Of course a Mac had to figure somewhere; it’s the new love of the disillusioned former user, who considers Windows 7’s arrival a little too late. Hit the video comments on YouTube for opinions following the classic Windows vs. Mac themes:

• “Idiot. Macs are more expensive for the same hardware”
• “Haha, PCs aren’t as reliable or secure as Macs”
• “Oh yes I totally agree! OS 1 is definitely better than OS 2!” (or vice-versa)
• “Shut up, you don’t know what you’re talking about”
• “Screw them both, I use Linux!”

Thanks for the tip Andry!

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Until this November 30, you can get Microsoft Office 2007 Home & Student for only $90, or effectively pay $30 to get a fully-functional version of Office 2007 on three different computers. If you see promotional material declaring a $80 price tag, take not that it doesn’t include the “Optional” License Lock Box, which allows you to download a copy in case you lose your original.

Click here to avail of the promo now. Deadline is this November 30!

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After deleting and repeatedly overwriting his unencrypted copies, the reporter finds himself served with a search warrant, and agents stream into the reporter’s home. One of the government lackeys uses Windows 7’s ability to save previous versions of folders to render the precaution useless:

He located the Documents folder, opened its Properties window, and clicked on the “Previous Versions” tab. Just as he thought, there were five previous versions of the folder – daily “shadow copies” made by the operating system as part of the System Restore mechanism. As these snapshots were prepared silently in the background and stored on a hidden disk volume, few users were aware of them. Agent Trallis was smiling. The good guys from Redmond were going to make his job easy again.

C’mon now Mr. author! I doubt anyone using TrueCrypt would remain unaware of Windows 7’s ability to save old copies of data—a feature that can be disabled by the way. Maybe the reporter in “The Hidden Shadow” was guilty of overconfidence in his counter-intelligence abilities, a narrow-mindedness that’s similar to the outlook of those who think anything Microsoft is necessarily bad.

In any case, this is a great heads-up for anyone using Windows, and with secrets to keep. Make sure to disable those Previous Versions!

Post from: The Gadget Blog

Now if only the creators, students at Carnegie Mellon’s Entertainment Technology Center (ETC), can come out with a polished final product. I’m pretty sure Wizards of the Coast (WOTC), owners of Dungeons & Dragons, would love this. At the very least, WOTC can turn Surface Scapes into an expensive new toy designed to make die-hard fans spend even more.

Totally immersive and addictive? Check! Let’s hope that future players remember Microsoft Surface isn’t exactly made of hardwood, and is less accommodating of passionate/angry tabletop slamming.

Source

Post from: The Gadget Blog

Even if this report turns out to be false, it’s still a good reminder to change your web email password now, regardless of what service you’re using. For something that’s literally the foundation of the online existence of millions, it’s amazing how few practice good security and change it on a regular basis. For hotmail users, may I also remind them not to accidentally visit hotmale.com?

Which accounts are affected? According to Neowin: “Currently it appears only accounts used to access Microsoft’s Windows Live Hotmail have been posted, this includes @hotmail.com, @msn.com and @live.com accounts”. The site has done the right thing and contacted Microsoft PR reps in the US and UK to keep them in the loop and possibly elicit feedback regarding the situation.

Technology Viewer suggests that, after those who are allegedly affected change their passwords, they should switch to Gmail ASAP. Personally, I find that sound advice, but I’m not sure what can be done for online services that don’t allow email changes.

Post from: The Gadget Blog

Personally, that seemed like a really low figure to me. “Only” 350GB to encompass the entire sum of our life experiences? Then again, if 3G users only consume around 211MB a month, and the average daily traffic of the internet is “mere” terrabytes (or thousands of gigabyes), then the figure makes sense. The amount of information we share on a daily basis won’t even threaten the capacity needed to “store” 50 individuals.

Maybe that’s because we humans excel at processing the information, locating useful relationships between specific ideas and perspectives, and turning them into more ideas that we can execute to achieve our objectives. Sure, we only need 350GB to store everything our brain will absorb during our lifetimes, and we’ve passed that threshold a couple of years ago: a half-terabyte hard drive is slowly becoming standard on today’s computers, and rarely costs more than $200.

But the technology needed to properly process stored information in the same way your typical human does? I’m betting we’re still a long way from achieving that kind of breakthrough.

Source

Post from: The Gadget Blog

I’ve got a few things to say about that!

“It’s a laptop. They’re all portable.” – Try lugging around a 15.4″ laptop!

“Apparently the screen size wasn’t a big factor for her.” – Well, maybe Lauren was smart enough to realize that you need to strike a balance between portability and screen size?

“What is ‘do programs fast’?” – I guess something we tech-savvy people like to call “responsiveness”? You know, like when you launch an app, it launches fast?

“$970? Really?” and “They go way under the price limit…” – Don’t tell me you never tried to save money? Budgets aren’t ironclad you know, especially when you can get something you need for much less than what you allocated.

“For about $150, you can get a 1 terabyte external drive” – Oh, but I prefer having everything right on my laptop. An external hard drive is always a good buy, but not when your anticipating your everyday storage needs around it.

“Vista’s garbage” – No it’s not. Admittedly Microsoft dropped the ball upon Vista’s launch, but the updates made up for that, performance-wise at least. And guess what? If Lauren bought

“You don’t need 10 gigabytes of RAM to run it smoothly.” – Wait wait wait. You do know that the Vista on Lauren’s chosen laptop, can only support a maximum of 3.25GB? So 10GB is kinda pointless.

“I really don’t get what Microsoft is trying to do with these commercials, they’re stupid and they make no sense.” – They’re trying to appeal to a market eager for sweeping yet easy-to-package generalizations. You know, just like the I’m a PC ads.

“At least they had a cute girl in this commercial.” – On this point I agree!

The only point I concede is the Apple’s better battery life. Apple’s laptops do have better battery lives! But that doesn’t make up for the illusion of smugness some of Apple’s customers like giving off.

Post from: The Gadget Blog

Courtesy Joy of Tech

True or false?

Post from: The Gadget Blog

Opinions over the video online seem divided. Some wonder what the heck Microsoft was thinking, while others find the tongue-in-cheek presentation funny. Supporters have accused critics of not liking the Office 2010 trailer because it’s a Microsoft project.

Personally, I’m inclined to think that’s true. A lot of people have panned the movie for failing at humor, but some critics actually go out of their way to accuse Microsoft of wasting money. So why can’t Microsoft spend its marketing budget on what seems to be an expensive short film? What, they can’t try anything new?

Another argument against the trailer ad is that reveals nothing about Office 2010. Then again, consider how well-known Microsoft Office is. I really doubt if anyone watching the video for the first time would wonder what this “Word”, “Powerpoint”, or “Outlook” is all about.

It’s the weakness of these arguments that make me think that people continue to play the Microsoft-is-still-evil/uncool game. What’s interesting is that some critics actually went out of their way to formulate “rational” explanations for their reactions, to avoid looking like they were just picking on Microsoft once again.

Then again, Microsoft could have done worse: what if their new blockbuster trailer was met with apathy, with no reaction?

Post from: The Gadget Blog

“There is a lot of excitement for Windows 7 in the marketplace today. However, many consumers need a new Windows PC for school, work or home before October 22,” said Brad Brooks, corporate vice president, Windows consumer marketing at Microsoft. “So starting June 26th, any customer who buys a PC from a participating computer maker or retailer with Windows Vista Home Premium, Business or Ultimate will also receive an upgrade to the corresponding version of Window 7 at little or no cost.”

In other words, only Vista Home Basic users are exempted from this program. Micro Center has compiled a list of manufacturers included in the program, with relevant links:

Windows 7 OEM Upgrade Info

Acer
Upgrade Info

Averatec
Upgrade Info

Compaq
Upgrade Info
Support Info

Dell
Upgrade Info
Support Info

eMachines
Upgrade Info

Fujitsu
Upgrade Info

Gateway
Upgrade Info

HP
Upgrade Info
Support Info

Lenovo
Upgrade Info
Support Info

Retail Box Upgrade
Upgrade and Support Info

Sony
Upgrade Info

Toshiba
Upgrade Info

Velocity Micro
Upgrade and Support Info

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