Please visit the LangaList Home Page

Please note: Older issues may contain information that is now out of date.

How To Subscribe and Unsubscribe is at the end of this note. Mailing List Trouble? See http://www.langa.com/help.htm
Questions about the advertisers? See the end of this note. Please also see legal notices at the end of this note
LangaList: ISSN 1533-1156

Please recommend the LangaList to a friend! (And maybe win $10,000 !)

An easier-to read formatted HTML version of this newsletter is available
<a href=" http://www.langa.com/newsletters/2002/2002-01-21.htm ">here</a>

The LangaList
Standard Edition

2002-01-21

A Free Email Newsletter from Fred Langa
That Helps You Get More From Your Hardware, 
Software, and Time Online

Please visit our sponsors and help keep the LangaList S.E. free!

Contents:

1) January’s XP Surprise: Your PC As A Paperweight
2) Super-Simple Defrag Automation
3) Security problem In Windows Media Player
4) LurkHere
5) A Monitor Testing Tool; A Free Cooling Fix
6) Is This Information Useful?
7) What's Churning Your Hard Drive?
8) They Loaded The Code
9) Ultimate Boot Disk?
10) Just For Grins
11) Plus! Edition Highlights

For even more content, downloads and special services,
check out the LangaList Plus! Edition: http://www.langa.com/plus.htm

 

--- ( Your Clicks On Ad Links Help Keep The LangaList Free! ) ---

--------------( the above is an advertisement )--------------

 

1) January’s XP Surprise: Your PC As A Paperweight

Bill Gates says that some 17 million copies of XP have shipped since the operating system was launched late in October. It's a safe bet that a high percentage of these sales and shipments were bunched at the very end of last year, and the very beginning of this one. Between end-of-year budget purchases, holiday promotions, and Christmas gift PCs preloaded with Windows XP, millions of people--- and thousands of LangaList readers--- are right now experiencing their first few weeks with the new operating system.

That means many users are heading for a surprise as the internal counter inside every copy of Windows XP gets ready to enforce the mandatory "Windows Product Activation" (WPA) after one month of use.

The surprise isn't WPA itself--- we've covered that in depth. The surprise is the way it's implemented in Windows XP: You see, unlike the WPA in the Office XP/2002 products, one misstep with the version of WPA inside Windows XP (the operating system) may leave you unable to boot your PC; unable to access or back up your files; and in fact, unable to do *anything useful at all* with your PC. Your shiny new XP system will be nothing but a giant paperweight!

If you’re in your first month of use of XP, you need to know what’s coming. If you don't, that one WPA misstep could leave you with no way to access or salvage your data!

For the full scoop, please see the new Information.Com article at http://www.informationweek.com/story/IWK20020117S0002 ; it contains full details on the various WPA scenarios and what the consequences of each are; plus info on how to ensure that you don't lose access to your data.

Please come check it out, and then share your thoughts on WPA in the ListeningPost: http://www.informationweek.com/forum/Fred Langa

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

--- ( Your Clicks On Ad Links Help Keep The LangaList Free! ) ---

--------------( the above is an advertisement )--------------

2) Super-Simple Defrag Automation

Hi Fred! Some time ago, I began following your excellent advice and used MS Task Scheduler to schedule nightly maintenance - disk cleanup, scan disk, defrag, and a Norton Antivirus scan. The problem I have found - all the more so with Windows XP - is that defrag requires manual selection of options (such as selecting the drive, clicking "OK"). As a result, although scheduler calls up defrag, it doesn't run. Can you tell me how to work around this? Thanks, Gene

Actually, this is one of those rare things where a very, very simple approach works best.

For Win98/Me/XP (Home and Pro), just run NotePad, and enter one line into a new  file:

defrag c:

Save the file and name it "defrag c.bat" or any similar, obvious name ending in ".bat". You then can click on the file to manually trigger a defrag of C:. or you can use Task Scheduler to run the batch file whenever you want, such as late at night.

If you have other drives, you can either defrag them via separate batch files (a "defrag d.bat" file would contain just the line "defrag d:" for example), or you can enter the lines serially into one batch file.

I have a file called "defrag_all.bat" for example, and it contains these lines:

defrag c:
defrag d:
defrag e:
defrag f:

When run, defrag_all.bat defrags the drives one after the other.

Man, I wish *all* computing problems could be solved that easily. Don't you? 8-)

(Alas, as far as I can tell, things are NOT so simple in Win2K. You have to use a more complex and indirect command-line to open the Management Console, and run the Defrag snap-in from there. Search Win2K's Help for Defrag and MMC, and you'll get the info you need.)

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

3) Security Problem In Windows Media Player

Reader Leo Feret writes:

I thought I was current on security and privacy issues, but I missed this info at http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/cn/20020115/tc/privacy_flaw_continues_to_dig_ie_hole_1.html

"In Windows Media Player versions 6.4 and 7.1, people can turn off the option "Allow Internet Sites to uniquely identify your player" in their settings to stop potential tracking by creating a different number for each IE session.... [M]any people may not make the connection that they need to tweak Windows Media Player, a free product that is distributed with most copies of the Windows operating system, to fix a privacy leak in IE."

The problem is that each copy of Media Player can identify itself with a unique ID string. If you allow media Player to do that, then a web site can grab the unique code from the Media Player and use that to build a covert profile of your activity on the site, even if you otherwise take steps not to identify yourself to the site.

Major problem? No. In fact, as these things go, it's quite minor. But it's good to know about, and easy to fix. Thanks, Leo!

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

--- ( Your Clicks On Ad Links Help Keep The LangaList Free! ) ---

--------------( the above is an advertisement )--------------

4) LurkHere

Adelaide Zirkle found a site I also like:

Dear Fred

While looking for something to backup the lavasoft / ad-aware site which is, of course, down more than up, I visited one of their mirror download sites... http://www.lurkhere.com . I'm glad I did since it has the ad-aware downloads as well as some really interesting downloads, articles and links.

For example:

1. A file to replace the win98se defrag program with the winme defrag program. Yes, there was something good to come out of WinME. I tried it and it cut my defrag time from 45 minutes to 10 minutes.

2. An Article on Bootdisk creation in several configurations....both detailed instructions and links. It's off to the right of the page...click "butter". Good stuff and really easy to follow.

Check it out. --- Adelaide Zirkle

Thanks, Adelaide. I featured LurkHere as a HotSpot ( http://www.browsertune.com/flanga/hotspots.htm ) a while ago--- it *is* a good site.

BTW: For another boot disk resource, see item #9, below...

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

5) A Monitor Testing Tool; A Free Cooling Fix

You stare at your monitor for hours; it's an essential and expensive part of your PC setup, and one that can make your computing experience either a pleasure or a literal headache!

Oddly, although there are many tools, tests and benchmarks for video cards, very few are designed also to let you test and adjust your monitor itself. But reader Chris O'Bryan found just such a tool during a system overhaul--- and incidentally discovered a simple way to cool his CPU!

Fred, I have been a Langalist Plus subscriber from the start. I have benefited immensely.... I just finished installing a new Radeon 8500 video board and was overwhelmed with my monitor setup for the various display settings for different resolutions, mainly screen size and fill. I spent hours on it. I finally browsed the web and found http://www.passmark.com Monitor test 1.1. It took just 10 minutes to set up all of the display resolutions my video card and monitor are capable of. It has features to check convergence (I used the convergence lines for the sizing), gamma, moire, contrast and solid colors for purity. The one thing it lacks is a reversed convergence test as CRT power supply regulation can cause "blooming" which will increase the size of the display with increased brightness levels.

The software has a 30 day free trial and is $15.00 after that. I plan to buy it just to support the company.

By the way I finally got around to cleaning the dust out of the fans and assemblies in my computer and found that Gateway had affixed a part number across the end of the CPU heat sink, blocking the air flow. I moved the sticker to the side of the heat sink on the flat surface and noticed an immediate 6 degree temperature reduction, not much but the effort was free. --- Chris O'Bryan

Thanks on both counts, Chris. Some monitors have built-in diagnostics that put appropriate patterns on the screen so you can make adjustments simpler (color purity patterns, convergence patterns, gridlines for alignment, color-fringing tests, etc.), but a surprising number do not. A good monitor test can let you get things right, fast.

And while most people won't find serial number tags blocking their PC's airflow, it's not at all uncommon to find dust balls, cables, or other impediments. It's often a mess in there! <g>

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

6) Is This Information Useful?

If you think the LangaList is a worthwhile read, maybe a friend would find it useful too! Just use the following link to recommend the LangaList---your friend may find a new source of useful information and you just may win $10,000 for your trouble (full details also available via this link): http://www.recommend-it.com/l.z.e?s=143182

Or, win a no-strings $30 Gift Certificate for any item at Amazon.Com--- books, software, hardware, kitchenware, toys... and more. (Full details also available via this link):
http://www.langa.com/recommend.htm

Either way, thank you, and good luck!

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

7) What's Churning Your Hard Drive?

Just about every Windows users has, at one time or another, seen his or her hard drive burst into life for no obvious reason. What the heck is going on?

Sometimes, you can figure it out by seeing what's running on the Task Bar or via the Task Manager. Other times, you can make an educated guess about things like the Swapfile growing/shrinking itself. But some bursts of activity can remain stubbornly mysterious.

Reader Jerry Rubackin found a way to help clear up the mystery on Win95/98/ME boxes:

[DiskAction] is perfect for those of us who keep wondering..."Why do i hear all that disc activity without any input from me?" I think it's good enough to share.... All the best!!--- Jerry Rubackin

[from the site] "Have you ever wondered why your hard drive starts cranking away sometimes--seemingly of its own volition--when you're not even sitting at the computer? This issue's utility, DiskAction, tells you what the machine is doing. DiskAction sits in the system tray, monitoring the hard drives you designate. The tray icon, which appears when you launch the program, is a picture of a hard drive with a light that flashes green to indicate activity. To see the last 12 processes that accessed the hard drive, you double-click the tray icon. A Refresh button lets you view drive accesses that occurred after you opened the dialog box. You can also clear the list and start monitoring anew...."

There's lots more, but you can get the full scoop  on the tool at http://www.pcmag.com/article/0,2997,s%253D1476%2526a%253D11135,00.asp
and download it at
http://www.pcmag.com/article/0,2997,s%253D1476%2526a%253D11134,00.asp

Note: The ZD site requires that you register before you download anything. Sorry--- nothing I can do about that!

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

8) They Loaded The Code

Do you have a home page or website? (It doesn't matter what size.) Please click over to http://www.langa.com/code.htm , and maybe you can join the hundreds and hundreds of LangaList readers who have "Loaded the Code!" (If you've already "Loaded The Code" and are wondering if your site will appear here or on the Langa.Com web site, please see http://www.langa.com/link.txt  )

Speaking of which: Here's another eclectic sample of reader sites--- some professional, some very personal:

View A Randomly-Chosen Reader Site
http://www.langa.com/randomlink.htm

Manually Browse All Posted-to-Date Sites Starting At
http://www.langa.com/readersites.htm

Mega Sites
http://www.selfexpressionsunlimited.org/SEU/WebSites/MegaSites/WS-MegaSites.htm

Purveyors of general and unusual merchandise
http://members-http-2.rwc1.sfba.home.net/jbanks52/onandaga/

Riddles & Brain Teasers
http://personal.vsnl.com/viveknayak/riddles.htm

Twigg Enterprises (custom programming)
http://www.twigg.org/

Kroschel Genealogy
http://home.pacbell.net/chriskro/

WillyMac Digital Imagery
http://www.willymac.net/

Indian (Amerind) Prayer
http://www.angelfire.com/ab6/indianprayer/

Photos, Jokes...
http://www.kimsky5.com/Goodies.htm

Agitated
http://www.electricstoat.com/rich/

Herbal Nutrition
http://www.herbal-nutrition.net/members/theresaa

Ron and Carol (So. Texas)
http://pages.prodigy.net/ronorcarol/

"Love Potions"
http://www.lovepotionsite.com/

The Puzzled Shadow
http://home.gci.net/~johnroy/

Rapture Divers' Virtual Dive Site
http://www.rapturedivers.com/

Washington State Pension Reform
http://www.wapri.org/

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

--- ( Your Clicks On Ad Links Help Keep The LangaList Free! ) ---

--------------( the above is an advertisement )--------------

9) Ultimate Boot Disk?

Many readers have suggested this site, which I initially resisted covering it because it's usually relatively easy to make a boot disk. I've also presented do-it-yourself boot disk many times and in many flavors (see http://www.freetune.com/most_popular_pages.htm )

Well, Duh! I was wrong, and this site is *not* about standard boot disks:

Hello Fred, I thought I would write and tell you of another useful DOS tool readers may want to add to the list (and of course its free). Its the Ultimate Boot Disk. I downloaded it from  http://www.startdisk.com/  because I thought it might help me solve a big time crash with a colleague's machine, helping navigate around the disk with the Find Files interface. It gave me many options in a DOS environment which are really superb, including finding "lost" personal data when it was of course too late to make a backup!!

There were some other "goodies" there too... --- David Banyard

Thanks, David--- and all the other readers who have been trying to tell me about The Ultimate Boot Disk for a while. OK, I get it, now. <g>

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

10) Just For Grins

Tony King sends along these apocryphal "ANSWERS FROM STUDENTS ON MUSIC EXAMS." Bogus or not, some are quite funny. (I like the one about the harp...)

The principal singer of nineteenth century opera was called pre-Madonna.

It is easy to teach anyone to play the maracas. Just grip the neck and shake him in rhythm.

Gregorian chant has no music, just singers singing the same lines.

Sherbet composed the Unfinished Symphony.

All female parts were sung by castrati. We don't know exactly what they sounded like because there are no known descendants.

Young scholars have expressed their rapture for the Bronze Lullaby, the Taco Bell Cannon, Beethoven's Erotica, Tchaikovsky Cracknutter Suite, and Gershwin's Rap City in Blue.

Music sung by two people at the same time is called a duel; if they sing without music it is called Acapulco.

A virtuoso is a musician with real high morals.

Contralto is a low sort of music that only ladies sing.

Diatonic is a low calorie Schweppes.

Probably the most marvelous fugue was the one between the Hatfields and the McCoys.

A harp is a nude piano.

The main trouble with a French Horn is that it is too tangled up.

An interval in music is the distance from one piano to the next.

The correct way to find the key to a piece of music is to use a pitchfork.

Agitato is a state of mind when one's finger slips in the middle of playing a piece.

Refrain means don't do it. A refrain in music is the part you'd better not try to sing.

Most authorities agree that music of antiquity was written long ago.

My favorite composer was Opus.

Agnus Dei was a woman composer famous for her church music.

Henry Purcell was a well-known composer few people have ever heard of.

Rock Monanoff was a famous post-romantic composer of piano concertos.

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

--- ( Your Clicks On Ad Links Help Keep The LangaList Free! ) ---

--------------( the above is an advertisement )--------------

11) Plus! Edition Highlights

  • Free, Easy Cleanups In Win2K and XP (and Win98!)
  • Nice Security Collection
  • More On Viewers, Editors, and Tag Line Generators...

Today's LangaList Plus! Edition contains all ten items above, plus about 30% more content including: A 60-second way to permanently automate disk cleanups in WinXP and 2K--- and Win98; a reader-recommendation of a great site for online security info; and more info on file viewers, file editors and tag-line generators!

The Plus! Edition only costs a dollar for eight issues! Info: http://www.langa.com/plus.htm 

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

See you next issue!

 

Best,

Fred
(fred@langa.com)

Please recommend the LangaList to a friend! (And maybe win $10,000!I)

An easier-to read formatted HTML version is available in the "Current Issue" section of http://www.langa.com.  (The HTML version of each issue normally is available by 9AM EST [UT-5] of the issue date.) All past LangaList issues are also available at the Langa.Com site.

return to top of page

Administrivia:

UNSUBSCRIBE: From the same email account you used to sign up with), send an email to
unsubscribe-langalist@lyris.dundee.net

SUBSCRIBE (it's free!): Create and send a new email to
subscribe-langalist@lyris.dundee.net

CHANGE ADDRESS? LIST TROUBLE? HAVE QUESTIONS? OTHER PROBLEM? NEED HELP? See http://www.langa.com/help.htm

This is a 100% OPT-IN newsletter: See http://www.langa.com/info.htm

About the advertisers: http://www.langa.com/privacy.htm#ads

Disclaimer: http://www.langa.com/legal.htm  In brief: All information herein is offered as-is and without warranty of any kind. Neither Langa Consulting LLC, nor its employees nor contributors are responsible for any loss, injury, or damage, direct or consequential, resulting from your choosing to use of any information presented here.

This newsletter is a service of Langa Consulting LLC and is Copyright © 1997-2005 Fred Langa/ Langa Consulting LLC. All worldwide rights reserved. LangaList: ISSN 1533-1156

return to top of page

Please visit the LangaList Home Page