The Oakland Tribune

"At a certain point, Microsoft had to make a decision on where to place its bets, and it's placed its bets on Xbox," Brett Sappington, director of research at consulting firm Parks Associates, told the Mercury News on Monday.

That bet could be supported by another Silicon Valley company, according to a Monday report. Bloomberg News reported that Microsoft will use an Advanced Micro Devices processor in the new Xbox, which is expected to debut in the next two months.

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Kurt Scherf, an analyst with Parks Associates, said he used Support.com when his computer started acting funny while he was in France.

"I noticed my computer was getting buggy, and I had an agent online for hours. In the end, it was my hard drive that was failing. There was nothing he could do about that." Scherf said the services have great potential for small businesses and people who work at home. But studies have shown that a typical customer is "the stressed out 25-45-y ...read more