more SCO stuff: techworld: "SCO's controversial court case against IBM in which it claims Linux uses copyrighted Unix source code has been comprehensively chewed up online by the Open Source Initiative."

ZDnet review Macromedia Studio MX 2004.

Check this out : Pentium-M goodness in a 102mm x 147mm package!!! CRIKEY that's SMALL!!

the beeb to open up archive and let you watch / download tv programs off'tinternet

Geek Name Generator

this dude's made an fm transmitting mini-epia system that looks like an imac very cool.

windows in insecure by design according to the washington post

new zealand spammer shut down makes a big difference further details here.

athon xp2000+ (1.67ghz) vs G5 1.6ghz and G4 CPUs in this benchmark test thing here show the AMD CPU to beat the G5 and absolutely paste the G4 :)

and microsoft looks like they're going to distribute blaster beating CDs according to this.

dude builds a web controlled mp3 player using a via epia motherboard (wahey) sweet

Fat boy slim funky video in flash... jamie oliver's hungry!, and mad mac user (they're all mad* apart from friends and family) says he can open 1 million safari windows. can ya mat?

*funny video with a mad mac person.

Linux users vs SCO "Users and analysts have poured scorn on SCO's claim that it owns so much of the code in Linux that to remove it would cause the operating system to collapse."

Dell to reduce prices 22% bbc news, the inq say that HP are set to increase their PC prices... hmmm, I wonder which people will buy if they actually stop and think about it...

more security patches from MS all of them fairly critical. chuffin nora. there's more holes in windows than a chuffin thing with loads of holes in.

You don't get this sort of behaviour round nelson:
minellium bridge
somerset house

Why windows update needs an update.

AMD Duron lives on up to 1.8GHz, with 266mhz bus and Barton based core, but with less cache.

I can't believe SCO are Preparing Legal Action Against a Customer.

"SCO Group Inc is preparing to take a Linux user to court to speed up the legal process in its claim Unix code has been illegally copied into Linux, and also encourage Linux users to take out a license for its intellectual property."

Copied code shown to select few. The code seemed to be then leaked onto the net and linux boffins say SCO are wrong.

Worm stuff: Blaster Fixing Worm causes more damage than the original Blaster worm. Update That worm plus the Sobig.F causes double whammy of pain!. and makes me wonder again... why SO many people don't have anti-virus software even when it's FREE! Also, it begs the question, why are they allowed on the internet!!?!?

via announce fanless 733mhz cpu press release here. the latest virus to rear it's ugly head is the sobig.f. so really really make sure your free anti-virus software is up to date :)

Its irritating when the BBC almost manage to report computing news accurately.

update another worm tries to fix the blaster problem (but fails) causing lots of internet traffic, according to this article, blaster has infected 1.5 million pcs. Microsoft think about turning Auto-Update on as a default option.

new worm "W32.Welchia.Worm" exploiting the RPC hole in Windows NT based systems (NT,2000,XP,2003) just when you thought it was safe to go back to sleep. remember to get your PC patched and protected and up to date, if you still not patched, there's a mirror here.

Also, using windowsupdate may not work perfectly, although using it is definitely better than not using it, but to make sure your system is completely up to date, it is recommended you use Microsoft's BaseLine Security Analyser.

epialinks.tk via epia links - more links than you can throw a stick at - if you know of any more sites / reviews etc, then let me know. also, check out epiacenter.com ;)

"..somebody in India starves because of lack of tech support calls. Please. Think of the Indians. Buy PC." is the first reply to this slashdot article, that asks "Recommend Apple, Lose Your Job?.

"Microsoft has had to front-end its "WindowsUpdate" site with about 15,000 Akamai servers this weekend (and very ironically, those Akamai servers are all running Linux)." crikey - is that enough servers to make WindowsUpdate a super computer yet?

possibly a non-story but they reckon there's a flaw in windows updates if the pc crashes half way through update. eWeek say windows update is still alive, and CNet news say the worm isn't doing too much, but it could get worse.

here's another mirror for the MS Blast update heise.de. and in a slashdot poll, the most zealous zealots are currently no.1: anti-microsoft zealots, with no.2: apple zealots a close second, figures here

joshwaller.tk has had a bit of a face lift. check it out.

Windows XP + Office XP for �36 in Thai!!! without the Activation! Crikey!

More MSBlast stuff: very good details about the worm, patch from MS, and a command line tool that scans the network to tell you which computers are unpatched. and there's even a document explaining how to install a personal firewall. If you need an alternative location to get the patches, then you can also get them from download.com. an article about patching computers here at the bbc

there's a review of a Matrox graphics card here which may interest some of you. (not a lot, but it might)

More SCO stupidness. - Update they seem to have changed their mind.

a rant about microsoft security (the lack of). some of it's kinda interesting. and here's some pretty comprehensive information about the blaster worm check it out here.

I got a pleasant email from Zonelabs today saying if I buy Zone Alarm Pro I'll be protected from the MSBlast thing... they fail to mention that it's possible to be protected by getting the free patch from Microsoft. And in other news of companies cashing in on other people's stupidity, PC World (the store in the UK) announced they will "cure" your PC of the MSBlast thingy for a mere �19.99, probably using tools they downloaded for free off the internet!! Unbelievable!

MSBlast.exe / Lovsan RPC Worm / Blaster Worm. a.k.a. W32/Lovsan.worm, W32.Blaster.Worm, Poza, Lovsun, Lovsan.c, Penis32.exe, TEEKIDS.EXE etc. Here's some help.

Windows XP Users will find their PC reboots when they're connected to the internet / network. "The worm doesn�t seem to infect your computer so much as control it. It forces your Remote Procedure Call service to overload and restart your computer. Those who have experienced this will know that it happens within about 30 seconds of connecting to the Internet i.e. browsing is impossible! - First you need to stop the computer restarting. To do this go to �control panel� - �Administrator Tools� - and �Services� - Find �Remote Procedure Call (RPC)� and double click - Select the tab �Recovery� and change the options from �Restart Computer� to �Take no action� - get the MS patch for Windows XP here. If you do not have time to get this, then get a friend to get it for you, and disconnect your PC from the internet!

Windows 2000 Apparently this won't cause your PC to reboot when you are being attacked, get the patch here.

Windows NT 4 Server, Terminal Server Edition, Windows XP 64bit, Windows 2003 Server get your patches here.

If you think your PC is infected get the removal tool here.

If you don't have anti-virus software then you can get AVG Anti Virus Software for FREE from grisoft.com. After installing this, you can set it to automatically keep itself up to date.

If you have a broadband internet connection then get a personal firewall, such as the FREE ZoneAlarm program, or the FREE Sygate Personal Firewall. If you have a home network, and a spare PC, then you might want to look at setting up a spare PC as a Firewall [only recommended to people who know what they're doing] using the FREE smoothwall or the FREE Clark Connect.

To keep your PC up to date in future you can either go to windowsupdate.com and scan for new updates, or with Windows 2000 and XP, you can enable "Automatic Updates", which will keep your computer up to date for you! Just go to [Windows 2000] Start, Settings, Control Panel, and double click "Automatic Updates", make sure the box is ticked when it starts "Keep my computer up to date..." and then choose one of the settings, if you trust microsoft, then you could select "Automatically download the updates, and install them on the schedule that I specify." [Windows XP] Find the Automatic Updates in the control panel, and make sure it's turned on.

If you are unable to access windowsupdate.microsoft.com you can also download the latest patches etc, from Microsoft's download center.

BBC News article about it. It affects Windows NT4.0, but Microsoft do not seem to have made a patch available for NT4.0! What are NT4.0 users going to do?

Symptoms of being attacked or infected Windows 2000 users may experience Copy and Paste no longer working, (this has happened where I work and the RPC service has stopped / crashed), and general unresponsiveness. Windows XP users will experience the machine rebooting itself when connected to the network or the internet. Microsoft has some helpful information about it as well. Please let me know if you experience any other symptoms / problems due to being affected / infected with the Worm.

there's loads of stuff here about that worm : don't know how useful it is but there's a lot there, don't know how you can write so much about it in so little time! (they must be paid for it!) Arstechnica say people didn't patch their systems becuase they didn't want to reboot which sort of makes sense if you're running a server and you do IT support, and people use the server 9-5 and you as the IT person work 9-5. There's also a new version of the MSBlast thing out... with 300,000 people infected so far (With the old one). This must be a nightmare for people who have Windows XP and don't have a clue why everytime they switch their PC on it reboots after 30 seconds... how are they supposed to find a fix...? "The new variety uses the name TEEKIDS.EXE"

MS say third party software is to blame for most crashes! yeah, that's the easy excuse. Outlook Express to go bye bye...? doh for some people at least. Windows 98 down to less than 4.5mb might be a good option with NT based systems broken! :) Apple are said to be giving refunds to people who don't like OS X or people who are annoyed by it! (looks like it's for G3 users who don't get all the features).

for those of you interested joshwaller.tk is now back. (my broadband internet is working again and the server is up) the ip address is: 82.42.131.178 should you need it.

another alternate OS : reactOS

Intel say Apple should be using their chips....

Nude walkers near the Leeds-Liverpool canal my ass!

have i mentioned epiacenter.com? it's a new epia site, it's pretty good too :) (i didn't do it...)

SCO stops licensing Linux hoorah! can't believe they were doing that in the first place!

New virus could infect 10 million machines, and bring down windowsupdate.com further details. Known as "W32.Blaster.Worm" by Symantec, "W32/Lovsan.worm" by Mcafee and who knows what else by the other A/V companies... also known as MSBlast and Lovsan bbc news reports. I'm hearing a lot of people (on the internet) say they've been infected and are being attacked by a lot of other people on the network (eg broadband etc), also our exchange server has been attacked by it as well. The MS patch fixed the RPC problem though, and the server wasn't infected.

Microsoft fined $520 million in patent case. microsoft to appeal what is it with microsoft, they always appeal! surely a court case that's been decided is an acceptable result...

6 Degrees of Separation, interesting Columbia University experiment that uses a chain letter as its medium - Is it ethical? Conslusions at least some poeple are smart enough, or jaded enough, not to forward emails? http://smallworld.columbia.edu

G5 delivery dates here says
"The low-end and mid-range models, at 1.6GHz and 1.8GHz, respectively, are expected to become available the third week of August, beginning August 18, in line with Apple's promise to ship the new systems in August.
Things don't look quite as bright for the high-end, dual-2GHz Power Mac G5. According to the updated ETA from Ingram, the dual-GHz won't reach the channel until "late September.""
- talk about false overhypertising (www.apple.com : the worlds fastest personal computer.. the worlds first 64 bit personal computer..) ok eventually I go to the apple.com website and it says estimated shipping time 7-10 weeks. So that would be erm late september, early october.

dude in london talks to people on the tube join his website and do good deeds on friday. don't worry it's not some kind of religious mumbo jumbo, it's just some good deeds thing.

Atari, Amiga etc could not compete with the IBM clone, and now even the IBM clone struggles to make money from selling PCs. HP merger with Compaq wisdom questioned.

The Evil Spork

via epia systems power an army of robots with A.I. like the robots in Terminator 3 - we're all doomed!! :)

some stuff for sale here. not very interesting - have a look anyway though.

Opteron 2ghz (246) CPU benchmarked in 1CPU configuration vs 3.2Ghz P4, and XP3200+

"One thing that is certain however is that with Intel's rumored power issues with Prescott, and even IBM pointing a finger at their power consumption, the pressure is on for Q4. IBM is aiming directly at Dell sales, and Opteron is one of their many weapons. Intel has to be watching that closely."

in other AMD news, Gateway should be selling AMD 64bit systems, IBM are to launch Opteron Workstations (but I can't find where I read that anymore), and AMD may not bother with 64-bit CPUs slower than 2 GHz.

another "found on some other website" link brought to you by josh. ascii rock (although they're a bit big considering they seem to be just ascii and midi files...?) and what's flashmobbing all about then, especially when it's at home?

microsoft say sorry to that man from merseyside, who they thought was a spam master linky.

Things Matt Missed� AMD Opteron� Processors Power LinuxWorld Conference�s Best Cluster Solution as voted by LinuxWorld Conference and Expo. IBM counter-sues SCO hoorah! Here's a quote:

"In a 45-page document filed late Wednesday, IBM argues that because SCO distributed a version of Linux under the open-source General Public License (GPL), it can't claim that Linux software is proprietary. IBM also argues that SCO software violates four IBM patents and that the company interfered with IBM's business by saying it had terminated IBM's right to ship a Unix product, AIX."

more on this saga : SCO Calls IBM Countersuit "Unsubstantiated Allegations"

More stuff: Windows 95 in 4.47mb linked at slashdot [a mirror], Athlon64 getting nearer, The Inq Review a Dual Boxx AMD Opteron 240 (1.4 GHz) PC, and that's all that seemed interesting...

Its been 5 days since Joshes last post, is he okay? I've had no email from him in that time. Is it time to send out a search party? Could he be dead in front of his computer.

Comp news so far this week..

Inquirer gets flamed for publishing "senior analyst" story about the G5.
Original story
flame against inq, G5, analyst
analyst complains
inquirer flamed

IBM really think they can get 65nanometer chips to work
IBM and Chartered plan to have the jointly developed 65-nanometer process installed in their most advanced fabrication plants

Microsoft get a strongly worded letter from Europe
European Commission to punish Microsoft

Geek alert ! Robot hacks wi-fi net works, check out the nerds in the accompanying picture.

26,920 tablet pcs have been sold in Europe/Middle East/Africa from Nov 2002 to June 2003. (see pcpro) suggesting that the atari STylus was ahead of its time and they were fools to develop it in the first place :-)

This is well cool - more about nelson

Tony Blair wants to puts God / Christianity at the centre of Government.

on a lighter note, teenage lawnmower looks cool here.

whoa, the F-22 Raptor's software requires in-flight reboots. Apparently the 2 million line software project is 93% done. sounds a bit Terminator 3 / Skynet stuff to me. "it's critical software. This is the 'let's go kill people' software" that still has to be integrated into the plane ! :(

AMD CPU price cuts Biggest price cut, Opteron 242 (1.6GHz) down 34% to 455 US$ (�283 UK). There's some stuff here about what the Athlon64s will probably look like pin / cache / ram support wise. This robot shark is cool the TV program is on BBC One, this Sunday 8pm.

This dude made a silent Nehemiah (1ghz) VIA computer in an old Cambridge Audio A4 Amplifier :)

[Updated] World's most powerful Linux supercomputer by IBM, will use AMD Opteron CPUs which is definitely a vote of confidence for AMD. (especially considering IBM chose the Opteron over their own Power 4 CPU!) It's set to be the world's 3rd most powerful supercomputer "system will comprise 1058 dual-processor 1U rack-mounted eServer 325s. Each server is based on a pair of AMD Opteron 200-series CPUs, including the Opteron 246 (2ghz), IBM said."

Opteron's are going to be used in other super computers too. Apparently they scale much better than dual Xeons do. Adding a second Opteron get's you nearly twice the speed, whereas adding an extra Xeon gets you 1.09x the speed.

there's a number of opteron benchmarks at the inq.; here, here (this one shows "MTOPS" for all CPU configs, and includes results for 2ghz Opterons as well), and here the last one showing a dual Opteron 1.8ghz as twice as fast as a P4 at 3ghz, and also twice as fast as a dual Xeon 1.7ghz system.

http://www.mailinator.com/ it's funny. so is crapmail.com.

failures of desktop linux tested in the real world more here.

i've started to understand why people might want 2gb/4gb or more in RAM. i converted a 1 minute section from DVD into an uncompressed AVI, and the resulting file is 1.7gb! and then to do anything with it, whatever program you use (eg adobe image ready) tends to open the whole file into memory! (in fact, the system is using over 2gb of memory now... i've only got 256mb physical ram so the rest is virtual) crucial sell ram. (couldn't have a post without a link!)

scary worm. make sure you're patched. alt patch location.

this months (sept 2003) PC Pro* has a benchmark / review of a dual 1.8ghz Opteron workstation costing a shocking �4000+ including VAT (2gb, 200gb, DVD-+RW, Quadro FX, 17" TFT, XP Pro), it beats a dual 3.06ghz Xeon in 2d, and compares well with a p4 3ghz system according to the PC Pro tests. They also claim to have a review of the G5, but inside it's called a preview (says it's only 20db!). cheeky. although with the G5, with dual G5's at 2ghz, at �2,299 inc VAT it does seem much better value than the dual opteron system. IT Week / PC Pro says the 2ghz Opteron should be out soon though (28th July!), with price drops accross the entire AMD range... also in an advert, I noticed MESH are selling a 17" TFT P4 2.66Ghz, 256mb, 40gb, 64mb ati radeon 9000, DVD/CDRW, WinXP Home, Laptop for �1173 inc VAT!! (�350 off!)

*if you go to pc pro's site and do their Reliability and Awards Survey you could win one of �15,000 worth of prizes.

ULTRA cheap Linux / Lindows Webstations which boot from CD and therefore don't need a Hard Drive, costing just $169 US Dollars (�104 UK Pounds). Crikey, that's cheap. I wonder how anyone can make any money from building and selling PCs these days! These would probably be perfect for an internet cafe, if they booted into Windows... but one slashdotter points out "the OEM XP Pro costs more than the machine AND the Operating system" this site looks like it could be interesting, it's about cheap pcs.

Athlon 64 Motherboard(s) and Dual Opteron Motherboard with AGP. Make sure you know that the 754 pin Athlon64 is single channel DDR - whereas the 939/940 pin Athlon 64's will be dual channel DDR meaning faster ram performance - i think you may as well just get a dual opteron system :)

AMIGA 600 HD for sale.

anti virus software results top four are : 1. F-Secure version 5.40 - 99.67% 2. Kaspersky version 4.0.5.37 - 99.55% 3. e-Scan Pro version 2.5.181.5 - 7.66% 4. McAfee version 7.00.5000 - 97.14% with AVG 22nd, and eTrust 23rd.

Canadian teenager has filed a �100,000 lawsuit against four of his peers for stealing a video clip of his light sabre acrobatics and posting it on the web. Any one seen the clip? Got any images?

http://www.christianlinux.com/. hmmm. big family? what about people who aren't his sisters and brothers?

"The reason I am offering these disk at these low prices is because most of them are CDR disks. Yes the licencing allows me to do this and because I can do this I can offer them to my sisters and brothers at prices that will make you never spend full price for a broken OS again."

"A number of them described the company's overall strategy as "integrated innovation," a reference to the drive to add a continual stream of features and services to Microsoft's Windows and Office software businesses.

"It shouldn't be necessary for people to buy additional products for their secure infrastructures," Mr. Gates said."

so much for that whole going to court thing, and being ruled a monopoly, due to adding / tying in additional software into windows to wipe out the competition. don't worry about that, lets just carry on doing what we always do... interesting article here.

"Mr. Gates acknowledged today that the company's error reporting service indicated that 5 percent of all Windows-based computers now crash more than twice each day."

and that's just the PCs that bother reporting the errors, what about the people (with win98 etc) that don't have that feature or those that aren't connected to the net...

"Mr. Gates said the company was considering the possibility of charging for some of its software updates that are now made available free over the Internet."

It looks like they are copying off Apple again...

5.1 speakers AND sound card (5.1) AND FREE SHIPPING!! �50 inc vat! wow. Creative Soundblaster soundcard, and Cambridge Soundworks speakers!!

another windows security issue - i won't bother putting affects all versions of windows, including windows 2003 server, as i may end up with the grammar police onto me again :)

microsoft passwords dead easy to crack.

"Swiss researchers released a paper on Tuesday outlining a way to speed the cracking of alphanumeric Windows passwords, reducing the time to break such codes to an average of 13.6 seconds, from one minute 41 seconds."

more details

Google bias article fairly interesting, sort of.

wahey isn't the web brilliant sesameseventies.com

What would have happened if Intel got stuck at 1ghz? and the fastest CPU they did was the P3-1Ghz chip? Would we now be running Dual and Quad P3-1ghz chips with 512k / 1mb caches? (ala apple and the G4).

Did you know you can get a Quad at Argos! Lets you choose whether you want to get done 1, 2, 3 or 4 bits of work. Completely scalable, no loss of performance when using all 4 units. Extreme value.

Dell dell.co.uk do Celeron (P4 based) 2.0ghz, 128mb ECC, 40gb IDE, CD-ROM, Servers for �299 (exc vat) with 1yr warranty. No OS. Has Gigabit (1000Mbit) NIC. Includes keyboard, but you can save �23 if you don't have it. (making it �276 exc / �324 inc vat) No monitor. Plus you can get Linux pre-installed for you with CDs and documents (for �113).

"SCO, in the middle of a $1 billion-plus lawsuit with IBM, has sent letters to 1,500 of the largest global enterprises, warning them that it believes Linux infringed on SCO's Unix intellectual property rights.

Now SCO is considering asking business users for a fee for every copy of Linux they run distributed by any of the vendors, including Red Hat Inc., SuSE Inc., Debian GNU Linux and Turbolinux Inc., sources said, adding that individual users would likely not have to pay."

SCO are bad. more details This would certainly help kill Linux, if people start having to pay for it! Especially if they had to pay SCO for it, when SCO didn't even make it!

go to joshwaller.tk and try out the new "flashcom" thingy. (click flashcom when you're there). you'll need flash installed. :)

Pentium Mac story. it's pretty crap. opteron seti benchmark here seems the 1.6ghz Opteron running 32bit code, does a unit in about 3hours 38minutes which is about the same as my Athlon XP 2400+ anyway, here's an article about how he doesn't care about IT and how it's all really boring.

University Robot ruled too scary. looks a bit like terminator.

load of abandonware sim games including Sim Earth, which I haven't played yet. (as well as Sim City and Sim City 2000 and others).

Linux Ranks No. 2 On Microsoft Risk List you may be interested to see what rates No. 1

fan tastic! fan dribbly tastic (disable your pop-up blocker).

Free competitions The Smart Car competition is only open to Orange customers, but the rest are open to anyone.

ha ha apple. read the article here it's very funny. (here's where you can get the dual opteron 64-bit desktop / workstation computers - [UK Supplier] - not that there's really any difference between "workstation" and "desktop" in my opinion...)

new at onestupid.org Download icons for MSN messenger 6

Cat translater

"Although AOL owns Netscape, it has preferred to build its web browsing tools around Microsoft's Internet Explorer."

BBC News has an article about the death of Netscape the browser. With some good links to Browser emulators, archive, and the early internet.

Microsoft urges users to patch their PCs, users should expect another update... I use the Automatic Updates things that you get with W2K SP3/4 / XP and got an update through the other day, and this morning again, I got another one. Well now I know why :)

A senior British official said the case added urgency to legislation intended to outlaw cultivating sexual contacts over the Internet. Ban the internet I say, and the phone, and the written word. Idiots

joel from rathergood.com has made an advert for't telly which you can watch here.

Sending faeces through the post was (is) illegal. "The police have told us that they will prosecute if they can prove wrongdoing."

Commodore 64 to be relaunched. Again.

According to ArsTechnica you can download Counter Strike and Half-Life for FREE! Sweet! :) Anyone downloaded them yet?