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News

• VMware says: Windows still matters, sort of

  Is the operating system dead? If any tech vendors were going to make that argument, you would expect VMware to be at the top of the list -- especially now that Google is building its own operating system.

• Oracle gearing up for more purchases

  Ever-acquisitive Oracle apparently has no immediate plans to stop buying up companies, as indicated by a US$3.25 billion debt issue it made this week.

• Energy Efficient Ethernet being put to the test

  The University of New Hampshire InterOperability Lab (UNH-IOL)  has begun testing Energy Efficient Ethernet (EEE) products to make sure they work together.

• Microsoft extends Windows XP downgrade rights until 2020

  Just a day before Microsoft drops support for Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2), the company announced on Monday that people running some versions of Windows 7 can "downgrade" to the aged operating system for up to 10 years.

• Intel Lab to Focus on Human Side of IT

  Intel Corp.is creating a new research lab dedicated to figuring out how people want to use computers in the future.

• Ballmer: Microsoft 'months' from tablet launch

  Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has announced a bevy of tablets and "smart device" are on their way from the company in the next "several months."

• Making sense of client virtualisation

  Not long ago server virtualisation was IT's New World, inhabited by a relatively few courageous souls who dared to break the framework of one server per application and one application to server. The others stood faithfully by rooms filled to capacity with servers, cabling, cooling equipment and hotspots.

• Laptop PSU standard in the works

  The days of having to use a different power supply unit (PSU) for every laptop could be drawing to a close with reports that the IEEE industry body is looking at the possibility of a universal standard.

• Java supplants IT security as most sought-after tech skill set, survey finds

  Java development has supplanted IT security as the most difficult skill set for hiring managers to locate.

• Pew Research: Wealthy use laptops, poor have mobile phones

  While the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project stated that wireless usage is up in almost all categories, some groups are trending differently than others.

• VMware: no 'timeline' for release of delay-ridden client hypervisor

  VMware is accustomed to dominating the world of server virtualization, but its attempts to become the de facto virtualization vendor on the desktop haven't gone quite as well.

• World's biggest laptop maker breaks shipment record in June

  Quanta Computer, the world's largest contract laptop computer maker, set record highs for shipments and revenue in the month of June, a sign demand for technology products hasn't stumbled despite fears of debt problems in some parts of Europe.

• OLPC to add multitouch screen to future XO-1.75 laptop

  Nonprofit organization One Laptop Per Child on Thursday said it is adding a multitouch screen to the upcoming XO-1.75 laptop and is modifying software to take advantage of the new hardware.

• Five Trends Shaping Data Center Designs

  In the past, companies built data centers like parents buy clothes for their children: Buy big and wait for the kids to grow into them.

• iPad Invades corporate America

  Despite all claims by PC purists that the iPad is a toy that has no real purpose--especially in the corporate world, there are large enterprises embracing the tablet device.