AvantGo today announced that it has secured third round equity investments totaling $14.7 million from Microsoft and 3Com, investment management firm Fayez Sarofim & Co., which led the round, and venture capital firms 21st Century Internet Venture Partners, H&Q Venture Associates and Adobe Ventures. The company also announced that Gregory Waldorf was selected by the new investors to serve on AvantGo’s Board of Directors, effective immediately.

In this editor’s opinion, one of the most crass efforts to sucker consumers was the DIVX format. This format was designed to allow a DVD-like disk to be viewed once or twice, and then the disk would cease functioning. The reasons why this format is horrid are all over the net, but the good news (except for those poor consumers who bought the extra-priced DIVX players and disks) is that DIVX has ceased operations, something your editor considered inevitable. Finally, the DVD standard can move on without division and maybe we’ll finally get Star Wars, Raiders, and Jurassic Park on DVD. And if you haven’t looked into DVD, you should. It’s amazingly cool. — DG

It seems that Franklin’s Rex personal digital assistant is not living up to the hype when it debuted two years ago. News.com has an article on the reasons why.

Yesterday, we reported a story on Compaq’s Itsy, a handheld device based on Linux. Here’s a link to Compaq’s Itsy Project page for more information.

IBM announced today it has started shipping the IBM 340 megabyte (MB) microdrive to its initial key customers. The manufacturer’s suggested retail price of the microdrive kit, including a 340 MB microdrive, PC Card adapter and field case, is $499 (U.S.). IBM microdrives will be available in Japan and the U.S. in retail stores by early summer.

Palmtop Publishing announced the availability of a Windows CE-based pocket trade show guide for PC Expo, held June 21-24 at the Jacob K. Javitz Convention Center in New York City. This guide directs PC Expo showgoers with an illustrated and in-hand, pocket reference featuring over 450 exhibitors and booth locations, keynotes, and daily track session detail for enterprise, internet/intranet, technology management, networking, PC and server technology. This interactive pocket guide even provides key tutorial information, including session moderators, and panelists.

In this editor’s opinion, one of the most crass efforts to sucker consumers was the DIVX format. This format was designed to allow a DVD-like disk to be viewed once or twice, and then the disk would cease functioning. The reasons why this format is horrid are all over the net, but the good news (except for those poor consumers who bought the extra-priced DIVX players and disks) is that DIVX has ceased operations, something your editor considered inevitable. Finally, the DVD standard can move on without division and maybe we’ll finally get Star Wars, Raiders, and Jurassic Park on DVD. And if you haven’t looked into DVD, you should. It’s amazingly cool. — DG

It seems that Franklin’s Rex personal digital assistant is not living up to the hype when it debuted two years ago. News.com has an article on the reasons why.

Yesterday, we reported a story on Compaq’s Itsy, a handheld device based on Linux. Here’s a link to Compaq’s Itsy Project page for more information.

Tescina announces DataGet, which allows Palm computer users to collect data. To start collecting data, users plug a Mitutoyo compatible gauge into DataGet port and plug DataGet port into a Palm computer. DataGet is available for $149.