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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 9/2/2010 1:04:56 PM
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neuronstatic
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Some Windows applications could make GRUB 2 unbootable.
Basically, some Windows apps will use the "unused" area after the master boot record to record their installation. Its like writing secret notes where no one normally can see. This is most often associated with trial period software and demos.
"This is a bug in which some proprietary Windows-based software overwrites particular sectors in the gap between the master boot record and the first partition, sometimes called the "embedding area". GRUB Legacy and GRUB 2 both normally use this part of the disk to store one of their key components: GRUB Legacy calls this component Stage 1.5, while GRUB 2 calls it the core image (comparison). However, Stage 1.5 is less useful than the core image (for example, the latter provides a rescue shell which can be used to recover from some problems), and is therefore rather smaller: somewhere around 10KB vs. 24KB for the common case of ext[234] on plain block devices. It seems that the Windows-based software writes to a sector which is after the end of Stage 1.5, but before the end of the core image. This is why the problem appears to be new with GRUB 2.
At least some occurrences of this are with software which writes a signature to the embedding area which hangs around even after uninstallation (even with one of those tools that tracks everything the installation process did and reverses it, I gather), so that you cannot uninstall and reinstall the application to defeat a trial period. This seems like a fine example of an antifeature, especially given its destructive consequences for free software, and is in general a poor piece of engineering; what happens if multiple such programs want to use the same sector, I wonder?"
So if you are a dual-booter like me, you may want to check out some of those trialware and demoware apps before installation.
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 9/3/2010 9:53:50 AM
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DaveW
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Plastic Logic's QUE now vaporware.....
MOUNTAIN VIEW, CALIFORNIA - August 10, 2010 – Plastic Logic today announced it is revising its product strategy and plans to shift its focus to bring to market a second-generation ProReader plastic electronics-based product. The company said it has cancelled its QUE product, which it debuted at CES in January 2010 and planned to ship earlier this year.
"We recognize the market has dramatically changed, and with the product delays we have experienced, it no longer make sense for us to move forward with our first generation electronic reading product," said Plastic Logic CEO Richard Archuleta. "This was a hard decision, but is the best one for our company, our investors and our customers."
http://www.plasticlogic.com/news/pr_2g_aug102010.php
And I have been waiting for this e-reader for more than a year! Grrr!!!
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Windows XP end-of-sales next month... - 9/21/2010 4:11:39 PM
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neuronstatic
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As announced back in 2008 by Microsoft, Windows XP end-of-sales is October 22, 2010.
What this means to everyone is you will no longer be able to buy a laptop from an OEM like Dell, HP, IBM, Lenovo, or whoever, with Windows XP installed on it. So whatever is in inventory will be it come October.
After October 22, 2010, its Win 7 or Vista for Windows options.
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RE: Windows XP end-of-sales next month... - 9/29/2010 4:12:56 PM
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neuronstatic
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Intel to begin charging to uncripple their processors.
"Sometimes it seems that companies do something so monumentally bone-headed you have to wonder whether anyone is awake at the helm and OKing these crazy moves. Today brings word that chip giant Intel is allowing OEMs to sell CPUs with certain features locked - that the customer can unlock by paying $50 for a software code."
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RE: Windows XP end-of-sales next month... - 9/29/2010 8:04:14 PM
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neuronstatic
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OpenOffice files divorce against Oracle!
Ok, a bit melodramatic I know. Essentially with Oracle acquiring Sun, they acquired OpenOffice. But Oracle is yet another big bully in the industry. Having already killed OpenSolaris and Java hanging on their whims, Oracle is not making friends in the open source ecosystem. Here is an excerpt:
"Open sourcers have seized control of the OpenOffice project and product and declared their independence from database giant Oracle.
The OpenOffice.org Project has unveiled a major restructuring that separates itself from Oracle and that takes responsibility for OpenOffice away from a single company."
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RE: Windows XP end-of-sales next month... - 10/3/2010 4:56:14 PM
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tacitus
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quote:
Good riddance to Windows XP. The fact that there is no OS between XP and 7 for 85%+ of the computers made from '05 to '08 doesn't change the fact that XP needs to die. I'm tired of all of the little crashes, instability.
It's interesting how different people's perceptions can be. I am no fan of Microsoft in general (I spent several years working on OS/2, which ended up being trounced by MS Windows, which probably doesn't help!) but I really have had very little trouble with Windows XP in the last few years. On my current machine (a Thinkpad T61) I can only recall maybe two BSODs in the last two years of almost constant use (several hours a day) and while I do get crashes, it's only because I run with the disk cache off, and Firefox ends up chewing up all the available memory if I don't watch out.
So overall, XP has been a very stable platform for me, and although I don't run many games these days, I do run a full gamut of development and design tools. I certainly saw no reason to move to Vista, and will likely only move to W7 when it comes with a new computer, or when the software I need is no longer supported or available on XP.
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RE: Windows XP end-of-sales next month... - 10/3/2010 7:43:25 PM
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rlj
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quote:
ORIGINAL: tacitus
quote:
Good riddance to Windows XP. The fact that there is no OS between XP and 7 for 85%+ of the computers made from '05 to '08 doesn't change the fact that XP needs to die. I'm tired of all of the little crashes, instability.
It's interesting how different people's perceptions can be. I am no fan of Microsoft in general (I spent several years working on OS/2, which ended up being trounced by MS Windows, which probably doesn't help!) but I really have had very little trouble with Windows XP in the last few years. On my current machine (a Thinkpad T61) I can only recall maybe two BSODs in the last two years of almost constant use (several hours a day) and while I do get crashes, it's only because I run with the disk cache off, and Firefox ends up chewing up all the available memory if I don't watch out.
So overall, XP has been a very stable platform for me, and although I don't run many games these days, I do run a full gamut of development and design tools. I certainly saw no reason to move to Vista, and will likely only move to W7 when it comes with a new computer, or when the software I need is no longer supported or available on XP.
On the right rig XP is awesome. My old rig had XP MCE and ran great with 2gb and an athlon 3000 socket 754. I would still get some silly quick crashes doing whatever and that seems to be the case on any XP rig I mess with- not BSOD's just little crashes. Where I am having problems is with some of the older hardware in combination with all of the service packs and the increased loads on anti-virus software. When XP was new back in '03 I could run av software, all of the patches, sp 1, on a Duron 1.2 with 512mb and it always ran great. With all of the sp's, patches, increased loads for protecting your computer from trojans and the like it's totally killing the performance in every socket A I have touched, and all Prescott and earlier Celeron's and P4's. The performance is just pathetic, it reminds me of when I tried to run Windows 95 on a 486. The rig my wife uses at church is a p4 2.4 with 1.5GB and XP is just terrible now. It's defragged, stripped down, etc. There seems to be little you can do to make those older rigs run an OS that ran beautifully 5 years ago, even if the software is basically the same.
XP was supposed to go out in '05 or '06 at the latest and it was only because Vista was a disaster that it wasn't. Of course for those of us who did some computer gaming and had 4gb of Ram, DX 10 video Cards, etc. etc. we could easily check our e-mail, play a YouTube video, or make an office document with no difficulty. That in itself is totally absurd. 
I still have a copy of OS/2 in my basement that I borrowed from a friend years ago, hehe. 
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RE: Windows XP end-of-sales next month... - 10/5/2010 1:08:08 PM
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DaveW
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quote:
ORIGINAL: neuronstatic
Intel to begin charging to uncripple their processors.
"Sometimes it seems that companies do something so monumentally bone-headed you have to wonder whether anyone is awake at the helm and OKing these crazy moves. Today brings word that chip giant Intel is allowing OEMs to sell CPUs with certain features locked - that the customer can unlock by paying $50 for a software code."
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Intel has done this before. Remember the 80486 SX, which was exactly the same as the -486 DX but with the math co-processor disabled? You had to get a 80487 SX chip to restore the math capabilities.
_____________________________
Saphira went home from the hospital 11/2/11. She is VERY happy to be home. This pic was taken on her 4th birthday, just after another round of outpatient chemo.
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 10/6/2010 7:14:04 AM
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DaveW
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So I read. I understand that if the math coprocessor part failed they severed the connections and put the SX label on them.
< Message edited by DaveW -- 10/7/2010 6:40:05 AM >
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Saphira went home from the hospital 11/2/11. She is VERY happy to be home. This pic was taken on her 4th birthday, just after another round of outpatient chemo.
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 10/13/2010 3:24:20 PM
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neuronstatic
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Two million US PCs hijacked by hackers
The US leads the world in numbers of Windows PCs that are part of botnets reveals a report.
"More than 2.2 million US PCs were found to be part of botnets, networks of hijacked home computers, in the first six months of 2010, it said."
The report was compiled by Microsoft.
All the hijacked PCs run some version of Windows OS and were exploited from hacks against vulnerabilities in the Windows OS.
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 10/15/2010 12:00:04 PM
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DaveW
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Google’s self-driving car 10/11/10
Google announced this weekend that it’s been building robotic cars that have been driving themselves around California — down curvy Lombard Street in San Francisco, across the Golden Gate Bridge, along the Pacific Coast Highway, around Lake Tahoe and from Google’s Mountain View headquarters to Santa Monica (a 350-mile trip). So far, the cars have logged over 140,000 miles.
Story on Smart Planet
Story on NY Times
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Saphira went home from the hospital 11/2/11. She is VERY happy to be home. This pic was taken on her 4th birthday, just after another round of outpatient chemo.
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 11/30/2010 3:05:57 PM
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car2nist
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quote:
According to W3C:
IE (all versions) at 41.6%
Firefox at 30%
Chrome at 12%
Safar at 5.5%
Opera at about 2%
I've been using another browser...still newish. Rockmelt. It's focus is on social networking and a news reader. Works great for online video.
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 11/30/2010 4:56:54 PM
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neuronstatic
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Yeah, Rockmelt is a startup company providing their browser for free (for now). Their browser is based on webkit, like Chrome and Safari.
I don't see how they will survive unless they are bought by a social provider like Facebook. In fact, that would be my guess at their business plan: make a browser that is tuned to Facebook and sell it to them.
With the changing demographic of web users, I think it is a good browser for those who really are on the social networks. But apart from the UI integration of social networking sites, its Chrome underneath.
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 11/30/2010 9:39:18 PM
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stellaluna
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Yeah, I follow browser usage pretty closely. Personally, I'm Chrome all the way...with the exception of one piece of software at work that requires IE. I used to be very devoted to Firefox, but no more. I'm willing to try RockMelt. I put in a request for an invite.
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 11/30/2010 11:25:07 PM
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trelawrence
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Gonna give this Rockmelt a try...
I like Chrome too.
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 12/1/2010 6:35:25 AM
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car2nist
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I usually use Chrome. IE for a few sites that require it. Rockmelt is nice in the mornings so I can browse and see when facebook friends are online and want to chat. It is nice for news feeds including ones from Christianity.com.
But while playing video games, announcements kept popping up in the bottom right hand corner where I had some important information and buttons I had to click. So I run google for G Chat when I play games.
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 12/1/2010 9:44:14 AM
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Miss Giggles
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I was thkinking of getting a win 7 phone but apparently verizon is going to wait and see if they sell so they are probably aren't going to carry them soon
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 12/21/2010 11:05:21 AM
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neuronstatic
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I was just perusing OS statistics and tech info. That led me to an article in Wikipedia about Windows Phone 7 (i.e. the renamed Windows Mobile OS - i.e. the renamed Windows CE OS - i.e. the renamed multitasking DOS). Here is an excerpt from the article. Note, I had no idea, MS had crippled the OS so much in its debut.
quote:
Removed Features
Windows Phone 7 lacks some features that were found in earlier versions of Windows Mobile. Among the features that have been confirmed to arrive in the near-future include cut, copy, and paste, full multitasking for 3rd party apps, and Adobe Flash. Windows Phone 7 supports upgradable storage via an SD Card, however it does not support the ability to hot-swap SD cards without having the phone reset to factory settings. Windows Phone 7 does not support the ability to connect to hidden wireless (Wi-Fi) hotspots, hotspots with a static IP address, tethering to a computer (although it can be done via hack on the Samsung Focus), videocalling, VoIP calling, USB mass-storage, universal email inbox, universal search, turn-by-turn navigation, a system-wide file manager, Bluetooth file transfers, USSD messages, or custom ringtones.
Windows Phone 7 devices only support syncing with Exchange ActiveSync over the network. There is no support for syncing with Exchange ActiveSync using a cable or cradle.
In the enterprise, Windows Phone 7 does not support Office documents with security permissions, IPsec security, on-device encryption, strong passwords, or internet sockets. While the older Windows Mobile phones supported the full range of Microsoft Exchange Server policies, Windows Phone 7 only supports a small subset of Exchange features. The Calendar app no longer has a 'Weekly' view. The list of past phone calls is now a single list, and cannot be separated into inbound, outbound or missed calls.
I bolded the "reset to factory settings" because to me, that is just stupid. I mean the other removed features are bad in and of themselves. But if you swap out your SD card, the phone resets to factory? That is so brain-dead.
These are the kinds of mistakes that kill a product line. Maybe that is why MS pulled the "Kin" phones after only 6 weeks on the market.
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 12/21/2010 8:34:34 PM
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figmentPez
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quote:
ORIGINAL: neuronstatic
I bolded the "reset to factory settings" because to me, that is just stupid. I mean the other removed features are bad in and of themselves. But if you swap out your SD card, the phone resets to factory? That is so brain-dead.
Keep in mind that the phones don't have external SD card slots. They use highly specialized SD cards as if they were an SSD, complete with custom formatting and all sorts of tricks to improve performance. This isn't an external slot that has a bug, it's an internal slot that's not supposed to be changed by the end user at all.
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 12/22/2010 12:12:11 AM
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neuronstatic
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quote:
ORIGINAL: figmentPez
Keep in mind that the phones don't have external SD card slots. They use highly specialized SD cards as if they were an SSD, complete with custom formatting and all sorts of tricks to improve performance. This isn't an external slot that has a bug, it's an internal slot that's not supposed to be changed by the end user at all.
That would explain it then. In other words, MS messed up a phone design yet again.
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 12/23/2010 5:48:36 PM
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trelawrence
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Oh wow... c'mon, MS...
Bad, bad design it seems...
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RE: Interesting tech news and other bits - 12/23/2010 6:02:59 PM
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Miss Giggles
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Wow, that's even more backwards than the Iphone now :(
I get a work Verizon Discount now so I am sticking with them.
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(This probably wouldn't happen though since so much hardware is cannibalized anyway)
