Chip process evolution is a usual thing in a console’s lifecycle, but rarely has it been as important as in the case of the Xbox 360.

Known for its relatively hardware fragility, the original design of the Xbox 360 would frequently fall to the “Red Ring of Death” failure, which Microsoft terms as the three flashing red lights. While improvements in cooling and a CPU die shrink to 65nm in the Falcon revision have surely improved the situation, the problematic GPU still sits with its 90nm process.

The 65nm drop for the GPU in the Xbox 360 revision codenamed Jasper isn’t expected until August, a time frame backed up by a report from CENS. Microsoft has contracted Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC), Advanced Semiconductor Engineering Inc. (ASE) and Nanya PCB Corp. to build the chips that will ship with the Jasper consoles later this summer.

TSMC will produce the 65nm chips, ASE will package and test them, and Nanya will supply the flip-chip packaging substrates. Microsoft has supposedly booked a production capacity at TSMC estimated to be at around 10,000 300mm wafers.

Inventory of the existing Falcon chips are reportedly depleted, paving the way for the transition to Jasper. The next step for the Xbox 360 console is dubbed “Valhalla,” which will integrate both the GPU and CPU in a single package as a cost-cutting measure, isn’t expected until a year after Jasper.

Microsoft plans to fix critical bugs in its Word, Publisher and Jet database software next week.

The software vendor also plans to release a less-critical update for its antivirus products, fixing a flaw that attackers could use to launch a denial of service (DoS) attack against products such as Windows Live OneCare and Microsoft Forefront Security.

The updates will be released Tuesday, the day set aside for Microsoft's monthly set of security patches. Microsoft provided some early details on the patches Thursday, in a note on its Web site.

Microsoft considers flaws to be critical when they could be exploited by attackers in order to run unauthorized software on a victim's system.

Although Microsoft's note does not describe the bugs in detail, it looks like the company is planning to fix a known bug in the Jet database engine, which was disclosed in late March. Attackers had figured out a new way to launch a malicious Jet file using Microsoft Word, Microsoft warned in a blog posting.

Jet files, which have a .mdb extension, are typically blocked by Outlook, but "attackers have figured out a way to work around the mitigations built into Outlook," Microsoft said in its post.

The Jet flaw affects Windows XP, 2000 and Server 2003 Service Pack 1.

The Word flaw is rated critical for both Windows and Mac users.

Although rated only "moderate," the DoS bug in Microsoft's security products is also a cause for concern. It affects many Microsoft security products including OneCare, Antigen, Windows Defender, Standalone System Sweeper and several Forefront Security products.

Creative has told buyers of its ALchemy for Audigy sound software that they'll get their money back following its decision to release the next version of the app free of charge.

In an email sent out to customers yesterday, Creative said the new version of the software will be released on or shortly after 19 May. Unlike previous releases, it won't cost anything. Older versions of the application came with a $10 price tag.

And this made a lot of SoundBlaster Audigy users rather angry. The changes Microsoft made to the way audio is handled by Windows in the Vista era prevented Audigy users from getting the 3D audio and other sound effects generated by their sound cards.

Under Windows XP, MS' DirectSound and DirectSound 3D API were able to mediate communcations between game and audio hardware. That feature was essentially removed from the Vista-oriented DirectX 10, forcing DirectSound calls to be processed solely by the CPU.

No mere driver update would fix this, so Creative offered ALchemy to convert DirectSound calls into their equivalents in OpenAL, an open sound library. But because ALchemy was an application, not a driver, Creative decided customers should pay extra for it.

That annoyed rather a lot of buyers who'd enjoyed using Audigy under XP but suddenly found it didn't work fully under Vista. We agree with them. Vendors shouldn't penalise their customers because of something someone else altogether does.

Get your tinfoil hats out and get ready to start slinging those conspiracy theories. Vivendi and Activision -- or should we say the entity soon to be known as Activision Blizzard -- have apparently left the Entertainment Software Association.

The story began earlier today (May 5th) when the sharp eyed guys at GamePolitics noticed that the current list of ESA members posted at the ESA's website no longer lists either Activision or Vivendi among its members.

The glaring omission of such important entities from gaming's "who's who" is puzzling, doubly significant when you consider how their absence (and the absence of their membership dues) will affect the ESA's day to day operations. As gamers know, besides funding industry advocacy efforts and serving as the public face for the games business to politicians and the media, the ESA is also responsible for overseeing and organizing events such as E3, the DICE summit and bodies like the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences, as well as political action groups such as the Video Game Voters Network.

An update from Rich Taylor, Senior Vice President of Communications and Research at the ESA confirmed the loss of Vivendi and Activision from the organization's ranks: "While the Entertainment Software Association remains the preeminent voice for U.S. computer and video game publishers, we can confirm that Activision and Vivendi Games opted to discontinue their membership."

Although Taylor's statement doesn't shed any more light on the question of why exactly the two publishers might be leaving the ESA it does explain the mystery of why neither organization bothered to sign up for this year's E3. Obviously some kind of bad blood going around in the world of big publishing -- but what on earth could cause two of the biggest movers and shakers in the games world to just walk away from the guys that are supposed to be sticking up for them?

AT&T's iPhone website (under 'Plans' tab) has been updated to reveal that each iPhone plan now includes access to their "more than 17,000 Wi-Fi hotspots, including Starbucks all for use in the U.S."

It was first revealed last week that AT&T had quietly begun offering iPhone users access to their Wi-Fi hotspots for free (including Starbucks and Barnes & Noble). No official announcement had been made, however, and the service was abruptly turned off a few days later. AT&T has remained quiet about this new offering, but it's clear they will be officially delivering this service shortly.

Yahoo is introducing new technology to its search engine which will warn users if they are about to click on a website that hosts viruses, spyware and spam.

SearchScan uses security firm McAfee's SiteAdvisor technology to warn users about "potentially risky sites".

The service, which is switched on by default, produces an on-screen alert.

"Our goal is to protect users by allowing them to make a more informed decision about the sites they visit," said Yahoo's Priyank Garg.

Rival firm Google introduced similar technology in 2006.

Yahoo's service will warn users about three types of risk:

* Browser exploits: Sites that can harm a user's computer or install malware simply by visiting the site. Any such sites or pages included in McAfee's data will be removed from search results automatically.

* Dangerous downloads: SearchScan will display warnings next to search results for sites that offer potentially dangerous software, such as viruses, spyware or adware.

* Unsolicited e-mail: SearchScan will alert users to scanned sites that send unsolicited e-mails or inappropriately share e-mail addresses with third parties.

Viruses, spyware and adware programs are often "hidden" inside innocuous-looking programs such as screensavers and toolbars.

Industry analysts IDC estimate that 67% of all computers have some form of spyware installed without a user's knowledge.

Not long ago ASUS demonstrated a concept card called Trinity which had three RV670 GPUS mounted through two daughter boards. Today ASUS is taking this concept a step further with the introduction of the ASUS Splendid MA3850M modulized card that is assumed to be more than a museum piece.

The Splendid MA3850M has a modular structure with single ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3850 GPU loaded on a ASUS Splendid HD PCI-Express daughter card that is 27% shorter than an average PCI-E graphics card. Moreover, the card supports ATI's proprietary PowerPlay technology, and ASUSTeK's Splendid HD processor that enhances image and video quality without increasing CPU load.

Clocked at 668MHz/1.65GHz core/memory clocks and fueled by 512MB DDR3 and 256-bit memory interface the card will perform on par with other generic HD 3850 video cards. The manufacturer did not announce availability or pricing for this new graphics product, but you can find a little bit more info.

The Internet Storm Center, which tracks online threats, warned Wednesday that a worm is infecting vulnerable Web sites with a database attack. Though relatively small by Web attack standards with about 4,000 reported infected sites, the assault adds invisible code to a site that can force visitors to download malware onto their PC. Bad PR, to say the least.

IMPORTANT: DO NOT visit the domain named in the following test, or any sites that show up on a Web search as having this domain listed in their pages' code (including cached pages). Doing so could infect your PC with malware.

To see if your site has been hit, run the following Google search: "site:your company domain (ex. pcworld.com) winzipices.cn." -- or search for that domain within your Web site's HTML code. If you find anything, let your IT know immediately. When I ran a search just now I saw sites for everything from insurance companies to cemeteries to universities that all appear to have been infected.

The worm uses a SQL injection attack, according to the ISC, but it doesn't yet know just what vulnerability is targeted. The attack highlights the importance of keeping your site secure, something I wrote about last month. It's likewise critical to keep your own PC software up-to-date, as the ISC says visitors to infected sites can be hit via a known flaw in old Real Player software.

No taint of ill repute could deter the worldwide rush for "Grand Theft Auto IV," a notoriously violent video game that racked up a record $500 million in estimated retail sales globally in its first week.

Take-Two Interactive Software, the "Grand Theft Auto" publisher that's under pressure from a takeover bid by Electronic Arts, said Wednesday that GTA IV sold approximately 6 million copies in the seven days since its April 29 release.

About 3.6 million copies were sold the first day, with a retail value of roughly $310 million for combined sales of the standard $60 game and a $90 collector's edition, the company said. GTA IV is available for two consoles, Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3.

The dollar figures were boosted by exchange rates that made the retail price significantly higher in Europe, where almost as many copies may have been sold as in the United States, according to analyst Michael Pachter of Wedbush Morgan Securities.

Still, the GTA results soared beyond the previously reported video-game and entertainment highs: $300 million in global first-week sales last year for Microsoft's "Halo 3" game, and worldwide first-week movie box office totals of more than $400 million each last year for Disney's "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End" and Sony's "Spider-Man 3."

We have seen some chatter in the blogosphere over the last 24 hours around a couple of posts speculating about what Zune may or may not do in terms of putting content filtering features directly into the Zune family of devices in future releases.

We know you guys are following this discussion closely, and wanted to be absolutely clear on this issue:

We have no plans or commitments to implement any new type of content filtering in the Zune devices as part of our content distribution deal with NBC.

We think some folks in the industry were expressing hopes for how the entire industry, not just Microsoft, would come to look at content distribution, and some speculation has ensued. Again, no plans are in place toward this end.

I hope this clears up any confusion on the topic, and that you can now go back to enjoying the spring update

id Software's confirmed what we've known since last August -- that Doom 4's in the offing. Today's emailed news-bomb courtesy Karina Tang confirms Doom 4 finally has a dedicated team, and hey, they're hiring! (I think you have to drag race Carmack for the benefits package.)

"DOOM is part of the id Software DNA and demands the greatest talent and brightest minds in the industry to bring the next installment of our flagship franchise to Earth," said Todd Hollenshead, CEO, id Software. "It’s critical for id Software to have the best creative minds in-house to develop games that meet the standards synonymous with our titles."

While nothing's announced yet, expect versions for the PC, Xbox 360, PS3, and probably the Mac.

A Comcast insider tells me the company is considering implementing very clear monthly caps, and may begin charging overage fees for customers who cross them. While still in the early stages of development, the plan -- as it stands now -- would work like this: all users get a 250GB per month cap. Users would get one free "slip up" in a twelve month period, after which users would pay a $15 charge for each 10 GB over the cap they travel. According to the source, the plan has "a lot of momentum behind it," and initial testing is slated to begin in a month or two.

"The intent appears to be to go after the people who consistently download far more than the typical user without hurting those who may have a really big month infrequently," says an insider familiar with the project, who prefers to remain anonymous. "As far as I am aware, uploads are not affected, at least not initially." According to this source, the new system should only impact some 14,000 customers out of Comcast's 14.1 million users (i.e. the top 0.1%).

As a few of you may have noticed, Comcast received a public relations beating and is being investigated by the FCC for their use of Sandvine gear to throttle upstream P2P traffic. This practice of using forged TCP packets to "break" BitTorrent connections was discovered first in our forums in May of last year, some five months before the Associated Press story made national headlines.

Today, XP SP3 has officially hit the Release to Web (RTW) milestone. In other words, SP3 is available both on Windows Update and the Microsoft Download Center (network installation, ISO CD Image, and Checked build).

The final build of SP3 (5512) reportedly includes 1,073 fixes, including every security update, out-of-band release, and hotfix released since Windows XP SP2 hit Microsoft's servers back in August 2004. The release notes for SP3 have also been updated, as has the MUI pack. Also, make sure you know what to do with your version of Internet Explorer before installing the service pack.

Sony's PlayStation 3 games console has outsold Microsoft's Xbox 360 in Europe, according to figures released by Sony.

More than five million PS3s have been sold across the continent, Sony's David Reeves confirmed.

Speaking at a European PlayStation event in London, he said: "The numbers are a testament to the strength of the PlayStation brand."

He said PlayStation 3 had been outselling the Xbox 360 since October last year.

"We have sold more PlayStation 3s throughout Europe than Xbox 360 even though they launched 16 months before us."

Mr Reeves, head of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe, also said 12 million PSP handheld consoles and 48 million PlayStation 2s had been sold in Europe.

Despite Sony's overhauling of Microsoft in Europe, both firms' sales are a long way behind the Nintendo Wii.

T-Mobile USA's UMTS/HSDPA network rollout last week in New York will now be followed by buildouts in 20 more markets, according to plan. Spokespersons say this upgrade will cover both voice and data traffic, contrary to prior reports.

The number four carrier in the US has reportedly spent nearly $5 billion on the 3G network, and has done little to hype up the upgrade. Device support is currently lacking, however the company has plans to add to the lineup of handsets within the next week to include the carrier's first HSDPA device, and several "all-in-one" handsets.

Markets in the rollout are New Jersey/Long Island, Austin, Houston, Las Vegas, Minneapolis, Miami, Dallas, Chicago, Philadelphia, Denver, Detroit, Orlando, Kansas City, Atlanta, Los Angeles, New England, Portland, Sacramento, San Francisco, San Diego, Seattle, Washington D.C., Birmingham, Memphis, Tampa, and Phoenix. These will be up and running "by year's end," according to T-Mobile.

Freesat is available to 98% of homes, including those that are unable to receive Freeview through a TV aerial.

It will carry 80 digital TV and radio channels, including free high definition programmes, with that number due to rise to 200 by the end of 2008.

Users will make a one-off payment for a dish, set-top box and installation, but will not pay a monthly subscription.

The price of a box will start at £49, rising to £120 for a high-definition (HD) version. The cost of installation, including the satellite dish, will be a further £80.

BBC director general Mark Thompson at the launch of Freesat
The BBC, ITV and Channel 4's digital services will feature on Freesat, with news and children's channels among the others on offer.

The BBC's HD channel will appear on the service immediately, while ITV HD will launch soon.

ITV executive chairman Michael Grade called Freesat "the final piece in the digital jigsaw that will ensure that all viewers in the UK have access to free-to-air digital and high definition TV".

BBC director general Mark Thompson said: "All the BBC's digital channels, including BBC HD, will now be available to all licence fee payers wherever they live and however they choose to access them."

Microsoft rolled out a spring update for the Zune this morning--updating the MP3 player's software and social networking site, Zune Social, and rolling out portable Zune cards, store subscriptions, and an all-new video store.

On the software side, Microsoft is offering closer integration between Zune Social and the player's client software. The company is also releasing various other updates that "customers have been asking for through the Zune Forums and other feedback channels," such as auto playlists and meta data editing.

Currently home to some 2 million users, according to Microsoft, Zune Social is also getting a facelift, including new interaction, recommendation, and review features. And Zune Social's Zune Card playlists are now portable, letting users import music recommendations to their own players.

Microsoft is also introducing a subscription element to the music store, letting users download unlimited music for a monthly fee, similar to Rhapsody and Napster. Marketplace is also getting video beginning today, featuring content from providers such as Comedy Central, FUNimation Entertainment, MTV, NBC Universal, , Nickelodeon, Starz Media (including Manga Entertainment), Turner Broadcasting, Ultimate Fighting Championship, and VH1.

Microsoft Corp. has dropped its nearly three-month-long pursuit of Yahoo Inc., ending a historic acquisition attempt whose failure takes Microsoft back to square one in its quest to boost its online business to better compete against Google.

"We continue to believe that our proposed acquisition made sense for Microsoft, Yahoo and the market as a whole. Our goal in pursuing a combination with Yahoo was to provide greater choice and innovation in the marketplace and create real value for our respective stockholders and employees," said Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer in a statement distributed early Saturday evening.

In response, Yahoo issued a statement reiterating its position that Microsoft's offer was too low, and saying that many Yahoo shareholders agreed with its position.

Spam - the scourge of every e-mail inbox - celebrates its 30th anniversary this weekend.

The first recognisable e-mail marketing message was sent on 3 May, 1978 to 400 people on behalf of DEC - a now-defunct computer-maker.

The message was sent via Arpanet - the internet's forerunner - and won its sender much criticism from recipients.

Thirty years on, spam has grown into an underground industry that sends out billions of messages every day.

Statistics gathered by the FBI suggest that 75% of net scams snare people through junk e-mail. In 2007 these cons netted criminals more than $239m (£121m).