I tested Panda Cloud Antivirus extensively on my systems while it was in beta and only recently switched to Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) for evaluation. Today, I’ll switch back to Panda on my older, slower system to compare performance of each one. I have noticed a slight performance degradation with MSE that was all but non-existent with Panda. Now that Panda Cloud Antivirus is out of beta, I can make a fair comparison which I will report on later. Check out the full report in this Security Corner post.

You’ll also notice a sign-up pop-up on some pages when you go to them. Please sign up so I can keep you up to date on new content and special offers from select vendors. I promise I won’t spam you with a bunch of useless junk; I will pass on any special offers that I become aware of from reputable hardware and software sellers.

For now, check out the “Safe Computing Tips” and sign up for my list. And be on the lookout for a new page that reviews top freeware, Open Source, and commercial software offerings.

As always, I’m glad to be of service and I look forward to keeping you as a loyal reader. If you ever need anything at all, feel free to hit the “Ask a Question” or “Leave Feedback” links over at the right.

Cheers!
The Geek

1. Power cycle your router.
2. Disable WAN-facing telnet, SSH or web-based configuration interfaces.
3. Change the passwords to something unguessable (see this article).
4. Upgrade to the latest firmware.

If you’re not sure how to handle this, find a geek who can. While the hacker who wrote this worm appears to have disabled the botnet’s control center, others will follow and it could get ugly.

You should also read and apply the Safe Computing Tips available as a free PDF download. Just click on the link to the right.

As always, I’m looking out for you.

Cheers!

The Geek

Mr. Zonbu says: "The company has consistently delivered new releases, fixing bugs, enhancing the system and updating the key software packages. None of the updates have broken anything on my system and Zonbu has listened to the public feedback and made changes and adjustments to continue to improve and refine the overall experience for the end-user. I was skeptical about their ability to keep up the pace and handle things smoothly, but so far they have exceeded my high expectations…If you don’t want the hassle, let Zonbu take care of it for you."

Yep, it’s completely hassle-free and mostly automatic for even the most novice user.

John Biggs of crunchgear.com says: "The Zonbu notebook costs $279 with a 2-year $14.95/month subscription to Zonbu’s update and storage service. This, clearly, is Zonbu’s real MO. They offer unlimited support and upgrades along with 50GB of Amazon S3-based storage. If you opt out of all of the support, you pay $479 for a fairly basic laptop.

"Here’s the rub, kids. With the service pack you’re paying $637.80 for a Linux laptop."

The key words here are "unlimited support and upgrades along with 50GB of Amazon S3-based storage." Most people don’t have a clue how to back up and secure their PCs, much less do upgrades. Geek Squad will give you "Basic Security" for $229. With Zonbu, you plug it in, it works, it’s secure and you never have to worry about it. As long as you’re under the subscription plan, if the unit breaks, they ship you a brand-new one. That says "affordable" to me.

Arsgeek.com says: "On turning it on, you’ll see the typical Zonbu startup screen where various icons light up to show you what phase of the boot process it’s in. After about a minute or so I was on the desktop. Zonbu, no matter what else they may have going for them certainly have great wallpapers. The desktop is crisp and clean, with a few icons in the upper left and a few items in the taskbar on the bottom.

"I was immediately greeted with a network connection wizard which walked me through getting online using my home wireless connection. It was painless and in a minute I was happily online. I logged in with my email and password and I was ready to play!"

I had the same experience on first boot. Even a novice could get on line quickly, in my opinion.

Security? I can compromise your PC in just a few minutes at some of the sites I know of. I have been unable to compromise either the Zonbu desktop unit or the laptop.

The Zonbu laptop isn’t necessarily for Geeks to use, but it will certainly lower the amount of free tech support you have to give to your friends, neighbors, mom and girlfriend who all own Windows PCs.

Cheers!
The Geek

Let’s take a look at what Zonbu has to say on these three points:

Hassle-free: The Zonbu Notebook works right out of the box. It includes 20 best-of-breed software applications, free automatic software upgrades, generous online storage, remote file access and sharing, automatic data back-up, unlimited online tech support, and free hardware replacement in case of damage.  Best of all it eliminates the need to spend any time on managing the PC, or spending money on anti-virus packages, back-up storage or firewalls.

Environmentally Friendly: The Zonbu Notebook uses less energy, reduced use of hazardous materials like cadmium and mercury, offers free recycling/take back programs and responsible packaging, meeting the EU?s strict RoHS standards and earning the Zonbu Notebook a Silver EPEAT rating.

Affordable: The Zonbu Notebook starts at $279 with a $14.95 monthly subscription fee with the same acclaimed hassle-free plan as the Zonbu Mini Desktop.

Having reviewed the Zonbu Mini Desktop, I have to agree it’s definitely hassle-free. In fact, it’s so easy, a seven-year-old can use it right out of the box (See my article at Ask the Geek, Too). I fell in love with it.

Now, we’ll see about the Zonbu Notebook–they’re sending me a review unit today. So, stay tuned and I’ll tell you all about it. (Chances are, I’ll fall in love with the notebook, too.)

Cheers!
The Geek

I never paid much attention to the noise coming from my PC, I just figured that’s the way it is and put it out of my mind. But when I decided to record some of the songs I’ve written, I was dismayed to discover that I could hear the PC noise in my recordings.

Where does all that noise come from? A lot of it comes from the cooling fans on your CPU and power supply. Some high-performance PCs also have a cooling fan on the video card and there may be another fan in the front or back of the case that draws outside air in. Your hard drive is also a noisy beast and difficult to silence, until now.

Check it out, will you? Eric has solutions for the most demanding quiet cooling applications including hard drive silencers, silent cases, acoustic case insulation, you name it. Here’s that link again:

http://www.acousticpc.com

Tell him The Geek sent you.

Cheers!
The Geek

Both my desktop computers have died (electrical surge), and I’m using my laptop. I need a device that I can hook my desktop hard drives to and access/retrieve the files. All the storage devices I’ve found operate from an existing computer setup and need an O/S to run. Does a device exist that I can just attach my hard drives to and retrieve/store/access my files? In short, I don’t care about the computers, only about retrieving my data.

As a matter of fact, you can convert your drives to USB drives with a relatively inexpensive kit. Then you can plug them into your laptop and access all the data and even use the external drives as backups for your laptop. Here’s one link: http://www.usb-ware.com/tt-firewire-400-usb-2-drive-kit.htm.

Cheers!
The Geek

Technorati tags: hard disk, USB, hard drive, convert, how to, IDE

1. Your computer slows to a crawl while loading or saving files. The hourglass just sits there and spins. The file may or may not load or you get an error.

2. Your computer frequently hangs up and you lose all control. The keyboard and mouse don’t work and you are forced to use the power button to shut down. The keyword here is frequently. Don’t fret over the occasional, and inevitable, software lockup.

3. File loss or corruption. You know the file was there the last time you looked. Now it’s gone. Or, you open the file and there is gibberish interspered with readable text. Multimedia files may begin to skip or look garbled.

4. Your computer frequently hangs up while booting or you get a message saying “One of your disks needs to be checked for consistency…” All computers get this occasionally, but if it’s happening all the time it means your drive is in imminent danger of failure.

What do you do if you notice any of the early warning signs? First, immediately back up all of your files by copying them to whatever backup media you normally use (you ARE backing up, aren’t you?). Then get yourself a copy of Steve Gibson’s Spinrite — the best hard drive repair and recovery software available, bar none. Run Spinrite on the failing drive. I’ve seen “failed” hard drives run for years after having been repaired with Spinrite.

But if you have a complete hard drive failure, don’t panic, click on the Seagate Recovery Services banner above.

Cheers!
The Geek

Technorati tags: hard disk, hard drive, warning signs, Ken Harthun, geek, ask the Geek, tips, data recovery

What’s fun about a flash drive? Check out my article at Ask the Geek, Too.

Cheers!
The Geek

TagJag Tags: freeware, fun stuff, toys, ask the Geek, USB, flash drive

After dinner, my wife got on the phone to call my daughter while I was online. My wireless connection speed immediately dropped to less than 2Mbps (it should be solid at 11 Mbps). As soon as she hung up, the connection speed recovered. It didn’t make sense. Voice over IP is not that bandwidth-intensive.

That wasn’t the only problem. The voice quality on the other end of our line was terrible. The audio was choppy. The person on the other end could barely understand us most of the time. I was ready to tell the cable company to forget it all and reverse the changes. But I finally figured it out.

I had my wireless phone next to my wireless router. Traffic from the radio in the phone was crossing up with traffic from the wireless causing interference in both. I moved the phone across the room and everything got right again. Problem solved.

Cheers!
The Geek

Technorati tags: Wireless, computers, telephone, VoIP