Terry's Computer Tips - Newsletter
December 30, 2007

Link to the January 6, 2008 newsletter!

Terry's Computer Tips Newsletter
http://www.terryscomputertips.com
A computer tips newsletter for users of PC's.

Volume 3, Number 29 — Sunday, December 30, 2007

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IN THIS WEEK'S ON-LINE ISSUE:
   1.   New, Faster Web Host
   2.   Updates Last Week
   3.   Intelligent Fun on the Web
   4.   My Computer Security Software Recommendations

Welcome to the on-line edition of my Terry's Computer Tips newsletter.

My emailed newsletter is sent weekly to individuals who have subscribed to the newsletter. Click here to subscribe. It's free!

1.  New, Faster Web Host

Big news at Terry's Computer Tips this week. If you tried to visit on Wednesday or Thursday, you might have noticed...the site was down on Wednesday afternoon and Thursday morning (U.S. Central Standard Time).

It's a lot faster now...

I've moved my two main sites TerrysComputerTips.com and TerryStockdale.com from Powweb to HostGator after some frustration at Powweb. I'm sure they'll get it solved, but my sites have been running slowly. The slowness gradually got worse, but would get better every time I was about ready to change.

Their options for shared hosting (where my account is one of several on a server) range from $4.95 per month to $14.95 per month, where the price varies mainly on disk space, bandwidth and length of the hosting purchased.

This week, I looked at HostGator again and saw that they had a 20% OFF coupon code that was good for any of their hosting packages.(SNOWMAN, expires January 1st). That gave me the final reason to move...

I signed up for their "Baby" plan for three years — 600GB space and 6000 GB/month throughput ought to be enough for anyone... ( Do you remember "640K ought to be enough for anyone?" <grin> ). HostGator's web site indicates that this is their most popular plan. One of my requirements was that whatever web host I used must have forums for user-to-user support, which HostGator does. These are usually great places to get ideas and figure out how to do things.

Transition of my main domain was easy — if you've already got a web site, they'll even move it for you, including moving your MySQL databases (if any). So far, I've moved two of my sites plus my Terry's Computer Tips blog to my new HostGator account. They run a LOT faster now.

That's the good news for you. If you've been disappointed with slow responsiveness of my old site, you'll be amazed at the new one.
Take a look...

Then, give me your comments on it — I want your feedback! Was it worth the move?

If you're considering setting up a web site or moving your current one, take a look at HostGator.

http://terryscomputertips.com/HostGator
20% off coupon code "SNOWMAN" expires on January 1.

 

2.  Updates Last Week

Microsoft (operating systems, email, web browser, office suites):
Microsoft releases almost all updates once per month, on the second Tuesday. This week did not include Patch Tuesday.

Firefox (web browser, http://www.mozilla.com, free):
No new version. Version 2.0.0.11 was released on Friday, November 30, 2007. This was a stabilityi update to correct a problem that was found in the previous release, Firefox 2.0.0.10.

Opera (web browser, http://www.opera.com, free):
No new version this week. Version 9.25 was released on December 19th. This release is a recommended security upgrade.

Opera 9.50 beta 1 became available on October 25th. Based on the changelog, there are a lot of changes coming to Opera. But, beware, if you're using OperaMail, this is a one-way upgrade as it will change your mail storage system.

Netscape (web browser, http://browser.netscape.com, free):
No new version this week. Version 9.0.0.5 was released during the week ending December 15th. The new release includes security fixes that were included in Firefox 2.0.0.11. According to an Associated Press news article on Yahoo!, AOL has decided to stop any further development and security fixes on Netscape as of February 1, 2008.

SeaMonkey (web browser, email, HTML editor, newsreader; http://www.mozilla.org/projects/seamonkey; free): No new version this week. Version 1.1.7 was released during the week ending December 1, 2007. This update includes security and stability fixes.

Eudora (email, http://www.eudora.com):
No update last week. Version 7.1.0.9 was released October 11, 2006. Eudora is now free, with no ads and no "paid mode" option.

The second public beta version of v8 (v8.0.0.b2) was released and is now available from http://wiki.mozilla.org/Eudora_Releases .

Mozilla Thunderbird (email, http://www.mozilla.com/thunderbird, free):
No new version this week. Thunderbird version 2.0.0.9 was released on November 14, 2007. This is primarily a security update.

OpenOffice (office suite — spreadsheet, word processor, presentations, graphics, web design; http://www.openoffice.org; free): New Version! Version 2.3.1 was released during the week ending December 8th. According to the Release Notes, this version does not include any new features. It is a security bug fix.

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3.   Intelligent Fun on the Web

Every once in a while, I stumble (whether manually or using StumbleUpon) upon a cool web site that is fun, but makes you think, too.

The lastest is marumushi, which has a number of Java and Flash animations with which we can experiment.

There are two, in particular, that I'd like to recommend that you check out.

First, there is the NewsMap. This Flash application generates a treemap of the most popular articles at news.google.com. If you aren't familiar with treemaps, this application uses relative sizes of the items to show the relative popularity of the news articles.

Here's a screenshot of NewsMap:

Different colors indicate different categories of news: world, national, business, etc. The legend is in the lower right-hand corner. But, it's much more than just a legend. It's also a picker that lets you select an individual category and the age of the news. The left-hand corner has a date and time picker, too.

The other animation I want to suggest is "MediumGrid 09." Like most of the other animations, it is interactive to you — click your mouse button in the box and drag it. The flow pattern will be based on your mouse movement. Try a straight line, a curve, a complex curve, an S shape, etc.

Those are the same animation — before, and after the animation has run for about 30 seconds after my mouse movement.

Enjoy!

 

4.  My Computer Security Software Recommendations

Anti-Virus

I'm often asked about several other popular anti-virus or anti-virus combination packages. Yes, I realize that they are not in my recommendation list. "Enough said..."

My personal choice is the ESET's small, fast NOD32 anti-virus program, which offers a FREE 30-day evaluation license. I consider NOD32 to be the cream of the crop in anti-virus protection. Unlike some of the others, ESET offers multiple-year licenses also, including updates to the program in the multiple-year license.

Many antivirus programs will offer you an anti-virus signature subscription renewal when your subscription renews. I strongly recommend against this option. Vendors routinely improve the capabilities and speed fo the programs also.

If you update only the signatures, you miss any program improvements. Fortunately, NOD32's subscriptions include both program updates and signature updates.

Read more about anti-virus programs on my web site.

Related articles:

• Anti-Virus Programs and Online Scanners
• Free Online Antivirus Scan
• NOD32 Anti-Virus Review - A Look at NOD32

Firewall Software

If you get the PC-cillin Internet Security package above, you are covered from a firewall point of view.

While the Windows XP firewall is much better than no firewall at all, don't count on the Windows XP firewall to meet your needs. You need a two-way firewall, which the Windows XP firewall is not!.

The Windows XP firewall does not control outbound communications originating from your computer — and you should want to have control if adware/trojans/spyware or even commercial products want to talk to the Internet.

Do you want Windows Media Player to call home every time you play something? It does! Do you use the Search function in Windows Explorer to find things on your hard drive? Did you know that every time you search, Windows Explorer talks to Microsoft — I didn't know that when I ran ZoneAlarm, but the Sunbelt Kerio Personal Firewall flags that for me, and I can stop or allow it to happen.

Many other programs call home when you run them, too.

If you don't get either of the above multi-function packages, I recommend my choice for a firewall program is Sunbelt Personal Firewall.

You can try the full-featured "paid version" of Sunbelt Personal Firewall free for 30 days — after that, you can register it or, if you're using it on a home non-business computer, you can let it revert to the free, lesser-function license. Sunbelt Personal Firewall is $19.95 (with discounts for multiple computers!) for a non-expiring license for the program and includes one year of their updates subscription.

Related articles:

• The Internet Versus You
• Do I Need a Firewall Program?
• Sunbelt Personal Firewall Review

Anti-Spyware / Anti-Adware Software

CounterSpy, from Sunbelt Software, has received many kudos from the computer press for its always-running and periodic full system scans. It is also my personal choice for my PC's and my family's PC's.

Sunbelt released their CounterSpy v2 in early February and I promptly updated my computers to it. Version 2 greatly improved CounterSpy's performance and reduced its load on the computer when it was scanning.

Recently (late July, 2007), Sunbelt released v2.5 of CounterSpy, which again both improved CounterSpy's performance against malware and reduced its impact on system resources and responsiveness when its scanning.

Related articles:

• Fighting Against Spyware & Malware
• CounterSpy Review

Anti-spam Software

In today's Internet world, the question is not "if" you will get spam, but "how much will you get?"

I use and now I recommend POPFile as my first choice for handling spam. POPFile sits on your computer, between your email program and your ISP mailbox, and handles emial as it downloads.

POPFile uses a different approach to handle spam than some other programs do — it does nothing to reduce spam. It is designed as an email classification tool — you train it to recognize spam and any other type of email that you want to classify. These classifications can help you sort your emails into appropriate folders in your email program.

Sunbelt Software, who makes the anti-spyware program CounterSpy (which I use and recommend) and the firewall that I use and recommend (Sunbelt Kerio Personal Firewall) also has a well-regarded, award-winning anti-spam program called iHateSpam for Outlook and Outlook Express. Since I don't use Outlook or Outlook Express for email, I haven't tried iHateSpam.

Mailwasher Pro is my first choice to handle spam before it ever gets into your computer's Inbox. Mailwasher Pro uses on-line Realtime Black Lists mail servers sending spam recently, "training" by you of what you think is spam, and your own "friends" and "blacklist" lists.

Mailwasher Pro can even bounce spam messages, as if your email address was not valid, although the usefulness and appropriateness of this is questionable. There is a free version called "Mailwasher," but it omits the functions that I consider critical for this purpose -- such as safely previewing the emails safely before they ever get to your email inbox.

Cable/DSL Router

If you have a cable modem or a DSL modem, you need to have another layer of inexpensive protection between you and the Internet. A cable/DSL router isolates your computer from direct connection to the Internet. Your computer can easily request your email, web pages, etc. through the router. The responses come back to the router and are smoothly routed to your computer. But, someone on the Internet side of the router can not initiate a connection to your computer — they can only respond to your request.

Even if you only have one computer to connect to your cable or DSL modem, I recommend that you purchase and use a cable/DSL router because of the protection it can give you against attempts to attack through some flaws in Windows itself.

A router isolates your local network, whether it is only one computer or several, from the Internet by actually making it a separate network. The router gets the "public" IP address and handles all your outbound communications and the responses to them. But, it blocks computers on the Internet side from being able to initiate communications with your computer! This will prevent you from falling prey to many worms that try to attack security holes in Windows itself.

For a wireless router, I recommend the Linksys WRT54G wireless router. I'm using the relatively new version 6 of this router.

If you don't want wireless, I recommend the Linksys BEFSR41 wired router. Either way, based on my experience, I recommend Linksys routers for price, reliability and Linksys' habit of releasing updated firmware for their products..

See these related articles:

• Wireless Security
• Wi-Fi Hotspots and Computer Security
• Wireless Networking Problems & Wireless Networking Security

Volume 3, Number 29 — Sunday, December 30, 2007

Copyright © 2007 Terry A. Stockdale.  All rights reserved.