(Reuters) Microsoft Corp. and the U.S. Justice Department on Friday announced a settlement in their three-year-old antitrust case, with the software giant accepting restrictions on its business practices but avoiding harsher penalties. The pact, which must be endorsed by a federal judge, gives computer makers freedom to feature software made by companies other than Microsoft, and requires Microsoft to share the inner workings of its Windows operating system with other software makers. Also, Microsoft will have to modify its new Windows XP operating system within a matter of months so that software can be added and deleted by consumers and computer makers, the department said.
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(ZDNET) Advanced Micro Devices has again upped the stakes in its processor performance race with rival Intel. AMD on Monday launched the new Athlon XP 1900+, its highest performance desktop processor issued to date. The new 1900+ chip runs at a clock speed of 1.6GHz. The resulting megahertz boost over its 1.53GHz Athlon XP 1800+ is expected by many to push the chip's performance ahead of that of Intel's Pentium 4. AMD argues that its Athlon provides better overall performance, even though its clock speed is lower than Pentium 4's. This argument, in part, was the influence behind the launch of the company's new Athlon XP naming scheme, which granted model numbers to various versions of the chip in place of clock-speed measurements.
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(CNET) Dell Computer will phase out a lower-end Quantum storage system in favor of Dell-designed systems the company introduced Monday. The company will begin selling the PowerVault 715N, 750N and 755N products and gradually phasing out the 701N and 705N, two designs actually from Quantum, said Brett McAnally, senior product manager for the company's storage line.
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(Reuters) ATI Technologies Inc. saw its stock climb as much as 10 percent on Monday after presenting investors with a list of new contract wins for its graphics chips, as excitement increased over its entry into the console video-game market. ATI, which supplies graphics chips to major computer makers, was trading at C$13.70, up 72 Canadian cents, or 6 percent on the Toronto Stock Exchange, in early afternoon trade. And on Nasdaq ATI was up 46 cents at $8.59.

ATI said its Mobility Radeon graphics processor has become the industry's most popular mobile graphics chip nine months after its introduction, and is now shipping in 15 notebook computers across nine major computer makers.
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(Press Release) Dell has announced three new PowerVault network-attached storage (NAS) servers designed to help customers quickly and easily add, consolidate and manage storage directly on their network, regardless of operating system. The new Dell PowerVault 755N, 750N and 715N storage servers are based on Microsoft's Windows 2000 Advanced Server operating system, enabling customers to consolidate storage in a cost-effective way by leveraging existing network security and backup infrastructures. The NAS servers can be set up in as little as 15 minutes with minimal IT expertise and no network downtime. The PowerVault NAS servers allow file access and sharing between Microsoft Windows, Novell NetWare, UNIX, Linux and Apple Macintosh operating systems. The products include Dell's ActiveArchives technology, which creates and preserves point-in-time snapshots of stored data to help guard against loss from network outages or disruptions. The NAS servers also feature LAN-free backup software enabling data backups to occur directly to locally attached Dell PowerVault tape systems. The new NAS servers can also be configured with third-party software for data backup, disk management or anti-virus protection for more seamless integration with customers' existing file serving applications. The PowerVault 750N and 755N servers are available immediately, priced starting at $8,700.
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Elsewhere on the web today...

• BoomGames has an interview with Robert Krakoff to discuss the future of the Razer mouse.
• Digit-Life has posted its 12x DVD-ROM drives roundup.
• Overclockers Online takes a look at the Shuttle SV24 Barebone System in their latest review.
• TweakTown has a new Windows XP Tweaking Guide.
• PC Hardware posted a review of the Abit TH7II-RAID motherboard.