Stories by Jeff Bertolucci

Today's hot Apple rumor suggests an iPhone 3GS 8GB may be on the way. The Boy Genius Report has screen grabs that purportedly show one or more documents from Canadian wireless provider Rogers. In what appears to be an internal memo, Rogers says it's "transitioning" to an as-of-yet unannounced 8-gig iPhone 3GS handset, and that it's reducing inventory of the older 3G model.

It's pretty much a given that solid state drives (SSDs) are the future of PC storage, and that hard drives are on the way out. But if you're buying a laptop today, which option is best?

If Apple doesn't introduce a tablet computer soon, we'll all be sorely disappointed. With all the ongoing speculation about the alleged iPod-on-steroids, I feel like the device is already here.

Apple iPods have overheated and burst into flames and smoke on a number of occasions, causing both injuries and property damage. And Apple has fought to keep federal government reports of these incidents from becoming public, according to a Seattle TV station.

The computer or smartphone you're using now, do you know who made it? Where it was made? Never mind the logo or brand on the case. It won't tell you much.

Microsoft's profits are seriously down, and you don't have to be Warren Buffet to figure out why.

The latest iTunes update, version 8.2.1, may offer up a few bug fixes, but its real purpose is to prevent the Palm Pre from syncing with iTunes. The move isn't a surprise. Last month, Apple warned that future versions of iTunes probably wouldn't support syncing with non-Apple media players. Today, Tom Neumayr, an Apple spokeson, reinforced that position:

It's no secret that iTunes' App Store has proven wildly successful--so much so that Apple's smartphone competitors are scrambling to duplicate the concept. But just to drive the point home, Apple today announced that its customers have downloaded more than 1.5 billion applications since the App Store opened one year ago.

Attorneys for Jammie Thomas-Rasset, a Minnesota mother of four slapped with a $1.92 million fine by a federal jury last month for illegally downloading 24 songs, have filed a request for a new trial.

Time is never kind to paper manuscripts, particular those written more than 1600 years ago. Some 800 pages remain of the Codex Sinaiticus, a version of the Christian Bible written in the fourth century, and the original text is thought to be nearly twice as long. Historians believe the book may be world's oldest Christian Bible.

It's always fun to speculate about what Apple has up its sleeve, and one way to get the rumors flying is to uncover Cupertino's latest patent applications. MacRumors has done just that, and the paperwork shows Apple has its eye on some intriguing technologies that may find their way into future iPhones and iPods.

Previous attempts to create a mass-market satellite phone may have failed miserably--just ask the backers of Globalstar, Iridium, and Odyssey--but a Virginia-based satellite firm believes it has a better solution that just may work this time.

Calling The Pirate Bay's owners "sellouts" who made a "deal with the devil," users of the notorious torrent-tracking site expressed their frustrations across the Internet today.

Not all Microsoft customers are cheering the just-announced Windows 7 pricing that puts the cost of an upgrade at as little as US$50.

Humans may excel at pattern recognition, but computers aren't very smart at identifying images. Our brains can immediately identify photos of famous landmarks such as the Statue of Liberty or Great Wall of China, but computers are typically clueless without text tags as a cheat sheet.