PuterGeek.Com News
Issue # 52
ISSN: 1533-1938
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PuterGeek.Com News: ISSN: 1533-1938
Hello Everyone!
As you can see, Amy and I are still in town. It's hard to make money when you're not working so we do plan to get back on the road ASAP. :-)
() Website stuff
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The ISSN (International Standard Serial Number) is universally accepted as the prime means of identifying serials (journals, magazines, periodicals of any kind), a vital first step for the
management of the articles or contributions they contain. Its use is essential throughout the information chain, from publisher (and from the author of every single contribution or article) to the
reader, through document delivery utilities, abstracting and indexing services, subscription agents, libraries, union catalogues, newsagents...., for the efficient management of research, ordering
and cataloguing.
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Anyway, I'm excited :-)
There's been no major changes to the website in the last few days. I'm kind of tired out. What did you think of the home networking page?
www.putergeek.com/home_network_2/ Have you found it useful? be sure to tell your friends about it if they're thinking of setting up a
network.
Did you know that this is a great way to stress-test your CPU, motherboard, and memory?
Since it uses all of your CPU's idle time it's an easy way to find out how stable your 'puter is. Besides the Windows client software, they also offer a "text only" version. This is
a completely clean program. Just download it and put it into a folder, create a shortcut, and away you go. No pretty graphics, but it has more speed, plus to un-install it all you
have to do is delete the shortcut and the folder you made.
I want to thank all of you who have taken not only the time to do so, but to also email me to let me know! I truly appreciate it! For those of you that haven't done so yet, feel free
to do so now :-)
Also in the last issue I said that I'd list the names of everyone who could tell me the 3 changes I made to the footer and header of all the webpages. Well I guess nobody figured it
out.
() Update hell
If you're like me, you try to keep everything as up-to-date as possible. Video drivers, sound card drivers, and so on. If you're a gamer (or even if you're not), staying up-to-date
includes getting the latest version of DirectX as well.
Have you ever thought about updating things like "Flash" or "Shockwave"? Maybe you'd better! If you use IE 5.0 or later with DirectX 8 and DON'T have the current version of
Shockwave, you may get the BSOD (Blue Screen Of Death). Go to
http://www.shockwave.com to get the updates. Thanks Jeff, for the heads-up!
() On with the good stuff!
How many do you remember? Start counting:
01. Candy cigarettes
02. Wax coke-shaped bottles with colored sugar water inside.
03. Soda pop machines that dispensed bottles.
04. Coffee shops with tableside juke boxes
05. Blackjack chewing gum
06. Home milk delivery in glass bottles, with Cardboard stoppers.
07. Party lines.
08. Newsreels before the movie.
09. P. F. Flyers
10. Butch wax
11. Telephone numbers with a word prefix ...(DRExel-5505)
12. Peashooters.
13. Howdy Doody
14. 45 RPM Records
15. S&H Green Stamps
16. Hi-fi's
17. Metal ice cube trays, with levers
18. Mimeograph paper
19. Blue flash Bulbs
20. Beanie and Cecil
21. roller skate keys
22. Cork pop guns
23. Drive ins
24. Studebakers
25. Wash tub wringers
If you remembered 0 to 5, you're still young
If you remembered 6 to 15, you are getting older.
If you remembered 16 to 25, you are older than dirt
(Apparently I am older than dirt)
The boss was complaining in our staff meeting the other day that he
wasn't getting any respect. Later that morning, he went to a local
sign shop and bought a small sign that read:
"I'm the Boss!"
He then attached it to his office door.
Later that day when he returned from lunch, he found that someone had
taped a note to the sign that said:
"Your wife called, she wants her sign back!"
The Xbox Unveiled
----------------------------------------------------------------
Microsoft has finally unveiled their Xbox gaming console. It has been no
secret that they have been working on it, but what it looked like was a big
secret until a couple of weeks ago when some online gaming sites obtained a
copy of a not yet released magazine that had done an article (with pictures)
about the Xbox. Bill Gates unveiled the Xbox at the Consumer Electronics
Show in Las Vegas.
Experts are saying that the high demand (and therefore low supply) of the
Sony Playstation 2 console will cause many consumers to wait until the end
of this year when the Xbox will be available.
The Xbox contains a 600MHz CPU, 300MHz custom-built graphics processor, 64Mb
memory, 4x DVD, 8Gb hard disk, and 64 audio channels.
The January 16, 2000 PC Magazine (which I received well before Christmas,
and which has finally arrived online) had a special section entitled "Leave
Me Alone" and it covered some of the firewall programs that are out there,
as well as some tips on how to secure your home computer. See the links
below.
Adobe PhotoShop, For Free?
Not quite--- but getting closer: GIMP--- the "The GIMP is the GNU
Image Manipulation Program... is a freely distributed piece of
software suitable for such tasks as photo retouching, image
composition and image authoring." Although GIMP's roots are in Linux
and other *NIX communities, it's recently been ported to Windows.
Although it's a complex piece of software that takes some time to
explore and exploit (very much like PhotoShop itself, in fact), if you
need an image editor/photo editor, it's definitely worth a look!
Avoid The Reformat/Reinstall Two-Step
Reader Ed Newbold ran into a problem that's fairly common. Well--- at
least the *result* is common: A hosed OS. Ed's specific problem may or
may not parallel one you've had or will have, but sooner or later,
everyone is at the point of knowing their OS is toast, and wondering
if there's an alternative to a full reformat/reinstall:
My current dilemma: I purchased Win98 SE, installed it OK,
installed some DSL hardware and software OK, and then got
the not-so-bright idea of attempting to remove the non-
essential IE Explorer stuff from the setup. So, I downloaded
one of these 'free' programs that strip Win 98 of the IE
components. It did. It also disabled my Explorer executable.
Now, when I fire up Explorer, it shows me all the disk
drives and subdirectories available, but it doesn't show me
any files! Just great! I tried finding a copy of
explorer.exe to install over it, but that didn't work
either. I'm now using a shareware Explorer-like application
to perform my Explorer activities, but it's just not as good
as Explorer was.
My question Do you think I'll have to perform a *complete*
Win 98 reinstallation to recover from this mess? I'd hate to
do that, 'cause my DSL install and configuration was a real
battle, and I'd hate to have to reinstall that too. <frown>
One often-overlooked option is an "in-place reinstall" where you just
layer a new copy of the OS over the copy that's gone bad. With some
kinds of problems--- missing or overwritten system, files, for example-
-- this kind of reinstall may completely cure what's wrong, and can do
so without losing your data, your installed apps, or any
customizations or alterations you've made. Instead, the new copy of
the OS picks up your existing installations, alterations and such, and
leaves them alone. With a little luck, the only thing the reinstall
alters is the broken portion of the old OS install.
The problem with the in-place reinstall is that it's not as thorough-
going as a clean install, and can also pick up bad settings, and may
not correctly replace subtly corrupted files. An in-place reinstall
isn't a panacea, but it may be worth a shot if you're out of other
options:
It's easy: Just insert your OS setup CD, navigate to the root
directory on the CD, and launch the Setup file. The OS should
reinstall right on top of the existing OS. The broken or missing parts
should be restored, and your settings *should* remain intact.
If that doesn't work, there's still another option short of a full
reformat, and it's spelled out at
http://www.winmag.com/library/1998/1001/fea0045i.htm#won't_work . It's
basically a way to completely delete Windows from your system, leaving
no trace, but leaving all your data intact. Although this "no-reformat
reinstall" does require that you re-install all your applications,
it's still faster than a full-reformat reinstall because all your data
stays put.
You know what's coming next: With good backups or drive images, you
can skip all the above and get your system back to a known-good state
with far less time and hassle than any of the above options. But I
know very, very few people bother with backups of any kind, so it's
worth discussing various no-reformat reinstall options, even though
they're a poor substitute.
In any case, it's good to have options other than "format c:" <g>
** Just a Reminder**
The Top of Your Pages "When you're working on your Web
pages it's easy to get distracted by the content and
forget about the hidden information at the top of your
Web page. Learn what that information does for your
page."
<
http://personalweb.about.com/cs/beginninghtml/index.htm>
Never be afraid to try something new. Remember,
amateurs built the ark. Professionals built the
Titanic.
Windows 2000 Performance Tuning
"This white paper provides information on how to tune the Microsoft® Windows® 2000 operating system to achieve optimal performance. It also provides useful information on how to test the
performance capabilities of Windows 2000; presents data generated using various servers and industry benchmarks that show the performance capabilities of Window 2000 when running in an optimized
environment; and, finally, shows how to use the integrated performance monitoring tools in Windows 2000 to eliminate potential bottlenecks."
Background Magic [2.8M] W9x/NT/2k FREE (LE)
{Create images for the Web} They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Although, in respect to copying graphics from Web pages for your own use, that saying can get you in a lot
of trouble. When it comes to art, people imitate all the time. Heck, many artists make collages from other people's work. This is perfect if you're not the most artistic person on the world. So, if
some big shot artist can use some other guy's work -- why should you be any different? Paint a boastful background with this powerful proggie, pal. It allows you to merge together two professionally
done backgrounds into a brand new one. It's so simple. You can also create borders, buttons, banners, and e-mail stationery. It's like a surrealist Xerox machine. A more complete version is available
for purchase.
Stationery Central
Unearthed by Judith Berger
{E-mails from the desk of} Hey there! Yeah, I'm talking to you. I've been getting e-mails from you for the last thirty years -- which is odd, since I'm 27 and the Internet hasn't been around
that long. Let me tell you something, buster -- your e-mails are b-o-r-i-n-g. You need to add a little spice, a little visual flair, a little mango to your tango. Okay, that last thing didn't make
much sense, but neither does plain ol' text in certain situations. This site will help make your e-mails look more like traditional stationery. Choose from nature pictures, cartoon characters,
animals, or other fancy works of art. Everyone will love getting messages from you... even more than before. NOTE: this was designed with Microsoft Outlook and Outlook Express users in mind.
C4U v1.3 Build 164 [1.1M] W9x/NT/2k FREE
Unearthed by Daniel Russell
{View only new content} I try to keep on top of the whole technology game. Nevertheless, it can tie your brain into a square knot -- even if you love the stuff. No, wait, I've been a geek since
I was an embryo. Well, there's always new developments; it's hard to keep track of them all. What I need is a program that will search a previously-viewed site and serve up only NEW content. Quit
going back and checking to see if something new has been uploaded -- let this C4U. No more wasted time searching, I say. Heck, you don't even have to be a technophile to use this program. Use it for
any site you visit on a regular basis. It won't interfere with other open applications, either. It's so nice that way.
() That's all for now!
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Last Revised: 01/11/2001
