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Saturday 28 April 2007

Tech News

Guests:

Hour 1: Scott Wilkinson of The Perfect Vision Magazine on Home Theater - LcOS TVs

• No screen door effect
• LcOS transistors are not in the way of the light
• JVC has their version of LcOS called HDILA: Wikipedia
• Sony has their version called LcOS: SXRD
• Memorex and Akai are ordering single-chip LcOS chips
• Managed to get to 1920×1080p resolution before other technologies

Hour 2: Rick “Dr. Web” Alber on Web 2.0 Nostalgia

• Windows front-end for Flickr
• Built on Windows Presentation Foundation
  • Not for OSX
• Will synchronize folder with Flickr
• Similar to Picasa
• Developer, Thirteen23 provides front-end applications to various web services
  • Program Denounce is a podcast player and blog reader

Hour 3: Paul Thurrott with a Vista tip and Steve Gibson on Security - http://

• No need to type http://
• Web browsers automatically put it in
• Humans not supposed to see that
• Just for user’s computer
• Stuck with it forever

Hour 3: Paul Thurott - Save Searches

• Alt+f opens up hidden menu
• Option to “save search” to come back to recent searches
  • Can save anywhere you want
• Constantly updating
  • Like smart folders

Hour 1

Q Mariana - Windows “hourglass” constantly slowing the computer in Word

• Maybe autosave is turned on and is running too often

Q Free TiVo

• MythTV is a Linux distribution
  • Try Knoppmyth
  • Can burn recorded content to DVD
• For Windows, try out SageTV
• Both services get TV listings from the Internet
• Can also get a Panasonic DVD recorder

Q Mark from Tustin - Printing more than one picture

• Try emptying print queue
  • Seems like a problem with the print spooler
• Try a different program

Q Carl - Sony Reader screen not protected

• Screen broke
• Not covered under warranty
  • Only 90 day warranty
• Sony is not known for its support

Hour 2

Q Speranza - Can’t play certain things in FireFox

• For YouTube, you need to install Flash
  • Go to flash.com within Firefox
• In terms of security, once you’ve been infected, you’re never sure you can be safe again
  • A better antivirus than Norton would be our advertiser, NOD32
  • AVG Free, Antivir, and ClamAV are free solutions
• The Windows firewall is sufficient with a router
• Windows Defender is Microsoft’s anti-spyware program
• Take a look at Leo’s Six Rules for Safe Computing

Q Christopher from Rosemund - Laptop computers in college

• Laptop computer have numerous advantages for college
• A computer is a must for college

Q Sydney from Costa Mesa - PDAs

• PDAs are a dying breed
• Phones are getting smarter
• Can get a UMPC, like the Sony UX series
• Or a Nokia Internet tablet

Q Anti-rootkits

• Victim of identity theft
• Computer is not the main source of identity theft still
• Try out the 3 main rootkit removers
  • Rootkit Revealer, AVG Anti-Rootkit, and Frisk
• In London, hackers would drop USB keys in parking lots with malware preloaded in order to infect unsuspecting souls

Hour 3

Q Cannot use Remote Desktop dialer after removing malware

• Malware often infects the winsock dialer file
• Reinstalling Windows is the only way to fix this
  • You need to format and then install
• Opportunity to back up

Q Camera that will datestamp pictures

• Some cameras disable digital zoom with datestamping
• Don’t want to use digital zoom anyways

Q Dell laptops

• Wants to upgrade the laptop
• Get up to 1gb of RAM
• See how hard it is to upgrade the hard drive
  • Harder on some laptops than others
• XP should have 1gb of RAM and Vista 2gb
• Hard drive MUCH slower than RAM

Q Rob - Xbox 360 or PS3 on a standard TV

• Still will look better
• Wii is more of a social gaming system
• In the long run, you will see fewer games for the previous generation
• Xbox 360 still looks great on SDTV

Q Mary from Inyokern, CA - Web designer for a dog shelter site

• Can spend a lot of money and get a cruddy site
• Several great designers
• Look at a community college for some student willing to help out