0
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (12.1MB)
Show Notes:
Contact info: | Feed: feeds.feedburner.com/geekcast | TheGeekcast.com | geekcast@gmail.com | Skype & Gizmo: Geekcast | 206-98-geek-1 | Show notes: send blank e-mail to geekcastpodcast-subscribe@yahoogroups.com | Frappr Map: Frappr.com/thegeekcast
**************
Items of Note:
**************
Tech news:
Firefox 2 looks to protect users from phishing. Mozilla’s Mike Shaver said in an interview that the upcoming Firefox 2 will have anti-phishing capability using technology that might come from Google. “With the continued rise in online attacks, security tools have become something Web browser makers can use to try to stand out. Microsoft plans to include features to protect Web surfers against online scams in Internet Explorer 7.”
Apple heading to India. Apple has announced that it plans to open a call center in India to handle its growing business and continue to expand call centers in the U.S. as well. The company is in the process of building a Bangalore facility to house the call center. “Apple has gained millions of new customers in the past year, and we are building a call center in India to help meet our growing service and support needs,” an Apple representative said in a statement. The company stressed that it isn’t cutting any U.S. jobs, noting that its ranks are growing both in the United States and overall. “Our call centers in Austin and Sacramento also continue to grow,” the Apple representative said.
**************
Test a geek: This segment will return on a future episode of The Geekcast
**************
How To: Make Windows run faster.
Windows XP is great when you first run it. It’s quick, nimble, and runs pretty darn good. The of course you own the computer for more than a week and it takes a huge hit in performance from spyware, viruses, security software, endless patches and on and on. As time goes on most people see XP begin to run slow and they aren’t sure what to do. Here are some tweaks you can make to the OS to get it to speed up and breathe some life into your PC.
Disable Indexing Services. Indexing Services is a small little program that uses large amounts of RAM and can often make a computer endlessly loud and noisy. This system process indexes and updates lists of all the files that are on your computer. It does this so that when you do a search for something on your computer, it will search faster by scanning the index lists. If you don’t search your computer often, or even if you do search often, this system service is completely unnecessary. To disable do the following:
1. Go to Start
2. Click Settings
3. Click Control Panel
4. Double-click Add/Remove Programs
5. Click the Add/Remove Window Components
6. Uncheck the Indexing services
7. Click Next
Disable Performance Counters. Windows XP has a performance monitor utility which monitors several areas of your PC’s performance. These utilities take up system resources so disabling is a good idea.
To disable:
1. download and install the Extensible Performance Counter List
2.Then select each counter in turn in the ‘Extensible performance counters’ window and clear the ‘performance counters enabled’ checkbox at the bottom button below.
Speedup Folder Browsing. You may have noticed that everytime you open my computer to browse folders that there is a slight delay. This is because Windows XP automatically searches for network files and printers everytime you open Windows Explorer. To fix this and to increase browsing significantly:
1. Open My Computer
2. Click on Tools menu
3. Click on Folder Options
4. Click on the View tab.
5. Uncheck the Automatically search for network folders and printers check box
6. Click Apply
7. Click Ok
8. Reboot your computer
Optimize Your Page file. If you give your page file a fixed size it saves the operating system from needing to resize the page file.
1. Right click on My Computer and select Properties
2. Select the Advanced tab
3. Under Performance choose the Settings button
4. Select the Advanced tab again and under Virtual Memory select Change
5. Highlight the drive containing your page file and make the initial Size of the file the same as the Maximum Size of the file.
Windows XP sizes the page file to about 1.5X the amount of actual physical memory by default. While this is good for systems with smaller amounts of memory (under 512MB) it is unlikely that a typical XP desktop system will ever need 1.5 X 512MB or more of virtual memory. If you have less than 512MB of memory, leave the page file at its default size. If you have 512MB or more, change the ratio to 1:1 page file size to physical memory size.
**************
Ask A Geek:
Max said “I was wondering about what is going to be happening with free downloading programs such as Limewire of Kazaa. Are they going to be shut down?”
Thanks for your question Max. When it comes to Limewire and Kazaa, they will always be pressured to be shut down. Because these programs are peer-to-peer (p2p) software, there is really nothing to shut down. People connect to each other and not to a central server such as the old Napster. Now while these programs are great for getting all sorts of content, these services are highly monitored by the RIAA & MPAA. This means that you are at risk for getting sued by the big companies that could cause a lot of issues for you financially. The biggest issue with using these services is that they are filled with spyware and viruses. The programs themselves are filled with spyware so just installing them causes the machine you’re using to become infected with crap that can cause problems. On top of this, files are commonly mislabeled to appear as popular songs and movies. The reason people do this is because they are disguising viruses and malware. Many people are out to infect you computer and if you can download a file from them, they will take advantage of it.
If you’re looking to acquire software and files, you should really look towards bittorrent. This technology is faster, more reliable, and most of all it keeps a lot of the bad software off your system. In general, files on bittorrent are what they claim to be as long as the file size match. While it’s safer you should still be careful and scan anything you download.
**************
Hack:
**************
The geek’s view: This segment will return on a future episode of The Geekcast
**************
Related Episodes:
E-mail
Voicemail
