Philips has updated its website by adding a new user-friendly section dedicated to the firmware of its optical disc drives.

Illegal copying of music, movies and other goods by Chinese product pirates is rising despite official promises to stamp it out, U.S. authorities said Monday, calling for stronger enforcement of intellectual-property laws.

Press Release: FrozenTech, a company dedicated to providing Linux LiveCDs, has introduced a new product – the ISO Loaded Hard Drive (ILHD). FrozenTech's ILHD immediately adds 246 Gigabytes of open source operating systems to any collection by distributing open source ISO files on consumer hard drives.

Malaysia's government has been accused of failing to act on evidence that licensed CD factories are producing pirated music, films and software.

Search engine contender Microsoft has retaliated to ambitious Google plans by striking a deal with the British Library to digitise 100,000 of its books.

Makers of DVD set-top boxes, in light of market saturation for entry-level DVD players and a much smaller than originally expected demand for DVD recorders, are trying to create a new market niche by offering DVD players equipped with additional functions like MPEG4-support, karaoke, and hard disk drives (HDDs), according to industry sources.

After facing a chorus of criticism from computer enthusiasts, Sony BMG has released a software patch that removes controversial cloaking technology found in copy protection software the company has been shipping with some of its CDs.

Hollywood has unveiled a powerful new technology which it hopes will help kill the pirating of movies. The system relies on sound – not vision – and was unveiled at a conference held by the international DVD Forum in Paris, France last week.

Press Release: Nero 7 Premium is finally available online. Nero released trial versions of its new multimedia software platform. The downloadable files are fully-functional until their expiry date.

Sysinternals' Mark Russinovich has performed an analysis of the copy restriction measures deployed by Sony Music on its latest CDs: which he bluntly calls a 'root kit'. Using conventional tools to remove Sony's digital media malware will leave ordinary users with a dead Windows box.

Japan's chief of Xbox operations, Yoshihiro Maruyama, has confirmed that while a HD-DVD version of the Xbox 360 console is a possibility, the next-generation DVD standard will never be used for games on the platform.

Software giant and music industry friend Microsoft was dragged squeaking before a court and accused of music piracy.

Sony have announced the forthcoming release of its DRX-810UL/T, an external double and dual-layer DVD burner that features both FireWire and USB 2.0 interfaces. The new drive will be available in November for 'less than US$150 (£85)'.

Although no deal has been signed BT wants Philips to make the set-top box which will include an 80-hour disc-based video recorder. The world's favourite telco has already signed up Microsoft's IPTV for the user interface.

Apple has finally coughed to the existence of a glitch numerous PowerBook G4 owners have been pointing out for months. Says a recently published Apple Knowledge Base entry: "Some earlier PowerBook G4 computers that have a SuperDrive with a 2x [sic] DVD-R write speed may not be able to burn 8x DVD-R media reliably. Because of this, you should only use 2x or 4x DVD-R media."

Following on from its merger with Telewest a few weeks back, UK cable company NTL is finally starting to rev up for its upcoming battle with Sky in the HDTV and personal video recorder markets. On Saturday the company announced details of its soon-to-be launched personal video recorder the Explorer 8450DVB.

Prodisc Technology, a leading producer of optical discs in Taiwan, will float up to 606 million new shares to be issued in installments over a year to raise additional capital from target investors, according to a decision made by the company's board of directors on October 21.

Press Release: Alera's new media destruction device cross cuts DVDs, CDs, Credit Cards, and ATM Cards into small unusable bits, preventing unauthorized use.

The latest review from our very own DVD jedi Flash leaves the 16x market temporarily to focus on two high-quality Dual Layer DVD+R discs - the Datawrite Titanium & the RiDisc Xtreme. You can read his review here.

Resident DVD genius Flash has an on-going campaign to find the best discs in the 16x market. In this review he compares Datasafe Premium vs Datawrite Optima Blue. Without wishing to let the cat out of the bag, it's notable that Flash says "The Datasafe ratings are all above 90% which can only be described as Superb" and that "I do not hesitate to recommend either of these discs". You can read the full review here.