linuxwrangler writes "Key3Media Group Inc. which produces the Comdex trade show may be unable to make it's debt payments and could declare bankruptcy. No decision will be made until after Fall Comdex opening on Monday. More info is available at Google News."

Big_Joe asks: "Lately Microsoft has put a satellite office in the Grand Rapids, MI area. Because of this I, an end user working for a large contractual company, have been getting harassment mail from Microsoft and the BSA. The information they are using to contact me is information from Chicago's Comdex 3 years ago. Since then I have switch my career direction from Windows to Linux. I would like to get my name removed from any association with Microsoft products. The only systems I use with any Microsoft software installed are owned and maintained by my employer. An earlier story here said not to reply because it is more of a headache. So how do I get them to quit bugging me? Is there any legal action I can take for harassment? How do I tell them that I am no longer a customer and that they have no further right to pester me?" Hmmm... smells like more spam. How should one handle any corporation that does crap like this, especially one that makes backhanded threats toward your workplace?

eugene ts wong writes "This past month, VanLUG went to Comdex, as we usually do. It went fairly well for us, but we are always looking for ways to refine our methods. Our main focus this year has been promoting the professionals of the LUG, so that we aren't perceived only as a bunch of hackers and script kiddies. What kinds of methods and focuses [yes, it's incorrect spelling, but I like it this way] have other LUGs had for their presence at Comdex? Or are there any other LUGs at all that have been to Comdex?"

Billy writes "Unless you've been living in a cave, you've seen Oracle's Unbreakable campaign (Can't break it. Can't break in.), which was kicked-off by Larry Ellison personally at Comdex last November. Now U.K. security researcher David Litchfield says you can break in, thanks to at least seven different security holes in Oracle 9i, according to this SecurityFocus story. Oracle's top security manager is quoted as saying that "unbreakable" doesn't really mean unbreakable, or something."

As promised chrisd back with his report from the expo floor at MacWorld and a brief note about what Linux can learn from the Macintosh.

adpowers writes "Anandtech has a large preview of upcoming motherboards shown at Comdex." P4s dominating Athlons, lots of DDR SDRAM boards. A quite lengthy article. The FIC pages have several interesting looking PCs, I dig the AquaPad, a WinCE Transmeta box.

Phillip M. Torrone writes: "Gosh folks, a thousand words couldn't describe how great Comdex 2001 was this year for me. But, about 300 pictures may help. Your pal pt from flashenabled.com/mobile has it all. Memory stick and SD GPS units, Cameras, Microwaves and Bluetooth; The new Sharp Linux PDA with keyboard; Bluetooth everything, Pocket PCs, Sony robot dogs, Sony Ericsson and Nokia phones, Windows XP, Xbox, Merecedes Benz test drives, Klingons, the Strip, virtual keyboards, DoCoMo, Harry Potter and more. The coverage is almost as good as being there."

ckd writes: "CNET is reporting that COMDEX organizers have a new security policy--no bags except vendor supplied plastic bags will allowed on the show floor. "While on-site, you should CARRY A PHOTO ID (DRIVER'S LICENSE OR PASSPORT) ON YOU AT ALL TIMES." They want you to leave your laptop in your hotel room, too! Oh, and no cameras at the keynotes, either. But they haven't announced that they're planning to strip search people ... yet."

Brian writes "This article reports that Intel will release new chips at the Comdex trade show, its first low-power designs for super-thin servers. The new Pentium III model is a gussied-up chip taken from the company's product line for portable computers, which share many of the same constraints as ultradense servers. These systems can't consume as much power or give off as much heat as ordinary CPUs because overheating causes processing errors. The systems are the first swing of a one-two punch against Transmeta, whose low-power designs caught Intel flat-footed, first in the mobile market and then in the low-power server market. Intel now is fighting back just when most server companies using Transmeta chips are on the ropes." And albat0r writes: "Intel says that it will hit 3GHz on the mainstream Pentium 4 by the end of 2002. Intel will advance its Celeron line, currently based on Pentium III technology, with Pentium 4 technology by mid-2002." I look forward to good values on eBay when 2GHz is "obsolete."

pescatello writes "Here's a CNET story describing the disappearance of the internet appliances from the market. The latest is the AOL/Gateway/Transmeta Internet Appliance. While it won Comdex's Best in Show in 2000, it hasn't been pushed by either AOL or Gateway, and is now unavailable anywhere. " Meanwhile, my Audrey came in yesterday.

Danny Yee popped up this review from down under of the provacatively titled Proudly Serving My Corporate Masters: What I Learned in Ten Years as a Microsoft Programmer . This sounds like a fun read, but not without flaws.

SEWilco has comprehensive report from the Spring Comdex show in Chicago. Good listing - show was smaller, but I think there was still some good exhibits put on there. Click thru to read more- you can also read the final report that Newsforge has.

buzzini writes: "Bloomberg is reporting that Microsoft's upcoming Tablet PC will be powered by the Crusoe chip. An announcement is expected tomorrow during a BillG speech at WinHEC." According to the article, "the development versions of the Tablet PCs will likely follow a hardware outline given at Comdex. Aside from the Transmeta chips, they will likely include 128MB of RAM, a 10GB hard drive, a docking cradle, a USB (universal serial bus) keyboard and mouse, along with built-in local-area networking based on the 802.11." Wireless webpads will rock -- hope they're here before 2000! OK, before the new millenium. Well, errr ...

udif writes: "OSTA, the Optical Storage Teechnology Association, (a standards body whose members include HP, Sony, Ricoh and others, and among other things, has defined the UDF filesytem for DVD's), is proposing a standard format for storing MP3's on CD, called CDA. Here is a quote from their press release: 'Many recently produced DVD players now have the ability to play back MP3 or WMA files. However, these players sometimes lack the ease of use of an audio CD when playing CD-R or CD-RW discs with MP3 or WMA files. Due to lack of standard format, discs containing MP3 or WMA files made in today's PCs with standard CD recording software often exhibit long initialization times and lead to a poor user experience ... CD-Text capable CD/DVD players will be able to display the names of artists and song titles and navigate the hundreds of MP3 or WMA files easily by selecting play lists or other criteria.'" CDA, by the way, stands for Compressed Data Audio. Seems like a good step toward at least good labeling of which players can play your shiny disks, whether they hold MP3s, home video in VCD format, or your digital pictures. Demo units using the spec should be at next month's Comdex.

If the iPAQ looks nice, the Yopy looks sexy, the Agenda intrigues you, and a V-Tech Helio running Pocket Linux looks interesting to you ... then you may enjoy this sweep of the available Palmtop GUIs with an emphasis on Free ones, written by reader 1010011010.

CitizenC writes "According to this GameCenter.Com story, at the Comdex trade show in Las Vegas on Wednesday, Wolford told Gamecenter that the Voodoo5 6000 has not been cancelled, that 3dfx will not start selling current chipset technology to third parties such as Creative Labs and ELSA, that Voodoo products, including current graphics and TV cards, will continue to be manufactured, and that the company isn't going belly-up any time soon."

discovercomics sent us a nifty report from MSNBC telling the tale of the Embedded Linux Devices that were present at COMDEX. They talk about the IPAQ, The Yopy, the Axis 2100 network camera (which is cool, but expensive), and more.

NO WAY! writes: "Wired has a story about Dimensonal Media's demonstration of a holographic projection system at this year's Comdex. Apparently the damn thing can project 3-d videos or create a live projection of an object as it goes. This sounds unbelievable -- has anyone else heard of this? Check out the article." It does sound unbelievable, but then, so does the idea of thousands of tiny nanoprobes hidden in our food.

the Man in Black writes: "AMD dropping the Mustang core to concentrate on an SMP solution seemed to bode ill at the time, but it seems that this was the wisest possible decision, given the below news. ZDNet is reporting that Intel will not have dual-processor support for the Pentium 4 at launch time ... indeed, not until the second half on next year, when the Pentium 4 is re-released with a new core."

code_slayer sent us a cool review of linux handhelds at COMDEX. You can see Qt Embedded (which has been released under the GPL) as well as MicroWindows, and a bunch of prototype boards. I'm still waiting for the 802.11 wireless linux handheld capable of displaying remote X applications, but it looks like we're getting closer.