2005/12/30

Digit LIVE news - Wireless USB creeps nearer

Digit LIVE news - Wireless USB creeps nearer

Wireless USB, which will work at 480Mbps using short-range ultra-wide band (UWB) radio has been specified by a group led by Intel, and has its standards published online.

Wisair has produced a device which plugs a dongle into the PC and has a hub that connects wirelessly to the dongle, in future there wont be a need for dongles at all and USB devices with have the UWB technology built-into the devices themselves and PC manafactures will put the UWB technology into the PCs or motherboards.

This all assumes UWB gets regulatory approval, and though the UK (Ofcom) has put forward a spec for UWB, it differs from the US version. It also needs to go through the EU approvals process so it's an EU harmonised standard, which could take a while.

Digit LIVE news - IE gains Firefox RSS icon, loses Mac version

Digit LIVE news - IE gains Firefox RSS icon, loses Mac version

Microsoft is jumping on the open source bandwagon, well maybe not, they're just using the orange Firefox icon to show RSS feeds, though MS do point out they have exchanged technology with the Mozilla lot in the past and will no doubt in the future.

They've also announce dthe dealth-bell for IE on Mac and recommend users upgrade to newer browsers such as Safari.

Digit LIVE news - Opera Mini browser quietly released

Digit LIVE news - Opera Mini browser quietly released

Opera have released a "mini browser" for mobile phones, it's only 100K in size and runs as a Java application.

It works on any Java enabled phone and communicates with servers run by Opera which strip out and compress content making it suitable for the browser real-estate.

Though meant to be launched next year, Opera have made the browser available for download now.

Digit LIVE news - Sony, BSkyB jointly promote HDTV

Digit LIVE news - Sony, BSkyB jointly promote HDTV

Sony and BSkyB promoting HDTV, nothing really exciting there (apart from the actual service when it launches next year).

BSkyB have already announced a deal with Thomson to manufacture the set-top box, so things may actually happen.

Now NTL has acquired Telewest it will be interesting to see if Telewest's HDTV service launches or they have to wait until NTL can catch-up with their network.

Digit LIVE news - Orange to launch Wi-Fi in UK

Digit LIVE news - Orange to launch Wi-Fi in UK

Orange launched a WiFo hotspot service, catching up with the other operators who have already launched in the UK.

They are not installing their own hotspots, but have just done a roaming deal with Openzone and others including Accor Hotels (provided by Orange France). Users have to send a text to the service and they'll be sent back a username and password which is valid for 24 hours (it also triggers the billing, which is £6.50 per hour).

Orange will launch combined 3G/GPRS and WiFi tarrifs in January known as Business Everywhere. Though not many details are available, one can guess this is part of the fixed mobile convergence strategy as all of France Telecomms non fixed business moves under the Orange brand (i.e. Wanadoo).