Hewlett-Packard Chief Executive Mark Hurd may have known as early as in July 2005 the company was looking into private phone records as part of its leak investigation, The Wall Street Journal reported in its online edition on Monday.

  Chicago (IL) - HP's recent purchase of boutique PC builder VoodooPC has taken many by surprise. HP's PC division and Voodoo couldn't be more different and couldn't be less complementary. TG Daily talked to Voodoo's founders, HP and other custom PC builders to find out more - and found that HP has bought itself a Formula 1 team, that could lead the way to an immense payoff.

AMD today said that it was received clearance from Taiwan's Fair Trade Commission of Taiwan to acquire graphics chip maker ATI. The acquisition still remains subject to the approval of ATI shareholders, court approval of the plan of arrangement, approval by the Minister of Industry under the Investment Canada Act and other customary closing conditions. AMD expects to finalize the deal within this month.

The included encryption and handwriting features in the upcoming Windows Vista operating system are giving European antitrust officials in Brussels some heartburn. Several small European software vendors believe the features could give Microsoft a monopoly and render their products uncompetitive.

Toshiba today said that it has shipped more than one million perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR) HDDs since June 2005, more than 40 million Ipod-sized 1.8" hard disk drives over the past six years as well as more than four million 2.5" drives for automobiles.

Electronic Arts today announced a deal to acquire game developer Digital Illusions CE. Effective immediately, the acuisition brings the creators of the Battlefield series under full ownership of EA.

San Diego (CA) - The anticipated showdown between Macbook Wi-Fi hackers and Apple has failed to materialize. David Maynor and Johnny "Cache" Ellch cancelled their scheduled talk at the Toorcon computer security convention in San Diego. The pairs was supposed to fully demonstrate the hack, but Maynor didn't take the flight to San Diego, while Ellch just gave a brief statement to convention attendees.

Yahoo said it has struck a deal with Hewlett-Packard to plant its Internet search engine on millions of computers, the latest volley in a high-stakes battle with Google Inc. and Microsoft.

Microsoft will likely lose money on its new music player, Zune, against Apple Computer Inc.'s "industry-leading iPod profitability," an American Technology Research analyst said Friday.

Symantec has warned that users of Microsoft's new Vista operating system could find their options for running anti-virus style software seriously reduced.

Partly on the basis that the quietest guy in the room is often the most interesting, a cottage industry has grown up seeking the low-down and scoopy on that most secretive of organisations, Apple Computer.

A holiday shopping forecast predicted by The Performics 50, a self-titled representative index of online search advertising, states that fourth quarter 2006 online sales will eclipse those of last year by more than 50%.

Apple Computer will focus its new video Ipod orders at Inventec rather than distributing to both Inventec and Quanta Computer, according to component makers cited in a Chinese-language Commercial Times report.

Shipments to the digital-camera and webcam segments are driving growth for IC designers, such as Syntek Semiconductor, Sunplus Technology, Ali, and Sonix Technology, according to market sources.

To stem the losses at its mobile operations, BenQ's board of directors agreed to discontinue injecting capital into BenQ Mobile.

Palo Alto (CA) - Hewlett-Packard is buying its way into the high-end PC market: Rather than establishing its own brand, the company decided to swallow VoodooPC, one of the larger enthusiast PC brands in the U.S. The deal comes about half a year after Dell's acquisition of Alienware.

Founder Technology, China's second largest PC provider and the seventh largest desktop PC company worldwide, today said that it will begin offering AMD-based desktop systems in early October.

In a testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, Hewlett-Packard chief executive officer Mark Hurd said that HP's " adherence to standards of ethics, privacy and corporate responsibility" were "were disregarded by people inside the company and by people outside the company whom [HP] hired." According to Hurd, the people investigating the board leaks to media "became so focused on finding the source of the leaks that they lost sight of the privacy of reporters and others."

PayPal has agreed to settle on claims brought forth by more than half of the states in the U.S. The online payment site also announced that it has reached a settlement in a class action lawsuit filed last year.