Gateway has just instroduced four new digital cameras. The top of the line DC-T50 Digital Camera offers 5 megapixel CCD, 3X optical zoom, compact, elegant design with metal housing, and extremely competitive pricing at $399.99.
The DC-T50 is joined by three other cameras labeled as fun and stylish 2MP (DC-T20), easy and affordable 4MP (DC-M40) and reliable and value 5MP (DC-M50) for $129.99, $199.99, and $299.99 respectively.
Check out the Gateway site for more information about these cameras.
SanDisk recently introduced the SanDisk Extreme™ CompactFlash® and SD line of high performance, high durability CF cards designed for use under extreme conditions. The SanDisk Extreme cards deliver a minimum write speed of 9 megabytes per second (MB/sec.) and a minimum read speed of 10MB/sec.
The SanDisk Extreme CF cards are available now in capacities of 256 and 512MB and 1 gigabyte, with suggested retail prices of $109.99, $229.99 and $439.99 respectively.
The 256MB SanDisk Extreme SD card is expected to ship in October with a suggested retail price of $134.99. The 512MB is expected to ship in November with a price of $299.99.
SanDisk has also announced updated versions of its SanDisk Ultra(TM) II line of high-performance CompactFlash and SD cards as well as updated versions of its SanDisk Extreme(TM) line of high-performance CompactFlash and SD cards. The Ultra II cards now deliver a minimum write speed of 9 megabytes per second (MB/sec.) and a minimum read speed of 10MB/sec.
The new SanDisk Ultra II CF card will initially be available in three capacities – 256MB, 512MB and 1 gigabyte (GB). The 256 and 512MB SanDisk Ultra II CF cards started shipping this month while the 1GB cards will be in the next thirty days. SanDisk Ultra II SD cards will be available in 256MB and 512MB capacities in October and November, respectively.
Suggested retail prices for the three SanDisk Ultra II CF cards capacities—256MB, 512MB and 1GB—are $104.99, $209.99, and $429.99.
Suggested retail prices for the SanDisk Ultra II SD cards are $129.99 and $289.99 for the 256 and 512MB cards.
The gaming hardware company Tapwave has announced that it will start making its forthcoming Zodiac device (pictured) available in late September. A preview of the device can be found at GoDoPlay.com.
The Zodiac, formerly called the Helix, is a handheld computing/gaming device powered by Palm OS 5.2 and sporting such tremendous hardware specs as a 480x320, 16-bit color user-rotatable screen, stereo speakers and headphone jack, dual SD expansion slots, user-replaceable rechargeable Li-polymer batteries, Bluetooth (for multi-player gaming) and a fast ARM processor (actual clock speed not yet released).
The unit will ship with 32 or 128 MB of RAM depending on the model purchased, and will cost either $299 or $399 directly from Tapwave's website. The Zodiac will not be sold in retail stores until some time in 2004.
A lot of excitement has been generated about this device, with most reactions claiming that the Zodiac has a definite edge over its rivals, the Nokia n'Gage and the Nintendo Gameboy Advance. Both gamers and PDA users are expressing significant interest in this cross-over device, which may, surprisingly enough, satisfy both user types equally well.
For more information, a dedicated Yahoo! Groups community for Tapwave's products already exists -- check out Tapwave_Users today.
Recently, a new online game/community came into existence: Second Life, which describes itself this way:
"Second Life is an expansive online society, lived in and built by its participants. Join a 3D world full of people, activity, and fun, where you and fellow residents can build a shared reality. You choose your own goals – travel and explore, claim and build on virtual land, make friends and socialize, or vie for status and wealth. Whatever you choose to do, your Second Life starts now."
Wired had an article on the game last month describing how many of the games participants may spend a bit too much time in cyberlife. However, some of the events that have unfolded in the Second Life environment sound pretty cool. For example, a group of WWII recreationists took over a small area of the game and posted warnings that anyone who came within would be killed.
So, has anyone tried this out? If so, what's it like? More importantly, is it worth $15 a month?
The picture says it all...er, well, most of it, at least.
At the Video Music Awards last night, Madonna, Britney Spears, and Christina Aguilera performed a piece together. The notable features of the performance were two kisses: Madonna first locking lips with Britney and then with Christina.
More photos can be found at the MTV website.
Is it just me, or do these pop singers seem to be getting a bit desperate to keep in the limelight?
I've been reviewing the latest Dana by Alphasmart, and I'm quite impressed with the device (see my upcoming MemoWare Features review). However, I sorely missed not having Wi-Fi. I like many others have been waiting for the promised wireless version of the Dana by Alphasmart. Well, it turns out, I don't have to wait any longer. With the latest ROM update (1.2), you can go wireless now with a number of available USB wireless adpaters. I am using a Microsoft USB Wireless Adapter, and it worked flawlessly the first time I tried to connect. The setup was extremely simple (I mean really simple). I installed SnapperMail and Blazer, and both programs worked great. Besides, MS MN-510, you can also use any of the following adapters: D-Link DWL120, Samsung WL-S150k, or US Robotics USR1120.
I'm not ready to say good-bye to my ThinkPad yet, but more and more I'll be leaving it behind and just carrying the Dana with me.
According to New Scientist, origami techniques are providing cameras in cellphones with a much better focusing mechanism.
"Thanks to a novel and ultra-cheap micromotor technology, cellphone cameras should soon be able to zoom and focus with the same precision as the autofocusing lenses used in expensive stills cameras.1 Limited of Cambridge, UK, has found a novel way to make a thin sheet of a piezoelectric ceramic material work like a motor. It can move whatever is placed on top of it, or it can be rolled into a cylinder to grasp and move a miniature camera lens."
Moving from fixed-focus to variable focus should provide a large improvement in picture quality. Of course, I'm not sure I'd put picture quality as my #1 concern when it comes to cellphones, but maybe that's just me.
My pal Mike turned me onto a really excellent tool for web designers and graphic artists who deal a lot with computer color codes.
QuickColor, at KOHAISTYLE.COM gives you a slider for RGB (Red, Green, and Blue) inputs, and then provides you with complimentary colors in both hex and RGB. Truly a terrific tool if you find yourself in need of that "perfect color" now and again.
Thanks, Mike!
A friend of mine just got the relatively new Explorer 8000 from Scientific Atlanta. The 8000 is a DVR (digital video recorder), much like TiVo or ReplayTV. It has some neat features, including an 80 GB hard drive, dual tuners, and a cheap, cheap price -- it's less than $10 per month from your local cable company (if it's like Time Warner is in our area). There's one big difference between the 8000 and your run-of-the-mill TiVo, however -- it appears to suck big time.
In the roughly 72 hours he's had the 8000, it has reset itself on him about half a dozen times, refused to quit recording, recorded the wrong show, and recorded several copies of the same show (even though it was set to ignore repeats). What's more is that he got no instruction manual or anything when he picked up the 8000. If it were so intuitive that you didn't need a manual, that would be one thing, but this unit's interface is far, far from intuitive.
The 8000 seems to be such an ornery piece of kit that a Yahoo! Group is dedicated to wrangling it into submission.
When I first heard that my buddy had this new unit, I was both curious and a bit envious. Two tuners?! 80 GB HDD?!? But, after hearing his ongoing tale of woe, I'm thankful we're a TiVo household. While we have had to fix the modem a couple times, our TiVo has never been so flaky as this Explorer 8000. Plus, the interface is pure joy to use. For these things, I am always grateful (thank you, TiVo).
The Wall Street Journal and LostRemote.com are reporting that Paul Allen, co-founder of Microsoft and owner of TechTV, is looking to sell the $250-300 million business. No interested parties have publicly come forth yet. Read more at Reuters.
TWICE is reporting that Samsung has officially launched its 120 GB (100-hour) DirecTV TiVo DVR (digital video recorder) unit. What's possibly even more exciting is Samsung's stated intention to release a HD version of the DVR early next year.
OK, Samsung, if you're listening to me, I have a few requests: First, make it a stand-alone TiVo so it will work with my cable. Two, put a functional DVI port on it. Three, you gotta have two HD tuners on the thing. Four, make it easy to connect it to a Wi-Fi network. If you do these things, I'll be first in line. Thanks.
Hats off to Gizmodo for the tip on this story.
Microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) use fabrication technologies derived from the semiconductor industry to construct components of microscopic size and smaller.
Using MEMS technology, people have made gears nine microns in size, working electrostatic motors, and projectors based on digital micromirrors. Ho hum.
Now comes a true advance: a MEMS scientific team have developed a new micromachining technique and - more importantly - have demonstrated its potential by making a micro pinball machine.
The ball, a 150-micron magnetic bead, is inserted in the 24-mm square pinball table, which is tilted at 20 degrees. The flippers are electromechanical silicon cantilevers which flick the ball at speeds of up to 0.75 km per hour against silicon bumper structures. Movies of the pinball machine in action are awesome.
The team says that the revolution is in replacing traditionally complex MEMS patterning fab steps with a single simple step, and using room temperature plasma bonding. For me, the pinball machine itself is revolution enough. The ultimate in mobile gaming!
ExtremeTech has a review of an interesting new music portable, the Neuros Audio Computer. It sounds pretty sweet.
"A new company on the scene, Neuros Audio, took a long hard look at this market space and is now shipping what the company has dubbed an 'audio computer'. It features an FM tuner and transmitter (transceiver), support for the open source encoder Ogg Vorbis, and a Linux music management app. It can not only record FM radio, but can sample and save music playing on an FM station and find similar material via the Web when the player is connected to your PC."
Check it out and read the article.
Anyone who has ever had to manage a computer from a remote location has dreamed of being able to do it wirelessly via a handheld computer. The dream of fast, convenient, virtually unbounded remote management is made just a bit more realistic by virtue of Palm VNC.
Palm VNC is an application for Palm OS devices. It enables the user to control any PC (Windows, Unix, etc.) running the freely available VNC Server application, which permits two-way desktop control between the server (the PC running VNC Server that is being controlled) and the client (in this case, the Palm OS handheld running Palm VNC). Basically, the client user "sees" the desktop and controls it just as if he or she were sitting at the console.
As with many highly useful and open application standards, there are several different "flavors" of VNC out there. The original VNC was cooked up by some AT&T engineers in the UK. The latest build can be gotten from the official VNC site at RealVNC.com. Other variants on the VNC protocol, most of which are backward-compatible with VNC, include Tight VNC and UltraVNC.
And, yes, there are even a couple of VNC clients for Palm OS to be had. I have had tremendous success with Palm VNC 2.0. This works tremendously well on my Palm Tungsten C, and I've used it to access my home machine (Tight VNC server on Windows XP) via Wi-Fi on multiple occasions from various locations. Palm VNC 2.0 is a really nice continuation of the work originally done by Vladimir Minenko a few years ago, which has now been taken over by Harakan Software.
So, if you like the idea of being able to control various computers' desktops remotely over wireless from your handheld, give Palm VNC a try...you might be as hopelessly addicted to it as I am.
As commented on by TeleRead, the Washington Post has an intriguing article about the potential influence Microsoft wields in our educational institutions.
While some of the research money and gifts that Microsoft has provided to top-tier universities and individual faculty has enabled projects that would otherwise have been financially impossible, a growing number of concerns have been raised about the degree to which these gifts are reducing the range of ideas that students have access to during their education.
"The corporation...has also directly or indirectly influenced curriculums and research priorities, drawing an outcry from critics who say the donations are turning computer science departments into vocational schools where mastery of proprietary computer programs are valued over the study of theory."
As an academic, I'm very aware of the fine line that researchers tread between doing things that benefit their students in the short run (e.g., getting corporate donations) and doing things that potentially harm the pedagogy in the long run (e.g., not exposing students to a variety of ideas and theories). The size of Microsoft's war chest, which it achieved through its monopolistic practices, to pursue these relationships is stunning, as the article goes on to point out:
"Today, more than 2,000 professors from top-tier schools are considered close collaborators with Microsoft, accepting cash, software, hardware or other in-kind donations from the company for specific research projects or classes. ... Microsoft's total research and development budget -- $4.7 billion in 2003, $4.3 billion in 2002 and $4.4 billion in 2001 -- is estimated to be more than all the rest of the software industry spends together. ... In comparison, according to the National Science Foundation, computer science department expenditures at all universities and colleges from all sources for 2001 was less than $1 billion."
Hmm...makes you wonder if www.microsoft.edu isn't just around the corner.
Well, what do you know? I was gone for 2 weeks on my vacation to LA and Maui, and when I returned both Canon and Kodak have introduced two new digital cameras for the proconsumer market. The Canon Digital Rebel is a feature reduced Canon 10D in the EOS Rebel body. It will be (now are you ready for this?) about $899 in the US. This is the first digital SLR that breaks the $1000 mark. It has a 6.3 Megapixel CMOS sensor. I'm sure this camera will generate a lot of interests in avid photogrpahers who have shied away from digital SLR's due to its higher price.
Kodak has announced the super zoom camera featuring 10x optical zoom (38 to 380mm equivalent), 4 megapixel. The DX6490 is priced at $499 and also comes with a professional quality Schneider-Kreuznach lens. Unfortunately, it doesn't offer any stablization for the lens. It does however comes with a new Kodak Color Science Imaging chip for the richer, accurate colors. The camera offers fully manual controls, but this camera is a great combination for folks who want a point-and-shoot camera most of the time, but may want manual controls when needed.
By the way, I'll be busy this week recuperating from my trip, and also processing my photos from my new Nikon D100 camera, and polishing up on my MemoWare Features article on the Alphasmart Dana. Also, this is my first week of school (Yeek!)
O'Reilly Network has an excellent article that demonstrates how easy it is to hack a so-called "secure" Wi-Fi network in about an hour and a half.
The network was set up as securely as 802.11b standards allow: closed (no SSID broadcasting), 128-bit WEP enabled, and MAC authentication. Then, the author walks through each step of the diagnostic process and provides links to each freely available software tool he uses.
Who would have guessed that J.R.R. Tolkien once worked on staff at the Oxford English Dictionary? :-)
An OED newsletter article traces his early contributions when he joined the OED in 1919: selected words that started with the letter W such as waggle, waistcoat, wake, walnut, walrus, wampum, wan, and want.
Tolkien was very interested in the etymologies of words, and upon taking up a post at Leeds University was rumored to have had a lengthy lecture on the etymology of the world walrus. (And you thought your prof's lectures were boring...)
His more notable contributions to the OED began 50 years later, when he was asked for help on the definition of the word hobbit. The final version:
In the tales of J. R. R. Tolkien (1892-1973): one of an imaginary people, a small variety of the human race, that gave themselves this name (meaning ‘hole-dweller’) but were called by others halflings, since they were half the height of normal men.
Other Middle-Earth words that have been accepted by the OED include mathom, mithril, and orc. Now under consideration, perhaps for the next edition of the dictionary: balrog.
Why is it that folks are protesting the use of RFID technology by companies like Wal-Mart, Procter & Gamble, and others?
In case you haven't heard of RFID, it stands for Radio Frequency ID. The technology behind RFID is still being tweaked, but the idea is pretty straightforward. RFID tags are simple circuits that have some small amount of information (a few kb at most) embedded in them. These small tags "identify" themselves and broadcast their information when they pass within a few yards or feet of special radio-frequency sensors. The tags are inert until they receive power from the reader's wavefield. These RFID tags could be placed on things (e.g., pallets of shampoo or individual bags of dog food) so that products can be tracked throughout the supply chain and more accurate information can be had about inventory levels, locations of products in stores and warehouses, etc. Additionally, they could possibly be used in metro or rail passes, hotel door keys, etc. -- wherever a unique identifier is needed.
According to stories like "Privacy advocates call for RFID regulation" (CNET News.com), there is an organized and growing opposition to the further development and deployment of this technology (which is already in use by the US military). The opposition claims that RFID offers the significant potential for companies to invade our personal privacy more easily and extensively than they already do.
Even though I fully agree that privacy is something we need to protect, the RFID technology does not pose a more serious threat than anything else out there today for a few reasons.
First, getting a chip to broadcast its coded information requires a sensor. Installing these sensors everywhere is both expensive and troublesome. While a supermarket or department store might be able to recoup this expense, most businesses would not. A restaurant, for example, would be unlikely to be able to tag much of its products because they're eaten on-site. Moreover, the restaurant isn't going to have much interest in RFID tags a patron may already have on his/her person when he/she walks in, so what would be its financial return for installing these sensors?
Second, these sensors don't contain any information about you, just the products you purchase. They don't contain your social security number, your age, your address, or your credit card number. A large number of US shoppers have willingly signed up for discount cards at their neighborhood grocery stores. These cards effectively generate the same information that the RFID system would -- what you buy, when, and where. Obviously, a large number (perhaps a majority?) of US shoppers are willing to trade some privacy for cheaper groceries. While it's true that some tags can be re-written wirelessly (perhaps even using PDA or handheld computers), it's unlikely that tags on standard consumer items like toothpaste would have this capability.
Finally, RFID represents a potentially huge improvement in our ability to reduce prices and improve availability of the goods in our stores. By having better information about when and where products are at any given time, supply chain managers can make better decisions about purchasing, stock levels, renewal policies, etc., etc. Personally, if RFID helps the grocery store improve the likelihood that it has the products I want when I want them on its shelves, then I'm all for giving them some additional information.
Maybe it's just that I don't have anything to hide. Maybe I don't really care that anybody knows what I buy. Or maybe I'm just not paranoid enough for my own good. What do you think?
Appearing on Wired is "Write a Story, Go To Jail," an article about Brian Robertson, an Oklahoma teen who was charged with a felony for writing a fictional account of an attack on a school. He was suspended from school and arrested under an Oklahoma statute that makes it illegal for anyone to "plan, attempt, conspire or endeavor to perform an act of violence involving or intended to involve serious bodily harm or death of another person."
If he is convicted for writing a piece of fiction, as he maintains and as the evidence so far seems to support, how can the state think it won't be overturned by a federal court? If someone writes a fictional account of a fictional person, perhaps even in the first person, planning an attack, under this Oklahoma law, it would be considered a felony. Moreover, the way this poorly drafted statute is worded, someone could be charged for merely thinking about such a story.
It doesn't seem plausible that this law will hold up to real scrutiny. This statute threatens not only free speech in the state of Oklahoma, but also free thought. George Orwell, author of 1984 should be held in higher regard than ever, since he seems to be turning out to be one of the most accurate prognosticators since Nostradamus.
According to a post at pdaPhoneHome.com, Verizon Wireless is offering a $100 off the purchase of a new Kyocera 7135 smartphone (pictured).
The offer supposedly runs from 8/18/03 to 10/31/03, only applies to wireless service plans of $39.99/month or higher, and you must trade in a phone to get the deal.
It's not typical of me to include such a blatantly commercial post here on GearBits, but this sounds like a pretty sweet deal. $100 off "just because" is nothing to sneeze at.
So, if you've been considering the 7135 (it's what I carry), this might be a good opportunity to pick one up.
Just be warned: once you start carrying this, you will constantly be stopped by folks wanting to know what it is, how it works, where to get one, and so forth. This is not a good device for the ardent introvert.
So you bought a new Palm OS PDA only to find out that Graffiti 2 is irritating the crap out of you. Wouldn't it be great to replace the Graffiti 2 multi-stroke characters with those classic unistroke ones from Graffiti? Well, Palm Infocenter has step-by-step instructions on how to do just that.
Here are the instructions, which were originally published by Brando, in a nutshell:
First, Using a file manager like FileZ, find these two files in the ROM on a PDA that has original Graffiti on it:
-- Graffiti Library.prc (30k)
-- Graffiti Library_enUS.prc (22k)
Second, beam those two files to the PDA on which you want original Graffiti to be installed.
Third, do a soft reset. That's it....you're done.
Additional information is located at the Palm Infocenter article, so give it a read.
I work at the University of Cincinnati, where we have just around 70,000 students, faculty, and staff. Managing the IT infrastructure here must be a nightmare -- I can only imagine. The recent spate of Internet worms isn't helping these guys to get any sleep either, as this portion of a recent email sent around to UC netizens suggests:
Two more computer WORMs - Nachi and Sobig.F - have joined LovSan/Blaster in the pack of cyber-prowlers looking to puncture privacy and take control of your computer. The Sobig virus is propagating aggressively around the Internet and within the UC network through the e-mail systems. In the past 36 hours, UC has intercepted and cleaned over 50,000 instances of these infections on the University's e-mail system.
Days like these make me glad I'm not an IT administrator. Of course, days like these don't really make me happy I'm even an email user.
So, I want to upgrade my PC's hard drive at home -- simple thing, right? Well, it would have been had it not been for a peculiarity in Palm Desktop (Palm Desktop is the PC program that allows me to synchronize and view my PDA's data on my desktop).
I install my new drive while keeping my old drive installed (so I can move stuff over). The new drive is given the letter F: -- no problem, right? Well, for Palm Desktop, it's a real problem. The geniuses who developed this program hard-coded into it the requirement that it run from C: and only C:. So, when I thought I was installing it onto F: (the new drive I booted into), it was really just re-installing it on C: (my old hard drive).
So, I had to unhook the old drive, re-install Windows onto the new drive so it would take on the drive letter C: (for whatever reason, Windows XP won't let you change the drive letter of your boot partition), and then start all over installing various programs and stuff. That's what I was doing from 9PM to 5AM last night. Fun stuff, eh?
Note to developers: Don't follow Palm's example in this regard. Please. For your own good.
Geeks can find truly bizarre ways to show the world their creativity. One oft-overlooked outlet is the SSID -- the "name" assigned to a wireless network.
Manufacturers of wireless access points often pre-configure their devices with SSID's that are either annoyingly banal or merely an advertisement. D-Link AP's are a good example of the former as their default SSID is, surprisingly, "default". Linksys takes the latter approach and uses "linksys" as its default SSID.
While it's always a good idea to change passwords, logins, and other security-related settings from the manufacturer defaults, some wireless network owners are using this opportunity to express themselves and give us wardrivers a peek into their personality. Here are some noteworthy SSIDs I've seen over the years:
keepdriving! -- seen near a busy intersection
cvsretail -- either this is the CVS store or some neighbor with a weird sense of humor
keepout -- apparently someone was feeling a bit grumpy
kapu4u -- seen near a Hawaiian resort ("kapu" is Hawaiian for "forbidden")
cockbite -- supposedly the dad asked the 14-year-old son to set up the WLAN (that'll teach him)
wireless fortress -- had no WEP activated (thanks, MikeW!)
I'll keep adding to this list and re-posting. So, do you have any good SSID's you've seen around?
According to Nikkei Electronics Online, the PCMCIA (Personal Computer Memory Card Interface Association) is nearing the release of specs for what will replace the venerable PC Card (or PCMCIA card) specification.
The new specs will be based on PCI Express instead of CardBus, yielding a 4X speed increase over today's cards. Two different sizes will be allowed in the spec, with the smaller card about half of the volume of current PC Cards.
While no official name has been adopted, the development codename being used is NEWCARD. Devices and laptops with NEWCARD slots should start appearing as early as the end of 2004.
Wired has two interesting articles on PowerPoint (yes, the presentation slide software from Microsoft).
In this article by David Byrne (yes, the artist and musician formerly with Talking Heads), PowerPoint is described as having the potential for being a new art medium. Byrne shows off some of his PowerPoint art, which I found (surprisingly) compelling and (not so surprisingly) humorous. My favorite image, which I cannot duplicate here due to (c) restrictions, is described as "This is Dan Rather's profile. Expanded to the nth degree. Taken to infinity. Overlayed on the back of Patrick Stewart's head." Now that's art.
In the second article, Edward Tufte denounces PowerPoint as something just slightly less than pure evil. In one of the better written articles I've read recently, Tufte claims "...the PowerPoint style routinely disrupts, dominates, and trivializes content. Thus PowerPoint presentations too often resemble a school play - very loud, very slow, and very simple." Excellent read if you spend more than 10 minutes a week futzing with presentations.
Personally, as a university professor, I've noticed a trend towards instructors relying more and more on PowerPoint for classroom lectures. I can't say I'm in agreement with this approach. I tend to use PowerPoint sparingly, often only for things I can't readily duplicate on the chalkboard or whiteboard. I've gotten some good comments from students who seem to appreciate this "novel" approach to lecturing (my, how quickly our memory fades). The one downside, according to the students, to my not using PowerPoint is that I don't give them harcopies of the lecture notes in advance, forcing them to actually write down what we discuss in class. My, that is a problem now, isn't it. ;-)
This morning, I received the following email (actual sender disguised):
Date: 04:34 AM EDT, 08/20/2003
From: t___.m___@n____.com
To: craig@memoware.com
Subject: Re: Re: My detailsNot sure who you are or what the attached file is as I cannot open it
----- Original Message -----
From: craig@memoware.com
To: t___.m___@n____.com
Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 2003 11:15 PM
Subject: Re: Re: My details> See the attached file for details
Obviously, TM (as I'll call her) received an email generated by someone (not me) infected with the Sobig.F worm that is making the rounds. Apparently, TM attempted to open the virus payload attached to this email and, by so doing, likely added her own computer to the growing list of Sobig.F's victims.
This simple email highlights a huge concern of mine: the world is becoming less and less able to deal with viruses, trojans, and other computer-based attacks like the Sobig.F worm. How long have we had viruses and worms and other problems for which anti-virus software was originally developed? A decade now? Yet more and more people are getting online without a clue as to how to protect themselves, their computers, and their data from these threats.
Moreover, the rate of technological change is constantly increasing. That sentence doesn't just mean that things are always changing, it means that things are changing faster all the time. This compounds the above problem of clueless users because it makes a larger and larger percentage of the online population incapable of keeping up with what is needed to practice safe computing. Computer-based threats are adapting and changing more rapidly than ever before, yet the typical user isn't learning any faster -- it's easy to see the problem this trend creates.
While we can continue to try to educate the masses about anti-virus software and firewalls and WEP and all the other security measures they should adopt, I think this is a losing battle. The "threat" is changing far too quickly for the majority of Internet users to keep themselves well-protected. So, what should we do?
One option would be to enforce a higher degree of centralized computing. Instead of giving consumers full-blown computers, they would be given dumb terminals by their ISPs and all their computing would happen via a centralized computing resource. This would permit a much higher degree of protection and would eliminate a lot of the problems users have with their computers. As many problems as this approach would solve, it can't overcome one big one: the desire of many (including me) to have 100% control over their computers. If you thought that NRA members were fanatical over their guns, think about how rabidly the geeks of the world would fight to protect their computers.
A second option would be to enforce better safeguards and mandate better security at the level of the operating system. Microsoft, which makes the OS that runs a majority of the world's desktop and laptop computers, has come under a great deal of criticism for its lax approach to security in the Windows product line. In response, Microsoft has announced that it is considering making Windows updates automatic rather than a user-enabled option.
While the specifics to this second approach -- beefing up security built into the OS -- are going to be tough to hammer out, it is probably the best solution to the growing range of computer-based threats. Let's hope that Microsoft is up to the challenge. And, if it is not, then let's hope that a more secure operating system can take the place of Windows before we have a catastrophic meltdown of the Internet.
At our house, a love of science fiction got us hooked on Amazon.com, and collecting porcelain got us hooked on eBay.
But guess what our household spends the most money online on? Groceries.
Online grocers are thriving - it turns out the key to survival was focussing on a local market, rather than "get big fast" like Webvan.
Our online grocer of choice is GroceryGateway.com. You place your order online (at competitive prices!), pick a delivery time, and a uniformed attendant delivers it straight to your door. For seniors, parents of small children, and those who spend far too much time online, it's nirvana!
GroceryGateway.com passed our first tests with eggs, milk, meats, vegetables. Now we're on our 27th order:
2 Campbell's Condensed Cream of Asparagus Soup
1 Cream - Whipping:Sealtest 500mL
1 Eggplant
1 Eggs - Extra Large:Gray Ridge 12 eggs
1 Eggs - Large:Gray Ridge 12 eggs
1 Frozen Orange Roughy 360-440 g
1 Golden Dragon Oyster Sauce 455ml
2 Green Giant International Mix - California Mix
1 Ground Beef - Lean 500g
2 Hunt's Thick & Rich Italian Style Pasta Sauce 680mL
2 Lacteeze Lactose Reduced Milk 2% 1 L
2 Lemons: Large
1 Meat Canelloni - Frozen: Queen's Pasta 5Lbs
3 Mori-Nu Soft Tofu 349g
1 Mushrooms : Whole White 227g Pkg
2 Natura Soy Beverage - Chocolate 1L
1 Onions: Green Bunch
1 Pork - Lean Ground: Medallion 500g
1 Pork Chops - Boneless Marinated BBQ, Medallion 380g - 420g
1 Pork Chops - Seasoned Boneless: Maple Leaf Medallion 418g
1 Squash : Butternut Cut & Peeled 1 lb. Pkg (454g)
1 Whole Chicken - Grade A 1.4Kg -1.6Kg
In other words, if you're in an area served by Peapod, Netgrocer, Pinkdot, or any of the other new new economy grocers, give them a try. You may be pleasantly surprised.
From the "stop and count to 10" department...
So there you are, watching some sporting event when the station decides to cut to something else (usually another sporting event). Or, two events coincide and the one you want to watch is of course the one that isn't being shown. What do you do?
Well, according to the Lowell Sun, one Boston man's solution was to bombard the station with half a million emails.
"A [Boston] man who crashed FOX TV's computer system with more than 500,000 e-mail messages to protest the station's airing of Red Sox games over NASCAR races will now have plenty of time at home to watch TV.Michael Melo, 45, of 12 Rainbow Lane, was sentenced yesterday in U.S. District Court to one year of probation, the first six months to be spent under home confinement, after he admitted he exceeded the authorized access to a FOX TV computer, causing $36,000 worth of damage to Channel 25."
With all that time on his hands at home, you have to wonder how much of it he'll spend watching TV.
SCO is still finding it hard to be completely open regarding the portions of Linux code that it says infringe on its Unix copyrights. Some limited parties have been permitted to review what SCO calls the "offending code," but have been required to sign highly restrictive NDAs. However, it seems that the only folks who are swayed by this "evidence" are ardent SCO supporters -- hardly the group that SCO needs to convince at this point in time.
What is perhaps the most troubling is the lame legal tactics that SCO is trying to use to support its claims. By attacking the GPL (GNU General Public License) directly, SCO seems to be both waging a bigger war than it can readily take on (in poker, that's called "bluffing") and making a potentially bigger mess of everything than if it just stuck to claims that it might actually be able to defend. If SCO's counsel is as misguided as it seems, then we may not have to wait much longer for this to all go away.
Also, given IBM's countersuit, and the billions (of both dollars and lawyers) it and other affected entities have to fight SCO, I can't seem to help thinking that this battle isn't going to last much longer. The facades have come down and we now are able to see that SCO's posturing is little more than just that. Hopefully, SCO stockholders will sell while the getting is still good, for once the tide has obviously turned, SCO's stock price will plummet to near zero.
Update: Good discussion at Slashdot.
David Rothman over at TeleRead has a nice article outlining some inexpensive devices that make good e-book readers.
While David generally recommends Palm OS devices because of their good value (what you get versus what they cost), I have to recommend that a serious e-book reader should only consider the high-res Palm OS devices featuring 320x320 pixel screens. These provide very high quality displays with excellent text rendering.
The article goes on to discuss some interesting possibilities coming out of China. David predicts that we will soon see several inexpensive devices capable of serving as e-book readers coming from Asia.
In this article, CNET News.com reports on a report suggesting that increased mobile phone sales are leading to the decline in PDA sales:
"The market for mobile phones is increasingly encroaching on the market for handheld organizers, leading to the second straight year of decline in organizer shipments, according to a report from research firm IDC.So-called "converged" mobile phones, which combine organizer functions with the ability to make phone calls, are taking customers away from the handheld device market, IDC said Monday. For 2003, worldwide shipments are expected to decline 8.4 percent, to 11.35 million units from 12.4 million units last year."
If you take a different perspective -- that "converged mobile devices" are both phones and PDAs, then one might conclude that the PDA market is doing well...actually growing. It's not clear why IDC arbitrarily decided that anything that can be used as a cellular phone is a "phone" -- I think the lines separating the various categories are getting too blurred to make this type of report very useful.
Think of the Palm Tungsten W (pictured at the right). Out of the box, it can be used to place voice calls, but it's primary mission in life is as a wireless data device. Is this a "phone?" It's not clear from IDC's report whether this is counted or not (I believe it would be).
OK, then, what about any of the PDAs that have Wi-Fi built-in? These can be used for voice-over-IP (VOIP), meaning you could place a voice call if you're within an active Wi-Fi network with an Internet connection. Is that a phone? If not, why not? Or, what about the phones that have merely a bare-bones calendar and address book? Are those considered "converged devices?" Again, it's not clear from the IDC report what the criteria truly are. In fact, one would nearly need to go device-by-device to establish which category each fits into and why.
So, as the lines between device categories continue to blur, and "converged device" has less and less meaning every day, I'll continue to take reports like this one from IDC with a huge grain of salt. Or, better yet, perhaps we should just start ignoring them totally. Maybe then these research/consulting houses would be forced to come up with something more useful than the omnipresent "exponential growth" curve that they seem to use to describe every technology on the horizon.
But then again, if they showed what a reasonably clued in person expects for most new technologies, many fewer copies of their reports would be sold -- nobody is interested in reading about things that are headed into obscurity. How do you spell "conflict of interest" again?
Early this morning, Palm Solutions Group, the hardware side of Palm, Inc. announced that it would take the new name of palmOne after Palm, Inc. splits off its PalmSource software sometime division this Fall.
According to the press release:
“Palm created an entirely new category when it delivered the first successful handheld computers in history,” said Todd Bradley, Palm Solutions Group chief executive officer. “palmOne builds on the brand promise and popularity of the Palm name, while indicating our intention to continue to be the driving force of innovation.”
The forthcoming and much delayed spin-off of PalmSource, Inc. has been approved by shareholders and should be completed as soon as the merger with Handspring is finalized.
It has been widely known (or assumed) that Palm Solutions Group would have to change its name once the spin-off was completed in order to reduce confusion over branding of the Palm operating system and the use of the word "Palm."
While I'm not crazy about the new name, I'm just happy that it's been announced. At least there's now one less hurdle to overcome before this corporate reconfiguration can be finalized. Then, everyone concerned can concentrate more on products and customers rather than organization charts and lawyers. Other coverage of and reactions to this announcement can be found at Palm Infocenter and Brighthand.
Remember the Rubik's Cube? My best time was just under a minute, which may sound great, but to modern speedcubers, is just pathetic.
If you can do it in less than 16 seconds, or can solve more than 150 cubes in one hour, or do it blindfolded, you've got a fair chance to place in the 2003 World Competition, being held in Toronto, Canada at the end of August. These are the first world championships in over 20 years.
Yes, Rubik's Cubes are back, with record times being set by a new generation of speedcubers, based on intensive permutation algorithms and time-conserving finger moves, on cubes that have been tricked-out so they are literally well-oiled machines.
Me? I'll just sit on the sidelines and watch.
Marx Toys is selling, or pre-ordering, rather, a line of IM Buddies, dolls fashioned after Disney characters that sit on top of your monitor and speak aloud whatever comes through your instant messaging client.
Daffy Duck and Bugs Bunny are currently mentioned as figures to be made available. These remind me of Mitch's post about Actimates.
Sounds like the IM Buddy would be fun for about, oh, 30 seconds.
It's becoming clear: we are on the cusp of the robotic revolution.
For decades, robots have captured the imagination in science fiction. Most people, however, rarely have the opportunity to interact with anything that even remotely resembles the typical definition of a robot. Most robot installations are industrial, such as welding and material handling robots. Very few consumer robots have existed at the level where a large percentage of the population were even aware of them. That, however, is changing...and changing quickly.
Over the past handful of years, consumer-oriented robots have become increasingly varied, affordable, and compelling. Take some of these recent examples:
Robo Mower -- just what it sounds like, an electric, self-guided lawn mower.
Roomba -- perhaps one of the more successful personal robots to date (no doubt due to its low price), this autonomous floor sweeper is finding its way into very typical US homes.
Aibo -- this robotic dog-like home companion from Sony gets increasingly sophisticated with every revision.
Robo-Doc -- not actually a robot, but this remote controlled device provides a vehicle for interaction between patients and physicians who aren't physically co-located.
Emotive robots -- researchers at MIT, among other places, are getting more skilled at enabling robots with human-like interaction capabilities.
There's even evidence that people are starting to think of robots on a personal level, a sure sign that consumer adoption is headed upwards. With most innovation coming from Japan, it will be interesting to watch how these human-centric devices continue to evolve.
The automotive world has been full of superlatives lately as the big automakers are tripping over each other to offer the latest, greatest, fastest, most technological, safest, quickest, best braking machine to the salivating, well-heeled buyer. Still, nothing has come out to surpass the amazing McLaren F1. Until now...
TopGear has recently tested the Koenigsegg CC and have crowned it as the fastest car they have ever tested. Words or pictures cannot really do this thing justice so I ask you to download this video [8 min - 22MB] and see for yourself. If you are a car enthusiast like me, you will go completely ape.
In the "Really Scary News" category comes a story from New Scientist about how weapons based on gamma ray explosives could be the next avenue of nuclear arms development...and proliferation.
"The explosive works by stimulating the release of energy from the nuclei of certain elements but does not involve nuclear fission or fusion. The energy, emitted as gamma radiation, is thousands of times greater than that from conventional chemical explosives."
The story goes on to describe how even "one gram of fully charged hafnium isomer could store more energy than 50 kilograms of TNT." Right now, production of the hafnium isomer is fairly limited, but experts predict gram quantities to be available within a handful of years.
Our own Ken Rhee has posted an extensive review of cases and protective covers for the Sony Clie NX series over at MemoWare Features.
Three different cases are reviewed. The Sena and Bellagio cases are soft leather cases and the Innopocket is a hard case made of aluminum.
Plus, Ken reviews a nifty Clie accessory: the Clie NX Charge Adapter, which lets you power your Clie using 4 'AA' cells.
If you like "Queer Eye For The Straight Guy" (my new fave), pop over to BBC America and catch "What Not To Wear". Trinny and Susannah make Simon Cowell seem like a nice guy as they pounce on unwary fashion disasters every week. The show is voyeuristic reality at its best as women are nominated to be made over by WNTW unbeknownst to them and are then filmed by hidden cameras for a couple of weeks to give the hosts an idea of how really tragic the situation is. They then bring the makeover target into the game by giving her a brutally honest evaluation of her couture status using a combination of the videos they took and a real good tongue lashing. After a crash course on how to dress, the invigorated victim goes on a £2000 shopping spree for a new wardrobe and then puts it all together with Trinny and Susannah's help. The wry, sharp Brit humor is the best part for me and they really do get nice results.
TeleRead.org is an interesting website with an interesting mission: to promote "well-stocked national digital libraries." Beyond the various lists and links, the site features a well-done blog related to e-books, the publishing industry, DRM (digital rights management), and other related matters.
As you may know, I'm a big fan of e-books, and I think they deserve a lot more attention than they've been getting, so I'm glad to see a well-organized and active site like this emerge. Check it out!
The D-Link DWL-800AP+ is an 802.11b Wi-Fi access point with a special trick up its sleeve. D-Link actually bills this device as a "Wireless Range Extender," since its primary function is to relay Wi-Fi signals to a main access point somewhere else in the wireless network.
Imagine that you have an access point on the second floor of your house, but the Wi-Fi signal doesn't make it down to the basement. You could place the DWL-800AP+ on the first floor (all it needs is a power outlet) and it would rebroadcast the signal from the main access point on down to the basement (plus, the first floor would then be doubly covered). Make sense?
Setting up the DWL-800AP+ was mostly painless. The only thing tough to figure out was telling the repeater the right MAC address (my main access point has three -- Ethernet, WAN, and wireless) to re-broadcast. If you guessed "Ethernet," congratulations, you win.
Be warned, however: the DWL-800AP+ doesn't work with all access points. Make sure you check the D-Link FAQs for a list of supported access points. The one I'm using with it is the D-Link DI-614+ Wireless Router, and it seems to work just great. Plus, since both of these devices are compatible with D-Link's proprietary AirPlus standard which promises speeds up to 22 Mmps (100% faster than 802.11b's standard 11 Mbps). As always, YMMV.
All in all, I'm pretty happy with the improvement. My back deck now has 100% Wi-Fi coverage, which means that sitting out back and sipping a tall cool drink while browsing the web (or updating GearBits) can't be too far off. Now all I need to figure out is how to hook up my grill to the WLAN...hmm...
After about a million Linkshare spam emails had arrived in my inbox over the past 6 months or so, I decided to try and see how I could get off their list. Surprisingly, their website has a toll-free number to customer support.
Calling that number, I spoke to a woman who informed me that Linkshare does not spam anyone and that I must have signed up. Pretty sure I didn't, she looked up my account and saw that my account was associated with a company called PEPID. I had never heard of PEPID, so I asked to be removed from Linkshare's email list, and that was promptly done. So, kudos to Linkshare -- I hate getting their email, but at least they give a guy a way to get off their list.
Now, back to PEPID. I found out that this company offers "Portable Healthcare Expertise." Granted, as founder of MemoWare, I'm fairly heavily embedded in the handheld computing community. However, as I'm not a physician, I don't know why PEPID would have ever had any reason to sign up my email address to a marketing company like Linkshare. So I called PEPID to see what was up.
I reached a guy manning the PEPID tech support line (also a toll-free number). After entering my name (not my email address) into his terminal, he said he wasn't sure how Linkshare got it because there was nobody with my name in the PEPID user database. Curious. I thanked him and hung up.
So, somebody's not quite being honest. Which company is it? Or, is it somebody else altogether? Who knows. As with all spam, I'll be happy when it stops invading my inbox.
CNET News.com has an interesting article about how the stability of Zip as the de facto compression standard for Windows users may be at risk.
Two companies, PKZip and WinZip, both offer Zip maniuplation programs. Each has implemented its own encryption system to add stronger password protection to the Zip format. However, the encryption systems aren't compatible, meaning that a Zip file may no longer be a Zip file even if it uses the same .zip extension that's existed for over a decade.
The article goes on to explain some of the specifics of the situation, which I hope can be reconciled without further fracturing the standard. Although Zip isn't a de jure standard, it is most certainly one of the better de facto standards in the Windows computing community.
Weather information is one of the many great uses of the Internet. As the weather is constantly changing, getting up-to-date and rich (i.e., graphical) information best happens via your browser.
When it comes to weather websites, a long time ago, I used to rely on weather.com. Of course, that was when it was run more like a hobby for somebody at the Weather Channel (i.e., a long time ago). Now, it's a disgusting morass of advertising and product placement as subtle as a sledgehammer.
Instead, I rely on the Weather Underground website. Granted, the name is a bit strange, as there is, by definition, no weather under the ground. But, the strengths of this website are a layout that crams as much information on your screen as possible while simultaneously allowing you to get your weather fix with absolutely no ads.
That's right, no banners, no pop-ups, no flashing "hit the mole" graphics or anything. For a mere $5 per year, you can become a sponsor and enjoy an ad-free experience.
The Weather Underground is a small group of weather and computer nerds that closely resembles those famed start-ups of yore. Think Romero and the Carmacks back at Id Computing circa 1994. Anywho, this is a great website and one that resembles what I think more of the WWW should look like.
In a stunt that could make or break Bravo's new hit Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, the Fab 5 will be making over Jay Leno, host of the The Tonight Show.
According to this article on CBSnews.com, the 'Queer Eye' gang is "...scheduled to appear on Leno's late-night talk show Aug. 14 — the same night NBC will re-air the second installment of the Bravo series. Then they'll come back the next night to show off the results of their work."
So, watch (or record) Thursday's episode for a treat. While I'm not a huge Leno fan, this could be particularly hilarious. Plus, like evey other Leno show, it'll be broadcast in high-definition TV. Bonus!
One of the apps I rely on daily is Irfanview, a image viewing utility that also incorporates some basic essential editing capabilities as well. Irfanview describes itself as "a very fast, small, compact and innovative FREEWARE (for non-commercial use) graphic viewer for Windows 9x/ME/NT/2000/XP."
Irfanview replaced ACDSee on all my systems when ACDSee became outrageously expensive some years ago. While Irfanview is indeed freeware, its robustness and feature set rival many shareware and commercialware alternatives.
So what's with the funky name? Like Linux, Irfanview is named after its author, Irfan Skiljan, who hails from Bosnia. And lest you sound like a total noob, it's pronounced "EarfanView." Go grab Irfanview and send Irfan an email thanking him for this wonderful app.
A friend (thanks, Bob!) pointed me to a hilarious TV advertisement from a car dealer. Follow this link (MPEG).
Now...where might I be able to get a Trunkmonkey installed?
A few months ago, I posted a blog entry where I described a typical day of mine and most of the tech I interact with. Well, I have a couple of revisions.
First, I had said that the first real piece of technology I used each day was an iPaq that lives on my nightstand -- I use it to get my email and check the weather before getting out of bed. Well, with the arrival of my Tungsten|C, the iPaq is pretty much collecting dust. The T|C just does what the iPaq did -- from checking email to web browsing -- a whole lot better. Part of that may be the T|C's faster processor (nearly twice as fast), but I think the apps I mostly use (Snappermail and Palm Web Browser) are just better than the standard Pocket PC equivalents.
Lest you think that Pocket PCs have no place in my daily life, the second change is that I've begun relying on my HP Jornada 565 to act as my home theater universal remote. Using the TV Remote Controller software I discussed previously, the 565 is now a very capable and flexible remote control that suits our entertainment system (TV, stereo, etc.) exceptionally well. Plus, with a Wi-Fi card installed, the 565 doubles as an email and web appliance for the family room. Now that's handy!
So, where one Pocket PC fell out of use, another use emerged. Funny how things work out like that. Anyway, just keeping up-to-date.
We've just added an "Authors" page so you can read a bit about those few hardy souls who bring you all the posts here at GearBits. The authors page also lists each author's last few blog entries.
To get to the Authors page from any blog entry, just click on the author's name at the bottom of the post. For example, at the bottom of this post, you should see "Posted by Craig" -- just click on "Craig" to get to the Authors page.
It appears that a hacker was able to break through security at Crutchfield, the online and catalog electronics dealer. I received the following email just this morning (the ____ contained my new temporary password). It appears that no credit card information was made available to the hacker, but other personal ID info was.
"Dear Craig Froehle:Crutchfield has discovered a breach of our web site security
and we believe your Crutchfield "Your Account" information may
have been compromised. The "Your Account" information may
include Name, Address, E-mail Address, Phone Number,
Vehicle Type, and Wish List information. We do not store
financial information in "Your Account".As a precaution, we have temporarily disabled the order history
on our website and have reset your account password.Your new password is __________.
At your earliest possible convenience, please login to the
site and update your password.Please accept our apologies.
Sincerely,
Customer Service
Crutchfield Corporation"
That's a pretty big-time operation to get hacked, but at least they were smart enough to keep my credit card info out of harm's way. Well, this time, at least. Yeesh.
In this post, I mentioned that I'd report back on my experience warwalking/wardriving with the Palm Tungsten|C handheld.
Using an application called Netchaser, I've been really impressed at how easy it is to find wireless networks. Armed with nothing more than the Tungsten, I can walk or drive, and about everywhere I go, there are Wi-Fi networks to be found.
Last night, I drove my daily 5 mile commute with the Tungsten sitting on the passenger seat. In scan mode, Netchaser keeps the handheld on and actively searching -- no user intervention is needed (which is good, as I wouldn't want to be fiddling with a PDA while driving). Netchaser will beep and/or vibrate when a new network is found.
In that short trip, I drove through 14 networks, 10 of which were completely unencrypted (i.e., no WEP). Some of the SSID's (network names) were "Charlotte's Wireless Network," "Christy's laptop," (?) and "Moe." Unfortunately, a lot of folks haven't heard that it's a good idea to change the default settings on your router/AP -- 6 of the 14 were named either "linksys" or "wireless." Oh, well, maybe if they read the manual they'd end up figuring out how to turn on WEP too, and then that wouldn't be nearly as much fun.
In summary, wardriving/warwalking with the Tungsten|C is easy and terrific. While I wish it was more sensitive in terms of its Wi-Fi reception, this is a great first version of a Palm OS handheld with integrated Wi-Fi.
If you haven't heard of wiki pages, that's probably not surprising. This interesting new (well, relatively new) web-based social computing tool is beginning to catch on and hit the mainstream.
In a nutshell, wiki pages are freely editable webpages. When viewed, they look like any other text-based webpage. However, an "Edit" button allows the user to revise, change, add to, or completely delete the contents of that page. Should some cybervandal come along and completely decimate a wiki page, the admin can restore it, but it seems this is a fairly rare occurrence.
The motivation behind wiki pages is a common one: being able to capture the collective intelligence of a group is easier when multiple people can contribute. Mailing lists and other "serial" archives take too long to wade through when the latest information is based on a series of sequential or parallel edits. The wiki seems like an excellent tool for tasks like groups needing to collaborate on documents or for building community-based FAQs.
For more information on wikis, take a look at the WikiWikiWeb (one of the original wikis) or grab a dead-tree version of The Wiki Way: Collaboration and Sharing on the Internet by Bo Leuf and Ward Cunningham.
While I still recommend going with 802.11g (for a variety of reasons), if you have no choice but to use 802.11b (Wi-Fi), then this product might be of interest.
The Netgear MA111 Wireless USB Adapter is a real peach of a product. It's small -- about the size of one of those keychain USB flash drives -- and it's almost idiot-proof (although some idiots are fairly inventive when it comes to screwing things up). Just plug it in a USB port and away you go. If you're running Windows XP, you have a choice to use either Windows' Wi-Fi management or you can use Netgear's included utility (Netgear's is better, IMHO).
You can either use it as a stub adapter (by itself) or you can use it with the included 3-foot cable. The cable gives you additional placement flexibility in case your Wi-Fi coverage isn't very good. For about $50 (street), it's a reasonably priced alternative to other adapters that are, almost without exception, larger.
I've been using one of these for a few weeks and it gets really good reception. I thought I would be sacrificing reception sensitivity because of the unit's small size, but I was wrong. The Netgear MA111 gets a big thumbs up.
A report from researchers at the Institut d'Informatique et Mathématiques Appliquées de Grenoble in France have found that a single user with a bad connection can dramatically slow down the access for all users of an 802.11b wireless network.
If someone connected to a Wi-Fi network at, say, 1 Mbps (the slowest transmission rate), then the transmission protocol used by the 802.11b access point will degrade everyone else using the same network to that slower speed. This happens even if another user has a strong enough signal to support the full 11 Mbps that 802.11b supports.
Given that the 802.11g standard is about 5X faster than 802.11b, and it does not suffer from this same failing, anyone thinking about setting up a new network (or upgrading an old one) should definitely steer towards 802.11g even if it is slightly more expensive. Read the full story...
Researchers may have stumbled on a way to eliminate the need for reading glasses in older adults: removing the fluid filling of the eye's lens and replacing it with a synthetic gel.
This article in New Scientist describes how the procedure, which could take as little as 15 minutes in an an outpatient facility, could work.
Testing is currently being done primarily on animals, but human testing could be close to follow if the results continue to be as promising. Between this and cataract surgery and Lasix, treatment of common eye maladies are definitely seeing a lot of headway. Now if we can just get some better progress made on treating macular degeneration, that'll be something.
Looks like Minolta has been busy. They have just announced a bunch of new digital cameras. The most exciting ones among the bunch are the DiMAGE A1 and DiMAGE Z1.
The DiMAGE A1 is probably the most exciting new release. It features a 5.0 megapixel progressive scan CCD, faster write speed (1.5x than the previous model 7Hi), 7x optical zoom (28 to 200mm equivalent), and fast shutter speed (30 to 1/16,000 seconds), and RAW image mode.
However, the best feature is the new image stabilization feature (Minolta calls it "Anti-Shake"). Rather than stabilizing the lens elements, this system stabilizes the CCD. We will have to wait and see how effective this new system will be though.
The DiMAGE Z1 offers a 3.2 megapixel CCD and a 10x zoom (38 to 380mm). It has a unique LCD monitor called the Real Motion Monitor that operates at 60 fps. The viewfinder has Minolta's unique Switch Finder that lets you see live view at all times as well. The Z1 stores its images on SD/MMC cards. Unfortunately, the Z1 doesn't come with any image stabilization system.
Looks like the A1 is a winner given a wide-view lens (28mm) and a decent zoom (200mm) with the Anti-Shake system. Check out the Minolta page.
The new Ben Affleck/Jennifer Lopez movie has just about everyone in agreement: it sucks. Some of the funniest reading I've done recently is the 130+ reviews of this awful flick over at RottenTomatoes.com. Here's a sample:
"Such an utter wreck of a movie you expect to see it lying on its side somewhere in rural Pennsylvania, with a small gang of engineers circling and a wisp of smoke rising from the caboose."
and
"Gigli is so unrelentingly bad that people may want to see it just as a bonding experience; viewers (read: victims) will want to talk and comfort each other afterwards."
Anyway, you get the idea. With a Tomatometer score of 7% (yes, that's really, really bad...even Ishtar got a 25%), there's no shortage of great quips -- the reviewers certainly had a field day with this one. Plus, you get to wonder what the heck the handful of reviewers tthat complimented the movie were thinking.
Update: According to one news story, Sony has pulled all of its TV advertising for Gigli in hopes of cutting its losses. Wow...what a bummer. Now I can't even get a hint at how bad this film is without actually seeing it.
I've been using Mozilla Firebird, the open-source browser formerly known as Phoenix, for a while now and it is the best browser I've ever used...period. And at only a 6.8 MB download, it loads and runs fast.
Like you, I'm sure, I spend a lot of my online time inside a browser, so having the best tool for that job is important. So far, Firebird has proven to be at least adequate, if not superb, in every task I've thrown at it. So go give this community-based browser a try and earn some karma points. And did I mention it's fast?
Think of all the things you hate about Gecko-based Netscape versions, and even some of the newer Mozilla-based Netscapes, and Firebird addresses darn near every one of them. Also, if you happen to be an Internet Explorer user, consider this a chance to "walk on the wild side." Be daring...try something new. If you don't like it, no problem...just delete the directory and continue as you have been. But GearBits looks a lot nicer in Firebird than it does in IE. ;-) Note that Firebird is just a browser.
If you want email as well, you may want to give Mozilla's new email client, Thunderbird, a try. Granted, it's only at version 0.1 right now, but given the good stuff coming out of the Mozilla camp these days, it may be a refreshing look at the trusty email app.
CNN has an interesting story on how cellphones are replacing landlines even faster than most people, at least most people here in the US, would have imagined. Today, 43% of all US phones are wireless, and we trail the rest of the world. One interesting fact: lesser developed nations are relying on wireless more than developed nations are. Take Cambodia, for example, where 90% of all phones are cellular. Read the whole story here.
Lexar Media, Inc. has just announced the world's first and only 4GB (you heard me right!) CompactFlash memory card. The 4GB card can store about 600 images captured in RAW mode using a 6-megapixel professional camera or about 45,000 JPEG images.
'The 4GB card is rated at 40X (6MB/sec) with Write Acceleration (WA) technology.
This is truly amazing since one of my previous laptops came with a 3GB hard disk (that was in 2000).
Unfortunately, you would have to mortgage your house in order to buy this card. The retail price of the new card is $1,499.
Read more about it here
Cerulean Studios has begun distributing beta invitations for Trillian Pro 2.0. In case you haven't heard of Trillian, it is a totally kick-ass universal messaging client that simultaneously supports IRC, ICQ, AOL Instant Messenger, MSN Messenger, and Yahoo! Messenger. Plus, it has loads of plug-ins (I even use it as my RSS newsreader). Very much a Swiss Army knife tool for the desktop -- flexible and indispensible. Check it out!
myHTPC looks like a nice front-end for Windows-based home theater PCs. It appears to offer a lot of functionality (handles TV tuning and serving up music, photo, and video files) and seems to have an active user and developer community excited about it. They've just added a hardware forum for those considering building their own HTPC to work with myHTPC. I haven't tried it out yet, but post a comment if you have to let us know what you think.
1,000 kilometers. 621 miles. It's not that far, but it has taken me eight months to cover that distance on my Concept 2 Model C Rowing Ergometer. If that's your first time seeing those words and letters arranged just so, the C2 as it's universally known is the defacto standard in indoor rowing machines. It was developed by Dick and Peter Dreissigacker back in 1981 and has gone through three model iterations, hence the current Model C designation. If you want to know more, see this complete history.
If anyone who rows asks you, "What is your 2K?", the question is really, "How fast can you row 2000 meters on a Concept 2 rowing ergometer?" It is an extremely accurate gauge of your performance as a rowing athlete. The world's elite do a 2K in about 5'46" whereas I can do it in 7'22" and not be able to walk or catch my breath for several minutes afterward. Rowing is a tremendously demanding sport with aerobic requirements nearing those of cross country skiing. Top rowers consume 7.0 liters/minute of oxygen which is outrageous.
I received mine last Christmas as a present from my wife and then used it to compete in an office weight loss contest. After the contest ended and an unwanted 20 pounds had disappeared, I set my sights on my first 1,000,000 meters and the free t-shirt and certificate associated with that milestone.
My C2 is hooked to my PC which runs a neat training and racing program called eRow. Using eRow, I set up all of my workouts and can even enter online races with rowers around the world. It keeps track of my time, heartrate, pace, stroke rate, splits...it does it all. Working out is fun and those 30 minutes every morning at 6AM jump start my metabolism and my day with a boost of energy.
I use the Concept 2 website's personal logbook feature to record all of my workouts and enter my work ranking times for comparison against other rowers. To keep my cool during workouts, I use a little device called a CBreeze which re-directs all the air you move with the C2 back at your body. Every C2er should have a CBreeze.
Now it's on to my second million meters!!!
You know a technology has hit mainstream when big companies want to control it. Such is the state of affairs of RSS, the family of formats used by bloggers and news websites (including GearBits) to syndicate their content. RSS stands for either "Rich Site Summary" or "Really Simple Syndication," depending on who you ask.
This story on CNET News.com describes the current and escalating battle over control of RSS and/or the technology that may replace it. It's certainly telling how popular the RSS concept has become when organizations like IBM, the W3C, and the IETF are all concerned about it.
We'll definitely keep an eye on this, and we'll hope the various entities keep their heads on their shoulders and don't screw up what's turned out to be a really nice and easy-to-implement concept...at least for us hacks.
For you home theater fanatics who might be in search of a universal remote control, I have an interesting alternative to suggest -- use your Pocket PC and the TV Remote Controller app (TVRC) by PDAWin.com.
TVRC basically turns your Pocket PC 2002 or 2003 into a full-color Pronto-compatible universal remote (note: if you don't know what a Pronto is, check out Philips' website). In short, just about anything that can be controlled via infrared can be controlled through TVRC.
It is insanely flexible. Using the free ProntoEdit software (from Philips), you design your templates and remote control layouts. Then, you upload the resulting .CCF file to your Pocket PC and open it up in TVRC. In "CCF mode," TVRC then emulates the Pronto (including hardware buttons!). If you don't have some infrared codes already in hexadecimal, no sweat -- just teach your Pocket PC using the "learn" mode and voila! TVRC also has a standard (non-CCF) mode that is far less exciting in my opinion.
Oh, and did I mention that TVRC can even accept voice commands!?! For less than $15, this is a really nice piece of software. Finally, I can put this Jornada 565 to use around my house! Check out TV Remote Controller 5.4 at PDAWin.com.
The Alphasmart Dana, having been out now for over a year, isn't exactly new news. However, recently, I got a chance to try out one of these devices that Alphasmart is billing as "The Palm Powered laptop alternative that's truly affordable."
The Dana is basically a 2-lb. unit with a full-sized keyboard attached to a 560x160 grayscale screen and running Palm OS. It comes equipped with dual MMC/SD expansion slots, a rechargeable battery (that can be removed and replaced by 'AA' cells), two USB ports (one type A and one type B), and an IrDA port. It comes with several pieces of custom software, including Alphaword, a text editor capable of creating and editing Microsoft Word files.
One of the more impressive aspects of the Dana is its durability. Alphasmart bills it as "rugged," and I've seen their salespeople repeatedly drop them on the floor from 3-4 feet up with absolutely no damage. Cool!
One thing that bugs me a bit about the Dana is the angle of the screen. I'm not very tall, and the angle of the display seems to "flat" -- I keep wanting to tilt it up to see it better (the contrast is lower at off-angles). Since this device is designed for kids, many of whom are shorter than I am, I wonder if this design is appropriate.
Recently, Alphasmart announced that it would soon start offering a model of the Dana equipped with built-in Wi-Fi (802.11b). I can see how that would be appealing to its customer base. Right now, the Dana can become Wi-Fi-enabled by hooking up a Wi-Fi adapter to its USB port (only certain adapters work, however, so be sure to check the documentation).
I'm not sure what Alphasmart means by "laptop alternative." Does that mean laptop replacement? I sure hope not, as that would be setting a pretty high bar to reach. Since it's not too terribly hard to find decent laptops with good feature-sets for $800 or so, laptops aren't really all that unaffordable anymore. If Alphasmart continues to push these into K-12 schools as typing tutors and alternatives to buying full-blown computers, they might be successful. I just don't see many professionals being satisfied by the Dana when they can have a full-fledged laptop for only a few hundred dollars more.
Norm Coleman, a Republican Senator from Minnesota, has asked the RIAA to produce what sounds like a ton of documentation regarding its massive barrage of lawsuits and subpoenas against those suspected of trading music online.
This article in Wired discusses some of the concerns the senator (rightly) has about the RIAA's attack. Finally, there's someone in Congress with some moderation on this issue.
Recently, I found Kemplar.com, who seem to have the latest and greatest when it comes to one of my favorite subjects: tiny sub-notebooks. They even let you compare them by size! While the prices are not for the faint of heart, if you must have the latest and coolest mini-laptop, phone or tiny camcorder, Kemplar.com may be the place for you. Enjoy...
The New York Times Technology section has a really nice article summarizing the state of the cable-versus-satellite wars over our television watching. And it's just not about television -- everyone is trying to get in on broadband Internet access, cellular phone service, and a host of enhanced services like video-on-demand and digital video recording. The sector is awash in new technologies and better choices for the consumer. Hey, deregulation may actually be working! Nah...
So, will cable and satellite digital video recording services kill TiVo? Read the whole story at the New York Times website (free account required).
