Microsoft Answers

Microsoft maintains many, many forums (we used to say fora, but now forums is acceptable?) on Windows 7, Vista, and XP. The categories are listed here on this one page. If you have a Windows Live id (Hotmail, for example) you can even login and post your own questions. But, even without that you'll find discussions on most any topic within the operating system of your choice. It's definitely worth a look and even an add to your Bookmarks (I assume by now that everyone is using Firefox as your default browser, and thus the Firefox terminology). Okay, Favorites, if you still insist on using Internet Explorer!

http://social.answers.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/categories

Spam

These are actual subjects of e-mails in my Junk mail folder at my pcdoc address:

payment request from "Publix"
payment request from "Electric Boat" 
payment request from "Avnet"
payment request from "Nike" 

Unbelievable, but easy to see how one might get in trouble and wind up with a virus if you happened to get just one of these and from a company you do business with. These spammers are actually making money sending this junk out, and stealing from anyone who is gullible enough to open one of these e-mails. And if they don't steal from the gullible, who knows what virus they  may install on your system?

A word to the wise: check your spam settings, and if you get an e-mail such as one of these, be sure to mark it as spam - AND DON'T OPEN IT!

AVG Free Version 9

AVG is still free. I had a call earlier today from a customer who was having trouble entering his credit card information in the AVG ordering process. I was very upset. I am so upset with AVG for their aggressive marketing technique, scaring people into buying their product. Shame on them!

AVG is still free. Rather than risk getting to the wrong page on AVG's own web  site, download it at http://filehippo.com or http://download.com.

In both cases search for AVG FREE, with the emphasis on the word FREE! Do not be led into buying their for-a-fee version.

PLEASE do not ever pay for any version of AVG anti-virus. If/when the FREE version is withdrawn, you'll hear it from me here, and I will be quick to point you to another free anti-virus.

Not so fast: Look before you leap!

After marveling at the Apple MacBook Pro 13 inch notebook yesterday, and blogging about it, I measured my own Acer laptop's screen, and found that mine is 15 inches measured diagonally. I would have a hard time adjusting to a smaller screen. The older I get the larger the display I want. I recently bought a 22 inch display for my desktop PC.

I guess the moral of the story is that you should see in person what it is you want to buy before making any important (and expensive) decisions. Touch it, lift it, view it and try it out.

I previously blogged about the Acer Aspire One Netbook I purchased, could it be a year ago? I wanted to find out what the Netbook craze was all about. It's about size and weight. And cost! These tiny machines are real lightweights, and a joy for the traveler, especially someone like me who lugged an IBM ThinkPad around the world. That wasn't fun.

However, the weight, size, and convenience come at a price. The Acer Aspire One's screen is 8.9 inches measured diagonally. I could never use that, traveling or not. I gave the machine to my wife to test, and she is using it to this day as her fulltime computer. She goes nowhere without it, and the fact that it is such a lightweight is probably the single most important factor contributing to her satisfaction. She is in and out of airports and train stations the way I am in and out of Dunkin' Donuts! Oh, and it has Windows XP.

More about the Acer Aspire One Netbook

Apple MacBook Pro 13-inch Notebook

From wired.com, a very nice review of the new MacBook Pro, makes me rethink the affordability issue (as in can I afford to buy one?).

"The littlest MacBook Pro finally gets all the features of its larger brethren, making it pound for pound one of the most impressive laptops on the market today. For starters, the aluminum unibody construction is solid to an extreme: There's no wiggle or shimmy when you lift up this laptop. It's a high-tech brick that, if you gathered enough of, you could probably pave your driveway with."

MORE....................

 

No e-mail prgram included in Windows 7

From Walt Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal:

Q: I have just bought a new computer with Windows 7, and not only can’t I download Outlook Express, I can’t even find it. Is it there? Where?

A: Sadly, Microsoft killed Outlook Express—its free, fast and simple Windows email program—long before Windows 7 came out. In Vista, it was replaced by something called Windows Mail. Now, there’s no email program at all built into Windows 7, unless a PC maker chooses to include one. But Microsoft offers for download a free product called Windows Live Email that is the latest successor to Outlook Express. You can get it, alone or as part of a suite of free “Essentials” programs that used to be routinely part of Windows, at: windowslive.com/desktop.

Review: 3 Windows 7 touch-screen laptops

It will be interesting to see if touch-screen sales begin to climb and ultimately take off or if the concept will fall by the wayside. I have to say I'd like to try one out. Read this Computerworld article at the following link:

Review: 3 Windows 7 touch-screen laptops

New iMac

As I have stated before, I would love to own an Apple computer. I guess their laptops are called Macs and their desktops are called iMacs? I'm not even sure about that, I know so little about them. I have only always known that they are pricey.

Today I went to apple.com and configured myself a nice new iMac with the highly touted 27" display. It starts out at $1695 or close to that, and that's not bad. However, I went step by step through their very nice configurator and wound up with a desktop machine, and I might say a beauty that I would be proud to own, but it came in at over $3200!

Maybe next year.

Windows 7 Update

Unable to get the Windows 7 DVD setup.exe program to run, I decided, after many dead-end trials (I tried to load the program on multile machines and it failed), to return the product to Amazon. I did request a replacement as opposed to a return because I had purchased this at a pre-order price of $49.

My DVD package was sealed and therefore I blame Microsoft for providing a non-functioning product DVD to Amazon. Now I realize that Microsoft probably never came near these DVDs, but obviously they are responsible for ensuring quality controls are implemented.

In the meantime I have decided to install Windows 7, after I get my replacement, on an older desktop unit instead of sacrificing my only working Vista machine.

Nice note from Amazon:

Hello,

I'm so sorry about the problem you had with your Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade.

It is certainly not our intention to ship defective products to our customers, and we will investigate the origin of this problem as soon as possible.

We always appreciate customer input on how we can improve our store, and I've forwarded your message to our shipping department, as I know they'll want to read about your experience.

In order to compensate for the inconvenience caused, I've placed a new order for you at no charge.

Windows 7 Disappointment

Well, my first day playing with Windows 7 didn't go well. I decided to sacrifice my Vista machine to Windows 7, stuck the Windows 7 DVD in the drive, and immediately found that setup.exe didn't work. I couldn't get the program to even begin. 

I quickly went to the appropriate Microsoft support forum, posted my problem, and got one response - all day long - wherein the guy just asked me if I did this and that, and I explained that I did this and that and then even some more!

Day one is a total washout!

Finally!

Well, it finally arrived late last week. Windows 7. After all my complaining about the shipping delay, I have to confess that I am not yet quite ready for it. I have yet to decide the machine I will use for the installation. I had been thinking my Vista laptop, but I only have one Vista machine, and lately I have been spending a lot of time with customers on their Vista machines. It might be wise for me to hang on to my Vista machine so I can use mine as a lab machine to try to replicate or simply explain what has happened when a customer has a Vista problem.

Operating Systems Offer New Choices in PC Shopping

If you will be shopping for a new PC or a Mac for yourself or a loved one this holiday season, you may find this article quite helpful. We do indeed have lots of choices.

Operating Systems Offer New Choices in PC Shopping

Windows 7 endless reboot answer evades Microsoft

It seems that there is a problem for some users who attempt to migrate an existing Vista machine to Windows 7. This comes as no surprise, since upgrading in place is always one of the toughest ways to go. It would be prudent to hold off on upgrading Vista to Windows 7 until problems like this one are all corrected.

ComputerWorld Article: Windows 7 endless reboot answer evades Microsoft

Comments

This new blog allows for comments on all posts. Look at the bottom right side of any post and you'll see the word "Comments". To leave a comment on any post simply click on that word and the rest is pretty simple. You do not need to register or enter a userid and password. Just enter your comment. You can even leave anonymous posts, but of course I'd prefer to know who you are.

I welcome any questions or general or specific comments on any and all posts. It would make my blog a much better place for you to visit if I had your comments to help me shape future posts.

Please think about it and then give comments a try.

Rootkits - Be afraid, be very afraid

I had heard of, and read about, rootkits. I have even used some free, standalone rootkit detectors on my own systems. However, I had never met a rootkit until this past weekend, when a customer said her machine had become unusable. I think rootkits came into existence about 5 years ago. This is from a 2005 Computerworld article:

"Microsoft Corp. security researchers are warning about a new generation of powerful system-monitoring programs, or "rootkits," that are almost impossible to detect using current security products and could pose a serious risk to corporations and individuals. The researchers discussed the growing threat posed by kernel rootkits at a session at the RSA Security Conference in San Francisco this week. The malicious snooping programs are becoming more common and could soon be used to create a new generation of mass-distributed spyware and worms."

The rootkit I encountered over the weekend blocked all of the tools I normally use to attack a virus-, rogue-, or trojan-infected system. I tried Malwarebytes Anti-Malware, Superantispyware, and Spybot. None of these programs would even start. They were completely blocked, as was AVG Free Anti-virus. So I went into Safe Mode (Windows XP) and lo and behold, they were blocked there too! I had never run into such a situation before, and didn't know what I was faced with other than a really tough cleaning job.

I had thought of using 2 approaches: one, a complete reinstall of XP, and two, removing the customer's hard drive, slipping it into an enclosure, and then attacking it as an external hard drive attached to my own machine. Fortunately, I didn't have to do either.

I was so frustrated at not being able to start any of the usual tools, that I kept trying different approaches. It was then that I noticed an option offered by SuperAntiSpyware called "SuperAntiSpyware Alternate Start". Have you ever noticed this option and wondered what it was all about? If you click on START/ALL PROGRAMS/SuperAntiSpyware, a menu appears and one of the entries in the menu is SuperAntiSpyware Alternate Start. I tried this and IT WORKED! I think what the folks have done is to start their program using a fabricated name, and this was not recognized by the rootkit. It's too late to make a long story short, but the Alternate version ran and found and eliminated the rootkit! Thank you, once again, SuperAntiSpyware.

It also found a bunch of viruses and trojans and killed them all. I then ran the vanilla flavor of Spybot and Anti-Malware, and as has been my experience, they both found additional serious problems and fixed them!

At this point the system was completely usable and I was able to continue with a badly-needed cleaning and tuning.

Rootkits have ingenious methods for making themselves undetectable to the operating system, but I also think that they open the door to viruses and trojans, and may even intentionally seek them and allow them to be installed. This belief is based only on this one experience.

I think today's security tools do a much better job at preventing rootkits from getting into our systems, but the hackers are working every day at finding other ways to "get us". So do be afraid, be very afraid. Take the steps I have recommended in this blog, and be careful out there. Just because you are not paranoid does not mean they are not out to get you.

Review my October 16 & March 9 blog posts for my security recommendations.

Windows 7 Delayed Ship - Intentional?

I blogged back in June, I think it was, that I had participated in a special pre-order opportunity to buy Windows 7 for $49.99. I expected the DVD to be in today's mail, or even yesterday's. First availability was yesterday.

But, at 5:30 PM today I received an e-mail from Amazon informing me that my order had shipped and is expected to arrive at my home on October 28! Now that is what I call a poorly-planned marketing effort. I was actually anxiously awaiting its arrival. Now I get to wait another week.

Microsoft Online Store

Of course today is a big day for Microsoft. Windows 7 is launched today!

I also read where Microsoft is starting to sell PCs online. This is an interesting turn. I thought at first that maybe they were selling their own line of PCs, but they are simply selling the big name brands. It might be worth a visit to their store at http://store.microsoft.com/microsoft/Computers/category/4 if you are now, or will soon be, in the market for a new machine. I have not done any comparison of prices so don't know if they will ever be the low cost supplier.

SeniorNet of Vermont

For my Vermont friends, are you aware of SeniorNet? This is a very valuable resource located within an easy ride to anyone living in Chittenden County, and when I was teaching there we had students who traveled in from other surrounding counties. They found it worth the trip.

SeniorNet is a non-profit staffed entirely by volunteers. It offers low-cost computer courses for seniors 50 and over. (With each passing year I think more and more of 50 year-olds as kids!) Take a look at the wide-ranging menu of courses and seminars offered this coming November. There are some excellent offerings there, being taught by seasoned professionals who love teaching others what they know. You should give SeniorNet a close look and seriously consider registering (online) for a course or seminar.

The SeniorNet web site can be found here: http://seniornetvt.org/

Vista

I worked on 3 customer machines today. All 3 had Vista installed, and were otherwise very nice machines. But if working on 3 Vista machines in one day isn't equivalent to a day in Hell, it surely must be equivalent to a day in Purgatory. Microsoft's Vista is an abomination, and I am thrilled that as of this coming Thursday no one will be sold a new machine with Vista on it.

If you are lucky enough to have an XP machine, keep it running and hang onto it as long as you can.

If you need to buy a new machine, from all accounts I have read the new Windows 7, available on new machines starting Thursday, 10/22, is much better. Even if you have to be a pioneer and be one of the first users, you should be better off.

Securing your PC - Revisited

I was looking for a certain post from some months ago, and with this new blog (thanks again Google!) it's easy to find the old stuff. On March 9 of this year I blogged on Securing Your PC with my recommendations for FREE software you can use for this purpose.

I did this because I was reading the latest Windows Secrets newsletter, and saw an article that explained how to get rid of a particularly vicious piece of malware. The following 3 paragraphs are taken directly from this newsletter and they read:

"As Peter discovered, if you try to remove the Advanced Virus Remover, you find that your access to Task Manager and the Registry Editor (Regedit) are blocked, making removal of this malware harder than normal. But there are several approaches to rid your system of this and similar kinds of malware. Even if you don't encounter this specific Trojan, the same techniques can work whenever a similar problem occurs.

The first and perhaps most-obvious step is to use one or more of the many free malware-removal tools that find and delete this Trojan. From user reviews online, two that do the job are Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware and SuperAntiSpyware.

Users of Grisoft's free AVG, a full-on antivirus/anti-malware tool that prevents and disinfects — as opposed to the malware-removal tools and online scanners mentioned above — also report success in banishing the Advanced Virus Remover Trojan. Download your copy of AVG from the Grisoft site."

Well, this makes me feel pretty good, since they are talking about the same tools I have recommended to you. There are, of course, other tools in the basic security toolset I recommend. If you use all of these regularly, you can stay out of trouble, or, if you manage to get into trouble, these same tools will enable you to repair your own system.

See my March 9, 2009 post, Securing Your PC by clicking HERE.