News


Stratus Cuts Prices on Fault-Tolerant Windows Servers

Stratus Technologies, which makes fault-tolerant Windows servers, cut list prices for its top-of-the-line, four-way-capable SMP systems last week. The computer maker expects the price-reduction strategy will bring it more share in a growing market for high-availability Windows systems.

HP to Ship Workstations with New Version of 64-bit Windows XP

HP will begin volume shipments on Thursday of Itanium 2-based workstations with the new Microsoft Windows XP 64-bit Edition Version 2003 operating system.

IBM Brings Enterprise X-Architecture to Itanium 2

IBM Corp. on Wednesday formally joined the increasingly crowded list of vendors offering multiprocessor server systems based on Intel's 64-bit Itanium processor family. IBM's offering comes in on the low end of the current 64-bit SMP scalability range, with systems initially supporting up to four processors.

Viewpoint: Windows Server 2003 Security

Microsoft's patch factory was running at full production last week at the same time that the company's formidable marketing arm was publicly launching a new operating system designed to reduce the frequency of security bugs. This apparent contradiction isn't proof that Trustworthy Computing is failing; instead, it's evidence that the initiative is critically necessary. Even though Windows Server 2003 is more secure than any previous Microsoft operating system, there will be no let up in patching for several years.

Free Windows Server 2003 Resource Kit Tools Available

Shortly after the launch of Windows Server 2003, Microsoft posted the Windows Server 2003 Resource Kit Tools for download on its Web site. The 12-MB download contains software tools intended for administrators, developers and power users.

EMC Building Windows Server 2003 APIs into Storage Platform

EMC Corp. this week unveiled a large commitment to supporting Microsoft Windows technologies throughout its line of storage products.

Analysis: Will AMD’s Opteron chip become a high-end player?

AMD Corp. this week officially introduced its 64-bit Opteron chip. Analysts say that Opteron boasts an advantage over competitive chips from Intel Corp. because it can run both 32- and 64-bit code without sacrificing performance.

HP Pushes Windows Server 2003 Scalability Higher

A day after Microsoft and NEC Corp. reached the top of the Transaction Processing Performance Council's OLTP benchmark raw performance list, Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard smashed that record.

The Right Time for Windows Server 2003?

SAN FRANCISCO -- Microsoft formally launched Windows Server 2003 on Thursday, after more than a year of delays and several changes in name and focus. During a launch keynote, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer argued that the timing was right for a Microsoft server operating release that improves IT manageability and provides data-center scalability.

Windows Server 2003 Atop Scalability Heap

In advance of the formal launch of Windows Server 2003 on Thursday, Microsoft and NEC posted record-setting results on the most important independent scalability benchmark in the industry on Wednesday.

Microsoft: 1 Million Downloads of Windows Server 2003 Preview

Microsoft claims more than 1 million customers downloaded the Windows Server 2003 preview code through the Corporate Preview Program prior to the server's launch, which is scheduled for Thursday in San Francisco.

.NET Enterprise Servers Renamed

It's been clear from Microsoft's naming announcements of the last few months that the .NET Enterprise Server products would have a new name shortly. The official word came down this week that the new name is Windows Server System.

Security Appliances Gain Popularity

At least one area of the IT industry is experiencing double digit growth, according to market research firm IDC -- security appliances.

More Spam Protection Added to Exchange 2003

Microsoft will put a "third gate" of spam protection into Exchange Server 2003, which is due for release in the middle of this year.

Windows Kernel Flaw Allows Privilege Elevation

A newly patched vulnerability in the Windows kernel opens enterprise systems to a significant threat of attacks from employees and others able to log on at a system keyboard.

SMS 2003 Beta 2 Released

Systems Management Server 2003 hit the beta 2 phase, moving the management server further along the track for its planned September release.

Microsoft Reports Profitable Quarter

The third quarter of Microsoft's fiscal 2003 brought the software giant flat profits on increased revenues compared to the year-ago quarter, the company reported late Tuesday.

ISA, Proxy Server Vulnerable to DoS Attack

Microsoft Internet Security & Acceleration Server and Proxy Server 2.0 are vulnerable to a denial-of-service attack due to a flaw in the way services in the two products handle a response from remote clients.

Microsoft Posts Group Policy Management Console

Microsoft this week posted a free tool to help administrators manage Group Policy.

Unisys Makes ES7000 Denser, Cheaper

Three years after rolling out massive, mainframe-inspired servers for Windows and Intel, Unisys is packing the big-server technology into smaller, denser pieces that the company hopes will be more digestible for enterprise buyers.