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Saturday, October 1, 2005

Tech News

I think this is a significant breakthrough in bringing wireless Internet to every citizen. Google is offering free Wi-Fi to the entire city of San Francisco. The speculation is that this is a pilot for a nationwide effort down the road.

Bad news for Microsoft. The USPTO rules in favor of Eolas. That means some of the most powerful features of Internet Explorer will have to be removed.

Microsoft has unaccountably gone against HP, Dell, Apple, and the rest of the computer industry by supporting HD-DVD over BluRay. The HiDef DVD wars are escalating. Consumers will have to choose from two different, and incompatible formats when the players come out next year.

Apple has agreed to replace damaged screens on the new Nano.

11a-Noon

Scott on the 405 - Component HD to laptop display

He’s shooting HD video from a helicopter and wants to take the component output of his Sony HD camera and display the video on his PC notebook. I don’t know if there are PC card that will do this, but I’m sure there are Firewire A/D converters that will. Suggestions?

I’m trying to minimize the weight and # of components I bring in teh chopper. There are lots of converters…. I am looking for a laptop that would let me use it’s beautiful monitor as a monitor… Via video in. The camera outputs HDSDI (it’s a $500,000 camera system) I don;t want to have to bring a monitor and a laptop.

Woden adds: found this DV Converter that looks like it might work.

Vest adds: Try Laird Telemedia Inertia, has component inputs and firewire out. www.markertek.com

Surge adds: If he is still using an old analog HDF camera then he needs … 1.http://www.aja.com/hdp.htm
2. he needs a real-time encoder for h264/3 or vc1 or mpeg2…but there are none for laptops (least never seen one) mainly rackmount…if it’s a digital hdtv camera all he needs is an encoder (but like i said never seen a portable one)

John in Santa Monica - removing keystroke loggers

ZoneAlarm Firewall detected keystroke loggers - how do I get rid of them. The key is to get the name of the logger. Once you do you can search Google for manual removal techniques. Using Hijack This will help you see all the processes running on your computer. You can submit the Hijack This log to the experts on sites like www.spywareinfo.com for analysis. Read Tom Coyote’s Hijack This quick start guide for details.

Marty - WI Tech Guy adds: Zone Alarm/Zone Labs is using a bad keystroke logger alert message feature.

These alerts will pop up Anytime it detects keystroke being logged even by a Safe program such as your email program or even a word processing program. So Zone Labs needs to update & fix these needless alerts as your computer is still 100% safe 3/4 of the time when these alerts pop up.

The Best thing to do when seeing these alerts is to click the More Info button on the alert to see where this alert was detected from. If it’s a common program you know is safe click the “Remember This Setting” on the alert & pick Allow or Block. Then you will not need to deal with this alert again.

Chris adds: www.hijackthis.de allows you to paste the Hijack This log, and automatically shows you good and bad processes based on user opinions.

Bill in Nevada: I had the same problem with zonealarm reporting a blocked program everytime I hit a mouse button. After upgrading to the latest version of zonealarm, the problem disappeared.

Mark in Maryland - do it yourself Internet TV

I could write a book on this. The first choice you have to make is do you want it to be live streaming or downloadable video. It’s much cheaper to do downloadable video. Because you pay for peak bandwidth demand asking everyone to watch at the same time is a recipe for disaster. On the other hand if it’s downloadable you spread the demand out and it costs less.

The next choice you have to make is how to compress the video. There are many choices here. Windows Media is the most compatible, but I don’t like the size/quality ratio. I far prefer the new H.264 codec, but it’s currently only supported by Apple’s Quicktime 7. However it offers amazing quality at very low file sizes, and it’s an open standard which will become very common in the next few months.

Oscar Adds:

Other H.264/AVC encoders/decoders

- Quicktime 7 Pro (Mac & PC)
Apple’s Quicktime 7 for the PC is now released and is included in the iTunes 5 install for Windows so you may already have it if you have the new iTunes. If you get the QT7 Pro version you can also encode video as well as decode. This is the easiest way Mac or PC to get AVC files but offers no builtin support for the Sony PSP variety of AVC. I use both but my PC is faster than my Mac so I tend to use it instead. Your mileage may vary.

- Nero Recode (PC)
Ahead Software makes a program called Nero Recode (part of the popular Nero package of tools) that can turn your WMV (Windows Media Video), MPEG2 and non-commercial/home DVD’s and turn them into MPEG4 or AVC. They have predefined output profiles for the Sony PSP as well as Mobile/portable and Cinema use and you can target a specific output size or an averate bit rate. The package has a lot of options and the full Nero package in general suffers from bloat but you can just buy Nero Recode and get just the tools you want. You may already have the free OEM package (it comes bundled with many DVD drives and new computers) but that does NOT include Recode. You can get a free 30 day trial from their website. The AVC encoder is widely held to be an excellent and compliant implementation of AVC. I use it but I am not otherwise affiliated with Nero.

- VLC Player (PC/Mac/Linux)
This is a free cross-platform player/encoder that uses open-source codec’s (i.e. it does NOT use the O/S codecs on Windows/Mac) in order to playback many different video file types including AVC. You can also use this program to transcode/transrate any video file type to any other video file type. This is a very flexible tool and is designed to do many things including unicast/multicast video across a network. Definitely worth a look. Not for the beginner due to the overwhelming amount of options and the trial and error required.

So if you want to go with H.264/AVC there are many options for encoding/decoding available to you on your platform of choice.

Noon-1p

Trisha in Santa Barbara - installing an anti-virus

It’s a good idea to fully uninstall the old AV first. If you’re worried about infection disconnect from the Internet, but if you have a firewall running it’s not necessary.

Bill in Laguna Beach - spyware infestation

His friend has a PIII with XP and it’s so infested with spyware he can’t boot anymore. If you have to get data off, put the drive in another machine as the secondary drive (don’t boot to it!) and copy off the data then format it and reinstall windows.

frankly I’d just buy her a Mac mini.

I would back up your friends data file, blast his hard drive, reinstall windows xp, download spybot search and destroy. You can get it from http://www.freewarehome.com and download AVGfree from that same sight. Spy bot has a feature called tea timer that blocks spyware from installing itself on to the computer. I would install all the Windows XP service packs, and install Mozilla. It would be a good idea to also log in as administrator and this person access so they cant blow up their os. This is if you dont buy a MAC.

Danvilted comments about OS stability: Never had to reinstall W98SE, OSX 4 times!
Quasimoto comments Microsoft doesn’t support W98SE. Internet Explorer has swiss cheese security. Reinstalling OSX 4 times? On what, a 68K Mac? Doesn’t work on older machines so YMMV. There’s a reason you don’t see Mac folks crying to Leo. I run my G4 with Panther with NO antivirus for 2 years now. I don’t recommend average folks to do this, but I don’t dare try this with my XP machine, so I run all the spyware that Leo suggests…taking the space on the system tray. Real world experience is proof. I upgraded Jaguar to Panther: Open CD Tray, Insert Upgrade, Click Install, DONE.

Who’s “still” using Windows 98? Those who regret “upgrading” to XP.(Xtra Problems)That is why some IT departments haven’t upgraded. Its not worth the headaches. And why don’t IT folks use more Macs? Job security. Its like the Maytag repairman. Nothing is perfect, but there IS a reason for existence of sites like www.annoyances.org. Microsoft has just lowered the bar of expectations. Why people “accept” mediocrity in software is beyond me…Just ask a true Mac user. Not some PC guy who’s dinked around the Mac section in Fry’s for 1 hour. Use one for a week and you’ll understand.

Buy the Mac Mini and be done with it. Or get a used Mac that can run OSX if you don’t want to spend the $499. Used PCs are given away and not worth anything. My co-worker still uses a Bondi-blue G3 from 1999 for production.

I’m still running 98 on one machine using an IE shell with no resident A/V, antispyware, or any of those other scare-tactics programs and I have no problems with malware. Geez, the computer is friend’s and that neither person even asked for a new machine.

Qazwiz commented The lady had three operating systems so she could use extra disk space and almost all boxes are able to add a second drive with little trouble

therefore I suggest she buy an extra drive

quick answer install as primary (old drive as secondary) and reimage drive the old drive comes up as D:

  this install is a flip of a switch on each drive for parallel drives
  and even easier for serial ATA, just unplug old drive (put it in 
  the plug next to where you unplug) and plug in the new drive

you can access old data on the D: drive (don’t run ANYTHING on D: )
then, after all your data is transfered to C: RECHECK FIRST then reformat D:

I also suggest dividing the reformatted old drive into three boot sectors

the thing to remember is that the blue screen of death is, 99.999% of the time, a software problem(windows files are trashed) not a hardware problem (hard drive is trashed) so you data is likely 100% recoverable IF you take steps to recover (DO NOT REIMAGE UNTIL DATA HAS BEEN RECOVERED)

sorry for the yelling but this has happened “BY A so called TECH GUY”. this repairman was called because a system had gone down because the floppy drive hadn’t worked for months. I wanted to install a drive for them but they had the service contract. there was a third party program that needed to boot from floppy to access the data but the serviceman, who couldn’t understand the hard drive assumed it was dead but a dead drive won’t access at all so instead of inserting the disk that was in the dead floppy drive he reformatted the hard drive, erasing six months of data

the serviceman’s response to my expression of horror, “you got it backed up, Right?”, “No?” and “oh, you should have backed it up”

the backup gave a one line error message that was easily overlooked for months, the operating system was a DOS cutup that wasn’t telling DOS what was going on (just a readme.txt file might have stopped a stupid but curious repairman) the users didn’t give a simple error message the respect that it deserved or didn’t understand the importance of regular and SUCCESSFUL back-ups. the serviceman wasn’t curious enough to boot a disk labeled “Boot Disk” and the nonprofit institution didn’t have a defined set of procedures for verifying, reporting and fixing computer related problems.

(I also suspect, but cannot prove, there were under the table goings on between the institution big-wigs and service contract provider which is why I do not give any details here)(and you would know the provider, a national name, and other non-profits would know the institution since most non-profits have a copy of the current version of the data that was lost)

James in Tuscon AZ - securing truckstop Wi-Fi

Hot spots frequently are not secure. You need to use a VPN or SSL connection to keep snoops from snagging your email etc. Anonymizer does this. Or you can use a VPN service like www.publicvpn.com.

He’s also looking for a way to download TV shows. I recommend the free bittorrent client Azureus.

What sites do you use to get free TV (legal only please)?

Sumo adds:
Legal Torrents and
Revision 3 -Sysm, Broken, Diggnation

Ryan in Boring, OR - Installing Linux

He has downloaded an ISO file - you need a program like Nero to turn that disc image into a bootable install disc.

A listener recommends: A simple free burner called ISOBURN. I’ve used it many times with no problems.

ISO Recorder is a free Windows Shell extension. It can be used to burn ISO images to CDs and DVDs. It can also be used to create ISO images of CDs and DVDs. http://isorecorder.alexfeinman.com

1–2p

Don in Northridge - faxes aren’t reliable

Instead of using the fax modem I use www.efax.com. Any recommendations for other online fax services?

Marty - WI Tech Guy adds: www.FreeFax.com is currently in “BETA Form” so they do not suggest you rely on FreeFax.com at this time as they are still working on this service. They also do not guarante delivery of your fax so FreeFax does not sound like the best choice for efaxing completely.

Tony in Upland - Backdoor.Trojan

Norton reports he has a generic Trojan. That’s not very helpful. Without a name there’s not much you can do. I’d get a few more opinions. Here are three good online scanners. See what they say.

• F-Secure
• Trend Micro’s Housecall
• Panda’s ActiveScan

If you can get the actual name of the Trojan you can search Google or www.sarc.com for a fix.
Scott Adds: Try updating your antivirus virus defintions, sometimes it can get a more specific handle on what virus it might be.

Bill in Helena, AL - iMac hard drive died

He still has his music on the iPod but how does he get it off? I recommend Rob’s iPod Exporter.

JHKilroy adds: There is also Senuti that can reverse pull Senuti.

David adds: There’s a program called Disk Warrior - probably can fix the HDD…

Jack in Ontario - Internet access in the car

If you drive mostly in the southern California area I highly recommend Verizon Wireless $60/month EVDO broadband access. It works great.

Rod in Santa Ana - His firewall tells him kernel32.dll is trying to access the Internet

Probably nothing to worry about. Make sure you have good anti-spyware and anti-virus software running. Often Windows processes are identified as the originator of Internet access requests. Click the “more information” link in your firewall to learn more about the process.

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