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Modern myths and the reality of those dodgy downloads
A popular myth in the early days of computing was that anti-virus vendors deliberately put out malware in order stimulate sales of their products. There was (almost) certainly no truth in the story, though proof-of-concept viruses are sometimes used for scary marketing even if they remain in the research lab; and instances of poachers turning gamekeepers abound in the security world.
A conspiracy theory waiting to do the rounds (if it is not doing so already) is that freely-available tools that allow you to crack software registration or bypass trialware timeouts are deliberately infected with trojans by major application developers in order discourage their use.
It seems, however, that there is no need for software houses to be so devious. Cracking tools downloaded from P2P networks or warez sites are riddled with malware by the people that develop and post them, according to security firm Trend Micro. So why do something that is going to scare people from using your code?
"It's the only way they can make money," said a spokesman. "They can stick in a trojan that will allow them to steal information such as banking details."
Just visiting warez sites can set your PC security alarms ringing like cash registers at Christmas, according to the spokesman. And downloaded utilities are often contained in zip files, self-extracting or not, that can carry all manner of extraneous code.
The top three downloads, all commonly infected, include a tool to help you convert trial Nero CD burning software into a full version; another to extract Windows and Microsoft Office registration codes from a computer, possibly for resale on the black market; and one to generate a code that can be used to register Windows XP.
Hot on their heels are a utility that hides program windows, and one that endeavours to stop other code (such as anti-virus software) running. Trend points out that both these tools can be used to cloak the activities of the malware they come with.
Sweden and Turkey in hacking war
A hacking war has broken out between Swedish and Turkish hackers after several newspapers in Sweden published a caricature of the prophet Muhammed. Around five thousand websites have been affected, including those of Linköping Cathedral and Gothenburg Council, according to the English-language Swedish newspaper The Local.
Swedish hackers are reported to have retaliated by breaking into Turkish forums and posting pornographic images of Muhammad and Kemal Atatürk, founder of the modern Turkish state.
Stefan B Grinneby, head of the Swedish IT Incident Centre (SITIC), has asked local hackers to exercise restraint to prevent an escalation.
Inevitably security firms are using the battle as a dire warning for companies to beef up their protection. Geoff Sweeney, chief technology officer of Tier-3 said companies can learn a lot from the methodology of the hackers, and claimed "more advanced" measures like behavioural analysis offered better protection because it provided a safety net against unknown as well as known threats.
Sat nav manufacturers need to make a sharp U-turn
After meeting up with a number of sat nav companies over the past few days, I've stumbled upon a worrying trend: many of them seem to falling into the style over functionality trap.
Mio popped in yesterday to show off its new C620T (pictured). There's no doubt it looks great and the 3D mapping feature (where you'll see a 3D image of landmarks such as Buckingham Palace) is an interesting, if perhaps slightly gimmicky addition, but my issue is that there is just a single physical button on it (the power button).
Mio pointed out that the volume was accessible on the touch screen display during navigation, but if you've ever tried using a touch screen while driving you'll know just how fiddly and, possibly, dangerous this can be. Would a couple of buttons on the side of it really be such a fashion faux pas? With a physical button you know exactly where it is and can operate it without having to take your eyes off the road.
It may be getting increasingly hard to differentiate products from the competition, but I sincerely hope sat nav manufacturers make a sharp U-turn and avoid heading down Apple's one-button mouse route of sacrificing functionality for style.
Parrot announces digital photo display with built-in Sim card
Digital photo frames are all over the place at the moment. Every man and his dog seem to be producing them, and Parrot has just announced its latest model.
The DF7700 stands out from the crowd in that it features a built-in Sim card. This means you can fire MMS digital photos from your phone direct to the display. Of course, unless you've got a decent mobile plan each MMS costs you a fair amount, but thanks to the relatively small 7in screen most mobile shots should look OK.
Pricing it to be confirmed, but if its anything like most other frames it'll be expensive. The other problem with digital photo frames is that if you want them on for extended period you'll need to hook them up to the mains - which means a power cable dangling ungainly from the display.
That said, one photo frame that caught my eye last year was the I-Mate Momento. Thanks to its built-in Wifi, it would grab photos from your PC wirelessly and would also let you update them over the internet.
Screen video from your PC on a TV without the aid of a network
Flash memory specialist Sandisk has launched a device that allows you to screen videos from a PC on your TV without the aid a network.
Supported formats include DivX, XVID and MPEG-4, the device works with Windows Vista, XP and the latest versions of Mac and Linux.
The device is expected to be available in Britain early next year. US prices for the 4Gbyte and 8Gbyte versios are $99.99 and $149.99 respectively.
Launched in conjunction with the device was a beta of a new download service called Fanfare, offering a combination of paid-for and free adverstising-financed content. Programs available immediately include CSI, Survivor, China, Dexter and Sleeper Cell.
Dandy drive crams 300GB into 2.5inches
Fujitsu is plugging its new 300GB drive as the largest capacity 2.5in external drive in the world.
The HandyDrive weighs 255g and consumes half the power in stand-by mode (using a special utility) compared with regular idle mode.
This monster midget features a password lock tool, 8MB read/write buffer and an internal shock-endurance mechanism to reduce damage from impacts.
The claimed maximum data transfer rate of 60Mbytes/sec will barely be achieved though. Our last hard disk group test revealed only 10,000rpm WD Raptors (the fastest 3.5in desktop drives) could maintain this speed in all circumstances.
We've seen it advertised online for £132, but it won't be shipping until the end of October.
Print directly from your phone
New software lets you print directly from your Symbian phone to networked printer.
EasyPrint isn't the first to introduce mobile phone printing, but it says competitors simply take screen shots of what you see on the phone and prints them. EasyPrint apparently prints the website, document, PDF or image in its original layout like on a regular desktop.
It currently works using Wifi but there's no reason why Bluetooth and infrared shouldn't work too according to Colin Cox, an engineer for developer Software Imaging. He told me other software manufacturers will be able to use EasyPrints API and build it into their own software.
Cox thinks consumers can benefit too, saying: "Japanese kids want to be able to take a photo on their phone and print it out straight away."
Software Imaging has developed drivers for several big printer manufacturers and as a result of its know-how, you don't always need a print server. EasyPrint can scan for printers, but if that fails then you can enter its IP address.
Phones five years behind PCs
Phones are five to seven years behind PCs in terms of technology, according to Sony Ericsson's chief technology officer Mats Lindoff.
The Symbian smartphone show in London hasn't been a glamorous event these last two days, but Lindoff was a breath of fresh air as he predicted how mobile phones will change in the run up to 2012, visions that he has an authority on since he's actually involved in their development.
Lindoff said: "You might say you can take individual components – camera, handycam and so on – and put it into a phone, but in 5-7 years we can take everything and put it into the cell phone.
"The most important feature is the optical system on a camera. You can use low noise sensors but heavy mathematics will have to improve image quality"
Divx Connected comes late to the party
Divx is to license software to media streamers that plug into your TV, which will let you access videos, photos and music files stored on your PC.
The software, called Divx Connected, will also give TVs access to the internet. Numerous plug-ins will allow utilities like Google Earth and internet radio stations to be accessed, although there will be no browser for the foreseeable future.
Divx founder, Jerome Rota, said: "There're just two chips inside, one to decode and one to do networking, so the cost of the box has the ability to go very low."
Cheap internet radio arrives
Freecom is launching an internet radio and MP3 streaming device with speaker for under £90, the cheapest of its type according to the company.
The MusicPal comes with an Ethernet port and 802.11b/g Wifi supporting WPA and WPA2 encryption, a cut above many streamers that get stuck on rather insecure WEP.
If the three Watt speaker isn't enough for your tastes (just the right volume to accompany me on my morning routines, I find) then composite and line out connections let you attach it to a bigger audio system.
My first impressions of the design and price are good – the rubber controls and comfortable to use – but I'm not convinced by the choice of internet radio server provider, vTuner.
vTuner, a list that points hardware in the direction of online audio streams, musters up 4000-5000 stations. This is far short of the 13000 I've seen on the Linksys Kiss 1600 and it also doesn't have a lot of the Danish national radio stations I like, which the Noxon 2 does.
The MusicPal currently only supports MP3 and Wav audio streams, but WMA and AAC streams will come via a firmware update before Christmas according to Freecom, which may broaden the number of stations available.
Evesham 'owed £6.8 million'
Evesham Technology is reported to have owed £6.8 million when it went into administration in August. Administrators DTE Leonard Curtis refused today to confirm a report that there are no "surplus funds" for payouts to non-secured creditors. They did issue a statement saying they are working with PCC Technology, which bought Evesham assets, to ensure customers get "ongoing support".
Microsoft and AMD are said to be among the biggest losers, being owed £800,000 and £340,000 respectively.
A DTE Leonard Curtis report, sent out to creditors last Friday, is said to echo Evesham founder Richard Austin's complaint that the firm's problems stemmed from Gordon Brown's sudden withdrawal of the Home Computing Initiative (HCI) scheme, which gave tax breaks to people buying computers through their employers.
When a reinstall could mean you pay twice for the same copy of Windows
It is a fact of life for anyone interested in computers that they become IT troubleshooter for friends, not to mention friends of friends. Nothing wrong with that, except when what seems like a simple job turns into a major hassle – and expecially so when the hassles come from the PC or software vendors or both.
A friend's Dell Dimension, perhaps three years old, had gone on a go-slow and, as it was used mostly for emails and had little software loaded, I offered to do a quick clean reinstall as the easiest way to fix it.
If he had got a Windows XP Home Edition disk with the PC, he had lost it. But I had a copy, and could use the licence number printed on the side of the Dell system box, so there was no question of stealing software if I used it for the reinstall.
Accordingly I reformatted the C-drive and began. There was no problem until I was asked for the licence number, which was promptly rejected. Microsoft told me it was Dell's problem.
Dell told me that the machine might have recovery code in a hidden partition, accessible by clicking Control-F11. This did not work; there was indeed a hidden partition but it appeared to contain only a hardware diagnostics utility.
Dell's support man told me the only alternative was to buy another copy of XP… in effect to pay a second time for the same code.
Dell's support staff in India (of whom, incidentally, I have had good reports) are supposed to be ringing me this evening to take me through the recovery procedure again but I don't hold out much hope. I've already had hours of unnecessary hassle, which appears to be a case of anti-piracy measures acting against the interests of legitimate users.
First DirectX 10 AGP card
We've just got our hands on the first DirectX 10 card to appear in AGP format, a Sapphire HD 2600 Pro.
AGP continues to be hugely popular in the retail market since many people want to upgrade their aging PCs with AGP motherboards.
I'm informed there is no support for HDMI, since ATI can't get the audio controller won't wok across AGP. This is its only major drawback, since HDCP keys are loaded onto it and regular drivers work no problem.
It's an early sample, which perhaps explains why it has a rubber bandage covering what might be the PCI-Express to AGP bridge chip.
We'll throw it in our labs testing now and bring you DirectX 10 and DirectX 9 scores next week.
Watch YouTube on Google Earth
Google has just added a new feature to Google Earth that adds a YouTube video layer. YouTube users simply need to provide location information for their videos and permit embedding. This will then let Google Earth users see a clickable tag for the videos appear in the correct geographical location. the video runs in an embedded window within Google Earth.
The new layer will automatically appear in the 'Featured Content' section of Google Earth the next time you open the application.
Now it's healthy, now it ain't
The Independent on Sunday has been plugging the perils of Wifi and phone radiation for weeks, with its growing tabloid-like propensity for not letting a sense of proportion get in the way of a sensational headline and a good scare story.
Its Wifi coverage, though it raised an important subject, has been way over the top. Now it has found a paper contradicting the recent reassuring report on the safety of mobile and cordless phones.
Sony releases £299 PS3 lite
Sony has released a stripped-down Playstation 3 for £299 and slashed the price of its regular Playstation 3 to £349.
The price drop comes as it remains firmly in last place in the Xbox360-Wii-PS3 shoot out.
According to Sony, the cheaper PS3 will lack backwards compatibility with Playstation 2 titles and considering there are only 65 games available for the PS3, this seems incredible.
The Playstation 2 and 1 continue to hold some gaming gems and with the Blu-ray - HD DVD war getting un-clearer by the day, the low end PS3 looks a bit of a gamble to me.
The PS3-lite has a 40GB hard disk, rather than a 60GB version present on the top end PS3 and the new model has had two USB ports and the memory card slot lopped off its specifications.
The £349 PS3 comes bundled with two games and looks to be the console to go for.
Wimax nomads will skirt the law and create a charging headache
So, the good news is that Wimax services will start to rollout in Britain. The bad news is that we don’t know exactly when (though we can assume it will be a matter of months) nor how much they will cost.
The people from Freedom4, formerly known as Pipex Wireless, haven’t yet worked these things out themselves, judging from yesterday’s launch press conference.
The uncertainty starts with the company’s licence to use its precious spectrum. Cliff Mason, manager of Ofcom’s mobile and broadband wireless policy team, pointed out that the terms were agreed 13 years ago when the technological climate was very different from today.
How dark-horse ARM could help Linux and wean Apple off toys
ARM is one of the great dark horses of computing, hardly known outside the industry yet far outselling Intel in the number of cores sold each year because its designs are used in a wider variety of devices - not least mobile phones, including Apple's iPhone.
It is the last laugh of Acorn, the Cambridge firm that produced the pioneering Archimedes computer but like so many British computer firms lost out when the industry consolidated around IBM's PC architecture. Acorn's innovative processor unit was hived off as Advanced Risc Machines but it never got a chance to exploit the fact that it was one of the first companies to experiment with webpads and tablets.
ARM launched its first multi-core processor in May 2004, before either AMD or Intel; and its architecture and coding tools are familiar to developers worldwide.
It is hard to compare the raw computing power of an ARM chip with that of an x86 processor but the latest design, announced yesterday, seems powerful enough for the two architectures to compete in the ultra-mobile space, which easily the most exciting for anyone interested in technological evolution.
Windows CE will run on ARM chips but not (to my knowledge) other versions of Windows. But more intriquing is the prospect of an ARM-based Linux ultra-mobile competing with Microsoft's UMPC; it could win on power consumption, if not computing power. And if the right design came along it could finally push Linux into the mainstream as a general-purpose operating system.
As intriquing is the possibility that Apple will see the light and use ARM power to build a proper ultra-mobile instead of wasting its time and considerable expertise on toys.
Wannabe mobile WUSB competes with next-generation Bluetooth
Plans for a version 1.1 of the Wireless USB specification are almost an admission that the current version is not yet ready for mobile use. This is far from saying that it is pointless: the dongle adapters and WUSB hubs currently available are basically cable replacements for fixed devices such as PCs and peripherals such as printers in which power consumption is not an issue.
Sales in the US, where they have been available for months, indicate that people have quickly realised the potential of a technology that can get rid of the mass of wires around desktops and offer more choice in where peripherals can be placed in a room.
