Brand: MacNews

MacMinute’s Executive Briefing for September 22 — a recap of all the news we have posted over the past week — is now available. If you think you may have missed something, here is your chance to catch up…

Hotline Communications, creators of the popular and sometimes controversial file server network, has reportedly ceased operations. “At noon today Hotline CEO Jack Kay announced, ‘Thats it folks. We’re out of money.’ A beta release of HL 2.0 may still come out, but lets not hold our breath here. The hotline network will still exist as long as people still use the software. at least now you wont have to put up with banners 😉 So there you go. HL communications is basically gone.

Microsoft today announced that it will be delaying the launch of Xbox, its foray into the console gaming world, by one week. The company said the system will now ship on November 15, although company reps refused to comment on the number of units that would available at the time. Microsoft originally intended to ship 600,000 to 800,000 systems on launch day, but retailers are saying they expect that figure to be halved.

Apple’s next-generation Power Mac systems, expected to be announced at Macworld San Francisco in January 2002, will sport both 1394b (FireWire 2.0) and USB 2.0 connectivity, according to an article at The Register. Register sources also say that Apple is expecting to ship the systems at 1GHz+ speeds with PowerPC G5 chips, although it could bump that down to 1GHz+ PowerPC G4 processors if production of the G5 is not sufficient at that time.

Firewire Direct today introduced its new Spark II Pro 2.5″ external FireWire/USB 2.0 combo hard drive. The drive features the Oxford 911 FireWire bridge chipset, delivering significant performance increases over the original Spark, and is available in three capacities: 10GB (US$219), 20GB ($279), and 30GB ($389). The enclosure is also available on its own for $139.