Secondly, he said, major changes to the way Vista handles audio and video caused headaches, particularly for those upgrading from XP. Finally, he said, many Windows XP drivers didn’t really work under Vista. “This is across the board for printers, scanners, wan, accessories (fingerprint readers, smartcards, tv tuners), and so on,” Sinofsky wrote. “This category is due to the fact that many of the associated applets don’t run within the constraints of the security model or the new video/audio driver models.”

These e-mails are particularly salient to this court case, in which Microsoft faces a class action suit over the fact that machines labeled as Windows Vista Capable were nonetheless not capable of running many of the operating system’s features.

As happens every year or so, some juicy Microsoft e-mails have surfaced as part of litigation that the software maker is party to.

“I think we have a lot of new PCs, which helps and the hobbyist people who bought (packaged copies of Windows) just know what to do and aren’t calling, but I know they are struggling,” he said.

In one e-mail, Steven Sinofsky writes to Steve Ballmer that three factors were to blame for early Vista challenges.

In this case, Microsoft is being sued over a program in 2006 that labeled some PCs as Windows Vista Capable ahead of the operating system’s mainstream release in January 2007. As part of the discovery process, a number of e-mails have emerged with Microsoft executives discussing various problems with Vista as it came to market.

One of the key issues raised in the e-mail exchange was the fact that by loosening the rules for one of Intel’s chip sets, Microsoft was creating a class of machines that were allowed to be marketed as
Windows Vista Capable, even though those same machines would not be eligible to even get Vista Basic logo certification once the software was released. I raised this issue in an article back in the spring of 2006.

The e-mail exchanges also include a note from Mike Ybarra to Jim Allchin saying that “We are caving to Intel.” In the same e-mail, he notes that Microsoft was “really burning HP” which had agreed to build its machines with graphics chips that had a Vista-specific driver that could take advantage of the operating system’s high-end interface features, unlike the aforementioned Intel 915 chipset.

First off, he said, “No one really believed we would ever ship so they didn’t start the work until very late in 2006.” He added that his Brother home printer didn’t have drivers until after Vista’s commercial launch.

Sinofsky notes this issue in his e-mail, as do several other executives. “The ‘915′ chipset which is not Aero capable is in a huge number of laptops and was tagged as ‘Vista Capable’ but not Vista Premium (ready),” he wrote. “I don’t know if this was a good call.”

Sinofsky noted that Microsoft executive Orlando Ayala had stuck with XP because there was no Vista driver for his Verizon mobile wireless card. “The Vista Ready logo program required drivers available on (January 30). I think we had had reasonable coverage, but quality was uneven as I experienced,” he wrote.

Companies are now in survival mode, according to Cohen. “It is a matter of survival and everyone needs to figure out how to stay in business over the next year or how to scavenge something if one (company) decides it cannot survive,” said Cohen.

(Credit:
Micron Technology)

This consolidation is not only affecting manufacturers but players in the retail channel too. SanDisk–which does not manufacture flash chips but sources them from a Japan-based joint venture with Toshiba–has seen its stock price plunge more than $60 per share over the last two years. This has made it vulnerable. SanDisk’s chairman and CEO, Eli Harari, said last month that the $26-a-share bid from Samsung was “opportunistically timed at the trough of an industry-wide downturn.”

Pricing has fallen off a cliff in the last few months, making a bad situation worse. Micron said Wednesday that the average selling prices of DRAM chips–the main memory used in PCs–was down between 15 percent and 20 percent from last quarter. NAND flash prices were down between 30 percent and 35 percent. (NAND flash is used as storage in portable music players, digital cameras, and the nascent solid-state drive market.)

The PC market has also turned bleak. “The PC business was plugging along pretty well and then all of sudden in the last months the demand profile has just really dropped off,” according to Foster.

“Memory manufacturers who have already been losing money for several quarters are now looking at another six months to a year of absolutely ominous conditions,” said Avi Cohen, managing partner at Avian Securities.

“Overall, the NAND market continues to be in an oversupply condition,” said Micron’s Foster.

The price decline for solid-state drives over the last quarter makes these drives “more attractive from an end user’s perspective,” Micron said Wednesday, adding that “NAND far exceeds DRAM growth demand rates.”

This is affecting investment. “The capital expenditure for the NAND market in 2008 is going to be down sequentially (year-to-year), which is the first time that’s happened since the inception of the market,” said Steven Appleton, chairman and CEO of Micron on Wednesday.

“The DRAM business–it just doesn’t feel like that, for many companies, it’s sustainable,” said Ron Foster, chief financial officer at Micron, speaking during the company’s earnings conference call on Wednesday.

All these negatives add up to a cruel market that is forcing some companies to either merge or perish. “This is leading to a new wave of forced consolidations and partnerships. This industry will look very different a year from now with very few players controlling much larger market shares and with a much better ability to control production and pricing,” said Cohen.

The average selling price for NAND and DRAM has dropped sharply since May.

The other ailing memory maker is Qimonda AG–an Infineon Technologies subsidiary. Rumors have been rife
that the manufacturing assets of the loss-ridden company will be snapped up.

The memory chip market–and industry–is caught in a particularly brutal downward price spiral that is threatening the viability of even the largest players.

Memory chipmakers are fighting for their life.

Ultraportable laptops, such as the ThinkPad X301 and Dell Latitude E4200, are also beginning to use SSDs as a storage replacement for hard disk drives.

Currently, two major memory chip manufacturers are seeking investment lifelines. Hynix, the world’s second largest maker of memory, is trying to scare up cash by seeking buyers for a 36 percent stake in the company. So far, the only likely bidder to emerge is Samsung–which has also made a play for struggling SanDisk, the largest supplier of retail flash memory cards.

Not everything is doom and gloom. The market for solid-state drives–which use NAND flash–is poised to grow. Appleton cited the burgeoning netbook market as an opportunity for SSDs. The enterprise is a target market too: SSDs based on single-level cell (SLC) technology can offer many times the performance of hard disk drives for customers such as credit card companies and airlines.

All of this turmoil was underscored this week when Micron Technology, the largest U.S. maker of memory, announced that it had lost $1.6 billion in fiscal 2008.

I’m going to Latin America for the month of March, and I don’t know what to do with my photos. Does anyone out there have any advice they’d like to share?

Wolverine Data's $370 ESP 5000 has a 120GB drive and can show raw image files.

Flash cards have a lot to recommend them, though: are pretty durable, reliable, lightweight, and don’t require batteries.

For the gearheads out there, here are my constraints.

One advantage of these devices is that I could also use them to play video and music files and collect photos from others’ digital cameras while I’m traveling.

I’ve been trying Wolverine Data’s ESP 5000, a 40GB model with a screen. I like its ability to review raw images as well as JPEGs, and its battery power seems sufficient for my needs. And I like these for giving impromptu slideshows.

And how reliable are hard drives anyway? My photos are precious, but I can say right now I’m not going to carry a second drive for backup.

Anybody have any experience with the Epson P-5000 or similar products? They’re even more expensive–an 80GB version costs nearly $700!

• Option 4 is whatever options readers are about to tell me about. I welcome your thoughts in the TalkBack section below or by e-mail to stephen.shankland@cnet.com.

First of all, I’m trying to travel reasonably light–I’ll only be backpacking a little, but I will be schlepping luggage a lot, and I don’t want to lug a laptop. Second, I probably won’t have to go more than two or three days without a wall socket for charging.

But I found the user interface clunky, and its raw image quality isn’t always enough to check focus quality, even with the latest firmware. A 100GB model costs $370.

(Credit:
Wolverine Data)

• Option 1 is a portable hard drive with a flash card reader and display.

• Option 3 is a bunch of CompactFlash cards. I have 16GB so far, but getting up to 100GB would cost something like $400 more even if I didn’t pay for premium brands like SanDisk or Lexar. Watching the ever-dropping prices on flash memory cards would be depressing, though.

I’m guessing I’ll need about 100GB of capacity. I’ll be shooting raw images with an SLR (single-lens reflex), and there should be some mighty scenic spots. On two weeks in Ireland last year, I shot about 30GB of files, winnowing lightly as I went. So here are my options as I see it.

It’s a good idea and whoever came up with it got a patent. I know that because the number, “U.S. Patent No. 5,205,473″ is printed in neat, black text right on the sleeve. (There’s actually a second patent number as well.) The reason the sleeve on my coffee cup, and most other patented products, have patent numbers printed on them is something patent lawyers call “constructive notice.”

That’s why you see patent numbers listed all over the place. But is it fair? Reasonable minds could differ as to whether listing a slew of patents on a complex piece of technology (or even a couple of patents on a brown cardboard ring) really gives people notice of anything.

But many times, the patents behind products marked with patent numbers are not as easily understandable. For example, the notice on Adobe Reader v. 8.1.2 lists over 60 different patents. I’m pretty sure that most of those patents are far more complex than the ‘473 patent. But, assuming the numbers are properly listed, the law says that I and the rest of the public are on notice of whatever it is those patents cover.

Under the law, the public is deemed to have constructive notice that something is patented if that something has a patent number on it. The idea behind the law apparently is that if one sees a patent number, one has the ability to look that patent up, read it, and maybe even understand what it says. For the corrugated sleeve, it was simple enough for me–albeit a little geeky–to take a look at the ‘473 patent and understand how the sleeve works to make the heat from my latte more bearable.

(Credit: U.S. Patent No. 5,205,473)

I actually have one of these sitting on my desk right now. It’s the corrugated, brown cardboard sleeve wrapped around my venti, no fat, no water chai latte. It insulates my hand from the hot liquid inside and allows me to walk from the barista to my
car without a wince or painful grimace.

So the question I ask, because admittedly I’m thankful for the protection offered by the corrugated-cardboard innovation of the ‘473 patent, is whether constructive notice is fair to the public and, if so, why is a patent owner who didn’t mark worse off than one who doesn’t have a commercial product to mark in the first place?

What’s also debatable is why the law allows patent owners who don’t have a commercial product–and therefore are not able to mark (after all it’s hard to stick a patent number on a product you don’t have)–to recover past damages without having provided actual notice of their patent. Obviously, the seeing-a-patent-number-and-looking-it-up theory for constructive notice can’t apply in that situation.

That means that if I got sued, I could be liable for things I did years before the lawsuit because I had notice. On the other hand, if there was no patent number listed on my coffee sleeve, the law may limit the patent owner’s right to recover damages for stuff that occurred prior to the lawsuit. Simply put, constructive notice is a big deal.

The title of U.S. Patent No. 5,205,473 (the ‘473 patent in patent speak) is “Recyclable corrugated beverage container and holder.” If you’ve ever been to Starbucks, the drawing on the first page of the ‘473 patent probably looks familiar.

The company blog offers some tips and a dose of reality:

Thirty-seven percent of respondents said that the recruitment issue is “very serious,” and 59 percent said it was “moderately serious.”

Remember that most cleantech companies, at least those on CleanLoop, are backed by investors who want a return on their money. If they couldn’t make money saving the planet, then they wouldn’t invest.

In a survey earlier this year, research firm New Energy Finance and recruiting firm Heidrick & Struggles queried 75 executives in clean-energy companies around the world and found that the lack of technical and managerial talent in the field is a problem.

A lack of skills is one of the biggest hurdles for the clean-tech industry.

On Tuesday, CleanLoop was launched as a job search site dedicated to the clean-tech industry.

It’s a common story: people are interested in the clean energy business but don’t have a clue how to get in.

It appears to be oriented toward people who have worked in the technology business and are looking to make a change, as many IT professionals already have.

Gefen Wireless HDMI Extender: The Gefen Wireless HDMI Extender debuted at the NAB show in April 2007, and Gefen even began accepting preorders later that summer. The product reappeared in late 2007/early 2008 with a different look, but it remains only available for preorder on Gefen’s Web site. Gefen’s press representative says, “The unit is still moving forward, but FCC and other testings still need to be completed.”

Philips Wireless HDMI Kit: At the Consumer Electronics Show in January 2007, Philips showed off a wireless HDMI kit that offered the promise of wirelessly connecting any HDMI source and any HDMI TV. It was due to be released in mid-2007, but the year ended with the product never materializing. In November, Philips claimed that the product had been delayed until 2008. However, our attempt to get a clarification from the company’s PR agency last week went unanswered, so we’re going to move this one into the vaporware column until we hear differently.
» Crave: Philips introduces new wireless HDMI kit
» CNET TV video: Philips Wireless HDMI at CES 2007

Belkin FlyWire: A wireless HDMI product that’s due later in 2008.

Belkin FlyWire: Despite the go-nowhere state of wireless HDMI in 2007, Belkin threw its hat into the ring at CES 2008 with the FlyWire. The unit one-upped the Philips one-in/one-out concept by including capacity for six AV sources, including HDMI, component, S-video, and composite ports. Originally slated for summer, Belkin says the FlyWire is now due in October and should retail for $500.
» CES blog:Belkin FlyWire wirelessly transmits six AV sources to your HDTV
» CNET TV video: Belkin FlyWire

But one aspect of the HDMI promise remains unfulfilled: wireless HDMI. It’s an attractive idea, especially for anybody with a wall-mounted flat-panel TV or a ceiling-mounted projector: have all of your HDMI-capable gear running into an AV receiver or HDMI switcher with a wireless HDMI transmitter, and have the TV equipped with a matching receiver–thus allowing you to have all your AV sources across the room from the actual display. We’ve been hearing about it for years, but to date, there are few–if any–products that you can actually buy. Here’s a quick update on the wireless HDMI products we’ve heard about to date–including when (or whether) we can expect to see them:

HDMI has certainly had its growing pains, but the connection is finally beginning to deliver on its original promise: a single-cable solution for delivering high-bandwidth, all-digital HD video and multichannel audio. HDMI is nearly universal in the home video market, present on all current HDTVs and Blu-ray players, as well as nearly all HD-capable cable and satellite set-top boxes; DVRs; game consoles; AV receivers; upscaling DVD players and recorders; and network video streamers such as the Apple TV. In fact, you realize just how convenient HDMI is when you come across a product without it–I’m looking at you,
Nintendo Wii–and then have five cables (three component video wires plus two-channel stereo) instead of one crowding the back of your home entertainment system.

(Credit:
Belkin)

While that list isn’t a comprehensive selection of wireless HDMI products, it’s enough of a cross-section to show that the technology hasn’t hit the consumer mainstream yet. Likewise, that complaint about laggy video could be a major hurdle for gamers if it extends to wireless HDMI products across the board, since even a fraction of a second is quite noticeable when doing any interactive activities. But with many of these products using similar chipsets and integrated solutions from vendors such as Amimon, don’t be surprised to see the trickle of wireless HDMI products become a flood just as soon as the baseline components and technology are ready for prime time.

Others? Is open source chipping away at the bloated price structures of traditional software vendors? (Yes, Savio, I use the word “chipping” judiciously.

An isolated incidence? Possibly. But where’s there’s smoke, there’s fire. I imagine that this isn’t the only Fortune 500 company that is looking to shave the money it pays to Oracle every year. Anyone else seen this sort of thing? I’ve definitely seen analogous situations in the ECM world, and I know from my friends at SugarCRM that they have, too.

I work for a major Fortune company, and we’re in the process of putting Oracle on a “sunset” list of restricted vendors. No new applications are allowed on Oracle, the only approved vendors are Sun/MySQL and Microsoft/SQL Server.

Arjen Lentz spotted an interesting comment on Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz’s blog, which suggests that Oracle may have cause for concern in its competition with MySQL:

Map creations can be embedded, which I’ve done after the break. You can also share them via e-mail or with a simple URL.

Draw on your maps with doodles and more using Quikmaps.

(Credit:
CNET Networks)

When Google launched its MyMaps feature last year I was pretty excited about the potential for creating things with it. Growing up in a house that required giving very complex directions because Mapquest would deliver people to the other end of our neighborhood I looked forward to making simple, personalized maps that could be shared easily. While the big G has done a great job adding a directory of special layers, the tools for creating your own maps have not seen that same advancement.

To answer that call Quikmaps, a third party tool that plugs into the same Google Maps data, is a far simpler solution letting you simply doodle on the map. In some cases this can be far more useful than Google’s straight line tool like when you’re creating turns and arcs (not all streets are straight). The best part is that the results will scale when you zoom in and out. Still included is a straight line tool, but between the two Google actually has a stronger effort since it shows the distance between each segment.

Get a DVR, and maybe you won't need couples counseling anymore.

The survey (PDF) was conducted in July 2008 in the U.S., U.K., Italy, and Australia, with more than 1,000 DVR owners participating. Overall, the device ranked as the third most indispensable household item (62 percent), just after the washing machine (97 percent) and the microwave oven (86 percent). In the U.S., however, a higher number of people (81 percent) cited their DVR as their most crucial gadget. It trailed only the cell phone (91 percent).

The survey also reveals that owning a DVR can lead to a happier, less stressful life. Eighty-one percent of respondents said their DVR has made life better by allowing for more time to do things together with loved ones and fewer arguments over what to watch. In fact, having a DVR around seems to improve relationships, 79 percent of respondents claimed.

DVRs (also called PVRs–personal video recorders) let you record TV in digital format to watch at your convenience. You then can fast-forward, rewind, skip commercials, and even pause live TV, something that was impossible before the birth of the DVR. DVRs include TiVo, other proprietary DVRs, or in my case, a computer running Windows Media Center.

(Credit:
NDS)

I’m not surprised by how much people love their DVRs, as personally, without my Media Center, I might not watch any TV at all. However, these results do bring up a question about how a TV show’s popularity should be rated now that a lot of people don’t watch TV the way they did prior to the age of DVR.

The survey also offers other interesting tidbits. Italian DVR owners care more about their hair than their DVRs, for example, and on average, Americans watch TV 4.5 hours a day, one hour more than people in the U.K.

Maybe this explains why my colleague Eric Franklin’s favorite show Battlestar Galactica’s Nielsen ratings have dropped as DVRs get more and more popular.