Top 10 PC Speedup ideas!

Recorder Software:
http://www.roemersoftware.com/

Using a conventional Wireless Access Point as a Range Extender

 Android MalWare: & Remedy

Today's show will use a Horoscope for your Technical Future the Next 2 weeks!

 GMAIL Outage.. . Or Not

Transfer a WebSite! 

Additional notes

Notifications of new show notes and edits are tweeted at: twitter.com/ddhart
They're tagged with #Zentech

Editor comments are delimited by < >

The guys talked about state of technology at KVMR when Paul first started working there — around 1999 or 2000. Paul said there was 1 Mac SE and the station just got an ISDN line. The station started streaming over the internet to users who had dialup connections, giving them audio similar to AM radio.

Glenn said KVMR had other computers, they were Macs, and they weren't networked. The station gradually migrated to PCs because, in part, they were less expensive.

Glenn said there are nice refurbished computers at geeks.com, buy.com or ebay.com. And there are a lot of Dell computers that have come off lease at overstock.com. When you buy cheep computers, check to see if they come with the operating system. If not, you'll have to factor that into the price.

Paul talked about laptop computers becoming more popular. Their price has come down and they're on par with their desktop equivalents. Paul has seen Lenovo laptops for under $300 at overstock.com. He also said Staples is reselling refurbished units with XP on them. Glenn came in to say that netbooks are priced from $300 to $450 depending on their power and hard drive size.

Glenn said he really likes using a wireless mouse and a nano receiver, which sticks out less than a 1/4". On the other hand, he said, bluetooth mice are expensive by contrast. However, Paul said, that a while ago, he found a bluetooth mouse at buy.com for $12.

Glenn went on to say that Mac users can get extra features by using a generic PC mouse. Paul said Mac users with only 1 button can get the equivalent of a right button by holding down the control key while clicking. If you have a Mac Book made in the last year, you can get the right click by touching the track pad with a second finger.

Some people try to figure out what Apple is coming out with next by noting what companies they buy. The multi-gesture track pads came from a company Apple bought years ago and it was an academic project for Multitouch.

Since the iPad 2 came out, other companies have been trying to come out with competing tablets approaching the $200 mark. Better tablets are the Samsung Galexy at about $699 and the Motorola Xoom at $799 (including service) from Verizon. Glenn heard a rumor that you can buy the Xoom from Verizon with 1 month cellular contract, cancel the contract and keep the unit.

Paul said he learned something clever about the Tracfone pay-as-you-go cell phone, which you can buy at many general retailers. You can unlock it and put in another SIM card, but the firmware itself has a counter to keep track of the number of minutes you use and will lock up went you use up the minutes you originally bought. You'll then have to get back on the network you were supposed to be on and buy more minutes. <Defeating the purpose of having a different SIM card>

Glenn told a tale of someone who broke into a house to take a shower. While in the shower, he heard what he thought was noise from someone breaking into the house and called 911 to report a burglary. The noise was from the house owner. Paul then told a story of bank robber who, having been marked by an exploding dye pack, hailed the police responding to the event.

Paul referred to the above link regarding 'Top 10 PC Speedup ideas!'. However he thought that adding more memory should come before getting a hard drive. It's easier to put in and is pretty cheap.

Paul then talked about software for recording radio broadcasts you receive over the net. The one by Roemer Software is 7megs, costs $30 to download and runs on both Macs & PCs. See the above link.

Glenn suggested using a program like Audacity <see the Favorite Files & Utilities page> and using the line-in port. Paul said that's fine if the audio you're getting comes from line-in but it's a different situation when you're getting it over the net. <Actually, Glenn's idea might work if you use a cable to connect line-out to line-in, but I haven't tried it myself>.

Paul said there's a trick with Window's own mixer program. It's called something like 'stereo mix' and allows you to record the audio. <See the Favorite Programs & Utilities file for instructions> And he also reminded people that there are an increasing number of KVMR shows that make their podcasts available. <You might start at the schedule page and click on the show of interest>

Brian called to say he took a Motorola Razr cell phone to England where he thought he could get a SIM card and use it on their networks, but he couldn't find anyone to unlock the phone.
– Try going to a different shop for the unlocking service, they may need to replace the firmware.
– There are different versions of the Razr and Motorola may have made later models unlockable.
– Buy another make of GSM phone on Ebay, for instance. And buy it already unlocked to save headaches.

Brian then asked where he could go in the U.S. to get a phone unlocked.
– Search the net for websites that provide unlock codes.
– Theoretically, the law says after you met your contract obligation, the cellular provider should allow you to unlock it.

The Android operating system recently got it's first malware (or virus) thru an app. But Google, maker of Android, can remotely kill such apps. Apple keeps rigid control over their apps for the iPhone, but if you jailbreak your iPhone and then use a site like Cydia to download apps, you're exposing yourself to malware. For more about the Android malware, see the above link. Android users shouldn't have to do anything because of Google's remote kill switch.

Some Gmail users (about 200,000 or .02% of all Gmail users) weren't able to get some of their mail recently. See the above link.

Yahoo has been a major target of stolen email accounts resulting in spam/phishing attacks from that domain. Though he couldn't confirm it, Paul thought that at some point 10% of Yahoo's accounts were compromised. Yahoo users shouldn't assume their accounts are safe and should regularly change their passwords.

Do you want to know how to write a horoscope see the above link.

Michael called to say he has a computer that's about 10 years old and it's gotten so full of viruses that it won't start. He's taken it in for service but the tech couldn't get it going either and was told to get a new computer. He's had it stored away for a while and wondered if there was now anti-virus technology available to fix his problem.
– You may get it fixed but you'll still end up with an old computer that may have been fine 10 years ago but inadequate now.

Michael said he just wants to get data off of it.
– What may seem like a symptom of a virus may be a hardware problem.
Explaining further, Michael said that it goes thru the boot up process and then just reboots.
– When it starts press F8 (possibly several times) to get to the safe mode selections. Choose the selection 'Safe mode with command prompt'. If it proceeds without rebooting, That should get you a dos-like screen (black screen with a prompt). Then type in: chkdsk /f. That can fix file errors that are the common reason his symptoms.
– If you can't get to the safe mode screen with the dos prompt, then reload your operating system.

Michael said someone suggested he boot from a Linux CD.
– His computer may be too old to be able to do that. As CD drives get older they have more trouble booting an operating system.
– Even if you could, you still need to know what to do using Linux.

Since Michael is mostly interested in getting the data off the hard drive he can get an external USB hard drive enclosure or just the cables. Then plug the cables into the hard drive, after taking it out of the old machine. He'll then be able to plug it into a more modern computer. But before accessing the hard drive with this new setup, he should scan it for viruses. Finally, transfer the data to this second computer. Some anti-virus software was mentioned: AVG, Microsoft Essentials, Norton if you already have it, or Malware Bytes. Also, be sure you get the correct cable for the hard drive. The older drives are parallel (PATA, likely what he has), the newer ones are serial (SATA).

Paul went on to talk about how to copy or backup a website. The software you get by going to the above link is known as a 'web sucker'. It's called WINWSD and is free.
– It will mark empty links (those that don't point to content).
– It will de-orphanize the website, exclude parts that are no longer accessible.
– It's smart enough to convert absolute links to relative ones. So, when using a browser, you can then click a link and end up going to a location in the copied website instead of the original one.

Some drawbacks of WINWSD…
– It will have trouble following links that are the result of JavaScript.
– Won't pick up password protected web pages.
– Some web hosts don't like web sucking. If WINWSD stops after a minute or two, the website has 'bandwidth throttling'.
– It's written in Hungary so not all the menus are in good English, but the price is right — free.

There's a link above that shows how to convert a wireless router to a range booster for when you have trouble getting a signal at a remote part of your house.

ehow is a great site for explanations on a wide range of topics.

The disclaimer:
The views expressed by us on this show don't represent those of anyone except the speakers, not KVMR, the board, staff or contributors.

Last update: 4:01 PM 3/15/2011 

Noon – 2 PM — Wed: Extended Show!

Free online Optical Character Recognition !

Nevada County Weather & Commentary

iPad, iPhone and more: Printing to your Printer! http://www.printeranywhere.com/

Speed Traps Nationswide?! http://www.speedtrap.org

Nomad Brush Artistry for iPads, Etc.. HERE

Better Deals by Searching than Directly by Website?
IE http://www.vistaprint.com for business cards, etc

small budget fund raising ? Try KICKSTARTER

More Google DOCS formats- Now most Office Docs can be read on the Web

Global Unarchiver for MAC (TheUnArchiver) and for PC (IzArc)

Comparing Various Streaming Media Options

Additional notes

Notifications of new show notes and edits are tweeted at: twitter.com/ddhart

They're tagged with #Zentech

Editor comments are delimited by < >

Paul said if you don't like the way Facebook displays photos, hit F5 and it will go back to the way it previously worked

Glenn doesn't like Facebook because he keeps getting "I love you" types messages from people he doesn't know.
Paul likes it for sharing photos.

Many applications running on the web like Gmail or Google Docs will respond to shortcut keys. E.g. in Gmail if you hit the C key, you'll be able to create a new email.
There are shortcut key for programs you run locally; like in Firefox you can switch tabs with cntrl-1 to go to tab 1, cntrl-2…to go to tab 2, etc.
You can often find out about the shortcut keys using the help facility of the program you're running.

Glenn likes to set his mouse so it will be over the default button in a dialog box. <In XP go to Control Panel -> mouse -> 'pointer options' tab and set the 'Automatically move pointer to the default button in a dialog box'

Paul made the comparison between how Facebook & the internet gained popularity. As both gained users, the amount of useless info increased. So, you need to be more discriminating and find what's useful for you.

Paul said social sites like Facebook work differently from email in that you broadcast information without expecting a reply. He compared it to Usenet where people post & read messages on topics of particular interest. <To experience Usenet go to groups.google.com or use Thunderbird or similar programs>

Glenn mentioned that social media like Facebook & Twitter facilitated the recent social unrest in Egypt.

Paul talked about flash mobs where people gather together in response to posts in the social media sites. Type in the words "flash mob" on Youtube to get video of mobs. Paul thinks that's how dissidents in Egypt got together.

Due to a need at KVMR to convert a picture of text, inside of a PDF file, to plain text, Paul discovered an online site that does optical character recognition (OCR). You don't have to extract the pictures from the PDF individually, you can just send the entire PDF and the site will do the extraction & conversion to text (or a Word document). See the above link.
Paul said the recognition was extremely accurate.

Glenn recalled that the IBM computer called Watson won the Jeopardy contest last week. He said Watson might have had an advantage by being able to press the button quickly. You can find the Watson at ibm.com/watson

You can find an interesting weather site for Nevada County by following the above link. It's privately run and has Doppler radar and photos of local scenes in the blog.

Paul talked about printing from an iPad or iPhone. One way is to copy the text and paste it into an email and then later print the email.
There are 3 apps to print from an iPad. They do best when using an HP printer on a network, but you have to use software called Bonjour (Rendezvous in the PC world) on the computer connected to the printer. The process is simplified by going to the website printeranywhere.com. See the above link.

Glenn again mentioned the $150 Coby tablet model md7015 running Android version 2.1 (see previous show notes). Though it was fine for downloading & reading ebooks, he found, for instance, that when it was in Mexico, the menus switched to Spanish and it was hard to figure out how to switch back. Other problems included poor response and difficulty working with the touch screen. He said he will be returning the unit.

Paul said that there is a hack of the Android operating system but it's not straightforward.

Thanks to Mikail for revealing a new website for hacking the iPhone called whited00r.com. The info for hacking the phone is widely scattered and this site brings it all together. It's especially useful for older iPhones.

Phil called to asked about OCR, He has a project to scan documents of different formats.
– You can try the previously mentioned onlineocr.net.
– There are 2 professional products:
  1) nuance.com Omnipage at $149 and a better one called Omnipage Pro at $499, which will do a better job of maintaining the format (like putting tables of numbers into a spreadsheet).
  2) Canon & Panasonic have special printers/scanners for document management in large projects. Some use keywords that you assign to documents to make them easier to find later. Finding what you've scanned can become a problem in large projects.
– Glenn recommended scanners with a document feeder to do a large number of pages.
– Glenn said most scanners come a light version of OCR software which can then be upgraded.
– Nuance also makes Dragon Naturally Speaking voice recognition software.

Mikail called in to say Apple will be announcing new stuff, possibly tomorrow. Word of a new Macbook Pro is expected. And the iPad 2 should be announced on Wed March 2nd.
He said the iPad 3G has been discounted heavily in Britain for 99 pounds including service. That's in anticipation of the new model.
The new Macbook Pro will include Intel's Lightpeak (named Thunderbold by Apple). This is a connection port that gives you 10 gigabits/sec.
Mikail said, if you're planning to buy a Macbook or iPad, wait for the new models.
Paul said that Apple used a custom chip in the iPad and that makes it more responsive than any other tablet he's seen, avoiding problems like Glenn had with the Coby.
Mikail also suggest you go to the Apple Store & get a referb of a current model, if you want to save money.

Paul mentioned you can get a 'touch stylus' on Ebay for use on touch screens. Some people may find a stylus easier to use than a finger. They go for $2 or $3.

A company called Nomad has come out with a brush for use on touch screens. It's for artists and is supposed to simulate using a brush for painting. It costs about $24. See the above link.

Greg called and said he's tried to read from a floppy disk but he gets an error. And he has some CDs with files that end in .pft <I think that's what he said> that he hasn't been able to open.
– The .pft files can be opened in Outlook. You have to have a copy of Outlook that hasn't been used. You can then use the import function.
– Or, you can create a new profile, a new user, on your computer. Then log out as the current user and log in as this new user. Then run Outlook. It will create a new .pft file. Close Outlook and replace the newly created .pft file with the one you're trying to open. You should then have access to it. This is most reliable way to do what you want.

For Greg's floppy problem:
– Before replacing the floppy drive, try reading your floppy in friends computer.
– Buy another floppy drive. You can get a USB connected floppy drive from Ebay for about $25.
Greg said he can read other floppies in his drive.
– Disks written on one drive may not be readable on another drive due to alignment problems. You'll be able to read disks created on your drive but not others.
– Go back to the computer that created the questionable floppy and see if it will read the disk. Then copy the files off of it.

Mike called. He has a desktop with XP that's running slow. And he asked if the Macs are subject to same problem.
– Maybe it needs a cleanup; vacuum up the dust. <Dust may make the CPU run slower. A control mechanism throttles it down to prevent overheating because dust keeps the heat in>

The disclaimer:
Everything you hear on KVMR is that of the speaker, not necessarily of KVMR staff, board, or underwriters or volunteers.
– Reinstall the operating system (XP). Then it'll run as fast as when you bought it.
– Give it more memory (RAM).
– Clean out the scratch files and redundant files. See the Favorite Files & Utilities page for things like Ccleaner & defrag programs.
– Glenn said some programs that do cleanup, like Weatherbug, install unneeded file and can actually slow down your machine.
– You can check how much RAM you have if you right-click on your desktop and choose properties and then the General tab. Check your manual for the maximum you can install.
– The Mac doesn't have similar problems though you may need to do occasional maintenance by running the disk utilities.
Off topic: Paul mentioned The Unarchiver for file compression on the Mac and IzArch for the PC. See the above link.
Paul said refurbished or used Macs are a good choice but don't use anything less than OS 10.

Paul talked about podcasts as a way of time shifting your listening activity. He recommended iTunes for podcasts even if you don't have an iPod. Many items on the iTunes store are free. He said he enjoys podcasts from Radio Lab and The Moth. He then played a sample from Radio Lab.

If you'd like to know where the speed traps are, visit speedtrap.org.

Paul was recently shopping for business cards at vistaprint.com but then tried cheapbusinesscards.com. Eventually he was directed back to Vistaprint which then detected he'd been shopping around, and so, offered a substantial discount. You may take advantage of similar tactics for other products, just don't delete your cookies.

kickstarter.com is an interesting site for raising funds for small projects. See above link.

Google Docs now supports more formats. See the above link.

Pamala called to confirm the name of the previously mentioned unarchiver. It's Theunarchiver for the Mac & IzArc for the PC. IzArc can open ISO image files too. The links are up above.
The guys highly recommended these programs; they have been using IzArc for a long time.

Roman called wanting to know how to have big documents display on an iPad or some other more cost-effective device.
– You can use Microsoft Word to create HTML documents.
– Save as a PDF file. Android devices should be able to read that format.
Is anything cheaper than iPad that will work for this?
– The Coby unit talked about earlier, Coby also makes units called Velocity, and Cruse. Many companies are currently coming out with similar products running the Android operating system.

Brian called wanting to know how get email to be automatically forwarded from an SBC Global account to a Yahoo account.
– Create a Yahoo account and activate the option to pull in mail from an external account.
– As a paying user of sbcglobal you're entitled to a paid account at Yahoo; call them & ask.

2/3 of Netflix subscriptions are for streaming media as opposed to DVDs.
– There are a couple hundred units that can stream Netfilx, Roku was the first at about $69 base price.|
– Not all titles are available for streaming.
– You need about 2 megabit connection.
– Some DVD players & TVs have Ethernet port & chip that can stream in Netfilx.
– Amazon just started a streaming service.
– See the above link.
– Apple TV has dropped to $99. It does streaming too, from iTunes but maybe not Netflix.
– The Slingbox takes its input from a video source of your choice (usually at home) and then sends the video over the internet to be seen wherever you happen to be. But, sometimes you may get the error "you're in the wrong country". So, there are limitations.

Gary called to ask if can you get special content over the internet like the extra content of DVD'S?
– No, not yet. But the firmware in the Roku boxes can be updated so eventually it may be possible.
– The Roku unit won't work with the older non-Intel Macs and you'll need the Silverlight plugin.

Gary also asked about Mac clones, aka the hackintosh. That is, running Mac software on a PC.

Ways to hackintosh:
– Download an illegal version of the Mac operating system.
– Change the BIOS on the PC so the Mac OS will think it's running on a Mac. This is the best way to go.
– It's not for the faint of heart. Don't do anything serious with a hackintosh because OS updates can disable it. Turn off the update feature.
– Paul tried it using something called Kinoma but it's not for all models of PC's.

Next show is March 9

Last updated: 3:00 PM 2/24/2011 

There should be some talk about Verizon's iPhone

Audiophiles that hate Digital Music Read HERE

My Internet's Not Working (SouthPark) Thanks, Dennis B!

Apple's 9.7" iPad is getting Increasing Competition from "Android Pads"  for as little as $149.00such as these Coby Models

 AutoTune Pitch Quantiser – Any better than Lipsyncing or Sid Vicious's Bass Playing
the Photoshop of the Audio World? Haters will always Hate…
Mesnwhile: Get the iPhone App!

Additional notes

Notifications of new show notes and edits are tweeted at: twitter.com/ddhart

They're tagged with #Zentech

Editor comments are delimited by < >

Paul said the next show, in 2 weeks, will be 2 hours long.

2 pieces of free software were mentioned:
Cobian Backup can backup to just about any drive except a CD, and it runs in the background. It's open source and is available on Sourceforge and comes with good tutorials. It also has compression & encryption options. It has a nice balance between simplicity of use and the ability of the user to configure it.
More info at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobian_Backup

The other free software is Synchback to synchronize folders which, in effect, backs up the files. It does require some configuration for your preferences.

The disclaimer:
The views and opinions expressed on this show are those of the speakers only and not necessarily KVMR its board, staff or contributors.

Glenn talked about Teamviewer, a program that allows 2 computers to communicate such that a user on one can run the other computer remotely over the internet. There are free and commercial versions. Security is provided by a password and an ID number.

Glenn offered kudos to Norton Securities because they were able to quickly solve a problem his friend was having which Glenn, try as he might, was unable to solve. This allowed a newly purchased CD drive to install the new System Works 2011. Norton used a remote access program, similar to Teamviewer, to effect the fix. Such remote software is much easier to use than it used to be, though using a satellite service for your ISP may cause it to be sluggish.

Paul again mentioned the 2 hour show coming up in 2 weeks.

Paul talked about Microsoft Essentials, which is an anti-virus, but not an internet security, program. Paul thinks anyone with Windows XP (with service pack 3) or later operating system has adequate firewall protection. And, he said, modern browsers have fine anti-phishing protection.

So, he said the only other necessity is an anti-virus and recommended AVG for the job. And, he said, all anti-virus programs can fail 1% to 5% of the time. AVG comes in free and commercial version. You can find it here.

About 2 years ago Microsoft bought an anti-virus company and tried to sell the software itself. Glenn thought it ironic that Microsoft was selling software to protect its own operating system.

Paul went on to say that Microsoft Essentials will only work on legitimate versions of Windows — not pirated versions.
<This looks like the link to Essentials>

Paul mentioned that AMD is no longer making 32bit CPUs, only 64bit. Microsoft Essentials is optimized for 64bit machines though it runs on 32bit hardware too.

Feb 10 marks the start of sale of the Verizon iPhone for new customers. Current customers were able to order it last week. Though coverage is better with Verizon, the big gottcha is that it doesn't use the world standard GSM network. Instead, it uses CDMA which does not use a SIM card. As such, it's activated by taking it to the retailer, not by changing the SIM card. World travelers should find it easier to get their GSM phones working in foreign markets just by changing the SIM.

Paul went on to say the Verzion phone can be jailbroken — you will be able to load third party software. Unlocking means you will be able to use it with various providers, but you'll not be able to unlock the Verizon phone to use it on the AT&T network.

Glenn bought the Coby Kyros 7" tablet for someone else. It runs version 2.1 of the Android operating system. He's a bit disappointed because the apps for the Android phones may not run on the tablet. For instance, he tried to get Skype for the tablet but it required the mobile number — which the tablet doesn't have. So, it's unlike the iPod Touch, the later generations of which can use Skype if you plug in an external mic and headset. See the above links for Coby.

Glenn also said there was a problem with the Kyros not being able to send new email, though replying to email worked fine. And when typing a reply, it would put occasionally "ANDROID" into the text of the message. Paul suggested an upgrade of the operating system.

Paul said that Nokia market share has dropped from about 30% to around 25% due, in part, to the popularity of the Android market.

The Android operating system is being used in many products by many manufacturers, unlike Apple's operating system, which is limited to Apple products.

Nokia released their operating system, called Symbian, as open source so developers wouldn't have to wait for the licensing agreements, but this was after the Android OS came out and they couldn't overcome Android's popularity.

Don called to say that the quiz show Jeopardy will match their 2 best former contestants against the IBM Watson computer. <From what I can tell the broadcasts will be Feb 14 thru 16.>

Paul told a story of an early research project for translating English into Russian. The test phrase was "the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak". When it was translated back from Russian to English the result was "the vodka is good but the meat is off"

John called with a question about different USB connectors. Does it matter which cable to use as long as it fits?
– There are 3 different type of connectors for such things a cameras and mp3 players. If it doesn't fit don't shove it.
– High power devices don't like skinny cables.
– Some of older cables were designed for USB-1 or USB-2.
– Some cables were made just to provide power and not transfer data.
– Some cables have a cylinder at some point along the length. It's a ferrite core to filter out radio frequency noise. These are a better quality cable.
– The cables operate on 5volts and up to about .5 amps.
– If you plug in many devices into the USB, you may not have enough power for all of them.

John also asked if there was a danger of over charging while using a solar charger.
– If it has a regulator on board there shouldn't be that danger.

Joshua called wanting to know how to use a 3 year old MacBook Pro to drive a TV display.
– On Ebay you can find a cable with mini DVI on one end (connect this end to the MacBook) and HDVI on the other (goes to the TV). A 6' long cable like this cost about $3.
– Modern MacBooks have 2 types of connectors — about 3mm & about 7mm. Make sure the measurement matches your computer before you buy.
– Using such a cable you can connect extend your Mac desktop. <See the show notes of 12-8-10>

Laurel called. She has Windows 7 and is using Gmail. She's having trouble attaching a Word document to her email. Paul walked her thru the process.

When Gmail asks her for the file to attach, she thinks she needs to open Word. What she needs to do is find the files that Word created, and attach that. She thinks she needs to open the Word program when in fact she needs to find the file created by Word.

She was invited to use the Zentech email to continue the tutoring — zen at kvmr dot org

Ellen called to comment about Verizon. She has trouble getting a signal in the house.
– Glenn said the signal strength depends where you are.
– He wondered if Verizon's performance will degrade when they get a lot of new iPhone users.

Ellen is trying to configure her Blackberry email. She said she receives mail just fine but "it will only save return responses as draft".
– Try att.blackberry.com
– Update the Blackberry.
– Use the Blackberry desktop.
– If you've done the above (she has), it's time to call Blackberry for help.
– Glenn thought the SMTP setting might be wrong.

Last updated: 9:00 PM 2/9/2011 

There was no Zentech show on Jan 5 

The new Zentech show schedule: 2nd, 4th, and sometimes 5th Weds of month. Sorry, I wasn't notified in time to modify the date on this page.

Notifications of new show notes and edits are tweeted at: twitter.com/ddhart

They're tagged with #Zentech

Editor comments are delimited by < >

Paul was in the studio, Glenn called in from North Carolina

Paul's been busy helping clients recover their equipment that suffered from voltage spikes during recent storms.
– No reason not to have a surge protector.
– The best kind is one that warranties the connected equipment up to $5000 or $10000.
– Usually equipment is supposed to be protected to twice the voltage, up to maybe a momentary 240 volts.
– A lot of cheap surge protectors are good for only 1 surge and need to be replaced.
– Power strips with a fuse are not good enough. A fuse won't protect against a spike

Listeners are reminded the Zentech show is now on every 2nd, 4th, and sometimes 5th Wednesday of the month.

Larry from Sacramento called to say sometimes a webpage would stop loading, as he browses the internet. He thought it might be a problem with his ISP. The only other device he has on the network is a Roku unit.
Paul suggested he do a test of his network speed. Paul found a speed test that's better than the one he used to recommend: try speedtest.phonepower.com
It tests both latency and jitter, which is the rate the latency changes, and the amount of packet loss due to damaged packets.
– Larry had called a while back saying he had trouble viewing streaming videos on his Mac. At the time, that problem was diagnosed (which proved to be correct) as a slow CPU.
– Paul determined Larry had a wired network — not wireless.
– Unplug the DSL circuit & router and plug it all in again, to reset everything.
– The idea is to find out what the sustainable traffic transfer rate is. He's paying for 3 megabits/sec and usually gets 2.5. Paul said that's reasonable.
– Since this is the same slow Mac he had before, Paul suggested using a different computer on his network. He thought the machine is underpowered.
– There's an application "under utilities" call something like task watcher or activity monitor that tracks how much the processor is used for each task. <Use that to see what may be slowing down the computer>
– Since the Roku box is working as expected, the ISP is not a likely cause.

Levin called but the call was dropped before he could say much.

Tim called and said he just got a new iPod and he wants to transfer selected playlists from his computer. He used to just mouse-drag the music to the iPod, but he was told, at the Apple Store, that he could use the "music" tab on his iPod. He wanted to know if the "synch" checkbox would cause all of the music to get transferred – he didn't want to do that.
– First, make sure you have the current version of iTunes.
– Tim indicated there's nothing that was dragged to the iPod that's not in iTunes, so it's ok to delete the content. <Implying he should clear the hard drive. Then…>
– Paul said he should not be doing a drag-n-drop but using the synchronize feature. During the synch you'll be asked what you want transferred; it's at that point you make your selections.
– Glenn pointed out that Tim was talking about a synch button on the iPod and Paul said he's never seen one
– The synch button is in iTunes. Tim was invited to call back to clarify.

Don called about Larry's problem. Don said he's had similar problems with his internet connection bogging down when his washing would run.
– Paul said, in that case a surge protector may not be enough, you may have to use a UPS (uninterruptible power supply) for the DSL modem.
– Don said his own problem was not the power supply but electrical noise on the line. He said some modems have their own HTTP address which you can use to look at what the modem 'thinks' the noise margins are. That may help distinguish between an ISP problem and a local problem.
– Paul said make sure all of the filters you're given by the phone company are used. Some people are confused by the fact that it's the phones that need the filters — not the DSL.
– Bottom line is Larry may be having a noise problem

The main reason Don called is about cell phone plans.
  He said the cheapest plan he's found is about $40/mo. The other option is some kind of Go Phone pay-as-you-go deal. He thinks those Go Phones are not compatible with monthly plans. He wondered if there are any other options where he can switch between the 2 types of plans.
<Other options mentioned in a previous show 11-24-10>
– Paul said he's managed to get the cost down to $5/mo for 20 minutes voice and $.10 or $.15 per text message.
– Get an unlocked GSM phone (a SIM type phone) from, like, Ebay. While on Ebay, look up "pay as you go sim". AT&T sells these SIMs for $10 — $5 for the card and number and $5 of usage. The usage expires every month.
– The pay-as-you-go phones like the TracFone are cheap to buy but cost much per minute to use. And they are locked so you can't use another SIM, like the AT&T SIM.
– The critical thing is for the GSM phone to be unlocked so you can use the AT&T SIM card.
– They don't like you to know the Go Phone uses the AT&T network. Apparently, you can make the standard free mobile-to-mobile voice calls between AT&T users with the Go Phone.

Jeff called to say he tried to open a Powerpoint file, created on a Mac, on his PC. The PC told him he needed Quick Time to open it.
– Make sure the filename ends in .ppt. He checked and it does.
– Go ahead and install Quick Time.
– Paul recommended going to itunes.com. Get iTunes, it comes with Quick Time.

Jeff also wanted to know how to extract just a few pages from a rather large PDF file. He'd like to find a free editor that will do that.
– Paul asked listeners for suggestions.
– Glenn said try to digitally save each desired page. <Presumably while viewing them>
– Paul then suggested PDFCreator. It turns a printable page into a PDF file. While viewing the original PDF, select the pages you want to print, select File -> Print and send it to PDFCreator to create a second PDF file with just the selected pages.
– Glenn mentioned that both he and Paul use PDFCreator a lot, more than printing to a paper.

Scott called. He said he had moved his computer and now it won't boot. He took it in for service and was told to send it to a data recovery place to get his data off the hard drive.
– Paul asked what it does when turned on. Scott said he gets a black screen asking if he wants to boot in safe mode. But booting in safe mode, he had trouble getting the cursor keys to work.
– Paul thought maybe the problem is with the keyboard. He said to press the caps lock key to see if the keyboard light responds. If the caps lock won't work, it may not be the hard drive — it's the machine itself. Scott said he took the hard drive itself in for service and it was diagnosed as defective — data could not be accessed.
– Data recovery is often very expensive. Try Advanced Data Recovery. <> google: adr folsom. <some mention on data recovery in the 1-26-9 show>
– Glenn suggested he get an external hard drive kit w/o the enclosure, just the cable. Connect the kit to a different computer, hook up the suspected hard drive and see if you can access the data.
– Paul said, as you use a failing drive, you could be losing data. You may not want to play around with it but take it in for recovery.

Matt called to ask if solid state drives are more reliable.
– They have no moving parts to fail.
– But pulling them out at the wrong time can damage them.
– Though they go bad less often, whan they do it's catastrophic.

Matt also said he's used hhtrack on a PC to copy webpages to his hard drive so he can browse them when not on the internet. But hhtrack is not easy to use with the Mac. He's tried SiteSucker and DeVacuum, they work pretty well but won't copy a PHP-driven site.
– Paul said those programs should copy the results that PHP produces, but Matt said he's had no success.
– Some sites are designed to foil copying attempts.
– Glenn suggested right clicking on the page and 'view source'. Then save the source.
– Try printing page to a PDF file and save that.
– Some sites resist site sucking — they recognize when something is trying to copy them.
– Matt thought the main problem was the PHP script. Paul asked listeners for suggestions.

Matt went on to ask if saving audio from iTunes, when it's in lossless mode, is as good as using Exact Audio Copy on the PC; he wants something like it on a Mac (there is no version for the Mac).
– Paul thinks there would be no degradation of the audio if iTunes is in lossless mode.
– Exact Audio Copy saves in .WAV format — it's lossless and as good as it gets.
– The AAC file format is a highly efficient lossy format. <You may consider using that>

Matt also asked if something similar to DVD Decrypt & DVD Shrink (for the PC) is available for the Mac.
– Paul "can't" recommend MacTheRipper, he's "never heard of it" as it might violate the Digital Millenium Copyright Act.

Then Matt said he keeps trying to get rid of Divx but keeps coming back on his Mac. He said it interferes with the Netflix viewer.
– Do a search for "divx" using Insight (the magnifying glass at the upper right). Throw everything that's found into the trash, but don't empty the trash until you're sure.
– Netflix requires Silverlight, make sure you have the latest version (ver 4).
– Paul is pretty sure Matt's problems aren't because of Divx.
– Try going to divx.com and installing the latest version.

The guys didn't get around to talking about Verizon and the iPhone it will be carrying. They will talk about it next show. Feb 10 is when you be able to order it.
Rumor has it that the next OS for the iPhone, version 4.3, will have tethering built in.
Paul had a chance to play with the Droid phone. It has tethering built in.

Last updated: 11:46 PM 1/13/2011 

Play the Atari "Battle Zone" arcade tank game from 1980 Here!!

More Info HERE

Additional notes

Notifications of new show notes and edits are tweeted at: twitter.com/ddhart

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Ed Rotberg was the guest today. He was the programmer & designer of the Atari game called Battle Zone, a vector graphics, tank commander, shoot-em-up style game from about 30 year ago.
Paul asked how much memory & speed were required for the game at that time.

Ed said those early video games didn't have hard drives but used ROM to store the program. RAM was 256 to 512 bytes and about 4K of ROM.

Battle Zone was programmed in assembly language. At that time, each computer instruction was 1 byte long <8 bits> so there was a max of 256 instructions available.
– It took about 9 or 10 months to finish programming the game but it involved long hours.
– The CRT was special. It didn't do raster scan but vector graphics instead.
– The circuitry & peripheral capabilities around the microprocessor were uniquely designed for each new game that came out.
– Battle Zone was not the first vector graphics game by Atari, but it was the first fully 3D arcade game.
– There was no hidden line removal so the tanks, and such, were transparent.
– Collision detection required a lot of computing power, so only one projectile at a time was allowed to be fired.
– The positions of the tanks were actually done in 2D. The missiles and exploding debris were the only things that could change vertical positions.
– The microprocessor used was the 6502 by Mostek. That was the same chip used in the Commodore 64 & the Apple 2 computers.

There is a Java-based emulator of Battle Zone, See the above link. Ed said the emulation is very accurate.
– The emulator uses the actual ROM image from the game.
– All of the hardware is emulated.

Paul mentioned that the movie Tron Legacy has just come out. The original Tron movie was by Disney and came out in 1982 or 1983.

Atari would not let the programmers put their names in the credits for fear that some other company would try to hire them. Eventually they were allowed to use their initials in the default values of the highest score table.

After Battle Zone, Ed co-programmed for one project and directed another project, neither of which were finished before he left Atari to form his own company.
– The first project was the original Star Wars game.
– The other was Dragon Riders of <something I couldn't make out>. It never made it to production.
– Star Wars was a vector graphic game.
– Dragon Riders, eventually called Fire Beast, was a raster graphics game.
– Raster games, at the time required too much horsepower to run in 3D.
– The 6502 chip ran at 1 megahertz, 1,000 times slower than a 1 gigahertz processor.
– The chipmaker AMD isn't making even 32bit processors anymore, only 64bit. And most distributions of modern operating systems are 64bit.

Ed said that few students of programming actually learn assembly programming these days. They are not likely to use assembly, though it does provide insight into how things work in the computer. He said it has helped in writing more efficient code. It has also helped to take advantage of the limited hardware they had back then. Now days, game designers don't need to know the technical aspects of their creations because the tools (programs) they use are so sophisticated. The designers can then concentrate on the creative aspects. But, eventually, a programmer has to incorporate all the design elements into the completed game.

The 6502 had 4K transistors, compared to the current processors that have hundreds of thousands. The chip was priced well below its competitors like the Intel 8080 & the Z80. Ed said the 6502 was more efficient than the others even though it too had a 8bit buss and a 16bit address space.

At the time Ed was writing Battle Zone, the US military approached Atari to write a training program. They wanted a simulator for the Bradley fighting vehicle. Ed, being a pacifist, was not thrilled and Atari was not amenable to the extra documentation that the military required. But he did work on the project and had to put in long hours to meet the deadline.

Paul asked Ed what he thought about current games being so realistic. Ed said he's happy with the trend but he's not pleased with all of the violence. He said many parents don't want to monitor their kids and expect the government to issue standards. He's mostly avoided working on violent games.

Paul asked if Ed had worked with force feedback handsets.
– Yes, he's worked for Silicon Entertainment on a NASCAR simulator game console. It provided physical feedback as if the vehicle was shaking or rounding a corner, etc. It cost the player about $7 for the experience.

According to Ed, the better arcade games had a lifespan of about 1 year. It depended on how much they were earning.

There were a couple of versions of Battle Zone. The original had a periscope feature, but it limited how many people could watch, and that limited its earning potential.

Paul wondered how the games were market tested.
– Ed said they used focus groups or they would just monitor how much it actually earned.
– Later on, they made the consoles collect data on the usage. Eventually, they put modems in them so the data could be sent back to the company.
– They had to make sure people didn't play too long or too short for each quarter spent. Too long and the company wouldn't earn as much money. Too short and the player would stop playing out of frustration.
– Some games were made with reprogrammable ROMS so the gaming experience could be changed.

The game Lunar Lander was mentioned. It was another game that Ed worked on.

Ed talked about there being collectors of arcade consoles and conventions featuring the old games. He said about 50,000 Battle Zone consoles were produced worldwide. Atari sold them to distributors but not to the end operators. The distributors were the same ones who handled pinball machines & jukeboxes.

Ed appeared in the credits of the original Tron movie for his sound effects work.

The sounds in Battle Zone were generated from the ROM. But music from the 1812 Overture did use a sound chip. It was the first game to use the sound chip from the Atari 800 computer.

John called to reminisce about playing Battle Zone in junior high. He also mentioned some controversy about the library lending violent games and wondered what other options are available for teenagers.
– Paul mentioned the video game called Mist that was non-violent.
– Glenn suggested getting kids to read books or get outdoors.
– Try to achieve a balance of entertainment options.

There was some talk about rating systems. First applied to movies and music and then to video games, the rating systems can get politicized. People will take positions for political reasons and lose sight of what's best for kids. Ed thinks censorship by the government sets a bad precedent and that parents are in the best position to oversee their children.

Some games have had hidden content inserted by the programmers. The content sometimes violates the rating of the game and causes controversy when discovered at a later time. There is a website dedicated to these easter eggs at eeggs.com

Paul said there are sometimes easter egg facilities in CDs — a hidden track called track 0. You put the CD into the player and it starts playing at track 1, but if you hit the button to play the previous track, it will, on some players, play track 0 — the hidden content.

Glenn mentioned that he couldn't find the original Tron movie on DVD. Ed said it should be available. Apparently, it was on Netflix, specifically, where Glenn couldn't find it

Paul said the audio of this show will be "stored up" on zen.kvmr.org

Last updated: 9:51 PM 12/22/2010