Gigabit Network Speed? You Had Better Check!

Don’t assume things, with your network or anything else. Hopefully you have seen the word “assume” diagrammed before so you know what I mean. I run a gigabit network at my place, and with a 3 month old PC that’s a Core 2 Duo, I expect performance.
But network file transfers seemed sluggish. I would have [...]

Arrested for Stealing WiFi? Why Not Arrest the Owner?

A recent article in CIO of the UK highlighted two people, in separate but similar incidents, arrested for stealing WiFi from neighbors. The man who was in his car with cardboard covering the windows obviously knew what he was doing. The other did not have details provided.
While on the surface, this seems ok, let me [...]

Computer or Laptop Repair – Beware the Reformatted Drive!

Reason #7 to backup your computer. Ok, I made up the #7 thing, but don’t the guys on TV commercials make it up too?
When you take your laptop or desktop PC in to be repaired, make sure you have a good backup of it. Preferably an entire drive image with a product like Acronis True [...]

The $100 Laptop

One Laptop Per Child is a non profit organization whose goal is to give children in developing countries access to computer technology. It’s a noble goal.
These laptops, with wireless but without hard drive, are designed to be easy to use and help these under privileged people gain access to the worlds prosperity.
The laptops have a [...]

Upgrade Vista? – XP Support Will End in 2 Years

April 14, 2009. That’s the date I understand Microsoft will officially discontinue support for Windows XP Home and Windows XP Professional.
Yes, I know. That seems like a long time out to even mention it. But believe me, that day will be here before you know it.
Does that mean you can’t run Windows XP past that [...]

System State Backup Error 0×800423f0

Note: This applies to servers that are domain controllers, but if you get this error on a workstation, try the fix anyway.
I have written about the value of a system state backup, but what do you do when it fails with some arcane error message?
From what I found, this error comes from a bug in [...]

Beyond Fear – The Virginia Tech Massacre

It may seem odd for me to be writing about this topic, and it’s more than just the connection between the name “Tech” and what I do for a living.
The reason I wanted to write this post was that I am a big fan of Bruce Schneier’s work (his world renowned security blog is here) [...]

Download Video – Don’t Sit and Wait for It!

Anymore, I almost always download video that I want to see. I got frustrated with too many videos starting and stopping, or maybe worse, stopping right before the end – with no way to restart at the point I left off!
So I did a little research some time ago and found out that most videos [...]

Sofware as a Service? – No thanks!

Around the turn of the century, that would be the 21st century, all we ever heard about was ASP – Application Service Provider.
No one was going to have any in house servers anymore, all you needed were some old cheap terminals that could run Citrix or Terminal Server or, hopefully, just a web browser. All [...]

USB Hard Drive – Which External Enclosure to Buy?

Since I’m always harping about Acronis True Image and External USB Hard Drives, I thought it only fair to tell you which enclosure I like.

VANTEC NST-360SU-BK External Enclosure

This unit from Vantec I have used extensively. It is a full size (for 3.5 inch hard drives) and does require a power cord with inline transformer. You [...]