The Great Geek Manual

1998
Symantec purchases Ghost, a disk cloning program developed by the New Zealand company Binary Research. The name Ghost is an acronym for “General Hardware-Oriented Software Transfer.” It is the program that created the market for disk-cloning software.

1999
The Cassini-Huygens space probe makes a gravity-assisted flyby of Venus on its mission to Saturn and Titan.

CompUSA, Inc. initiates dramatic changes to its chain of 211 stores. Changes include closures of up to fourteen locations, approximately 1,500 job cuts of 21,000 employees and a shift in focus away from desktop computers. Blaming low margins, weaker demand and highly competitive pricing, CompUSA also reports three consecutive quarterly losses. The chain will also close its distribution center in Grapevine, Texas.

Testimony in the U.S. Justice Department Microsoft anti-trust case ends after eight months.

Version 1.00 of the popular bulletin board software HydraBBS is released.

2000
United States President Bill Clinton makes the first ever Presidential webcast. Among the announcements made during the webcast, President Bill Clinton announces a new website that will be able to search all government resources.

2001
Jerry Jessop initiates an auction on eBay for item #1249640557, a very rare Atari 2700 “RC Stella” game system prototype featuring wireless RF controllers. The system was originally unveiled at the 1980 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Chicago, Illinois. A member using the handle “Buyatari” will ultimately be the highest bidder on the auction with a bid of US$2,626.

2002
Hewlett-Packard releases the HP iPAQ Pocket PC H3950 handheld computer, featuring the Pocket PC 2002 operating system, remote control software, an infrared port, a Secure Digital slot, a transreflective display, an Intel 400MHz XScale PXA250 processor, a lithium-polymer batteries, 64MB RAM, and 32MB flash memory. Price: US$649

Hewlett-Packard releases the HP iPAQ Pocket PC H3970 handheld computer, featuring a 400MHz Intel XScale PXA250 processor, 64MB RAM, 48MB flash ROM, remote control software, an infrared port, a Secure Digital slot, the Pocket PC 2002 operating system, Bluetooth wireless connectivity, a backlit transreflective TFT color display, and lithium-polymer batteries. Price: US$749 Weight: 6.6oz

Hewlett-Packard releases the HP Jornada 728 Handheld PC, featuring a 206MHz Intel SA1110 processor, a modem, and 64MB RAM. Price: US$999

Intel introduces the 1.9 and 2GHz Mobile Pentium 4-M processor, featuring 8kB Level 1 data cache, 12kB Level 1 instruction cache, 512kB Level 2 cache, a 400MHz system bus, MMX, SSE, and SSE2 instructions, 64GB address space, and two pipelined FPUs. It incorporates fifty-five million transistors in a 0.13-micron process. Code-name: Northwood Price: US$401 (1.9GHz) and US$637 (2GHz) in 1,000-unit quantities

Intel introduces the 1.33 to 1.5GHz Mobile Celeron processor, featuring 8kB Level 1 data cache, 12kB Level 1 instruction cache, 256kB Level 2 cache, a 400MHz system bus, MMX, SSE, and SSE2 instructions, 64GB address space, and two pipelined FPUs. It incorporates fifty-five million transistors in a 0.13-micron process. Code-name: Northwood Price: US$134 (1.33GHz), US$149 (1.4GHz), and US$170 (1.5GHz) in 1,000-unit quantities

Kyocera announces the Kyocera 7135 handheld computer, featuring a phone, keypad, color screen, Global Positioning System technology, a Secure Digital slot, a digital audio player, 16MB RAM, and the Palm OS 4.1. Price: Estimated US$500 Weight: 6.6oz

Sony releases the Clie PEG-T665C handheld computer, featuring a 66MHz Dragonball Super VZ processor, 16MB DRAM, 4MB Flash memory, a 320×320 pixel TFT color display, the Palm OS 4.1, a Memory Stick port, sixteen Sony applications, and eighteen third-party applications. It includes remote control software and infrared port allowing it to be used s a remote control for home entertainment equipment. Price: US$399.99

In Tokyo, Japan, Sharp introduces the Zaurus SL-A300 handheld computer, featuring a Linux operating system, an Intel 200MHz XScale PXA210 processor, 64MB RAM, a 3.5-inch active matrix 320×240 pixel display, and a Secure Digital slot. It will begin shipping July 12th.
Price: ¥50,000 (US$411) Weight: 4.2oz

2003
Nintendo releases the platform game Wario World for the GameCube in North America. It is the first appearance of Wario in a home console game, as well as the first 3D Wario game. Visit the game’s official website. ESRB: E (Everyone) Price: US$49.99

Netflix receives a patent covering its subscription rental service as well as Netflix’s methods of communication and delivery. (US No. 6,584,450) This is one of two patents which Netflix will accuse Blockbuster of violating in the lawsuit Netflix v Blockbuster, filed on April 4, 2006 in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California.

2004
Intel releases the Celeron D 315, 320, 325, and 330 processors, which run at 2266MHz, 2400MHz, 2533MHz, 2667MHz, and 2800MHz respectively. The processors feature Level 2 256KiB caches, 533 MT/s front side buses.

2005
EA Games releases Battlefield 2 (BF2) for Windows in Europe. BF2 is a first-person shooter with some strategy and RPG (role-playing game) elements developed by Digital Illusions CE (DICE) with a custom game engine. Visit the game’s official website. ESRB: T (Teen)

Universal Pictures releases the zombie film Land of the Dead, directed by George A. Romero and starring Simon Baker, John Leguizamo, Dennis Hopper, and Asia Argento to 2,249 U.S. theaters as well as to Canadian theaters. This is the fourth installment in George A. Romero’s “Dead Series.” In it, the world is full of zombies and the survivors have barricaded themselves inside a walled city to keep out the living dead. As the wealthy hide out in skyscrapers and chaos rules the streets, the rest of the survivors must find a way to stop the evolving zombies from breaking into the city. Produced on a budget of US$15 million, the film will gross US$10,221,705 domestically in its opening weekend. IMDB listing (MPAA Rating: R) Running Time: 1 hr 33 mins

2006
Microsoft releases Build 5456 of the Windows Vista operating system. Some of the new features included in this build include a revamped Aero subsystem and a completely overhauled and significantly less obtrusive User Account Control interface. “List view” has been brought back to Windows Explorer, after having been removed in Beta 1. Microsoft developer Ben Betz will later explain in a blog entry that, while developers felt that Explorer’s List mode made sense based on usability research and its inability to support Windows Explorer’s new “grouping” feature, the feature was restored because of feedback generated by beta testers. The disk space occupied by a clean installation is also significantly reduced.

Version 0.44 of Inkscape, a cross-platform vector graphics editor, is released under the GNU General Public License. This version adds a Layers dialog, support for clipping and masking, improved PDF export with transparency, and performance improvements. Visit the software’s official website.

Walt Disney Pictures premieres the film Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest at Disneyland in Anaheim, California. The film will be released to theaters on July 7, 2006. It is the first Disney film to use the new, computer-animated production logo that the Burbank-based studio spent a year designing. In just 30 seconds, Disney’s digitally revamped curtain-raiser travels from a star high above the clouds to reveal a jewel-colored landscape at dusk. The animated camera glides over a glistening lake to arrive at a glowing Disney castle where the studio’s classic logo is spelled out in a silvery new 3-D typeface. Read more about the new Disney logo at The Hollywood Reporter online.

Pages: 1 2