For more Leo and friends all week long, listen to the TWiT Netcast Network

Sunday, October 10, 2004

Show #82

Once again, I’ll be keeping the lines open after 3p today. We’re taping ahead and I need your help! Call in 1–800–520–1KFI from 3–4p today after I get off the air. I’ll be answering calls until around 4:30pm.

In the 1p hour today, Robin Liss, of Camcorderinfo stops by to talk about the latest camcorders, including Sony’s new HD camera.

 toc | toc 

Today’s news items

Microsoft has released a patch and a scan tool for TV Media, a piece of spyware that was causing Service Pack 2 to blue screen. Spyware seems to be the number one cause of SP-2 issues and Microsoft is recommending scanning for spyware before attempting the upgrade.

Microsoft also warned webmasters this morning of a flaw in ASP.NET that could give attackers access to password protected areas of web sites. There is no fix as yet for the bug which affects 2.9 million active sites.

Netscape founder Marc Andreesen told the Web 2.0 conference yesterday that he expects Microsoft to take aim at Mozilla and Apple’s Safari real soon now. “If I were them I’d take another look, and I would see how I could screw with other people’s businesses with this monopoly (I) have,” he said.

Just when you thought the DVD camcorder was dead, Sony, Sharp, and Panasonic have announced they’ll offer camcorders with 15GB Blu-ray DVD recorders built-in some time next year. The cameras would likely be aimed at the HD prosumer crowd. Give me a hard drive instead. We’ll ask Robin about it later.

Steve Jobs wants someone to come take away his old house. The house, which Jobs used to live in, is part of his Woodside estate. He wants to tear it down, but it’s deemed historic and he can’t. So he’s offering it to anyone who will come and take it away!

Noon-1p

Victor in LA - iPod and viruses

He’s worried that if he copies an infected MP3 to his iPod it could infect the iPod. Unless the virus is crafted specificially for the iPod, and we haven’t seen any iPod virii yet, it won’t affect it. On the other hand, the iPod is just like an external hard drive. It can store viruses and reinfect your PC with them if you’re not careful.

David in Sunland - long distance calls on Internet

There are three kinds:

• computer → computer: www.skype.com (the only free choice, requires Skype on both ends
• computer → phone: www.skype.com (new - in beta test)
• phone → phone: www.vonage.com or www.packet8.com

I have tried both Vonage and Packet8 and prefer the latter. But there are many other VoIP choices. Listeners: put your experience with them here. Thanks!

Try , just do the 3 steps: get a number, download it and use it. Its free and supports computer ⇔ computer (free) and computer ⇔ phone (per second billing). Checkout thier rates. Comes with free personal voicemail and instant messaging too. More reviews.

Firefly Softphone is free from spyware and does not install any malicious software on your PC - personally tested.

My Firefly No: 82062000 —Kalic

Ed in Redondo Beach - upgrading XP to SP2

I recommend a clean install. Download the full SP-2 or get a copy on CD from your local computer store or Microsoft. Install XP and then, before doing anything else, install SP-2.

1–2p

Robin Liss of

• HD Camcorders - JVC, new Sony $3000 HDR-FX1
• Digital camera video is replacing DV camcorders for many folks
• Blu-Ray DVD recording camcorders are coming in 2005
• Current DVD camcorders have both bad optics and MPEG-2 compression
• Hard drive based camcorders? No - bad for battery life, and people want tapes
• Flash media recorders are more popular: JVC Everio line
• Low end recommendations: JVC GRD-33 D-72, D93, good low-light performance
• Mid-range: Panasonic’s 3CCD camcorders, PVGS-120. Pay little more? GS-400
• High-End Prosumer: Sony DCRVX-2100, $2300

She also likes the Sony DCR-PC350.

Next week: Mike from www.digitalcamerainfo.com talks about buying a digital still camera.

Bill in South Sausalito - Should I upgrade from MacOS 9?

It’s probably ok not to, as long as you’re happy with the applications you run currently. You won’t be able to upgrade to more modern applications, of course.

Jill in Maine - flashing windows on Windows startup

Start→Run→msconfig to check out which programs start up with Windows
Sounds like spyware so make sure to run Spybot, AdAware, or Pest Patrol to scan your system.

Try CodeStuff’s free Starter for more information.

MechMan adds: RegCleaner, an old program Roger Chang had on CFH would also work. Although it’s not free now, it used to be. You might be able to find it on versiontracker.com

Santa Rosa Steve says: I like Starter, but novice users may prefer the smaller, simpler Startup Control Panel, also free.

  Startup Control Panel for Windows 9x / ME / NT4 / 2000 / XP
  -----------------------------------------------------------
  Startup Control Panel is a nifty control panel applet that allows
  you to easily configure which programs run when your computer
  starts. It’s simple to use, very small—won’t burden your system.

  Author: Mike Lin
  License: Freeware  
  Web page ( http://tinyurl.com/j7e )

Karen in Whittier - wireless access everywhere

You can, of course, use your cell phone. The speeds aren’t great, it can cost a lot, but it works everywhere you can get a cell signal. Wi-Fi works if you’re willing to find a hotspot (every Starbucks, for instance, offers Wi-Fi access through T-Mobile).

2–3p

Nick in Tampa Bay, Florida - Doesn’t like the HP iPaq 6315 SmartPhone

Had Sidekick 2 and wishes he still did. His big complaints about the 6315: his bluetooth headset keeps dropping out, it doesn’t have custom ringtones for different callers, and there’s no picture caller id. I’m waiting for the new Motorola A630 myself.

Kelly in Orange - Outlook 2003

STL_Alex says it’s because of the Microsoft Security Fix that blocked incoming attachments on Outlook and Outlook Express. He recommends DetachOL and says that fixed his problem with outgoing attachments.

Glich says She said she was useing a router sometimes if a routers MTU setting is too high attachments won’t work. Call your router maker and ask where the MTU setting is 1400–1450 should fix the issue (most defult to 1500–1490).

Paws say I had the exact problem here in Australia as in not being able to send attachments (no matter what size) After much trouble shooting, different email clients firewalls on/off turning anti-virus off/uninstalling etc, it basically all came down to the isp. (It was all to do with my actual signal strength of my cable connection coming from the wall outlet) not sure if Kelly was on cable or DSL, but if it’s cable then get you isp to send out a tech to test the signal strength from your wall.

Sandy in San Clemente - PDA for Middle East bound son

I like the Zire72. You can get the Zire 72 but it does not have built in wifi if you want and should get this addon card and plug in and you got WiFi. Also Leo said that he could put music on a card this WiFi card does take up that spot but i would get the WiFi/camera over the toons.

Bill in Huntington Beach - Where are the Hotmail attachments

They’re on Hotmail’s servers. You have to explicity save the email or attachment on your machine to have your own copy.

Chris in Palmdale - iMac is slowing down

He’s got 256MB of RAM - I’d add 256, at least. He may try defragging the drive, too, using DriveX from www.micromat.com - althogh Apple claims that fragmentation is not a problem on HFS disks.

TTK_PB in the chat room recommends OnyX to speed up OS X.

Jack in Yucaipa, CA - Found a good hard drive backup and imaging software.
I just wanted to share with your audience a good backup software. I dumped Symantecs Ghost infavor of this package. It actually works with my RAID hard drive setup. Ghost told me my mileage will vary and it didn’t work. I have been a Ghost fan for years but this package is really what Ghost could have been if Symantec would actually continue development of it. But why wait?

True Image 8 works very well for me. I just wanted to pass this along. When I see good software I feel like I should pass on information about it.
Jack

SJinLA agrees- Acronis TrueImage does Win/Mac/LINUX full & Incremental Backup/Restore/CD-DVD burn/multi-volume spanning. See Tips: RescueRestoreBackUpDiskImaging

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