Terry's Computer Tips - Newsletter
September 7, 2008

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

Volume 4, Number 13 — Sunday, September 7, 2008

IN THIS ON-LINE ISSUE:

   1.   Excel and the Scroll Lock Key
   2.   Malware By Email - This Week
   3.   My Computer Security Software Recommendations
   4.   Notebook Hard Drive Failures, Again
   5.   Recommend my Terry's Computer Tips Newsletter to Your Friends

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

 

  

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1.  Excel and the Scroll Lock Key

In my article Microsoft Excel - Navigating with Scroll Lock, I wrote about how to use the scroll lock key to help you move around in Excel.

In part of the article, I wrote:

Excel modifies the way the arrow keys work if you've turned on the Scroll Lock key. It follows the concept of: if you turn on Scroll Lock and press the right-arrow key, the columns scroll one position to the left. Your selected cell (the active cell) stays the same, though, which means that it quickly shifts out of the window.

I also included screenshots as visual examples. Then, I stated:

I haven't figured out any reason that Excel should support this type of movement.

On the other hand, I have seen (and experienced) the confusion that results when someone accidentally turns on the scroll lock key.

A site visitor named Kostas wrote me to explain how he uses the scroll lock key in Excel:

Hi Terry, Commenting on your post as to what is the use of scroll lock key in MS Excel. This applies when using Excel mainly by keyboard instead of mouse. I find the option extremely handy when, say, I want to check, in which cell certain data has been entered and the particular cell is outside the current view of the worksheet. So instead of taking your hand off the keyboard to grab a mouse and use its scroll wheel (let alone clicking or dragging the scroll bar) you can simply press the scroll lock button and navigate yourself to that certain cell by pressing either the page up/down or arrow up/down buttons and then easily return to the area of the original cell, for example, by pressing off the scroll lock and then hitting enter key. The further the cell-area you briefly want to visit is, the more useful the scroll lock button becomes. I' m not sure if I illustrated the applicability of the scroll lock button the best way, but rest assured, there still exist people that find that peculiar button quite usefull.

There we have the answer. For those people who like to keep their hands on the keyboard and not reach for the mouse, it can be a handy (pun intended) way to move around an Excel spreadsheet.

Thanks for the comment, Kostas!

Click here for more information about VIPRE.

This has been an active week for malware, especially as attachments to emails. I received both a trojan downloader by email and a worm by email.

The bad guys are continuing to use "social engineering," to get their malware opened and run. Recent malware has been arriving in some form of compressed file. This week, I saw both ZIP files and RAR files.

They try to get the receipient's curiosity to overcome his sense of wariness, with filenames such as "Fees-2008_2009.zip" and "movie.rar".

The Fees-2008_2009.zip file contained a worm (a self-replicating program designed to spread the problem to the recipient's friends and net-neighbors). Here's what VIPRE showed when it found this malware:

(click on the image for a larger version)

The movie.rar file, which uses the less common RAR compression method, contained a backdoor "Bot" program, designed to give the operator of the bot network (bot = short for robot) remote control of the recipient's computer. These remotely controlled computers are often used for spamming and attacks on other computers.

The movie.rar file was attached to an email claiming "Great Jugs", so you can imagine that a few of these were opened...

(click on the image for a larger version)

The movie.rar file also is an example of malware using one of the misleading security holes which Microsoft has given us.

By default, recent versions of Windows have hidden the actual filename extensions from us. Unless we change our settings in Windows so that it shows filename extensions, we don't realize the true name of the file.

In this case, the real filename of the malware is "movie.avi.exe" — which a default version of Windows will show as "movie.avi". Since we know .avi files are video files, we might be tempted not to worry about them. In reality, it is a .exe executable program that would run when we open the file.

You can change your Windows XP settings to display the full filename. Here's the link to my article Hidden File Extensions in Windows

3.  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..."

For the last five years, my personal choice has been ESET's small, fast NOD32 anti-virus program, which offers a FREE 30-day evaluation license. I consider NOD32 one of the best in anti-virus protection. Unlike some of its competitors, ESET offers multiple-year licenses also, and includes program updates in the multiple-year license.

Now, I'm in the process of changing from my long-time programs NOD32 (antivirus) and CounterSpy (antispyware) to Sunbelt's new VIPRE Antivirus + Antispyware.

I've found that VIPRE puts even less load on my computer than the speedy combination of NOD32 and CounterSpy. I've also been impressed with the way its "deep scan" has found and eliminated risks that were stored in zip files, which is one of the latest malware email tricks.

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
• VIPRE Antivirus + Antispyware Review

Firewall Software

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!. Microsoft woke up and supplied a two-way firewall with Windows Vista.

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. Whether they are calling home or spewing spam, you want to be able to control your computer.

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 Personal Firewall flags that to me, and I can stop it or allow it to happen. Many other programs try to call home when you run them, too.

I recommend my choice for a firewall program, which 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 regularly $19.95 (with discounts for multiple computers and/or multiple years!) 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 has been my personal choice for my PC's and my family's PC's.

In 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.

Sunbelt continues to release updated program versions. Nicely, they do NOT install the updated programs automatically. You have to use the Update process in the program, which means that you'll know that something significant has changed.

Now, I'm in the process of changing from my long-time programs NOD32 (antivirus) and CounterSpy (antispyware) to Sunbelt's new VIPRE Antivirus + Antispyware.

I've found that VIPRE puts even less load on my computer than the speedy combination of NOD32 and CounterSpy. I've also been impressed with the way its "deep scan" has found and eliminated risks that were stored in zip files, which is one of the latest malware email tricks.

Related articles:

• Fighting Against Spyware & Malware
• CounterSpy Review
• VIPRE Antivirus + Antispyware 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 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 would be 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. Note: I found that PopFile generally meets my needs and stopped using Mailwasher Pro, even though PopFile works AFTER the emails have been downloaded. If I used a dialup connection, I would be more interested in Mailwasher Pro.

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.

Related articles:

• Spam Filtering
• Keeping spam out of your Inbox
• Getting Control of Your Inbox
• How Can I Prevent spam?

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, which I also use. 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

I've been having a real problem with the hard drive on my notebook. Longtime readers of my newsletters know that my notebook computer is my primary computer. Sure, I've got a Windows XP desktop, too, and a Linux box, and a Windows XP-based home theater PC, but my Dell Inspiron 8600 is my main machine.

A couple years ago, I had the original 60 GB hard drive fail almost catastrophically. It began to have read errors when I tried to access the drive for reading or writing. The problem quickly became so bad that the computer became virtually unusable.

Dell replaced that hard drive under warranty. In fact, in place of that 7200 RPM Hitachi 60 GB drive, they sent me a 7200 RPM 80 GB drive. While I waited for the drive to be shipped over the weekend, I spent much of the time deleting the personal data on the bad drive — yes, it took that long! I had to wipe files directory by directory; any bigger attempt at wipe the files would crash on read errors, plus the utility I was using deleted the files but not the directories, so it was hard to figure out what had been cleared and what hadn't. Even listing a directory took a long time.

Anyway, while the replacement 60GB drive was being shipped (I didn't know they were sending an 80GB one), I bought a 100GB 7200 RPM Hitachi drive. Same model, bigger size.

It now appears to be failing.

Early this year, I had my first occurrence — I turned on the notebook, it did it's BIOS checking, and then gave me a blinking cursor in the top left corner of the screen. It never got far enough to try to start Windows.

The fix was easy enough, but aggravating and could be a problem if I wasn't at home. I had to get out my Windows XP Operating System CDROM that came with my computer (thank goodness Dell shipped actual OS CD's at that time and not just "recovery CD's". I boot the CD, select R for Repair. Then, I enter my Administrator password and drop to a DOS-type prompt. The commannd FIXMBR completely rewrites the Master Boot Record on the hard drive.

Until this week, it has been a very occasional thing. Still too often, but maybe 6 times all year.

Well, this week, while fighting Hurricane Gustav, I had rewrite the Master Boot Record twice. Enough is enough.

I'm looking for replacement hard drives. They're a lot bigger now, but the options for this old notebook (which uses the old Parallel ATA interface, not the new Serial ATA interface) are very limited. Price isn't too bad though. I can get 160GB 5200RPM drives for about $85 or even 250GB drives for $100. I haven't found any 7200RPM PATA drives at the vendors I usually ship, like NewEgg.

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