Crazy press release of the day

DELL SUPPORTS NETWORK RAIL’S SAFETY CAMPAIGN – NO MESSIN’ LIVE!

Series of two-day events across the UK aimed at young people ready to learn new skills, backed by boxing superstar Amir Khan, DJ Dave VJ and athlete Roger Black

Bracknell, UK, August 29, 2006 – Network Rail and Dell are out to show young people that there are better things to do than risk their lives messin' on the railways through a summer tour that will reach out to thousands aged between 10-16. In the past year, almost 50 people were killed and hundreds more were injured across the UK using the railways as a playground. The No Messin’ Live! summer tour is giving young people the chance to try out all kinds of boredom-busting activities and challenge their skills for free.

The Network Rail’s national campaign aims to reduce death and injury on the railway by showing young people there are better ways of spending their time. Each event consists of three zones – music, gaming and sport - where participants can take part in activities such as DJing, computer gaming, urban dance, football, urban cricket, tag rugby, basketball, and karaoke. The events take place in 10 venues across the UK.

Dell is supporting the event by providing a range of DellTM XPSTM desktops and Dell volunteers for the Gaming Zone. The tour is also backed by boxing superstar Amir Khan, DJ Dave VJ and athlete Roger Black.

Claire Vyvyan, Director and General Manager, Corporate Business Group, Dell UK says: “We immediately said yes to Network Rail as soon as the opportunity became available to support this campaign. We are pleased to be part of the No Messin’ Live! tour and show young people that there are other ways to have fun without risking life or limb.

“At Dell, we encourage our employees to contribute positively in every community that we call home, both personally and organisationally. The Dell UK team currently supports several local and national charities and our primary community focus is to support children. In addition to these activities, our employees also volunteer in the local community as part of our Dell Global Community Involvement Month, held every September.”

Ian Chapman, National Railway Crime Education Manager for Network Rail commented: "The No Messin’ Live! events have been a great success so far, with all those attending thoroughly enjoying a variety of sports, music and dance activities on offer. In particular, the Gaming Zone has proved very popular thanks to the equipment and staff provided by Dell. We have found that engaging with young people in this lively and fun environment is a great way to get young people engaged in more positive activities than risking their lives on the tracks.”




No Messin’ Live! 2006 events schedule


There are 10 No Messin’ Live! events this summer. Nine events have already been held, with hundreds of young people attending each event.

* Edinburgh – Drummond Community High School – 6 and 7 July
* Glasgow – Scotstoun Leisure Centre – 10 and 11 July
* Cardiff – Eastern Leisure Centre – 25 and 26 July
* Rochdale – Hopwood Hall College – 31 July and 1 August
* Crawley – HBG Fitness at Oriel High School – 3 and 4 August
* Wolverhampton – Aldersley Leisure Village – 8 and 9 August
* Stockton – Ragworth Neighbourhood Centre – 14 and 15 August
* Manchester – Manchester Tennis Centre – Sportscity – 21 and 22 August
* Wandsworth – Battersea Technology College – 24 and 25 August



Outstanding event to be held in the following venue:

* Enfield – Southby Leisure Centre – 31 August and 1 September

The event is free to enter to all local children aged 10-16. For more information please visit: www.no-messin.com

About Dell

Dell Inc. (NASDAQ: DELL) listens to customers and delivers innovative technology and services they trust and value. Uniquely enabled by its direct business model, Dell sells more systems globally than any computer company, placing it No. 25 on the Fortune 500. Company revenue for the last four quarters was $57.4 billion. For more information, visit www.dell.co.uk. To get Dell news direct, visit www.dell.com/RSS .

Last weekend...

...we went to Brighton for Richie's birthday and Richie and Nick's kind of goodbye thing as they're off round the world soon to meet more people like Ben. A great weekend was had, with £4.50 easyPizza, Gay Pride and Parade and a night on the beach with Richie getting slightly undressed.

Pics here.

Wedding madness

As part of my world tour of weddings, I have been to two in two weeks. So here are the pictures from the weddings of Mike and Hannah (where I was usher) and Elliott and Gemma.

http://www.dangrabham.com/pictures/mikeandhannah/index.htm
http://www.dangrabham.com/pictures/elliottandgemma/index.htm

Intel quad core will arrive in 2006

Chips out for the winter



In a move that appears like another shot across the bows of the beleaguered AMD, it seems Intel is going quad core by the end of 2006 to further boost revenue.In a move that appears like another shot across the bows of the beleaguered , it seems is going quad core by the end of 2006 to further boost revenue.Don’t get too excited though, since the first quad-core chips will effectively be two dual-core chips stuck together in a single package. Intel's quad-core Xeon server processor is codenamed Clovertown, and the desktop variant Kentsfield. It will still fit into a single processor slot.

On the other side of the fence AMD is banking on its 4x4 technology; that’s two dual-core chips in two sockets on the same board. It won’t be long before we see it, either. Indeed, the looming release of 4x4 could be one very crucial reason why Intel is keen to bring forward the release its quad-core chips.

Heating up

The real quad-core magic is set to arrive later in 2007 when Intel will probably introduce a leaner processor on a single die manufactured using the forthcoming 45nm process. AMD’s quad-core designs, slated for later on in 2007, are likely to be a on a single die from the off.

Quite what this will mean in terms of power required and heat outputted remains to be seen, though there will inevitably be some advance on Core 2. This might seem like jumping the gun, but since the new packages will essentially be two Core 2 Duos, it’s no wonder the thermal envelope will be pushed.

Ramping up

Intel has certainly ramped up its release schedules in recent months. Woodcrest, the Xeon chip, went on sale earlier this year when initial roadmaps showed it wouldn’t be on the market even now. The Tulsa Xeon chip for quad-processor servers looks set to be out in the autumn. Indeed, HP is already showing off machines on its website featuring said silicon.

Microsoft releases a dozen patches

Whole lotta holes



Patches will be available from Microsoft tomorrow (August 8) that fix potential security flaws in both Windows XP and Microsoft Office. The 12 patches represent a significant update, but they do nonetheless fit into Microsoft’s monthly patch release schedule.

The fixes cover holes discovered in PowerPoint for which there are known exploits; a virus installs a keylogger on your machine which enables all keystrokes to be recorded as well as giving hackers back-door access to your machine.

The Windows patches are also expected to prevent any problems with a new variant of an old exploit that Microsoft has previously released a fix for.

These updates will be available automatically if you have Automatic Updates enabled or as a download via Windows Update.

PlusNet loses 700GB of customer emails

Sorry doesn’t seem to be the hardest word



PlusNet has revealed the loss of 700Gb of its customers' emails on 9 July. Since then, the ISP has been working with a data recovery firm to retrieve the mails, which were lost due to human error.ISP PlusNet has revealed the loss of 700Gb of its customers' emails on 9 July. Since then, the ISP has been working with a data recovery firm to retrieve the mails, which were lost due to human error.Bit part lists of files have been recovered, but the directory structure is lacking. What that means in English is that it can’t recover the emails.

Alistair Wyse, PlusNet's technical director, said: “I once again extend our sincerest apologies for the inconvenience caused by the loss of any customer emails.”

The company reckons that around 50 per cent of the lost email was spam – probably on email stats it previously held. It also thinks that 48 per cent of the emails had already been read. We’re a bit dubious about this last figure, unless people really don’t use POP3 access any longer, or at least don’t copy mail off the server.

The whole sorry episode goes to show that any critical information you have on email does need to be backed up elsewhere, even if it's just forwarding it on to a secondary email account.