geek ('gēk), noun. 1. Obsessive Computer User: somebody who enjoys or takes pride in using computers or other technology, often to what others consider an excessive degree 2. Someone with greater than normal computer skills.
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If you missed the latest round of format wars, consider yourself lucky. Similar to the competing formats of VHS -vs- Betamax, there was recent confusion over the hi-definition format that’s going to replace DVDs. The competing formats were Blu-Ray, and HD-DVD. Toshiba was the primary backer of HD-DVD, and recently conceded defeat in the high-definition DVD battle to Sony backed Blu-Ray.
However, this time almost everyone who bought a player is a loser. People who purchased HD-DVD players will still be able to use them as up-converting DVD players, but HD-DVDs will soon be as hard to find as Betamax tapes. Many early adopters of Blu-Ray also have discovered they won’t be able to enjoy the new features of Blu-Ray’s 2.0 spec, as their players aren’t upgradeable. A notable exception is the PlayStation 3. In fact, if you’re in the market for a Blu-Ray player in the immediate future, the PS3 is easily the best bargain.
Motherboard GIGABYTE GA-MA770-DS3
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Motherboard review by James_8970
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As technology continues to progress, our present demands continue to outgrow our pasts. Over the past few months we have seen many new chipsets released: Intel’s P35/X38/X48, nVidia’s 7×0i series, and now it’s AMD’s turn with the 770 (AM2+) and 790fx series chipsets. With our budget constraints we were not able to leap for a $200+ motherboard, but overall we believe this board is a great compromise between performance and dollar value.
As time moves on, new CPU’s are released and their performance is greatly affected by the features on the motherboard. AMD has just recently released some new products, the Phenom series CPU’s. While they aren’t quite as good as their Intel counterparts, they do have a great number of innovative features that set them apart from Intel’s current offerings. That aside, many of the current motherboards are Phenom compatible – after a BIOS update. This motherboard, on the other hand, is compatible with this CPU out of the box. It also has a higher hyper transport speed then other traditional AM2 motherboards, which could ultimately affect future upgrades. This motherboard comes fully equipped with native DDR2 1066MHz, PCIe 2.0 – a first for an AMD motherboard - and up to 16GB of RAM to keep you on the leading edge of technology and give you an unprecedented upgradability path for the future.
Why are there so many people down on Vista? Especially media people? I am so tired of hearing Vista failure! Vista disaster! Vista sux!
I think every one of these people have a very short memory. I have been doing computer support for over 15 years, most of it supporting end users at the consumer level and enterprise level. My first enterprise/corporate task was to upgrade Windows 3.1 computers to Windows 95 for “Outlook” email. I have deployed Windows 2000 and Windows XP as major projects to help corporations standardize their hardware and software platforms. I know the ins-and-outs of the operating systems pretty well.
There are some basic truths to be had. It doesn’t matter how well an OS is designed, tested, and maintained, the user will find a way to break it. The user will always find something doesn’t work (OS compatibility) no matter how much time is spent making sure that compatibility issues are worked out. Lastly, you will not be able to satisfy everyone.
Some of our more “chronologically enhanced” readers might remember a time in their childhood when dad decided that the family should pile into the trusty station wagon (sans seatbelts of course) and see the country (for you younger readers, this time should be referred to as “back in the day”). You might have gone to drive the famed Route 66 or traveled countless hours with your thighs sticking to the vinyl seats to ride a smelly burro through the Grand Canyon. Wherever your ill fated journey’s final destination was supposed to be, there was always one part of every trip that was guaranteed to be ever present, the giant multifold map (or if your dad was particularly adventurous, the full sized road atlas of the lower 48 plus Alaska and Hawaii). Have you ever used a standard multifold map? Probably. Have you ever successfully re-folded one back to its original form? I seriously doubt it, unless you’ve got a doctorate in “map-folding-ology”.
I’ve been a fan of Corsair RAM for years, so when they decided to enter the power supply market, I jumped at the chance to see what they have to offer.
The TX750W comes with some impressive packaging including a “velvet” bag to keep it in if you’re not actually going to use it…which would be a serious mistake. Don’t let the “Plain Jane” matte black and orange dressings fool you, this is a truly nice piece of hardware. When you remove this PSU from the box (and the bag), the first thing you notice is the abundance of leads…more than enough for almost any installation. There’s an ATX 24/20 pin connector, an EPS/ATX12V 8/4 pin connector, 4 PCI-E 6/8pin connectors, 8 SATA power connectors, 8 4 pin Molex peripheral connectors, and 2 floppy connectors…all of adequate length. This all sounds great; but it presents some issues I’ll get to a little later.
Ok, the cat’s out of the bag. I’m a geek. Not only am I a geek, but I’m a geek with “prominently defined antisocial tendencies” (at least that’s how it was described to me by a medical professional way back when). I’m also a self proclaimed “Social Observer” (read: “That creepy guy in the corner that never says anything but watches everyone else have fun”). These “personality traits” offer me a LOT of “alone time”, often spent inside my own head, giving me ample opportunity to formulate odd theories and observations about our human existence (or at least my personal perception thereof). Some people have called me “weird” because of this. I, of course, prefer the use of the term “eccentric” to quantify my “unique” level of sanity mainly because the term eccentric conveys the perception of one having; A) large sums of money or B) a “higher than average” level of inelegance (the former is unequivocally false while the later is open for debate) .
One of my most prominent “Observational theories” as of late has been the “Best Buy - Circuit City Conundrum”. Don’t let the auspicious title fool you, this theory has nothing to do with Best Buy or Circuit City, I simply use those two stores as the easiest proof of the existence of the model. The basic model (which I will outline further in a moment) can be applied to any “entity” that has a general match partner in the same level of service. So the following model can be applied to stores, hospitals, restaurants, or any other service or retail based establishment that you can think of as long as there is another establishment that follows the same general business plan. Ok, enough babbling (”eccentric ramblings” perhaps?) let’s get down to the model.
There used to be a time when our society was built and maintained by blood, sweat, and hard work. Today, however, our world runs on information and communication. With the ever growing amount of digital information that we create, modify, and share on a daily basis the need for ensuring the security of that information also increases.
One of the most common methods in today’s world for transferring our important data from one place to another is the ubiquitous USB memory key (or Thumb drive, or Memory stick, or little magic contraption of wonderfulness). With the current availability of high capacity, small form-factor USB flash memory comes a universal availability of inexpensive storage devices. Don’t believe me? Go to your local computer store (heck even Wal-Mart) and look for the USB drive section, if there is not an entire aisle in the store dedicated solely to these little titans of data migration then there is definitely a large section of one.
This universal availability comes at a cost though, more of us every day are loading Gigabytes worth of personal, corporate, or even government related information onto these, for the most part, COMPLETELY unsecured devices. There is also a growing trend, in all forms of consumer electronic devices, towards making everything as small as the laws of physics will allow. How many Über-micro cell phones have you lost? When’s the last time you set that Ipod mini down and couldn’t remember where? Now compare the size of most modern electronic devices to your USB drive, it’s virtually invisible isn’t it? So what happens when you misplace your memory key (which, incidentally, I did this morning. No idea where that thing is.) that contains all of your personal photos, hours of music, or top secret plans to take power from your boss and rule with an iron fist? Your only option, in most cases, is to hope that some Good Samaritan finds it, realizes that you’re the only geek in the place, and returns it to you. That’s a pretty scary “disaster recovery plan” if you ask me.
A question was asked recently that stopped me in my tracks. The question was,
“Why is grammar and spelling important on the Internet? I can understand if you’re writing a paper for school, but on forums and boards, I never bother”.
What? I thought one of the reasons we were taught grammar and spelling in school was so that every sentence we wrote, whether online, in a paper, or a letter to our grandmother, would be clear and understandable. This means not only correct spelling and grammar, but the ability to convey one’s idea or question so it can be understood. In my opinion, writing correctly when online is more important, not less so, and I can give several reasons why.
To many Windows users, it sounds all too familiar. Attempting to watch a video online, a prompt directs them to download a codec to enable viewing. However, the download is malware, and it infects their computer.
Now this popular, and successful social engineering technique is being used to spread a Mac OSX trojan, OSX.RSPlug.A. At this time spam is being flooded onto Mac forums trying to lure users to the sites where this is employed. The pornography sites present a still image of a video. Clicking on the image to play the video returns the following message:
Quicktime Player is unable to play movie file. Please click here to download new version of codec.
After that page loads the malware is download as a disk image (.dmg), and launches an installer. The installer requires the user to enter the admin password. If the password entered then the malware infection is complete. This infection alters DNS setting to redirect web pages, and advertisments for porn sites. However, it could just as easily be used for phishing attacks, or search redirects.
While the Geek Squad may be getting most of the bad press recently, it seems other home computer repair companies may not be fairing much better. CBC Canadian television news called 10 on-site geeks into a house with hidden cameras to repair a simple hardware problem. How many got it right? Watch the short video below to find out:
The original story and a much longer 25 minute video, including the performance of some big box retailers and a notebook system, can be found on CBC.ca Marketplace.
Announcement
If you missed the latest round of format wars, consider yourself lucky. Similar to the competing formats of VHS -vs- Betamax, there was recent confusion over the hi-definition format that’s going to replace DVDs. The competing formats were Blu-Ray, and HD-DVD. Toshiba was the primary backer of HD-DVD, and recently conceded defeat in the high-definition DVD battle to Sony backed Blu-Ray.
I’ve been a fan of Corsair RAM for years, so when they decided to enter the power supply market, I jumped at the chance to see what they have to offer.
