Technology, Computers | featured news

Dell is buying Quest Software for $2.4 billion to expand its offerings as its personal computer business weakens in an era of smartphones and sleeker devices like the iPad. The deal announced Monday capped off a bidding war that began last month when Quest revealed a mystery suitor had made an offer trumping a $2 billion sale that had been worked out with Insight Venture Partners in March. The secret bidder turned out to be Dell Inc., the second largest PC maker in the U.S. behind Hewlett-Packard Co.

For decades, the tablet computer was like a mirage in the technology industry: a great idea, seemingly reachable on the horizon, that disappointed as hopeful companies got closer. Microsoft has experienced this cycle of hope and disappointment many times....

The U.S., knocked from the top spot by China in 2010 and Japan in 2011, once again has the world's fastest supercomputer, scorecard says.

The world of Wintel - Microsoft, Intel and the Taiwan-based companies that build the computers their products power and run on - is taking a huge collective bet on Windows 8.

Hewlett-Packard Co., the world’s largest PC maker, will cut 27,000 jobs, or about 8 percent of its staff, by 2014 to bring down costs and make the company more competitive in a changing marketplace.

A tiny crystal could hold the secret to computers of the future, unimaginably more powerful than today's most advanced supercomputers. Preliminary tests indicate that the new processor can eclipse the capacity of current computers by an extraordinary 80 orders of magnitude -- a one with 80 zeros after it -- potentially taking computing into a new dimension.

New York's Pace University connects its students with senior citizens who want to learn how to stay in touch with their more tech-savvy children and grandchildren. Thirty senior citizens squeezed around a long table designed for about 20, the crush made tighter by canes, walkers and wheelchairs.

The team of scientists say their achievement lays the groundwork for quantum computing, which would involve technology much smaller and faster than is currently possible.