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Panasonic today added a tablet UMPC to its rugged Toughbook line. Sure, you could buy six Asus Eee PCs and still have some walking around money left for the price of one $2,499 Toughbook CF-U1, but we doubt you'll grab your lunch pail and Eee PC and head down to the mine. Panasonic's latest Toughbook is, of course, built for use in the field. It's "engineered for the walking worker," according to Panasonic, and comes loaded with features.

The 5.6-inch LED backlit LCD touch screen is designed for viewing in direct sunlight, and below it is a backlit thumb keyboard divided by a number pad and arrow keys in its middle. On the right side, you can see a hand strap, but should you choose not to tether yourself to the Toughbook CF-U1, you can rest easy knowing it's been engineered to survive a four-foot drop and to resist rain, spills, dust, and vibration. It ships with two batteries, which, according to Panasonic, adds up to 9 hours of running time. The unit measures 7.2 inches wide by 5.9 inches deep by 2.2 inches high. It weighs a trim 2.3 pounds, which includes lugging around both batteries. It's completely fanless and uses a solid-state hard drive and an Intel Atom CPU, all of which should aid battery life.

In addition to a 2-megapixel Webcam and fingerprint scanner, it also features barcode and RFID readers and GPS. Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and 3G-mobile-broadband are also onboard. Many of these features are listed as options, so they most likely will add to the $2,499 price. Panasonic expects the Toughbook CF-U1 to ship in August.

Full specs after the break.… Read more

Updated 1:12 p.m. PDT to reflect that the hearing session has ended.

SAN JOSE, Calif.--A hearing in a dispute between Facebook and ConnectU wrapped up early Monday afternoon with no ruling, after the federal judge overseeing the matter had closed the proceedings to the public and the press.

U.S. District Judge James Ware plans to issue a ruling before too much time has elapsed, attorneys involved in the matter said as they left the courthouse here following the hearing, which lasted somewhat less than two hours.

Reporters from CNET News.com, the San Jose Mercury News, … Read more

Tiger Woods' playoff performance at the U.S. Open drew traffic big enough to look like a massive denial-of-service attack to Internet service providers.

According to Internet security company Arbor Networks, the playoff between Woods and Rocco Mediate "generated one of the larger Internet-wide flash crowds this year." The country's golf fans who were at work, turned to Web video to watch the duel at Torrey Pines.

The security firm reported that several ISP's saw between 15 and 25 percent spikes in traffic. One ISP reported that traffic nearly doubled. Engineers at the ISPs stopped worrying … Read more

Federal antitrust regulators and Microsoft issued a joint status report Tuesday on the software giant's compliance with the 2003 final judgment on interoperability with third parties.

In the interim report, the parties focus on efforts by the U.S. Department of Justice to enforce the final judgments of the 2003 order and Microsoft's work on complying with those judgments.

The final settlement stems from a 2002 consent decree, which the court, in a ruling earlier this year, extended by two years. Under the settlement, Microsoft agreed to be subject to antitrust review for compliance of the consent decree, … Read more

When Glam Media raised $84.6 million in February, international expansion was on its radar, and now we're seeing the results: the women's-focused ad network announced on Tuesday that it has acquired Monetise, a London-based digital-ad sales start-up.

(Yes, that's British spelling.)

All Monetise employees will become part of Glam under the deal, financial terms of which were not disclosed.

"The acquisition of Monetise speeds our entry into the important U.K. display ad market," Glam Chairman and CEO Samir Arora said in a release. "Monetise has strong relationships with London advertising agencies and … Read more

Scandal fans, rejoice--the crimson-hued nastiness between ConnectU and Facebook ain't over yet!

Court documents filed on Wednesday reveal that the founders of ConnectU, who claim that Facebook czar Mark Zuckerberg pilfered their business plan and code, are touting new "smoking-gun" evidence against the 24-year-old billionaire.

Facebook settled ConnectU v. Facebook in April, but ConnectU founders Cameron Winklevoss, Tyler Winklevoss, and Divya Narendra say a search for related documents has produced some results.

Forensic expert Jeff Parmet was commissioned by ConnectU to trawl through Facebook hard drives after a court order opened them up for discovery in … Read more

As if launch details of the Iriver Spinn weren't enough to keep your blood pumping wildly, we've got some prices and new specs on two of the Korean company's other new flash players: the T7 and L Player.

The L Player is the most interesting of the two--it's similar to the Clix, only smaller. It's got the same D-Click interface that we loved in the Clix, a 51-millimeter (2-inch) 320 x 240-pixel display, support for MP3, WMA, and ASF audio, MPEG-4, WMV, and Flash video, an FM radio, voice, and radio recording. It comes in … Read more

Hard to pronounce but easy to use, ?Torrent is a renowned torrent client. Factor in its robust feature set and that it can run on an old USB key, and you've got yourself a must-have program. And now, with Morrent, ?Torrent can be monitored from within Facebook.

Still not convinced? Watch this First Look video to learn more.

It's too bad that Michael Kanellos has given up his masochistic hobbies because this item would be right up his alley. It's one thing to have joysticks, keyboards, and other game gear that make you feel the action, but earphones?

A Korean company that goes by the amusing moniker of iFeelU is peddling a pair of "body-sonic" buds that will make your aural canals feel like they've been assaulted by heavy artillery. The rumbling EX2 earphones supposedly will create a "home theater in your ears," Gizmodo says, though we suspect it might be … Read more