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  Headlines and summaries from the pages of Electronic Engineering Times. Previous editions are available from the 1994, 1995, 1996, and 1997 News Archives.
 Friday June 13, 1997Audio society sounds off on Net concernsObserving that the Internet has inspired fundamental changes in every aspect of broadcasting, the Audio Engineering Society is vowing that audio will not be "the bastard child to pictures in the worlds of information and entertainment."
Experts predict this is the year for DVDCopy-protection questions continued to cloud the outlook for DVD at the DVD '97 conference here recently, despite growing anticipation about the technology's full-fledged launch.
Adobe opts for Wind River's VxWorks real-time OSAdobe Systems Inc. is dropping its proprietary real-time operating system and turning to the VxWorks OS of Wind River Systems Inc. Printers and other imaging products based on Adobe's PostScript document-creation language will now run VxWorks, and developers will use Wind River's Tornado tools environment.
PC audio shapes up as hardware-software battleMicrosoft Corp. is teaming with Philips Semiconductors and other chip makers to rapidly shepherd low-cost, USB-enabled audio into PCs within a year, an effort that is drawing fire from established audio-IC players.
Alcatel's reorganized chip arm emphasizes IPAlcatel-Mietec, the semiconductor arm of the $12.4-billion European tele-communications equipment company Alcatel, is reorganizing in a move that will separate chip design from chip manufacturing.
Thursday June 12, 1997Winbond backs submicron-fab start in HsinchuA new logic foundry is getting on its feet in the Science-based Industrial Park in Hsinchu City, Taiwan with support from deep-pocketed financial backers and a core group of experienced managers drawn largely from locally based Hewlett-Packard Corp. and Winbond Electronics Corp.
Computer-aided reading simultaneously increased speed/comprehensionTenax Software Engineering says it has reengineered the simple task of reading by assigning the time-consuming and error-prone tasks to a computer.
Murdoch to collect all the key digital video technology piecesAmong modern-day empire builders, few are more tenacious than Rupert Murdoch, who has lately turned his relentless conquering energy toward the emerging digital-TV market in all its forms--satellite, cable and terrestrial.
Projection displays look to hang in new nichesToday's biggest market for LCD-based electronic projectors is the corporate presentation market, but tomorrow's market will be really big: the rear-projection TV. Until that tomorrow arrives, there are a number of emerging applications where LCD projectors will carve out a niche.
BBN deal continues Bay State exodusThe timing of Massachusetts' unveiling as Telecommunications Capital last month couldn't have been worse: a bullish study on Massachusetts' telecommunications jobs, headed up by Stephen Levy, the former chairman of BBN Corp., based in Cambridge Mass., was followed by a report that BBN would be acquired by GTE Corp., with headquarters in Dallas.
Wednesday June 11, 1997Assembly process targets mini-LCDsAn integrated assembly process developed here at the University of Colorado shows potential as a practical industrial method for making miniature liquid-crystal-on-silicon (LCOS) displays. Researchers say the technique could enhance the 0.7- and 0.5-inch-diagonal displays used in head- and eyeglass-mounted computer systems and in camcorders and projection display systems.
Nickel plated MEMS process aims at microrelaysResearchers at Northeastern University have broken new ground in micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) with a process based on electroplated nickel as the mechanical device. Analog Devices Inc. expects to introduce a microrelay based on it within 18 months.
Mitel launches WAN blitzThe semiconductor division of Mitel Corp. came to the recent Supercomm show with a grab bag of offerings tailored for WAN semiconductor markets where time-division multiplexed and asynchronous-transfer-mode switching meet.
Chip set aims at Socket 7 PCAcer Laboratories Inc. (ALI), the semiconductor arm of Taiwan's Acer Group, has begun sampling its Aladdin 4-plus core-logic chip set for Pentium-class CPUs. The set attempts to match the features of Intel Corp.'s newest 440TX chip set, while offering lower cost, support for multiple processors and Super I/O integration.
Tool models parasitic coupling in chip substratesSnake Technologies S.A. (SnakeTech), a two-year-old startup specializing in IC physical layout on PC platforms, is introducing Layin, a Unix-hosted tool for analysis of parasitic coupling via the substrate in CMOS integrated circuits.
Tuesday June 10, 1997World's first nanotechnology company turning lead to goldZyvex Limited Liability Corp. (LLC), which is leading the charge to next-generation nanotechnology, has disclosed its first corporate goal: a nanotechnology assembler-that is, a device capable of assembling macroscopic substances from microscopic materials with atomic precision.
Software lobby presses copyright, crypto issuesThe U.S. software industry executed a full-court press last week, armed with a new study on its growing impact on the U.S. economy and descending on the White House and Capitol Hill to press policy makers on copyright, encryption and securities issues.
U.S. patent ruling bars Samsung's NAND flashIn a blow to its efforts to beef up its flash-memory business, Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. was barred from exporting NAND-based flash chips to the United States after the International Trade Commission last week upheld a preliminary finding that the architecture violates two key patents held by SanDisk Corp.
April semiconductor sales trail '96 levelsWorldwide semiconductor sales rose between March and April but remained below last April's levels, according to figures released by the Semiconductor Industry Association.
ImageNet package boosts IP planningImageNet Inc. has upgraded its Computer Aided Network Engineering (Cane) software package, adding in Cane Release 2. New capabilities include an autodiscovering node and assigning and planning IP addresses. Thus, Cane is now taking on design tasks that can't be handled by cabling topology or capacity-planning tools.
Battery charger adapts to various chemistriesA novel rapid-charging scheme developed by Advanced Charger Technology Inc. (ACT) promises to cut battery-charging time by more than half for a variety of rechargeable chemistries. ACT has already used its Ultra-Rapid technology in a nickel-cadmium-based charger for two-way radios, and it intends to create similar solutions for cellular phones and other portable products.
Monday June 9, 1997Comdex buzz: DVD-enabled PCs set to shipDespite recent talk of a delayed takeoff for DVD-equipped PCs, both computer and higher-priced, standalone consumer DVD drives were the main buzz at an otherwise lackluster Spring Comdex here last week. Indeed, news emerged that several big DVD-related announcements are expected over the next few weeks, indicating that digital-video-disk technology is finally poised to hit the market in a big way.
ATM comes under attack in the WANThe advocates of networking gear based on the increasingly pervasive Internet Protocol are taking their fight into the last perceived bastion of asynchronous-transfer-mode signaling technology: the wide-area public network. While ATM is by no means dead, the Internet Protocol (IP) is extending its reach further than previously thought, and a broad class of network-equipment designers may have to support both approaches.
Chip-scale steps up as wafers grow legsChip-scale packaging may take off sooner than expected, with the emergence of techniques for putting contacts on a chip while it is still in wafer form. The wafer-level work, being performed at two companies, will help vendors take chip-scale packaging beyond low-lead-count devices to more-complex components, in which the space-saving benefits of chip-scale become even more pronounced.
Alliances propel embedded-DRAM strategiesTwo new embedded-DRAM camps were formed last week, when LSI Logic Corp. and Micron Technology Inc. agreed to develop a stacked-cell process, while Toshiba Corp. licensed its trench-cell process to Singapore's Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing Pte. Ltd. The alliances come after several years of technology-hoarding among chip companies and could put pressure on companies to team up or risk falling behind.
VME vet Moto to deal CompactPCI, X86 cardsThe embedded market moves a step closer to PC technologies this week as Motorola Computer Group announces plans to launch CompactPCI and X86 boards.The VMEbus market leader will take the wraps off its first CompactPCI (CPCI) board today, a PowerPC-based CPU board, and it will confirm persistent rumors that its CPCI plans include boards with Intel-architecture processors running Microsoft's Windows NT operating system.
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