Jon Pogue, a technical writer for the New York Times, recently discovered how very insecure Wi-Fi connections can be (via Lifehacker). This is nothing new. However, it can be a jarring shock to those of you who hop on free Wi-Fi connections down at the local coffee shop. Your email messages, web [...]
Here’s an interesting experiment. On a Windows desktop, right-click on the desktop, and create a new Folder. Then, try renaming it ‘aux’. Can’t do it, right? There are certain restricted words that cannot be used to name folders or files, even though they use regular characters. You can’t even [...]
First off, let me just state that the ordering of DSL from Verizon was a surprisingly painless procedure. The support and sales people I talked to were courteous and helpful. I called up to get a “dry loop” (no phone service) DSL line, and they got me squared away (with one small error [...]
“If the man at the top and a team of Microsoft’s best engineers faced defeat, what chance do ordinary punters have of keeping their Windows PCs virus-free?” Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and a team of top Microsoft engineers couldn’t remove spyware from a PC. If they couldn’t do it, we know we have [...]
If you’re using Yahoo Instant Messenger, beware of strange messages from friends or strangers. There’s a couple malicious things floating around that may trouble you.
The first is a worm virus, that sends a message with a malicious URL. Clicking on the URL will send you to a page that will install a custom [...]
Everybody probably has this thought at some point: I have two UPSes rated for 20 minutes of battery time; can I plug them into each other and get 40 minutes of power? The short answer is ‘no’. It’s just not a good idea, and not just because it voids your warranty. [...]
The music industry is at war with you, the consumer. You might not have even known you were at war, and yet, you are. The music industry as a whole, and especially the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), is working to restrict your rights. Whereas before when you would buy an [...]
Saying there’s a security flaw in Windows makes a tech’s eyes roll. Anyone who’s run Windows Update periodically know that there are flaws that crop up. However, recently, a new flaw was discovered that has yet to be fixed — a fully patched Windows XP machine with updated Norton Antivirus was able to [...]
Last week my sister pointed at a computer and called it a hard drive. The other one I’ve heard is calling a computer a CPU. I didn’t correct her, because no one really cares. No one, that is, except for techs. Techies are really annoyed when they hear this, because it’s [...]
You probably keep hearing about BitTorrent, but might not have any idea what it is. Or, perhaps you’ve downloaded a .torrent file, and have no idea how to open it. BitTorrent has been getting a lot more distribution, and it’s a good idea to understand what it’s all about.
BitTorrent is a method of [...]