aus

Unlocked fin likely brought down X-51A in August crash

The U.S. Air Force said today that an experimental test in August of its hypersonic X-51A Waverider failed due to a fin inadvertently unlocking and sending the aircraft into a corkscrew that ended in a crash into the Pacific Ocean.

At the time, the Air Force said only that the August flight had ended with the crash, but didn't reveal what had been at fault. But in a conference call today, X-51A program manager Charlie Brink explained what he and his colleagues have learned over a couple of months of investigation.

The August flight was the third of … Read more

Samsung targets Apple's iPhone, iPad in Australia

The legal spat between Apple and Samsung that has stretched around the world took on additional weight this week, with a new claim lodged against Apple by Samsung in Australia.

Bloomberg reports that Samsung this week went ahead with plans to file a cross claim with a federal court in Australia that takes aim at Apple's iPhone and iPad for infringing on seven wireless patents it holds. The claim also aims to invalidate patents held by Apple that have been used against the company, Bloomberg said.

Last month Samsung announced it would be taking retaliatory action against Apple, which … Read more

Linksys E3200 router review: A formidable contender

A short while ago, I gave the Editors' Choice Award to the Asus RT-N56U. At the time I thought, "It's gonna be some time before there's another router that comes close." I was wrong.

Cisco's new Linksys E3200 High Performance Dual-Band N Router, which we just reviewed, makes a great contender as another excellent, true dual-band router that won't break your bank. As a matter of fact, if it were just a little cheaper and offered better built-in network storage performance, it would get an Editors' Choice Award as well.

Released at the same … Read more

X-51A races to hypersonic record

The X-51A Waverider flew today, and it flew fast.

The scramjet engine in the experimental aircraft burned for a little over three minutes at around 10 a.m. PDT Wednesday in a test range over the Pacific Ocean, pushing the X-51A to the hypersonic speed of Mach 5, or five times the speed of sound. That was the top speed reached by the aircraft in its brief flight, according to Boeing and press reports citing U.S. Air Force officials. (Editors' note: A separate Air Force News Service report had initially cited a higher speed, but was amended to give … Read more

IBM: We distributed malware-ridden USB drives

IBM is apologizing for handing out USB drives at a security conference in Australia this week that had malware on them.

The thumb drives were distributed for free to people who walked up to the IBM booth at the AusCERT conference.

"Unfortunately we have discovered that some of these USB keys contained malware and we suspect that all USB keys may be affected," Glenn Wightwick, chief technologist at IBM Australia, wrote in a letter to AusCERT delegates that was reprinted on the Beast or Buddha blog.

"The malware is detected by the majority of current Anti Virus … Read more