Sunday - August 30, 2009

Soldiers banned from training with live rounds.  Sorry state of modern military …

Millions for asylum seekers, welfare frauds , immigrants and the 2012 olympics, but damn little for defence by comparison.
What a sorry state.  But hey BMEWS ... this is NOT the first time in Brit military history that ammo has seen this restriction.
The Royal Navy in the days of iron men and wooden ships didn’t always use live rounds as they had a powder problem.
And so they had a restriction on practise gunnery.

Not so our American navy .... apparently we had enough for our smaller navy and PRACTISE WE DID!

Soldiers are being told they cannot train with live ammunition unless they are due to go to Afghanistan, according to reports.

Ian Johnston
Published: 12:18AM BST 30 Aug 2009

Ministry of Defence cutbacks mean that troops are being issue with blank rounds, which cost about 10p, instead of live rounds which cost about 30p. The MoD said the “ever-improving quality” of computer simulation had also reduced the need for live fire training.
Sources told The Sunday Times that the ban would affect everyone in the Territorial Army and also some regular Army units.

An officer told the newspaper: “We’ve been told we cannot fire live rounds unless we are going to Afghanistan. How on earth is a professional soldier supposed to be able to keep up with his skills like that?  “It is absolutely wretched. It is a total farce.”

Troops must pass a yearly test showing they can properly maintain their weapons and shoot with a reasonable degree of accuracy.
Conservative MP Patrick Mercer, who was an officer in the infantry, said cutting back on live firing could have serious consequences.
“The idea that our front line reserves should not be able to use live rounds is quite extraordinary,” he said.

“We can’t have a popgun army. The next thing you know we’ll be reduced to Dad’s Army-style training, shouting ‘bang bang.’”
The Ministry of Defence said: “The top priority is to train those about to deploy to Afghanistan, but the training of others continues.
“The ever-improving quality of simulation technologies has reduced the need to rely on live-fire exercises, although they still play an important role.”

TELEGRAPH

ok, I am NO kind of expert on weapons and such but still do not understand how puter simulation can be a good enough sub. for real thing.
Anyone ,,, explain it to me.

Posted by peiper     on 08/30/2009 at 03:11 AM   
Filed Under: • Computers • UK •  
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   Wednesday - April 01, 2009

Confiker Panic

From Mcafee.com, the anti-virus people:

Identifying and removing Conficker

There’s been a lot of talk about how Conficker is going to create havoc on April 1. Conficker, formally named W32/Conficker.worm, began infecting systems at the end of 2008 by exploiting a vulnerability in Microsoft Windows. Since then McAfee has seen two more variants of this worm and many binaries – files ready to load into memory and execute – that carry the worm’s malicious payload. Conficker.C is the latest variant. Its “call-home protocol” will change on Wednesday, April 1, and may entail an update with some as-yet unknown functionality.

McAfee already offers protection from the Conficker worm in its endpoint and network products, and Microsoft has issued a security patch for the vulnerability that the Conficker family has used to propagate. Yet many computer users continue to worry about infection. The information below will help you understand more about the worm, the steps you can take to clean an infected system, and measures to prevent reinfection.
What is the Conficker worm?

Conficker.C is the most recent variant of the Conficker worm. Exposure to Conficker.C is limited to systems that are still infected with the earlier variants, Conficker.A and Conficker.B, which operate by exploiting the MS08-067 vulnerability in Microsoft Windows Server Service. If the vulnerability is successfully exploited, it could allow remote code execution when file sharing is enabled. Conficker combats efforts at eradication by creating scheduled tasks and/or using autorun.inf files to reactivate itself.

McAfee has identified thousands of binaries that carry the Conficker payload. Depending on the specific variant, the worm may spread via LAN, WAN, web, or removable drives, and by exploiting weak passwords. Conficker disables several important system services and security products, and downloads arbitrary files. Computers infected with the worm become part of an “army” of compromised computers and could be used to launch attacks on websites, distribute spam, host phishing websites, or carry out other malicious activities.
How to tell if your system is infected

Symptoms of Conficker infection include the following:

* Access to security-related sites is blocked
* Users are locked out of the directory
* Traffic is sent through port 445 on non-Directory Service (DS) servers
* Access to admininistrator shared drives is denied
* Autorun.inf files are placed in the recycled directory, or trash bin

Steps to remove Conficker and prevent re-infection

We recommend customers take the following steps to remove W32/Conficker.worm and prevent it from spreading:

1. Install Microsoft Security Update MS08-067: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/Bulletin/MS08-067.mspx
2. Clean the infected systems, and reboot
Use anti-malware solutions such as McAfee VirusScan Plus or ToPS for Endpoint to clean the infection. Use behavioral detection techniques like the buffer overflow protection in Host IPS to prevent future infections. This is important because Conficker can propagate via portable media such as infected USB drives. As the media are accessed, the system processes autorun.inf and executes the attack. For more information, read McAfee Avert Labs’ document “Combating Conficker Worm.”
3. Identify other systems at risk of infection
You need to identify which systems are at risk. The list includes systems that either are not patched against Microsoft vulnerability MS08-067 or do not have proactive protection controls to mitigate the vulnerability. McAfee Vulnerability Manager and ePolicy Orchestrator can identify systems that are vulnerable and not protected.
4. Limit the threat’s ability to propagate
Using network IPS at strategic points in your network will quickly limit the ability of the threat to spread. This gives you time to either update your client anti-virus signatures or modify policies to block the threat using the behavioral controls.

The talking heads on TV are saying that if you can get on the internet and bring up the mcafee.com web site, then your system is Ok. I’ve kept up with the Windows updates, and I do quite a bit of system cleansing on a regular basis, so I’m Ok.

And you Mac guys, hush. Sooner or later somebody’s going to invent a Mac virus, and you’ll have to go through this BS too.

Posted by Drew458     on 04/01/2009 at 06:16 AM   
Filed Under: • Computers •  
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   Sunday - March 29, 2009

Nazi codebreaker which shortened the Second World War by two years.

I know this isn’t a new story and it’s fair to say everyone by now knows about Bletchley Park.

However, here’s another view with some great photos.  More photos at the link too.

Shame Churchill had originals destroyed but this gives you some idea of computing before BMEWS.

The Wider View: Nazi codebreaker which shortened the Second World War by two years

By Mail On Sunday Reporter
Last updated at 11:36 PM on 28th March 2009

The rows of silver dials and tangle of scarlet wires look more like a telephone exchange.

But this is the inside of the Turing Bombe, the part-electronic, part-mechanical code-breaking machine and forerunner of the modern computer, which cracked 3,000 messages a day sent on Nazi Enigma machines during the Second World War.

There were 210 such bookcase-like Bombes that gave Britain advance warning of Hitler’s plans and shortened the conflict by two years

All were destroyed for security reasons on Churchill’s orders after the war. This is a replica, built by 60 volunteers, which was fired up last Tuesday.

Code-breakers including former Wrens Ruth Bourne and Jean Valentine, pictured above, returned for a reunion at Bletchley Park, Buckinghamshire, where they worked in top secret in blacked-out, cupboard-sized spaces.

The original Bombes, invented by brilliant mathematician Alan Turing, were made using reinforced brown Tufnol plastic moulded from sheets a tenth of an inch thick, a cast-iron framework and 12 miles of intricate wire circuits.

The machine has taken 14 years to build from scratch into working order

At 61⁄2ft tall and running on no more power than a kettle, the Bombe could unravel 158 trillion possible combinations to unlock a seemingly random series of letters sent by the Nazis to the front lines, which were, in fact, highly complex codes, changing daily. Typewriter-like Enigma machines scrambled the letters using three or four rotor wheels.

This inside view of the Bombe would not usually be visible to the operator. The right-hand wall is a hinged door, the inside of which holds electronic circuits.

The left-hand wall is the mechanical half of the Bombe. The brightly coloured squares are resistors and the loops of red tangled wire are circuits.

Teams of highly skilled mathematicians, cryptologists, inventive thinkers and crossword enthusiasts would receive hundreds of Nazi codes and ‘guess’ the approximate real message or plain text.

This ‘crib’ would be given to the Wrens who would set it on the Bombe’s alphabet wheels.

By checking all the permutations, the crib would help locate the true message within the code. It
took the Bombe about 11 minutes to find a possible message. When it did, a bell would sound and the Wrens passed it on to the code-crackers, using a red scrambler phone. Churchill called them ‘the geese that laid the golden eggs but never cackled’.

The machine was named after an earlier Polish code-breaking machine called a Bomba. Each Bombe had its own title, inscribed on wooden plaques. .

This replica is called Phoenix

Posted by peiper     on 03/29/2009 at 10:02 AM   
Filed Under: • Amazing Science and Discoveries • Computers • Science-Technology • UK • War-Stories •  
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   Wednesday - December 17, 2008

Just get Firefox already wouldja?

REDMOND, Wash. – Microsoft Corp. is taking the unusual step of issuing an emergency fix for a security hole in its Internet Explorer software that has exposed millions of users to having their computers taken over by hackers.

The “zero-day” vulnerability, which came to light last week, allows criminals to take over victims’ machines simply by steering them to infected Web sites; users don’t have to download anything for their computers to get infected, which makes the flaw in Internet Explorer’s programming code so dangerous. Internet Explorer is the world’s most widely used Web browser.

Microsoft said it plans to ship a security update, rated “critical,” for the browser on Wednesday. People with the Windows Update feature activated on their computers will get the patch automatically.

Thousands of Web sites already have been compromised by criminals looking to exploit the flaw. The bad guys have loaded malicious code onto those sites that automatically infect visitors’ machines if they’re using Internet Explorer and haven’t employed a complicated series of workarounds that Microsoft has suggested.

Microsoft said it has seen attacks targeting the flaw only in Internet Explorer 7, the most widely used version, but has cautioned that all other current editions of the browser are vulnerable.

Microsoft rarely issues security fixes for its software outside of its regular monthly updates. The company last did it in October, and a year and half before that.

On the Net:

Microsoft’s security advisory:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/advisory/961051.mspx

Gosh, Microsoft has a product with a glaring security hole in it. Who’da ever thunk that would happen?

Ok, I guess I’ll have to get the fix and install it. As much as I hate IE, I keep a copy around because some sites just won’t work with Firefox. Especially online shopping sites that need to enable session cookies. And it’s that online shopping time of year.

Posted by Drew458     on 12/17/2008 at 12:15 AM   
Filed Under: • Computers • Cyberspace-Internet •  
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   Wednesday - December 10, 2008

Hacked USB Cable

I like this.  You still need to encrypt it, but I love the “security by obscurity” aspect.

Your Flash-Drive’s Been HACKED!


We’ve got the tiniest flash-drives, and we’ve got flash-drives that are hardened against attack. Now, we’ve got flash-drives that look like they’ve been hacked! Imagine yourself, sitting in a coffee-shop. You pull out your venerable laptop, and fire it up. You may not realize it, but there are jealous eyes on your hardware. They see your computer and size you up. Is the computer you carry worth trying to steal? Are you enough of a threat to them? The mental-calculations proceed apace. That is until you reach for your flash drive.

You pull from your bag a seemingly torn and frayed piece of USB cabling. Immediately, your potential miscreant raises an eyebrow. Exactly what does he think he’s going to do with that cable? Grinning like a madman, you plug your phantom USB device into your computer, and happily continue on with your work, apparently oblivious to your devices obvious lack of connectivity.

It appears to all around you that you are, indeed, mad. In fact, what you’ve really done is plug in a 2 gigabyte flash drive that’s masterfully disguised as a frayed and broken USB cable. You’ve managed to make it appear that you’re insane, and as all thieves know - never EVER screw with an insane person.


Features

• 2GB flash drive cleverly disguised as a frayed and broken USB cable
• Easily transfer and store files, photos and music
• USB 2.0 with 1.1 backwards compatibility
• Mac, Windows and Linux compatible, of course

Posted by Mr. Christian     on 12/10/2008 at 09:34 AM   
Filed Under: • Computers •  
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   Thursday - October 16, 2008

FAKE MICROSOFT PATCH TUESDAY.

I get the Tuesday Patch on Wed here, and this arrived in Thurs. email.

While tech things not usually my forte (but I’m in there trying to learn. Slowly. ) I simply wondered how many have seen this and are aware.

My guess is that most BMEWSers would be aware of something in email anyway.  Even I know about that. BUT ..
hey.  Just on the off chance that even one hasn’t caught this and might get nailed, I thought I should post the article and the link.

October 14th, 2008
Fake Microsoft Patch Tuesday malware campaign spreading

Posted by Dancho Danchev @ 3:00 pm

Malicious attackers are once again taking advantage of event-based social engineering attacks, and are currently mass mailing fake notifications for Microsoft’s Patch Tuesday, attaching a copy of Trojan.Backdoor.Haxdoor, next to a legitimately looking PGP signature which is, of course, fake too :

“We received some questions from customers about an e-mail that’s circulating that claims to be a security e-mail from Microsoft. The e-mail comes with an attached executable, which it claims is the latest security update, and encourages the recipient to run the attached executable so they can be safe. While malicious e-mails posing as Microsoft security notifications with attached malware aren’t new (we’ve seen this problem for several years) this particular one is a bit different in that it claims to be signed by our own Steve Lipner and has what appears to be a PGP signature block attached to it. While those are clever attempts to increase the credibility of the mail, I can tell you categorically that this is not a legitimate e-mail: it is a piece of malicious spam and the attachment is malware. Specifically, it contains Backdoor:Win32/Haxdoor.”

http://blogs.zdnet.com/security/?p=2027

Posted by Drew458     on 10/16/2008 at 10:32 AM   
Filed Under: • Computers • Cyberspace-Internet •  
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   Monday - October 06, 2008

ANTIQUITY FOR US HISTORY BUFFS … FOUND IN A COMPUTER MAGAZINE.

As everyone who knows me also knows by now, I’m blown away by things like this.  Even though I read this short piece, I still can not grasp exactly how they can know for sure how an ancient Greek instrument sounded.  I understand what they are telling me here. No problem there.
I guess I don’t have the imagination to quite figure out how they can be so sure they have it right.

Bottom line though is, I do believe em and think this is a great find.

For our BMEWS readers who are bored by this kind of thing, take heart and please be patient.
I’m sure I can find blood and gore and politics to post. Especially the first two as there’s so damn much of it here.

The link below is an audio only, no photos.

http://www.astraproject.org/examples/dufay.mp3

Posted by Drew458     on 10/06/2008 at 08:56 AM   
Filed Under: • Amazing Science and Discoveries • Computers •  
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   Tuesday - September 02, 2008

Google takes fight to Microsoft with Chrome browser launch.

Right ... Maybe you folks already know about this but I only just this minute found it.
Being GREEN (not the envirmnt) when it comes to thing tech, I get all kinds of excited over stuff like this.  That’s mostly cause I understand so little of it and think it’s a new magic trick.  And we almost all like magic, don’t we?

I’m lookin forward to this.  Some of you might be going, yawn.  And Drew knows how to build his own, most likely. Macker too. But the rest of us who still think of our kitchen toasters as hi-tech, we’re goin’ WOW. Huh?

By Matthew Moore
Last Updated: 2:01pm BST 02/09/2008

Google has opened up a new front in its increasingly bitter battle with Microsoft by releasing its own web browser.

Read the full web comic introducing Google Chrome
Shane Richmond: Google’s Chrome browser is an attack on Microsoft
The search giant hopes Google Chrome will challenge the dominance of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer, which is currently used by 75 per cent of surfers.

Google’s browser will be available for free download in 100 countries later on Tuesday, a week after the updated Internet Explorer 8 hit the market.

Google claims Chrome will be “clean and fast” and come with technical improvements that will make it more stable and allow it to “run today’s complex web applications much better” than its rivals.

It will also offer more web privacy functions, allowing users to withhold information from the sites they visit, including the Google search engine.

Initially Google Chrome will only work on computers with Microsoft’s Windows operating system, a clear sign that it intends to take on Microsoft on its own territory. Mac and Linux versions will follow later, Google says.

Google has long dominated the search market with nearly two-thirds of all queries, leaving Microsoft’s MSN Search trailing in third place behind Yahoo with around 10 per cent of searches. But the San Francisco firm is now launching an assault on the markets in which Microsoft is strongest.

It has already released free word processing and spreadsheet software, to rival Microsoft’s popular but expensive Word and Excel programmes, and Google Chrome marks the start of its campaign to rule how people navigate the web.

Mozilla’s Firefox, currently Internet Explorer’s largest rival, has managed to claw its way to around 20 per cent of the browser market thanks in part to co-operation with Google, but has never looked like claiming the No 1 spot.

Analysts believe Chrome, backed by the Google brand and supported by other Google services, could quickly become the strongest ever challenger to Internet Explorer’s crown.

“As the starting point for nearly every user’s Internet experience, the browser is important online real estate. The market share gains by Firefox in a short period of time show to us that users are looking for better browser experiences,” said Mark May of Needham & Co.

Other analysts have suggested that Chrome could help protect and promote Google’s other services, such as search and email.

“This gives Google another opportunity to protect its flank and to create a new branding position,’’ said Roger Kay of Endpoint Technologies Associates.

Other browsers – including Firefox, Apple’s Safari, and Opera - could also be threatened by Chrome, although the chief executive of Mozilla said it would continue to co-operate with Google over Firefox.

“On the financial front… we’ve just renewed our economic arrangement with them through November 2011, which means a lot for our ability to continue to invest in Firefox and in new things like mobile and services,” John Lilly wrote on his blog.

Chrome is designed to make it easier to browse the web, in part by making more use of tabs

In response to the Chrome launch, Microsoft released a statement identifying the improved privacy functions of the latest Internet Explorer.

“The browser landscape is highly competitive, but people will choose Internet Explorer 8 for the way it puts the services they want right at their fingertips ... and, more than any other browsing technology, puts them in control of their personal data online,” said Dean Hachamovitch, general manager of Internet Explorer.

Chrome is designed to make it easier and faster to browse the web, by offering enhanced address-bar features and other elements which differ from those on other rival browsers.

The launch announcement was made on Google’s official blog site last night, after a comic introducing some of Chrome’s functions emerged on the internet.

“We believe we can add value for users and, at the same time, help drive innovation on the web,” the statement said.

“The web gets better with more options and innovation. Google Chrome is another option, and we hope it contributes to making the web even better.”

http://tinyurl.com/5setqo

Posted by Drew458     on 09/02/2008 at 09:24 AM   
Filed Under: • Computers •  
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   Friday - August 01, 2008

I hate banks

I get a ton of junk mail. So do you. Most of the ads go right into the recycle bin. Letters that arrive with only a return address and no company name I don’t even bother to open. Guaranteed to be crap. Straight into the bins. Who has time to read through all this mess? I swear, the stupidest thing the Post Office ever did was come up with Bulk Mailing discount rates. But complaining about the Post Office is Peiper’s job, and he may have it with my blessings.

I do almost all of my banking and bill paying online. When I have a job that allows it, I’ll always sign up for direct deposit. It’s just so much easier. But there can be problems with banks, and when that happens ... good luck finding a real human being at the other end of the phone line. But I’ve kept this account forever. The bank I got it from is long gone. They were swallowed up by another bank, who was devoured by another bank, who was bought up by the bank I didn’t want to use because they had a lousy customer service reputation, and then that bank was bought up by the current bank. I think my money is in Hong Kong. I’m not sure. My bank doesn’t even have a name any more, just some initials. Whatever. Welcome to the 21st Century.

So I was scrolling through my bank account online the other month when I noticed that they were charging me $1 service fee for having a credit card with them. What? I have thinned my credit cards down to the bare minimum these days, and I know darn well that I have no such card. So it was dig throuhg the website to find the Contact Us telephone number, then I began my journey through Voice Menu Hell. Press 1 for English. Press 2 for personal banking. Press 1 for checking ... and on and on. Somehow I managed to find that magic combination of key presses that got me to a human being. Of course I got the recorded “Your call may be recorded for quality assurance purposes” messages, followed by another recording “All of our customer service people are currently assisting other customers. Please stand by” followed by some awful canned music usually used to get confessions from Al Qaeda terrorists in Gitmo. Finally the phone rings, and a person answers. “dabba dabba ubba dabba la? Sir?” Naturally the call center is in India. Grrr. So I patiently explained that I didn’t have this card, never requested this card, and had never used the card, so why were they charging me a buck? She ( I think ) credited me my dollar and said the problem was taken care of. Gosh, swell. And it only took me 45 minutes.

Next month the statement has another $1 charge for the same thing. Oh hell no, I’m not going through that process again. So I sat down at the computer and wrote, printed, and mailed them an actual letter. So I spent more time, and probably 50¢ to solve a $1 problem. Or so I thought.

Two weeks later there is a message on my answering machine. It’s the bank. Please call us back. I did. They had gone home for the weekend. So I called them back Monday and actually got a human to talk to. I explained the whole situation over again. “But sir, everyone at our bank has one of these cards. Our records show you were sent one.” Lady, no credit card ever arrived in an envelope from your bank. “No, it wouldn’t. For security purposes we send them in plain envelopes with just a PO Box return address.” You mean like every other piece of junk mail? Then I must have thrown it out. “Ok, then I’ll put down that you destroyed it, because if I mark that it was lost there’s a whole other process you have to go through”. Whatever. Why did you send me a credit card anyway, since I never applied for one? “Well, it’s not really a credit card even though it says MasterCard on it. It’s a debit card.” A debit card? What’s that? I already have an ATM card. Why do I need another card? “Well I see in your records that you use your ATM card at a number of stores, and each time you do you pay a 25¢ service fee. With the debit card there is no service fee. Just swipe the card and press the button marked Credit Card. And instead of paying a quarter each time, it’s only $1 per month.” So this debit card isn’t a credit card, it’s a direct account access card, just like my ATM card, but when I use it I pretend it’s a credit card? And the money comes straight out of my account, only without the transaction fee? “That’s right sir, we’ll have another one delivered to you in a few days. And I’ll waive the $1 fee.” What, forever, or just for this month? “Oh, forever. There will be no monthly fee for you. I can do that.” Well, great. Thanks.

The card arrived yesterday. I’ve spent the last week getting a callous on my thumb opening every piece of junk mail making sure it wasn’t the magic envelope. So I have the card. Can I run right out and use it? Heck no. First I have to call in to some number to activate it. I call, and I get this pimply voice. I was expecting a machine; it’s usually a 5 second process. You have to call from your home phone, they read the incoming phone number, and they know it’s me, and it’s done. No, this time I get young Mr. Acne. I have to read off the card number, provide my name and address and last 4 digits of my SSN. Ok fine. Are we done? “Not yet sir.” And then he tries to sell me a bunch of crap. Credit card protection, identity protection, white wall tires, magazine subscriptions ... whatever. Grrr. So I say no to all of them, and my card is activated. Whoo hoo! Now I can go shopping and save myself a quarter.

Not quite.

I get to the store, buy my stuff, and swipe the brand new card. “Please enter your PIN number” reads the card swiper. My what? There was no PIN number on any of the papers that came with the card. I know, because I read them all. Twice. So I put in my PIN from my ATM card ... same bank account, same essential card function, maybe it’s the same number, right? Wrong. The cashier gives me the dead eye when the transaction gets rejected, and I have to go and use my ATM again. Son of a bleach. So back home I go, twenty five cents poorer, and try and call the bank again.

Well, one of the most annoying things about voice menu systems is that they are always being changed. This time there’s a new menu, and I have to play Button, Button, Who Has The Button all over again ... and it doesn’t seem that any of the options has a human being at the other end. I even tried the extended silence thing, the pressing 0 thing, and the pressing several buttons at once thing. No good. Finally I tried the “To report your card Lost or Stolen” key press, and eventually got hold of a human being again. “dabba dabba ubba laba da? Sir?” Awww shit.

Look Benji, I just want to get a PIN for this card you guys sent me. It’s already authorized, but it didn’t come with a PIN. “umbalal dumba ladda bah, I transfer you” and it’s back to Gitmo for some more torture music. The phone rings. It answers. I hear the same old voice menu in the background. But Benji is riding the call with me! Boop-deep-deep-bah-bip! he enters some secret code, and the phone rings again. And I get “All of our customer service people are busy helping other customers. Please stay on the line” .... and I’m back getting ear torture again. But not for too long. Ring. Ring. “Hello? This is ----, how may I help you?” Horry Clap, a genuine American! So I explain things once again. “When did you get the card?” It came in the mail yesterday and I authorized it today. “PIN numbers are sent in a separate envelope for security purposes. You should receive it in 3 to 5 business days.” But it didn’t say that anywhere in the papers that came with the card. All it said was Dial This Number To Change Your PIN. “3 to 5 business days sir. And if you don’t have it in a week please call us back. Thank you have a nice day.”

So now I have to go back to opening all the junk mail again. Great.



I had a bunch of checks to put in the bank. Instead, I walked down the street to the nearest local no-name bank and opened a new checking account. I dealt with a nice young woman who spoke perfect English even though she is from the Middle East somewhere. Very pretty too. She filled out all the paperwork for me; all I had to do was sign my name once. Processed it all right there on the spot, even gave me my new debit card with my name on it. Which also works as an ATM card. And the first box of checks will arrive in under a week and they’re free. And that branch office is open 7 days a week, stop by any time. Here, have one of our pens. Here’s my card, here’s our web page address, and please come see me if there’s anything I can ever help you with. Thank you for your business!

Maybe I just hate that other bank. This one seems Ok. Of course, they’re in the process of being bought out by another bank right now. That’s how it goes. I figure I can get 3 to 5 good years out of them until they’re owned by my old bank. Then I’ll have to start the whole thing over again. Press 1 for Aggravation.

Posted by Drew458     on 08/01/2008 at 02:31 PM   
Filed Under: • Big Business • Computers •  
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   Saturday - July 19, 2008

new CCleaner version available

Go get the latest version of CCleaner for your PC. v2.09.600. Use it at least weekly. It’s a great tool, it’s easy to use, and it’s free. Cleans up most of the junk on your PC, even junk in the Registry.

CCleaner is a freeware system optimization and privacy tool. It removes unused files from your system, allowing Windows to run faster and freeing up valuable hard disk space. It also cleans traces of your online activities such as your Internet history. But the best part is that it’s fast (normally taking less than a second to run) and contains NO Spyware or Adware!

Get your copy from (just click the pic)

Posted by Drew458     on 07/19/2008 at 04:38 PM   
Filed Under: • Computers •  
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   Friday - June 13, 2008

PC Prices Dropping Again?

Even though the dollar may not be worth much right now, and I’ve heard rumors we might be in a recession, the prices of PCs seem to have come down again. I got a flyer in the mail from Dell, and they’re pushing a basic machine for $499. No monitor, but hey, if you’re reading this you don’t really need another one do you?

My PC is a Dell Dimension XPS 733r which dates from 1999. It has a 733Mhz Pentium, a 27Gb HD, and a 19” hi-rez CRT. I’ve got the memory maxxed out at 384Mb; that’s all it will hold. I’ve added a DVD burner/32X CD drive that replaced the 4X CD reader. It still has the original Sound Blaster card and the speaker system. This thing cost $2200 nine years ago.

Today, for less than one quarter of that price, you can buy a machine that runs 14 times faster, has 10 times the RAM (3Gb), 20 times the HD capacity - half a freakin Terabyte!!, and has a data bus that runs at least twice as fast. For $499. Amazing. Oh, and free shipping too.

Of course, to ramp things up a bit, you’ll want to spend $100 to upgrade to the next level of CPU, but that upgrade gets you a 1333Mhz data bus, a full third faster than standard. And another $60 gets you 4Gb of RAM that runs at a higher speed. And a decent stand-alone video card adds another $60. Which gives you a new bottom line of $729. For a smoking fast PC. All of this for $22 a month for 3 years. Hey, I’m still pretty impressed, even though this may not be the ultimate bang-for-the-buck deal out there.

Posted by Drew458     on 06/13/2008 at 11:23 AM   
Filed Under: • Computers •  
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   Thursday - May 01, 2008

Geek heaven

Charles Babbage’s Diffference Engine #2 built, and it works just fine.

Computer geeks rejoice, the very first computers have actually been built. 160 years after they were designed. Charles Babbage designed mechanical computers, well super calculators actually, that could do fairly advanced mathematics. He is considered the father of computers, and is one of those misty figures from techno pre-history like Henri Jacquard (who invented the punchcard) Ada Lovelace (who invented the loop and the If-Then statement that no programming language would work without) and Herman Hollerith (who modified Jacquard’s idea into the 80 column punchcard that was used from the 1890 US Census up until the early 1980s. He also started the company that would one day become IBM) Babbage’s engines are massive piles of gleaming steel and brass gears and rods, true works of mechanical art.

Engine #2 stands 11 feet long and weighs 5 tons. It has a mere 8000 precisely machined moving parts, less than a third of the nearly 25,000 parts count of Engine #1. Which shows you that something like Moore’s law existed even back then. Engine #2 can solve systems of simultaneous equations up to the seventh order.

Read all about it over at The Computer History Museum where you can watch a neat video. Or you can read about it at Gizmodo, and watch the same video in a slightly larger format. 

Posted by Drew458     on 05/01/2008 at 10:34 PM   
Filed Under: • Computers •  
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   Thursday - April 03, 2008

Firefox 3 Beta 5 is available for download

Those hard working code monkeys at Mozilla have been testing and tweaking, and the latest version of the Firefox browser is available for download. This is still a Beta edition, which means it has some bugs, but only one of them is a “Sev 1” fatal error in a Windows environment. And that one only happens in a rare circumstantial combination. The other bugs are just minor annoyances, and are few in number. So, you can be impatient and get it now, or you can wait another month perhaps until the final release version comes out.

This version of Firefox is said to be much faster, more secure, and more stable than earlier versions. You can find it here.

Posted by Drew458     on 04/03/2008 at 10:59 AM   
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   Monday - March 24, 2008

Network Solutions: Chicken Littles or Secret Islamists?

American Internet Service Provider giant Network Solutions takes down fitna.com webiste scheduled to run anti-izzy Dutch film. Network Solutions then proceeds to load up the now unused domain with lots of islam oriented advertisements. 8 of the 10 ads that are listed there. Think they’re trying to send a message?

An American internet provider has moved to ban a website on which a Dutch MP was planning to host an anti-Islam film portraying the Koran as a “fascist” book.  Website host Network Solutions suspended http://www.fitna com, the online venue that Geert Wilders, an anti-immigrant Dutch MP, has planned to show a short film condemning the tents of the Mulism faith. {DrewNote: I also condemn their tents. Stinky piles of musty camel hair, crusted with sand, loaded with fleas. Considering what Coleman, Kelty, and The North Face have for sale these days, there just is no excuse. Oh wait, did they mean to write “tenets”? Oh. Never mind.} Mr Wilders had planned to broadcast a 10 minute movie comparing the Koran to Mein Kampf on the internet site following the refusal of broadcasters to screen the film amid fears of a violent international backlash across the Islamic world.

“Network Solutions has received a number of complaints regarding this site that are under investigation,” said a statement by the internet provider.

The decision by the US website host to bar material deemed as harassing, hate propaganda, threatening, harmful or “otherwise objectionable” follows calls across Europe for the anti-Islam film to be banned.
...
Mr Wilders has promised to find another outlet to put his film “on the internet quickly” this week

Posted by Drew458     on 03/24/2008 at 08:44 PM   
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