Silicon chips that are allowed to make mistakes could help ensure computers continue to get more powerful, say researchers.

As components shrink, chip makers struggle to get more performance out of them while meeting power needs.

Research suggests relaxing the rules governing how they work and when they work correctly could mean they use less power but get a performance boost. Special software is also needed to cope with the error-laden chips.

The silicon industry is defined by Moore’s Law, which predicts that the number of transistors that can fit on a given area of silicon, for a given price will double every 18-24 months. This is usually accomplished by shrinking transistors and typically means that processing steadily gets more powerful.

Transistors are tiny switches that are used as the fundamental building blocks of silicon chips.

However, many experts point out that the relentless march of Moore’s Law could stumble when components get so small they become unreliable.

The unreliability – or “statistical variability” – of chips is a problem that many researchers were trying to deal with, said Professor Asen Asenov from the Department of Electronics and Electrical Engineering at the University of Glasgow.

Source: BBC Tech News

BT is to expand its fibre broadband footprint in the UK – investing an additional £1bn to take coverage to around two-thirds of the nation by 2015.

Just under two years ago, the telco announced it would be investing £1.5bn to bring fibre-based broadband to 40 per cent of the country by 2012.

Reporting its latest financial results today, BT said it now plans to boost its fibre investment to a total of £2.5bn – in order to take coverage to 66 per cent of UK homes by 2015.

“Assuming an acceptable environment for investment, we see the potential to roll out fibre to around two-thirds of the UK by 2015,” said BT CEO Ian Livingston in a statement. However, the BT spokesman said, on its own BT will not push beyond 66 per cent fibre coverage. Public sector support of some form will be required to go beyond that, be it at a national level via a central government administered funding support mechanism or by regional funds and local partnerships to boost coverage in particular areas. With the last third, the spokesman said costs “escalate out of all proportion”.

“This latest fibre investment] will go to the limit of where we can commercially,” he said, adding: “We’re pleased that all the parties – including the Conservatives – recognise that public sector funding will probably be needed to reach the final third.

“Our view is very much that the last third has to be an issue for the politicians.”

The telco’s commercial fibre broadband service launched back in January and has signed up “thousands” of customers so far, according to the spokesman.

“We’ve seen good interest in it so far,” he said, adding: “It does seem to change their habits with the internet – people are now watching a lot of multiple HD streaming.”

Technically speaking the CMOS (Complimentary Metal-Oxide Semiconductor) is the physical chip on the motherboard that stores information on the hardware configuration of your computer as well as the system date and time. CMOS is powered by a battery which looks a bit like a watch battery. It is CMOS that contains a firmware program called BIOS which performs four distinct functions.

1. It tests the computers main components by running its POST (Power On Self Test) program to make sure that they are all functioning properly. If not the POST will probably produce a series of beep codes.

2. The BIOS configures main components that are part of the motherboard or that are attached to it e.g. keyboard, mouse etc. This configuration role is decreasing all the time because modern operating systems are taking over more and more of these BIOS functions.

3. It boots the operating system from the hard disk drive or from a bootable floppy disk or CD/DVD at start up.

4. It provides access to some of the computers components and features, such as the keyboard, even when the operating system is running. In this way the BIOS provides an interface that lets hardware changes take place without having to make any changes to the operating system code. Windows 2000, XP, Vista and Windows 7 only make a small number of calls to the BIOS because of their greater device management capabilities.

Should you Flash your computers BIOS?

You should only flash the BIOS for a specific purpose, such as with an older PC where you need to use a particular piece of newer hardware. The only other reason to flash a BIOS is to fix a known BIOS bug that is well documented.

Before you even begin to think about re-flashing your BIOS check your computer’s motherboard manual to find out how BIOS updates are installed. If you don’t have a copy, download one from the motherboard manufacturer’s website.

And don’t forget to go into your BIOS and write down (or take a photo if you’ have a digital camera) all of your settings. This is crucial because the “default” settings may not be the best option for your system, especially if you’ve already tweaked your BIOS and you do not remember what tweaks you’ve applied.

Before re-flashing you should also try to install new drivers for the hardware you want to use, from the manufacturer’s support website. If that fails to resolve your problems, you should carefully check all your BIOS settings. You might also try resetting the BIOS to its default settings.

If none of that resolves your problem, you may have to flash the BIOS. But you must take great care in doing this. Flashing a BIOS can go wrong and your system could be out of action until you can get a BIOS program restored or you purchase a new motherboard that has a working BIOS chip.

The steps to take if you want to Flash a BIOS

If the only option left to you is to flash the BIOS then here are the steps you must take.

The manual BIOS flashing procedure reprograms the BIOS chip on the motherboard, and is usually accomplished on a Windows 95/98/Me system by copying the downloaded flash utility and the new BIOS file to a floppy disk containing three DOS system files that make it bootable. Most motherboard manufactures suggest that this procedure is also used for Windows 2000, XP and Vista (as long as you have a floppy drive attached to your PC).

There are three DOS files that make a floppy bootable; command.com, io.sys and msdos.sys. These can be transferred to a floppy disk by typing the command sys a: at a C:\> prompt in DOS. Within Windows you can also double click My Computer, put a floppy disc in the drive and then right click the 3 1/2 Floppy (A:) and select Format. Select Create an MS-DOS start up disc and click Start. When the floppy disc is ready just delete the extra files leaving just command.com, io.sys and msdos.sys on the disc. Now test the new start up disc to make sure it works.

You can then use your zip/unzip program to extract the new BIOS file and the utility that does the re-flashing to it, so that the boot floppy disk now has only five files on it.

Be sure to write down the name of the BIOS file to be installed and carefully follow any instructions about the BIOS file you downloaded.

Reboot your PC, leaving the floppy disc in the A: drive.

Type in the name of the flash program and then ENTER.

Follow the instructions to the letter! Abort the flash procedure if you are in any in doubt. It may also be wise to write down each step as the program runs through it’s menu.

Make sure when you get to the “save” old BIOS that you do save it. Make up an “old” BIOS name that you can remember and write it down, you may need it later.

When it’s time to type in the name of the BIOS file to be burnt into the chip, type it in and then compare this to the written down name – make sure that there are no typing errors. Hit Enter. Be sure not to touch any keys, don’t reboot, don’t turn off the power – wait for the update to complete.

When the message pops up that the BIOS flashing is done you will probably get a message saying that you can turn the PC’s power off or reboot the PC. Its best just to wait for a few minutes more to make sure the program isn’t still writing to the BIOS chip. If all has gone well the updated BIOS has now been successfully installed.

If an error message occurs. Read it carefully. Something has obviously gone wrong and you’ll need to see if there’s a way to re-flash at this point. Do not exit the flash program.

If the flash program is still running then this is the only time that you can re-flash without the BIOS chip working. Try reloading the old BIOS file that you saved. If you can’t get the program to respond and there is no other way to reload the old BIOS. Turn off power and hope for a POST message when you power up your PC.

If all has gone well you should be facing a POST message when the PC starts up. Follow the POST instructions to enter CMOS and reset the BIOS settings to “default” – if that’s the best setting for your PC. Alternatively, check all of the values and make sure that they are correct. You may also want to have BIOS auto detect your IDE hard drive(s), to be safe.

Note re SATA Drives – Even if they are installed correctly, SATA drives may not appear at all in the BIOS depending on the manufacturer of the motherboard and the way that SATA support is implemented. This doesn’t mean that they won’t work, just that you can’t confirm their existence without using Windows.

Carry on booting into Windows and check that everything is working, particularly your file and drive access.

If your computer does not have a floppy drive you could purchase a floppy drive that plugs into your USB port and then proceed with the above steps.

Two months after Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 launched to a huge media fanfare, its publisher Activision announced that it had taken more than $1bn in sales.

The sales put the video game in an elite club alongside other entertainment franchises such as James Cameron’s Avatar and Michael Jackson’s Thriller. In fact it beat both to become the most successful entertainment launch of all time, in terms of its first 24 hours on sale.

Its success should have allowed its creators, Infinity Ward (owned by Activision) to reap the rewards and become the leading lights of the world’s video games industry. Until recently Infinity Ward was lead by Jason West and Vince Zampella. Then in March they were suddenly dismissed by Activision for unspecified “breaches of contract and insubordination”. Almost immediately after being sacked the pair launched a $36 million lawsuit against their former employer.

There had been rumours of a rift between Infinity Ward and Activision but the sacking still astonished the games industry.

Microsoft said it plans to end support for more than 4,000 old-style newsgroups starting next month, pushing users instead to discussion forums such as those found on the Microsoft Answers, TechNet, and MSDN sites.

Although venerable, Microsoft said that so-called NNTP newsgroups are past their time in terms of being usable and secure.

“Newsgroups run on an outdated and discontinued platform that is no longer supported, making them vulnerable to spam and other usability issues,” Microsoft said in a statement. The company said that its forums get 15 million visits a month and have been growing, on average, 12 percent each month. By contrast, it said that participation in newsgroups has dropped nearly in half over the past year.

Still, at last count the company had 2,000 public newsgroups and another 2,200 private groups focused on specific communities such as partners or its MVP (Most Valued Professional) program.

Source: ZDNet

Microsoft’s Internet Explorer (IE) web browser, now accounts for less than 60% of the market, down from 95% at its peak in 2003, according to new figures.

Latest statistics, from measurement firm NetApplications, show that IE has 59.9% of the market, with Firefox gaining on it, with 24.5%.

While third-place Google Chrome’s 6.7% share of the market looks tiny by comparison it is rising sharply, up from just 1.7% this time last year.

Microsoft has gradually been losing market share, largely due to concerns over security, experts said. However, a new version of IE is now imminent and will support HTML 5.

Apple remains a key rival for Microsoft in the browser market and it has seen its Safari browser gain market share but the two rivals are united when it comes to supporting the HTML5 web standards.

Apple sees HTML5 – along with other technologies such as the h.264 standard for video – as a replacement for Flash and has been involved in a high-profile spat with Flash owners Adobe. Apple has even banned the video standard Flash on many of its products.

Source: BBC Tech News