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WiLAN sues Comcast, Time Warner, Charter

Canadian wireless company WiLAN is firing up another round of lawsuits, this time against leading cable companies.

Alleging patent infringement over technology in cable modems, WiLAN said today that it has has launched suits against Comcast, Time Warner, and Charter Communications in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas.

Ottawa-based WiLAN, which patents wireless products, asserts that the cable trio has been violating U.S. patent No. 5,761,602 by marketing and selling cable systems and modems. Issued in 1998, the patent in question covers "hybrid multichannel data transmission system utilizing a broadcast medium," … Read more

Judge issues order in WiLAN's patent lawsuit

The patent infringement lawsuit filed by WiLAN against Intel, HP, and other heavy hitters in the tech industry has entered a new stage.

Yesterday, Judge T. John Ward of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas issued a 55-page order that defines the terms used in a patent claim when those meanings are disputed by the parties.

In this case, the order (PDF) may have given WiLAN an edge because the company announced that it is pleased with the decision and said it believes it can now demonstrate that many of the defendants' Bluetooth, WiMax, and … Read more

WiLAN settles lawsuit with UTStarcom

Wireless company WiLAN has settled with another company, UTStarcom, over a 2008 patent lawsuit launched against several handset makers.

The Ottawa-based WiLAN, which patents wireless products, announced the settlement Wednesday, though terms were kept confidential.

Filed by WiLAN in June 2008, the suit alleges that the companies named violated WiLAN's U.S. patent that covers a method for wireless transceivers, such as those used at cell towers, to exchange data with each other.

As of now, WiLAN has also settled with BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion, while LG Electronics, Motorola, and Personal Communications Devices, a unit that UTStarcom spun off … Read more

Network any USB device with Addonics NAU

Moving from direct attached storage devices, such as an USB external hard drive, to network attached storage devices can be a daunting task as most NAS servers require new hard drives to work with them. This is why transitional devices such as the Iomega iConnect are such a great idea.

Addonics Technologies announced Tuesday a device that can do the same thing as the iConnect, but it's just about the size of your thumb and costs less than half the price of the Iomega.

Addonics NAU adapter, an acronym for network attached USB, can turn any USB storage device … Read more

Wi-LAN sues everybody over Bluetooth

A small Canadian wireless company is threatening to take a huge chunk of the technology industry to court.

Ottawa-based Wi-LAN, which patents wireless products, is suing around 18 of the tech industry's largest players over what it claims are patent violations of Bluetooth technology. More specifically, Wi-LAN is alleging that these companies--which include Acer, Apple, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Lenovo, Motorola, Sony, and Toshiba--have all infringed on one of its U.S. patents for selling PCs and mobile phones equipped with Bluetooth.

Announced Thursday, the suit claims a violation of Wi-LAN's U.S. Patent No. 5,515,369. Issued in … Read more

VLC for video victory

VLC Media Player is a long-time open-source favorite, and the latest version is also the first to be out of beta development. It's not the only option for free video playback, but it's one of the best, and the feature updates in version 1 make it well worth the upgrade.

Users can now get frame-by-frame advancement, granular speed controls allowing for on-the-fly slower or faster playback, and live recording of streaming video. The toolbars are fully customizable, so you can have only the buttons you need in the interface, there's AirTunes streaming, and there's better integration … Read more

VideoLAN releases VLC 1.0.0: Your media will never be the same

VideoLAN's VLC media player, arguably the world's best media player, hit version 0.9.9 in early April. Three months and more than 78 million downloads later, VideoLAN has announced VLC 1.0.0, or "Goldeneye."

Your media will never be the same.

In fact, with VideoLAN's VLC media player for Windows, Mac, and Linux, it doesn't have to be. One of the amazing things about VLC is that it can play anything that you've ever even thought about playing. That random media format that one site in Ecuador requires--VLC likely plays it, … Read more

Novices might be overwhelmed

KLS Backup 2008 Standard doesn't have the most intuitive user interface for backing up important files and folders, but thankfully, it employs wizards to streamline the process. Once we put it to the test, it successfully backed up designated files, folders, and even our Registry keys.

The user interface has commands at the top of the window, and four panels that display created profiles, profile tests, archives, and archive content. Not sure where to go first, we used the backup wizard to get started. Using the wizard, we added the files, selected the compression level, and applied encryption and … Read more

Sync files easily

Synchronizing files and folders can be an excruciating process for people who need to transfer many files from one place to another within their computers. Synchredible offers an alternative to spending countless minutes copying, clicking, and dragging files into new locations, and it has a great deal of success.

This free download look a little intimidating at first with its very sparse display, but it's easily mastered. Select two files or folders from the file tree drop-down and you are on your way. Synchredible keeps you on pace by telling you where you are in the seven-step process at … Read more