National Semiconductor on Tuesday reported net income of $34 million for the quarter ended Nov. 23, compared to earnings of $90.6 million a year earlier. The company forecast a 30 percent drop in revenue for the current quarter.

Hard-disk maker Seagate Technology said Wednesday it expects revenue for the current quarter to be in the range of $2.3 billion to $2.6 billion, down from previous expectations of $2.85 billion to $3.05 billion.

In the networking arena, optical technology maker Ciena on Thursday said it suffered a loss of $25.4 million for the period ended Oct. 31, compared with year-earlier net income of $30.4 million, as customers delayed orders. The company forecast current-quarter sales to be $170 million to $185 million, below the $190 million consensus estimate of analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters.

Meanwhile, fresh data appear to back up President-elect Barack Obama's belief, reiterated this week, that "things will get worse before they get better" for the U.S. economy. The four-week average of new claims for jobless benefits reached a nearly 26-year high, rising 14,250 to 540,500 for the period ending Dec. 6, the Labor Department said Thursday.

If the macro economy gets much worse, hopes for even a weak IT recovery in 2009 will fade.