Articles by Jennifer LeClaire

The Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago has produced a real-life bionic woman The RIC introduced Claudia Mitchell on Thursday, the first woman to be successfully fit with its original bionic arm technology. Three men were previously fitted with the bionic arm that weighs about six pounds and costs between US$60,000 and $75,000....

In what it calls the next big milestone for its connected entertainment vision, Microsoft on Thursday took the wraps off its upcoming Zune music player and service Microsoft's announcement comes a day after Apple revealed several new iPods and the availability of full-length feature films at its iTunes store. Microsoft does not appear to be intimid...

Nintendo on Thursday said it will launch its newest video game console in the United States on Nov. 19, just in time for the lucrative holiday shopping season. The console is set to debut in Japan a few weeks later, on Dec. 2 The firm's Wii system will come to market as the most affordable among the next-generation gaming consoles from the Big Thre...

Dell on Tuesday rolled out new desktop computers in truly made-to-order style. Not only can customers choose sizes and graphics capabilities, they can also choose between Intel and AMD chips Customers can select machines based on Intel's Core 2 Duo processors or, for the first time, AMD Athlon 64 X2 dual-core processors. Both technologies allow con...

Microsoft on Tuesday released three security updates for Windows and Office to patch as many vulnerabilities, following several consecutive Patch Tuesday events that saw much larger batches of fixes. The software giant rated only one of the September patches as "critical." Bulletin MS06-054 addresses the critical flaw. The bulletin described a bug ...

As technology becomes a large part of many consumers' everyday lives, the risk of overexposure to new advances grows for people of all ages. Children, however, may be especially at risk of becoming too dependent on devices and outlets such as television sets, cell phones, music players, video games and the Internet Part 1 of this three-part series ...

With memories of ousted Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina still fresh in the minds of many, news comes that the company's chairman, Patricia Dunn, has agreed to step down Dunn plans to give up her post on Jan. 18, 2007, but she will remain an HP board member. HP President and CEO Mark Hurd will fill her post in addition to retaining his other posit...

In an effort to encourage greater adoption of broadcast mobile TV services and accelerate service deployment, Motorola and Nokia on Monday said they would work together to make their Digital Video Broadcast-Handheld (DVB-H)-enabled mobile devices and network services interoperable DVB-H technology enables the TV service most consumers are familiar ...

Online fantasy gaming site "Second Life" on Friday admitted it suffered a security breach that exposed real-world personal data of its role playing users A detailed two-day investigation confirmed that some of the unencrypted customer information stored in the database was compromised, potentially including account names, real life names and contac...

Amid its pretexting controversy and board shakeup this week, Hewlett-Packard on Thursday said it has revamped its entire line of HP Integrity servers with more powerful models The new machines boast more than twice the performance of the previous generation of HP Integrity servers, according to the company. That is an accomplishment, since IDC alre...

The high season for video game sales is just around the corner and there is still speculation about what two of the three major console vendors will bring to market Sony announced earlier this week that its new PlayStation 3 would be available in much lower quantities than expected in the U.S. Now Nintendo is confirming that its new Wii console wil...

California's attorney general is investigating Hewlett-Packard The probe comes in the wake of HP's reported surveillance of board members that led to the company's decision not to renominate George A. Keyworth II to his seat on the board. HP said it discovered that he leaked confidential information that had appeared in the media....

White children are far more likely to use the Internet than Hispanic and black children, according to a new report from the National Center for Education Statistics The study, based on a national representative of households in 2003, reveals that 91 percent of students in nursery school through 12th grade use computers, but only 59 percent use the ...

Sony on Wednesday said the European launch of its next-generation PlayStation 3 video game console will be delayed until March 2007. The machine will go on sale in the U.S. and Japan in November as planned A problem in mass producing a key component in the machine's Blu-ray disc player is causing the delay, according to Sony Computer Entertainment ...

As technology creeps into more and more areas of consumers' everyday lives, the risk of overexposure to gadgets, content, games and high-tech services rises. How much is too much? This first article in a three-part series on the potential dangers of substantial exposure to technology focuses on the risk to infants and children From Baby Einstein ta...

Following Microsoft's Friday release of Windows Vista Release Candidate 1 (RC1), the software giant on Tuesday announced plans to make the software available for broad customer and partner testing Microsoft will reopen the Customer Preview Program (CPP), its pre-release testing program, to new enrollments this month. Windows Vista's final release i...

Nokia on Monday unveiled three new cell phones with design in mind. The 7390, the 7360 and the 7373 offer new looks for the fashion conscious with plenty of bells and whistles for the technologically demanding Nokia is describing the latest additions to its L'Amour Collection as style with substance. All three of the new phones draw their design in...

SanDisk on Friday introduced the latest MP3 players in its Sansa c200 series, a line of low-priced flash memory-based MP3 players loaded with features that the firm hopes will make Apple iPod shoppers think twice For about US$100, the c200 series offers a bright LCD color screen and up to 2 gigabytes of storage. There are two new models in the line...

Skype on Thursday announced cordless phones that do not require a running computer to use its Voice over Internet Protocol services. The new class of phones lets users make and receive Skype calls over both Internet and traditional landlines Skype has partnered with Philips and NetGear to introduce the first two cordless phones with this ability....

Electronic Arts on Thursday said it has inked a deal with video game advertising network Massive to push ads into its games The agreement makes a way for Massive, a Microsoft subsidiary, to include a portfolio of Electronics Arts games developed for the Xbox 360 and PCs in Massive's advertising network. Financial terms of the deal were undisclosed....