source - eweek.com/c/a/Desktops-and-Notebooks/Feds-Charge-ExIntel-Employee-with-Taking-1-Billion-in-Trade-Secrets/

Intel's Atom Processor in Fujitsu's U820 Notebook

Fujitsu is revamping its lineup of ultraportable mini-notebooks, and the company now plans to offer an Intel Atom processor with its new LifeBook U820 laptop. The Fujitsu LifeBook U820 notebook is a small, compact notebook thanks to a 5.6-inch display. Fujitsu is also offering the LifeBook P1630, a convertible tablet with an 8.9-inch screen, as well as the Fujitsu LifeBook N7010, which is marketed as a desktop replacement.

Finally, as part of a three-product unveiling, Fujitsu is rolling out the LifeBook N7010, with its 16-inch display and Intel Core 2 Duo P8400 processor running at 2.26GHz. And Fujitsu has built a second, smaller, touch-screen display into the N7010: This 4-inch display allows users to view photographs, control the CD/DVD drive or launch a second application while still working on the primary screen.

In addition to its desktop replacement laptop, Fujitsu is revamping its lineup of compact, ultraportable LifeBook notebooks with the LifeBook U820—which boasts the Intel Atom processor and an optional 64GB SSD (solid-state drive)—as well as unveiling a revamped convertible tablet, the LifeBook P1630.

Fujitsu is releasing all three notebooks Nov. 4.

The Fujitsu LifeBook U820 is the company’s second try at offering an extremely compact, lightweight notebook that is even smaller than the types of low-cost notebooks, or "netbooks," that have flooded the market in just the last months. In the last week of October, Dell, Hewlett-Packard and Lenovo all released netbooks based on Intel’s Atom processor.

Click here for images of the new Fujitsu notebooks.

In 2007, Fujitsu brought out the LifeBook U810, a mini-notebook that offered users a compact 5.6-inch display, weighed less than 2 bounds and used an Intel A110 processor running at 800MHz. With the LifeBook U820, Fujitsu kept the screen size at 5.6 inches and the weight at less than 2 pounds—1.32 pounds to be exact—but the company outfitted the notebook with an Intel Atom Z530 processor, which runs at 1.6GHz, which should boost the performance.

Fujitsu and other PC vendors are starting to see some benefits from these types of notebooks. Earlier this week, IDC released its report on the world’s x86 microprocessor market and found that Intel’s Atom chip helped boost processor sales despite concerns that the financial crisis has begun to cut into both consumer and enterprise spending.

While the LifeBook U820 uses the Intel Atom chip, it would be difficult to classify this mini-notebook as a typical netbook, such as the HP Mini-Note 1000, the Asus Eee PC or the Dell Mini Inspiron 9. For example, the screen size of the U820 is much smaller than typical netbooks, with displays between 7 and 10 inches.

The starting price of $1,049 also means that the U820 would have a difficult time with the “low-cost” classification of other netbooks. The LifeBook U820 has more in common with the Panasonic CF-U1, a high-end but compact notebook that uses the Atom chip but was created more for vertical markets than everyday use.

In addition to the Atom processor, Fujitsu now offers a 64GB SSD option with the LifeBook U820. And the company offers a choice of 60GB or 120GB hard disk drives. For battery life, a user can choose between a two-cell lithium ion battery that offers more than 3 hours of battery life or a four-cell battery that allows the notebook to work for approximately 7 hours. (The larger battery does add weight to the notebook.)

The U820 supports Microsoft Windows Vista and includes navigation and GPS software developed by Garmin Mobile. The laptop also offers 802.11a/b/g and draft-n wireless LAN (WLAN) technologies, with a cellular broadband option coming in 2009.

On Nov. 4, Fujitsu also upgraded its convertible tablet offering with the LifeBook P1630 notebook. This new convertible tablet offers a newer ultra-low-volt Intel Core 2 Duo SU9300 processor (1.2GHz) and an 8.9-inch display and weighs about 2.2 pounds. Fujitsu improved the battery life on this notebook: The LifeBook P1630 offers about 6 hours of battery life, compared with the 5 hours that the LifeBook P1620 offered.

Pricing for the LifeBook P6130 starts at about $2,179.

The LifeBook N7010 starts at $1,499.

Source - eweek.com/c/a/Desktops-and-Notebooks/Fujitsus-Ultraportable-LifeBook-U820-Notebook-Offers-Intels-Atom-Processor/

Pricing of Intel Nehalem Processor

Anticipating the release of the first processors based on Intel's Nehalem microarchitecture, the first comprehensive reviews of these chips were published on Tom's Hardware, ExtremeTech and other Web sites Nov. 3. The first of these Nehalem-based processors, called the Intel Core i7, will feature four processing cores. Intel will release three versions of the Intel Core i7, which will have clock speeds beginning at 2.66GHz and a starting price of $285. These Intel Core i7 processors will be released by the end of November.

Source - eweek.com/c/a/Desktops-and-Notebooks/First-Images-Pricing-of-Intel-Nehalem-Processor-Released/

Intel Nehalem Processor Prices Revealed

Intel Nehalem Processor Prices Revealed, First Core i7 Chips Due in November

In a series of reviews published today, Intel revealed the prices and clock speeds for the first line of processors that are built on the new Nehalem microarchitecture. The first of these chips, called the Intel Core i7, are slated for release later in November and these chips are designed for gaming machines and PC enthusiasts. The first Intel Core i7 processors will have speeds ranging from 2.66GHz to 3.20GHz and prices starting at about $300.

Prices and clock speeds of the first processors built on Intel’s new Nehalem microarchitecture have now been published in several online reviews as the chip giant prepares to launch the first of these new chips later in November.

In a number of reviews published Nov. 3, including pieces in Tom’s Hardware and ExtremeTech, the first of these new Intel processors, called the Intel Core i7, will have clock speeds starting at 2.66GHz and prices that begin at about $300. (The prices are calculated in quantities of 1,000 units.)

Intel has already announced that the first of these Core i7 processors are scheduled for release later this month, which allows Intel to take advantage of the holiday shopping season. The first chips based on the Intel Nehalem architecture are designed for gaming desktops and for PC enthusiasts.

In a few weeks, Intel will release three Core i7 processors with clock speeds of 2.66GHz, 2.93GHz and 3.20GHz. The prices will range from $284 on the low end to $562 for a mid-range processors and $999 on the high end. Some of the reviews noted that since the Core i7 processors are built on new architecture, PCs will require new motherboards and users will likely have to upgrade the PC’s memory to support newer DDR3 (double data rate 3) memory.

For business buyers and the enterprise, the roll out of these three Intel Core i7 processors offers a window into the other types of processors Intel will offer later this year and into 2009. At its Developer Forum in August, Intel Senior Vice President Pat Gelsinger detailed a strategy that will allow the company to gradually bring new processors into the market during the course of the next 12 months.

After the Core i7 processors, Intel will offers Nehalem-based processors for workstations and single-socket server systems. Other chips for two-socket servers and high-performance computing will follow.

It has been two years since Intel offered new microarchitecture and the company’s engineers have made a number of improvements. The first, and most obvious, is the manufacturing process. The new Nehalem-based processors are built on 45-nanometer manufacturing as opposed to the older, 65-nm process. The new processors reviewed Monday have four processing cores and share 8MB of L3 cache.

One of the most significant improvements with Nehalem is the use of an integrated memory controller. The memory controller, which is the part of the CPU that communicates with the DDR memory chips, is now integrated into the processor die itself, which eliminates the traditional FSB (front side bus). This type of integration will allow for greater levels of performance without increasing the clock speed of the processor, which should also keep the thermal envelope the same as the previous generation.

In the reviews, the three Intel Core i7 processors have thermal envelopes of 130 watts each.

Advanced Micro Devices has manufactured chips with an integrated memory controller for a number of years.

Nehalem will allow Intel to create processors that can scale from two to eight cores.

Each core supports two instructional threads that will then allow the chips to perform several tasks simultaneously. Finally, Intel will also introduce a technology called QuickPath, a high-speed chip-to-chip interconnect technology that will allow the Nehalem family of processors to connect to another component or another chip on the motherboard.

While Nehalem is one of the more significant announcements Intel has made this year, the company is already focusing on 2009. At a conference in December, Intel will begin talking about its next generation of processors build on 32-nm manufacturing.

Source - eweek.com/c/a/Desktops-and-Notebooks/Intel-Nehalem-Processor-Prices-Revealed-First-Core-i7-Chips-Due-in-November/