Samsung 51-Inch 3D TV With 3D Blu-ray Player and Glasses, $1019

Samsung's PN51D6500 is a 51-inch plasma HDTV with Internet connectivity and very good standard and 3D image quality (read our review for details). Normally the HDTV alone sells for around $1400. Right now, though, BuyDig.com has a great deal: $1039 gets you the HDTV, a Samsung BD-D5500 3D Blu-ray player, and two pairs of active-shutter 3D glasses, with free shipping. Enter coupon code SeasonsDigging20 at checkout and watch the price fall to $1019.

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Lenovo IdeaPad

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How We Test Antivirus Software and Security Suites

Want to choose the most effective security software for your PC? Learn more about how we evaluate antivirus utilities and security suites.By Nick Mediati, PCWorld  

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Linux: A Getting-Started Guide

Are you fed up with Microsoft Windows and ready to give Linux a try? Here's how to get started. This guide for Linux discusses who the Linux OS is right for, what you need to get started, and how to turn your Windows PC into a dual-boot computer so you can have the best of both worlds--Linux and Windows.

Why Try Linux?

Linux will never be as popular a desktop operating system as Microsoft Windows or Mac OS X, but there are some good reasons to give Linux a try.

For starters, you can download and install Linux for free. Applications that run on Linux machines tend to be free as well, and they include PC essentials such as office productivity suites, image editing software, and video editing tools. Though Linux is not immune to viruses, malware is rarely a concern in the Linux world, especially for home users. And because Linux is less of a PC resource hog than Windows and the Mac OS, it's ideal for use with a laptop, a netbook, or an older desktop.

Finally, as Web services and HTML5-based apps play an increasingly dominant role in our computing lives--from music services such as Pandora to Yahoo Mail to Google Docs to Bing Maps to countless games--the operating system begins to play second fiddle to the Web. Linux is a dirt-cheap alternative to dropping $500 on PC that can run Windows 7.

Who Should Use Linux?

Linux can be a good choice for anyone, but two types of users are likely benefit most from Linux: power users and nontechnical users.

Power users will enjoy Linux, because it's a flexible, highly customizable OS that they can adapt to suit their needs in such areas as the look of the desktop or the ability to prevent any extra software from adding bloat to the system.

Linux is also great for nontechnical users who just want a computer that's easy to use, has many applications available for download, and doesn't require a lot of maintenance. Thanks to Linux distributions such as Ubuntu that are easy to install and use, Linux is no longer "difficult to use."

What Is Linux?

Linux is a Unix-like open-source operating system that uses the Linux kernel as its base and comes packaged with basic software, including a lot of components from the GNU (pronounced Guh-new) project.

The Wildebeest in the Room

There is some debate among Linux users about whether it's correct to call the open-source operating system Linux or GNU/Linux to reflect the fact that Linux distributions are loaded with software from the GNU Project. GNU is another Unix-like operating system, but one that lacks a usable kernel. Typical pieces of GNU that you're likely to come across in Linux include the Bash shell and assorted command-line utilities, GNU Emacs, Gnu Image Manipulation Program (GIMP), GNOME, and GNASH (a Flash player replacement).

Know Your Components

Three main elements of a Linux operating system come up often in discussions of Linux: the distribution, the desktop environment, and the Linux kernel. These components, along with software from GNU, constitute the basic parts of your Linux distribution.

Distribution

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Panasonic Announces 20X-Zoom Pocket Camera, Full-Featured Rugged Camera

Four new Panasonic point-and-shoots were unveiled today, including the 20X-optical-zoom Lumix ZS20 and the durable Lumix TS4, which is packed with a barometer, an altimeter, and full manual controls.By Tim Moynihan, PCWorld  

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Salesforce.com Launches Desk.com Help-desk Service

By Chris Kanaracus, IDG News

Salesforce.com on Tuesday unveiled a new SaaS (software as a service) help-desk application called Desk.com that can reach end users through social networks like Facebook and Twitter.

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Oracle Handed Setback in HP Itanium Case

By John Ribeiro, IDG News

A court in California rejected Oracle's bid to use a fraud claim to undo an agreement to support the Itanium processor, that it is said to have made with Hewlett-Packard.

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Apple Appeals IPad Trademark Decision in China

By Michael Kan, IDG News

Apple has appealed a Chinese court ruling last December that rejected its ownership of the iPad trademark in the country, and could expose the company to trademark infringement lawsuits from a local company.

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Samsung Still Not Allowed to Sell Original Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Germany

By Mikael Ricknäs, IDG News  

Samsung Electronics is still not allowed to sell the original version of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Germany after it lost an appeal at the higher regional court in Düsseldorf, a spokesman at the court said on Tuesday.

The decision follows the verdict and ban in Düsseldorf's regional court last year. The design of Samsung's tablet is too close to Apple's registered Community Design, according to the German courts.

The ban also covers the Galaxy Tab 8.9, and it can't be appealed, the spokesman at the court said.

Samsung is disappointed with today's decision by the Dusseldorf Higher Regional Court to uphold the sales ban for the Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Germany, a spokeswoman at Samsung said via email. However, she said, today's ruling is of little factual relevance due to the new model Galaxy Tab 10.1 N.

After the ban in the regional court, Samsung developed the Galaxy Tab 10.1N, which has an altered design and is available in German stores.

Apple filed a motion to block the Galaxy Tab 10.1N, as well. But, in December, a judge at the district court in Düsseldorf issued a preliminary ruling that the Samsung tablet is now sufficiently different. So it is possible that there will be no ban this time, according to a spokesman at the court.

A final verdict, which can be appealed, will be handed down on Feb. 9.

One of Apple's core legal claims against Samsung is that the Korean company has copied the design of Apple's products. Apple has over and over argued that it's no coincidence that Samsung's latest products look a lot like the iPhone and iPad, from the shape of the hardware to the user interface and even the packaging. That message was reiterated on Tuesday.

Getting courts to agree with that has not been easy for Apple. After early Apple victories in Germany and Australia, Samsung tablets are now available in both countries. Last week, a Dutch court also sided with Samsung on the look of its tablets.

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Toshiba, Fujitsu Join Japanese Tech Peers in Booking Massive 3Q Losses

By Jay Alabaster, IDG News  

Toshiba and Fujitsu, two of Japan's largest tech companies, both said Tuesday they booked deep losses during the October-December quarter, blaming a spike in component costs caused by Thai flooding and a tough market for consumer electronics.

Toshiba said it was weighed down by its struggling TV business, which faced lower sales in Japan as a boost from the nationwide switch to digital broadcasting faded and government discounts ended, even as intense competition choked off profits. The company said it booked a ¥10.6 billion (US$136 million) loss during its third quarter, down from a ¥12.4 billion profit a year earlier.

Fujitsu said operating profit from its consumer goods fell by nearly half compared to a year earlier and its semiconductor business stumbled into an operating loss. The company said its smartphone sales are exceeding expectations, but it still had a ¥4.3 billion loss during the period, versus a ¥16.5 billion profit in the year-earlier period.

Both companies slashed their earnings targets for the current fiscal year through March, but said they are still on track to book an annual profit.

Tuesday's results were the latest in a series of grim third-quarter results for Japan's tech giants, whose are struggling to generate profits with their digital products even as foreign competitors such as Samsung and Apple report staggering profits. NEC said last week it is planning to cut 10,000 workers and now forecasts a $1.3 billion loss for the year, and tech bellwether Sony, which reports Thursday, also projects to finish deeply in the red.

Japanese firms have also been hurt by the strong yen. A strong local currency can negatively impact profits earned abroad.

Like many of Japan's large tech firms, both Toshiba and Fujitsu were buoyed by their non-consumer business. Toshiba said its memory and display components had a strong quarter, while Fujitsu reported strong profits at its large services division, which includes system integration and outsourcing.

For many Japanese companies including Toshiba and Fujitsu, the fiscal year runs from April through March.

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EU Launches Antitrust Investigation of Samsung Patent Licensing

By Peter Sayer, IDG News  

The European Commission is investigating the way Samsung Electronics licenses its patents on technology essential to mobile communications networks, concerned that it may be in breach of European competition law.

The Commission, Europe's highest antitrust authority, announced Tuesday that it has begun a formal investigation of Samsung's patent licensing practices.

The patents at issue relate to 3G mobile systems. Like other vendors working with the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) to develop the standards for 3G networks, Samsung gave a commitment in 1998 to license those of its patents considered essential to the standards on so-called fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms.

Such undertakings guarantee that one vendor cannot use patents to prevent its competitors from selling standards-compliant products.

But in 2011, Samsung filed suit in a number of European courts, asserting that some of its competitors' products infringed on patents it considered essential for mobile communications devices, and seeking injunctions preventing distribution of the products in Europe. Apple was among Samsung's targets.

The Commission now plans to examine whether those lawsuits conflict with Samsung's earlier undertaking to license such patents on FRAND terms, and whether it has distorted competition in the market for mobile communications devices.

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Norton Wants To Help You Remember Your Password

If you're anything like me, you're usually quick to reach for the "Forgot Password" link on most webpages that you don't visit that often. Sure you could have your browser remember your passwords for everything, but that probably isn't the best approach when it comes to handling your login information.

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Git Gets Enterprise Equipped

By Joab Jackson, IDG News

Developer tool provider AccuRev will release a package designed to help enterprises incorporate the increasingly popular Git open source version-control software into their development operations, the company announced Tuesday.

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Zultys Adds Android Client for Its IP PBX

By Mikael Ricknäs, IDG News

Zultys has upgraded the software in its MX family of IP PBXs and added a Mobile Communicator client for Android-based smartphones, the company said on Tuesday.

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HP Extends Asset Mapping Into Amazon, VMware Clouds

By Joab Jackson, IDG News

Hewlett-Packard has updated its Discovery and Dependency Mapping Advanced (DDMA) software package so it will allow administrators to map their IT assets in the cloud.

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Facebook Timeline Privacy Tips: Lockdown Your Profile

Facebook's Timeline is coming, whether you like it or not, to Facebook accounts everywhere - including yours. I've been using Timeline for about a month now, and I'm not sure how I feel about it.

On the one hand, it's a lot easier to find things -- events, wall posts, etc, because you can now search your Facebook profile by date. On the other hand, it's much easier for other people--friends, strangers, you name it -- to find things, because they can now search your Facebook profile by date.

Timeline Tell-all

As it turns out, I've posted a lot of things -- not all of which are totally tame and/or work-appropriate -- over the past eight years that I've had Facebook. And now they're all neatly categorized by date.

While it's true that you could technically see these posts before the introduction of Timeline, you would have had to do a lot more work. For example, in order to see my posts from 2006, you would have had to go to my Facebook profile, wait for the 20 or so most recent posts to load, and then click "Older posts" about

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Infor Revamps Support Services, Heightens Competition Against SAP, Oracle

By Chris Kanaracus, IDG News

Infor has rebranded and revamped its software support offerings in a bid to cement its profile as a potential alternative to rivals like SAP and Oracle.

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Office 15 Beta Slated for Summer, Time to Move to Office 2010

By Tony Bradley, PCWorld

Microsoft has launched the community technical preview (CTP) for Office 15 to a limited audience, with a public beta planned for summer of 2012. With what will likely end up being Office 2013 looming on the horizon, it’s time for those still using Office 2007 to migrate to Office 2010.

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Student Privacy Activists Due to Meet With Facebook

By Jeremy Kirk, IDG News

Austrian student activists say they expect to meet Facebook representatives in Vienna next Monday in an attempt to resolve their disagreements over the social-networking site's privacy policies.

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Smartphone Owners Prone to Using their Devices in the Bathroom

By John P. Mello Jr., PCWorld  Jan 31, 2012 6:25 AM

Smartphone owners just can't stop using their phones, even when they are answering nature's call, according to survey that tracked cellphone usage in the bathroom.

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Hackers Infect WordPress 3.2.1 Blogs to Distribute TDSS Rootkit

By Lucian Constantin, IDG News

Hackers are compromising WordPress 3.2.1 blogs in order to infect their visitors with the notorious TDSS rootkit, according to researchers from Web security firm Websense.

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IBM Buys Worklight for Mobile Software Platform

By Chris Kanaracus, IDG News

IBM on Tuesday announced plans to buy Worklight, a move that will give it a range of cross-platform mobile application development technologies. Terms of the deal, which is expected to close in the first quarter, were not disclosed.

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MegaUpload Users Get Reprieve on File Wipe

MegaUpload's users were granted a two week reprieve before the companies hosting their files wipe them off the face of the Internet.

Both companies

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Office 15: 5 Things Microsoft Should Do

Microsoft needs to better integrate Office with social networking sites and create a more useful Web version of its software suite.By Preston Gralla, Computerworld  

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When ERP Is Botched, CFOs Must Act

By Fred O'Connor, IDG News

Companies long have grappled with glitches in their ERP (enterprise resource planning) system implementations -- a situation that the recent botched-rollout record suggests won't get better any time soon. While ERP projects go awry for many reasons, each incident reveals its own set of troublesome repercussions, financial and otherwise.

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Windows 8 File Management Changes Include Minimized Ribbon

Hell hath no fury like a Windows power user scorned, as Microsoft learned when it introduced big changes to file management in Windows 8. Now, the company is responding to the feedback by tweaking or walking away from some of the changes it planned to make.

The most contentious issue was the

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SeaMicro Puts 256 Xeon Cores in Server

SeaMicro Tuesday announced a new microserver that incorporates 256 Xeon processor cores to enable faster delivery of data for Internet-based activities such as social media or search.

The SM10000-XE server is a 10U rack server with 64 quad-core Intel E3-1260L processors that run at a clock speed of 2.4GHz. The server is designed to provide faster response to Internet queries by speeding dynamic Web applications and tasks such as extraction of information from databases.

The new server is an upgrade from SeaMicro's SM10000-64HD, which launched last year with 384 dual-core Atom low-power netbook chips. The new server's Xeon processors have "heavyweight" cores that can deliver a better performance than Atom cores, said Andrew Feldman

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Firefox 10 Arrives Today with Extended Support for Businesses

By Katherine Noyes, PCWorld

Six weeks to the day after the release of Firefox 9, Mozilla is slated to roll out the next version of its popular open source browser on Tuesday.

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Twitter Terror: UK Pair Barred from United States Over Jokey Tweet

By Brennon Slattery, PCWorld  Jan 31, 2012 9:51 AM

Two UK tourists were arrested, detained for 12 hours and then sent home after U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents misinterpreted one traveler's tweets containing British vernacular and a

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Google, Microsoft and Facebook Battle Phishing with New Specification

By John E Dunn, techworld.com

Major Internet companies including Google, Microsoft, and Facebook have announced a new specification to streamline the way e-mail providers work out whether messages are part of phishing attacks using spoofed domain addresses.

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Final Cut Pro X Gets Multicam Editing

Apple's editing software receives multicam editing and broadcast output with version 10.0.3.By Serenity Caldwell, Macworld  

It’s been seven months since Apple released Final Cut Pro X amidst furor and bemusement; four months since the company released its first major update, with promised support for more pro-level features in the next year. That year is here, and with it, Apple brought its third major update to the platform, offering multicam editing, updates to Chroma Key, beta broadcast video monitoring, and an assortment of other improvements.

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SeaMicro Puts 256 Xeon Cores in Server

SeaMicro Tuesday announced a new microserver that incorporates 256 Xeon processor cores to enable faster delivery of data for Internet-based activities such as social media or search.

The SM10000-XE server is a 10U rack server with 64 quad-core Intel E3-1260L processors that run at a clock speed of 2.4GHz. The server is designed to provide faster response to Internet queries by speeding dynamic Web applications and tasks such as extraction of information from databases.

The new server is an upgrade from SeaMicro's SM10000-64HD, which launched last year with 384 dual-core Atom low-power netbook chips. The new server's Xeon processors have "heavyweight" cores that can deliver a better performance than Atom cores, said Andrew Feldman

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Semiconductor Market to Slow This Year, ISuppli Says

By Agam Shah, IDG News  

Semiconductor industry revenue will grow at a slow pace this year due to struggling economies worldwide, lower spending and sluggish demand for products, research firm IHS iSuppli said in a study released on Tuesday.

Revenue for the semiconductor industry this year is expected to be US$323 billion, growing by just 3.3 percent compared to last year's revenue, IHS iSuppli said.

"Because the world economy is not in a strong-enough position to drive growth, the semiconductor business is coming under pressure," said Len Jelinek, director and chief analyst of semiconductor manufacturing research at IHS iSuppli, in a statement.

The weak performance of the semiconductor market has continued from last year, and there are economic troubles in the U.S., Europe, Japan and China, Jelinek said.

Semiconductors are used in a range of products including PCs, smartphones, tablets, cars and medical devices. With consumers spending less, semiconductor demand will decrease and hurt revenue, Jelinek said.

Manufacturers will try to clear out semiconductor inventory and keep existing factories viable, iSuppli said. Any capital expenditure to boost production or upgrade factories will likely be pushed into 2013.

The weak demand for some products also will hurt demand for DRAM, iSuppli said. Revenue for the memory is expected to decline by 16.1 percent this year, which is slightly better than the 26.8 percent fall last year.

A shortfall in the PC market has hurt memory demand, which has softened DDR3 RAM pricing this year. As PC prices remain under pressure, PC makers have been resistant to adding more RAM, which has led memory makers to move excess memory inventory to market rapidly. Some top DRAM makers like Samsung have also been suffering from yield and supply issues.

The market for NAND flash is "less rosy" despite the surging demand for devices like smartphones and tablets, iSuppli said. There is growing demand for NAND flash as storage requirements grow on mobile devices, but additional factory capacity to meet excess demand could lead to oversupply and likely pressure NAND flash revenue.

NAND flash prices have also been tumbling since 2010, and stood at $12.90 on Tuesday afternoon for a 64GB unit, according to memory-price-tracking site DRAMexchange.

Semiconductor revenue growth will likely be negative in the first half and recover starting in the second half, iSuppli said.

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Nvidia Announces CUDA 4.1 with LLVM Compiler

8:00 PM - January 27, 2012 by Douglas Perry- source: Nvidia

Nvidia just released CUDA 4.1 Toolkit, which integrates, for the first time, the company's LLVM (Low Level Virtual Machine) compiler.

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1000-Player FPS Event Pits Press Against Gaming Industry

12:00 AM - January 28, 2012 by Kevin Parrish- source: MuchDifferent PR

The creator of Counter-Strike, the creator of ShadowGun and many more notable people will be participating in the 1000-player FPS Guinness event taking place this Sunday.

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Blizzard Makes Even More Changes to Diablo 3

6:00 AM - January 28, 2012 by Kevin Parrish- source: Blizzard

After releasing a long list of changes, Blizzard has revealed even more edits it will make to the upcoming PC game Diablo 3.

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Cleversafe Announces 10 Exabyte Storage System Configuration

12:00 PM - January 28, 2012 by Douglas Perry- source: Cleversafe

Cleversafe, a cloud storage software vendor which offers its customers "limitless storage space", says that it has designed a dispersed storage system that exceeds a storage capability of 10 Exabytes (EB), or 1,000 Petabytes (PB).

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Apple CEO Tim Cook Responds to Reports of Worker Mistreatment

6:00 PM - January 28, 2012 by Marcus Yam- source: Tom's Hardware US

Cook sends email out to Apple employees in response to report of factory worker conditions.

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You Can Edit 4K Video on a MacBook Air (With a Red Rocket)

11:00 AM - January 30, 2012 by Douglas Perry- source: Adobe

Since you can't even play 4K video on any PC, most of us would not automatically come up with an idea to edit 12-megapixel resolution video on a Macbook Air.

However, a demo published by Dave Helmly, in charge of tech sales of Adobe's pro audio and video products, shows that it is possible.

4K video editing

Helmly used a flagship Macbook Air with an Intel 1.8 GHz i7-2677M processor, which retails for $1700. The 4K video quickly overwhelmed the dual-core processor and its four threads. However, the video, apparently recorded with a Red One camera, ran in real-time via a Thunderbolt-connected Red Rocket accelerator and transcoder card. The Red Rocket card is key to getting 4K video to be played at 30 fps on a PC and can be purchased for $4,750.

It's important to note that Helmly went with the Apple hardware, but on the OS side it's running Windows 7 in boot camp. Helmly explained to Gizmodo on his choice:

No real reason I chose to show it running under Windows 7 other than I've been surprised that we haven't seen any demos of Windows running TB before now. It actually works pretty good in it's current beta state. That said the Mac OS kicks

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