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Sunday, September 11, 2005

Show #178

I’ll be live from Alhambra on Saturday, 9/17 during the LA Department of Public Works E-Waste Roundup. Join me as I do the radio show from 11a-2p. Details at 888CleanLA.com.

Tech News

I talked a little about how Google is planning to use what they know about you to make advertising work better for both companies and customers. They must be doing something right. The Google founders have purchased their own personal 767.

11a-Noon

Morty in Hermosa Beach - XP won’t run

He was reinstalling and the install failed. I think your only option at this point is to format and install.

Dennis In Marina Del Rey-Morty’s Problem

Morty in Hermosa Beach was having problems when re-installed Windows XP. If he starts over he will loose the programs that he wants to keep. I would go and purchase an additional hard drive which are very inexpensive. Check Best Buy—some 200Ghz disk are $49 after rebates. Then make the new drive the master and the existing drive the slave. Install XP on the master drive and he will be able to not only access the programs on the existing drive, but he will be able to access the data on the slave drive and have the benefit of additional storage for files or back up.

Bob in Oceanside - DVD Decrypter and DVD Shrink only run once

DVDFabDecrypter works though. It seems like a good replacement.

Nik from Australia writes: On last weeks Diggnation Kevin and Alex talked about I know it is spyware free certified by a couple of services, so it’s worth a look. Also I remember a caller on Call For Help said that the Interactal software thats on some DVD’s will mess with settings on some other DVD programs, mainly ones the MPAA dosnt like, so make shaw thats not installed on your system.

Gunnar in Edmond, OK - wireless connection keeps dropping

Disable the Wireless Zero Config service by right-clicking My Computer, selecting Manage, clicking the Services section and scrolling down to Wireles Zero Config. Double-click it then set the Startup to Manual.

Ricky - Removed Aurora but still gets error

He deleted nail.exe but keeps getting a warning that nail.exe can’t be started. That means nail was removed but not the registry entry that starts it. Fix this by clicking Start→Run and entering msconfig then hitting OK. Look for the startup item that starts nail.exe and disable it.

Or follow these manual removal instructions from Symantec.

Listener Mort writes: Ricky, The information below is based on my first hand experience with the NASTY Aurora infection. These SLIMES that inserted Aurora in you computer are part of a sleazy company ABi MArketing, which in turn is part a deceitful company Direct Revenue in NY.
When I first encountered Aurora, I found out that their support comes the MYPCTUNEUP.COM which is another bunch of liars. According to MYPCTUNEUP, you can not remove Aurora manually. They create random hidden files in you computer and registry. The major offending file is NAIL.EXE. If you remove it, it will re-install itself the next time you reboot. The slimes at MYPCTUNEUP informed me that they have a special removal program that did not work. Following that, they offered another DEBUG program that also did not work. According to some information on the internet, even their removal programs does insert more spyware in you computer. These people are plain NASTY.
To remove the nail.exe program you need a program called nailfix.
Go to http//forums.maddoktor2.com/index.php?showtopic=5104 and www.spyany.com/program/article_adw_rm_ABetterUnternet.html for more details.
Most anti-spyware programs do not touch Aurora. It is worst than cancer!!!!
It took me many hours to finaly get rid of Aurora.
Once it was done, I wrote a letter to the NY Attorney General and requested that he pursue look into possible legal action against the SLIMES direct revenue AKA abetterinternet AKA mypctuneup AKA abi network. All these AKA clearly show that these people are nasty, corrupt, dishonest, deceitful SLIMES.
I Will be more than happy to forward you a copy of my letter to the Attorney General. His name is Eliot Spitzer. If he receives lots of complaints, he may act and put these SLIMES out of business. They do not deserve being in business. The head SLIME at direct marketing is J.P. Maheu and he is the CEO.

I hope this helps.

Mort

Ricky,
I am sorry but I did not provide you with my address.
If you wish to contact me, I am marditti60@hotmail.com
Sorry for my goof.
Mort

Noon-1p

Guillermo from Phoenix, AZ - SCSI drives won’t work unless I reboot

That’s right. Unlike Firewire and USB, SCSI drives must be started before boot.

grant in Hollywood adds This is not always true. I hot plug SCSI and FibreChannel drives all the time on IRIX systems. Back in the dark ages you’d have to reboot to update the hardware inventory, and run MAKEDEV to build devices. Now you reset the bus, then rebuild the hardware tree, takes less than a minute. I sure wish the mac & wintel machines had a provision for this, it just doesn’t seem like it’s been a priority. Somehow everybody figured out how to do this with USB and FireWire, why not SCSI too?

Max in Myrtle Beach, SC - Mac to Windows video chat

I recommend iVisit for cross platform video chats. You will have to open ports on your routers to make this (or other video chat programs) work. iVisit describes the relevant ports here.

Elizabeth from Studio City - my Mac spins up really loudly then shuts down

It’s overheating. Check to make sure the fans are working and that the heat sinks are properly installed. This is probably one for the Apple Store.

Her boyfriend is a movie director and MPAA member and he’s frustrated by the MPAA’s anti-copying stance. Corey Doctorow has written an excellent essay on why DVD copy protection is bad for everyone. Read All Complex Ecosystems Have Parasites.

Battlestar Jeff from San Francisco - deleting temp files on Palm

How do you do it?

quantumBlog in Santa Barbara, CA adds: For my aging Sony Clie SJ-22, I use FileZ. It does a really great job and it’s free!

Lee in San Diego - what is bittorrent

Wikipedia has a great article about bittorrent. I recommend the Azureus client for Mac and Windows. To get a bittorrent file you need to download a small .torrent file. For instance, the torrent file for my latest this WEEK in TECH podcast is TWiT0021H.mp3.torrent. Download that small file then open it with Azureus. Azureus will do the rest.

owine adds: Kevin Rose’s revision3 has a good page about BitTorrent and their usage for their IPTV shows, podcasts and now TWiT video. Find it here

Jerry in LA - reinstalling Windows 98 SE

It’s safe to do so on top of an existing install - it won’t erase a thing.

Josh in St. Charles IL - installing XP Windows Media Center

He ran the installer but it just installed XP - it never asked for the second disc. Whatsa matta?

Someone in chat said the installer checks for hardware requirements, and skips the Media Center install if the machine doesn’t meet the requirements.

1–2p

Phil in Redwood City - How do I clear the recent fonts menu in Office 2003

This list, while not having a direct link to clearing the fonts, may be a good start for clearing the Most Recently Used list in Outlook.

Try this link for 2003 http://support.microsoft.com/kb/820917/ —or— for Word 97 http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=181471 search “font”, This will require editing the Registry! Be Careful!!

Don in Yacaipa - how do I convert the camcorder DVDs to normal DVDs

1. Rip the DVDs to VOB files
2. Convert the VOBs to AVI files
3. Combine the clips in a video editng program (I recommend Adobe Premiere Elements)
4. Save as MPG2 then burn to DVD

Nik from Australia writes: If your version of Nero 6.6 came with Nero Vision you should try that before Adobe Elements, Nero Vision is not as powerfull, but dose basic ripping and combining videos.

Thanks Nik. I used Nero Vision and it worked. Thanks again. Don in Yucaipa

James from Texas writes: Cyberlink PowerDirector will import VOB files for combining and editing and it should also have most of the features that Adobe Premiere Elements has.

Leanne in San Clemente - Sony Ericsson 710 as a camera

It’s 1.3 megapixel camera - which is as good as they get in the US. I think it’s very nice and definitely the best camera phone currently available from Cingular. Engadget has a good review.

Your recommendations for other good camera phones?

Kyle in Michigan - doesn’t see monitor until Windows starts

He has a video card that supports two monitors. When he starts up the computer is putting the video out to the first connector. Once Windows starts up it’s smart enough to send video the the second connector. To fix this just put the monitor on the other connector.

Robert from Glendale writes: The problem may occur on either DVI port. I think that the problem is related to the monitor not syncing to the video signal over DVI. I run into this problem a lot on various LCDs that are connected by DVI. When the video card sends a low res. signal (640×480) to the lcd over DVI, many LCDs have trouble syncing to the signal. The fact that you finally do see a screen after windows has completed loading indicates that the windows video driver is sending a “good” signal that the monitor can sync up to. One workaround is to press F1 or whatever you need to press to enter the bios (even though you can’t see the bios screen) and then turn the lcd off wait a few seconds and turn it back on, you should see your bios screen. Another thing to try is if your LCD has different inputs (DVI, VGA, S video) cycle through the inputs and go back to the DVI input. finally, if your lcd has a vga input you will be able to see the bios screen using a vga cable. all of my dell lcds have this issue with the bios screen not showing over DVI.

Bruce in San Diego - protecting my files while I’m on vacation

He has house sitters and he wants them to have Internet access while he’s gone. Just password protect your XP account and create another account for the house sitters. You may have to re-install the DSL dialer software from that new account, however.

Christian in Washington DC - Safari vs Shiira security

They both use the Apple Webkit so they’re equally secure (or insecure). As long as you apply patches offered by Apple through software update you should be fine. Firefox and Camino are secure, too, but you have to make sure they’re updated independently of Apple’s Software Update.

Joel in Northridge - my signmaking program is crashing

They deny responsibility - but it’s their program so it’s clearly their issue. They need to work with you to resolve the problem.

Chat Logs and Show Audio