Dave's Tech Blog
A Third Eye on Technology

In many office environments today it is common for mid and upper level employees to have their own corporate laptop that they carry with them everywhere they go and attach it to a dock station either at their desk at work or at home, which allows quick connection of the laptop to a traditional keyboard, mouse and monitor.  With the advances in CPU technology as of late and predictions of many new smart phones this year being equiped with quad-core processors, it has gotten some who use such laptops in office environments wondering if they still need to carry big old clunky laptops around just for the sake of processing power.  Well if you are such a person you’ll be in for a treat this year as the smart phone as we know it today is about to make many laptops obsolete.

Canonical has just announced their intentions of releasing Ubuntu for mobile smart phones this year, targeting business as well as consumer markets and allowing many current Android phone users the ability to install Ubuntu on their phone as an alternative in the coming months for free.  Quad-core processing power in smart phones seen this year will  approach the kind of processing speed you normally see on entry to moderate level PCs today (think Intel i3), which is more than necessary for a lot that people do on their desktop or on their phone for that matter.  The mobile version of the Ubuntu OS will be available for many Android users for free in the coming months and for those with the latest and greatest phones to hit market they’ll be able to use the phone as a complete desktop replacement via a dock much in the same way many laptops currently do.  It’s very exciting news!  I’m not going to ramble on here about how or why this is going to happen as head of Canonical Mark Shuttleworth has already done so in this proposal video where he speaks about the immediate goals for Ubuntu.

Above is a photo of the latest addition of MIDI controllers I use to write music.  This one in particular is designed specifically for a program called Ableton Live, which I really haven’t used before; I’ve never made anything with it, but I have played with it just a little.  You ever wonder what people like Skrillex or Phutureprimitive are doing on stage at a concert?  On the surface what a controller like this basically boils down to is a sound board.  Sound boards are basically buttons with clips of audio loaded into them that play when you press their button, however the rabbit hole goes a lot deeper then that.

The purpose of a controller (and Ableton for that matter, as it’s the brains behind this operation) is to facilitate a DJ the ability to play multi-tracked music live and allow them to change how all the parts fit together on-the-fly.  So, he’s not the kind of DJ that just has two vinyl record playing with a cross-fader between (aka, “the guy on stage with nothing but a couple of iPods”) but a DJ who has two separate A/B groups of dozens of record players dedicated to individual parts that play when triggered, with their own effects inserted that are also controllable.  Well… I’ve decided to join the party.  Ableton is actually a pretty cool piece of software that I’ve never given a fair shake, primarily because it’s strength requires a proper controller to exploit and I’ve not had one till now.  So far I’ve primarily been using Propellerhead Reason (and I still love the hell out of it).

So sometime soon I’m planning on putting on my own live shows!  Songs old, new and yet to be written will be diced up and rejuvenated with surprise and magic!  But in the mean time, there’s always my soundcloud feed.  Hope to see you soon!

I’ve been hearing more and more stories from clients I have worked for and from other techs who do what I do for a living.  People are getting phone calls from a call center filled with employees that only have East Indian accents (for now) claiming to work for Microsoft/your ISP/some company you’ve never heard of/etc. telling you that your computer is infected with a virus and that they would like to help you remove it… for $130 or so, or whatever they charge your card if you actually give it up to them.

However, it is often a scam that is based upon social engineering.  Social Engineering is a term used to describe the act of manipulating a person into believing you’re not a con-artist, or something like that.  Someone calls you out of the blue telling you that your computer is infected, that they’ve been receiving “signals” or whatever  from your computer that indicate you are infected with a virus.  They tell you they work for someone like Microsoft and their tone of voice is rather urgent and often outright rude.  They’ll tell you to do things to your computer that you likely never do on a regular basis, like press the Windows button + R (which brings up the run menu) and type some command into your computer, all of this in the hopes of convincing you that they are who they claim to be.  I’ve never called a psychic on the phone before… but if they were to call me out of the blue and use their “cold reading” skills to try to trick me into thinking I had a virus on my computer, talked me into putting a virus on my computer and/or simply insist that give them my credit card number to see me through some false peril… well that’s what you’ve got here.

If you get a phone call from anybody claiming to be from “tech support” or Microsoft or any handful of other places/companies, be on your guard.  It’s right along the lines of getting an email “from your bank” asking you to reply with your social security number, account number and passcodes to confirm your identity or something fishy like that.  Better yet, if you are already certain your computer is just fine and have a little experience with the computer, flat out waste their time for your own entertainment (if you have the time to spare).  You don’t even have to be at your computer.  Tell them to “hang on” and put the phone down for a few minutes; make some coffee or a sandwich.  When they’re talking interrupt and say you didn’t understand them, then put the phone down again.  Maybe you have a Macintosh or run Linux; would’t that be ironic.  Use your imagination, or just hang up.  In any case, be aware that there are scam artists out there calling random number trying to find someone who will fall for their manipulations.

Heads up Norton users!  A headline hit the news last night about the confirmed leak of source code for the popular Norton Antivirus software by Symantec.  You can read the articles for yourself here and here.

For those who aren’t tech savvy, the word “source code” refers to the so-to-speak “recipe” for the development/creation of a program.  It is literally the instructions that are more or less written by computer programmers.  This kind of information is proprietary and is often a trade secret, much like the coveted ingredients list for Coca Cola or my moms apple pie.  If one were able to obtain such information, say a competator or the creators of compuer viruses, one might use this information to one-up the software or, more importantly, exploit design flaws to circumvent the software.  In short this means it is quite likely there will be a new breed of viruses on the horizon that will be capable of outsmarting Norton, rendering it useless and crippled.

Symantec has been trying to downplay the severity of this breach by stressing the age of the code, stating that the origin is a version of their software that dates back to 2006, or so we’ve been told thus far.  This is an attempt to defuse the concern by implying that their latest software is far different at its core and that there won’t be very much that is useful to virus writers because they still don’t have their hands on the latest blueprints.  But the reality of the situation is far less peachy than they would like to paint it.  In the world of computer programming software and even entire operating systems will retain a fair chunk of old code from previous versions simply because, well, it’s already been written and if it “works” then there’s little need to rewrite it from scratch.  I’m not saying source code is never rewritten, revised or updated from time to time, but when it comes to large programs such as Norton Antivirus that’s made up of tens of thousands of lines of code it could easily be argued that there is likely a good percentage of old code that has been retained for years without ever being modified.  It would be like having a castle or fortress that is under continuous construction and maintenance.  You can’t afford to tear the whole thing down every year and rebuild it from scratch, so instead what you do is build around and upon the existing structure and make repairs to the parts that need repairing the most.  This means that likely most of the fundamental structure is retained and knowledge of the construction of such a structure could be used by an enemy to find a previously unnoticed vulnerability.

In the interest of full disclosure I will have to admit that Norton hasn’t been on my list of recommended software since the late 90s when it was practically the only anti-virus software available.  It’s early bird status was followed by years of successful marketing and advertising, which lead to its continuous wide spread recognition of the software/brand name, giving the impression to novice computer users that Norton really is the best thing out there.  ”How could it not be good when its so popular?” they might ask themselves.

I am here to tell you that the number one problem I fix for people in this line of work is virus removal and far too often I see systems that are running Norton that have become utterly trashed by multiple viruses while Norton gives inaccurate scan results, claiming the system is clean and virus free.  This is particularly irksome to me because when you consider the wide spread saturation of their software along with the monetary cost to the users for the renewal every year you would have to expect the company to use their position and resources to everyones benefit.  Despite its wide spread usage and price tag it fails to survey new viruses and develop new definitions for capturing and stopping them in an effective manner and so many users never seem to get their moneys worth.  I am willing to give the benefit of the doubt and accept the fact that there is no such thing as a “perfect” antivirus software, but you should expect to be given better treatment and results if you’re paying upwards of $70 a year for protection, especially when there are free alternatives out there that have been statistically shown to do a comparatively better job.  And to think these kinds of problems existed before some of their source code leaked.  Now that some source code has leaked and the potential for new viruses to be developed to exploit Norton itself are likely right around the corner I feel obligated to suggest that people avoid using it all together.  No amount of marketing or PR can change the consensus of most IT professionals who can see past all the BS and to me this incident is more than just one more nail in the coffin.

So what do I recommend instead of Norton?  I mentioned that there is “no such thing as a perfect antivirus” but there are alternatives that hold a higher reputation than Norton that cost a fraction of what Norton costs or even nothing at all.  In past blog entries I’ve mentioned Microsoft Security Essentials, Malwarebytes and Combofix and still recommend them, so here’s a little information about them.

Microsoft Security Essentials is a free antivirus solution that Microsoft itself actually produces and it’s quite popular in the IT community right now for a couple of reasons.  I already mentioned that its free but it is also effective and not as resource intensive as other software.  There’s also a new stand-alone bootable version of it that’s going through public beta testing right now which is handy to have for particularly difficult viruses.  You can read more about it here.  Be aware that there has, in the past, been a rogue malware impostor simply called “Security Essentials 2010/2011/2012″ which people have confused with the real deal, falling victim to a trap.  You can download the real deal from here.

Along side MSE I also recommend users purchase the full copy of Malwarebytes for the one time payment of $25.  Some of the handy features it has is an active connection monitor which will automatically block your computer from attempting to connect to known malicious web servers.  It also features an active process monitor like a traditional antivirus and will help prevent a good number of rogue malware type software from infecting your system.  There is a free version of this available but its active monitoring features are disabled. I’ve been using it in the field for over 2 years now and it has worked incredibly well for helping clean systems that had already become infected.  You can read more about it here and download/purchase it from here.

Finally a tool I use quite often to help clean systems that have already become infected is a program called Combofix, which is free.  This isn’t so much a traditional antivirus that runs in the background as it is a stand-alone utility for scanning a system after it has become infected.  It is regularly updated so it’s best to not bother downloading and using it until you actually have to.  You can read more about it here and download it from here.

In conclusion I strongly advise my clients to not use Norton Antivirus because it’s one of the most over-hyped, over-priced products out there right now and with the news of parts of its source code being leaked it only stands to become an even less effective product that will do less to protect you than other cheaper alternatives out there.

Speaking of alternatives, there is always the option of picking an alternative operating system such as Linux.

Linux is a free open-source OS that comes in many flavors.  We are already seeing Android being adopted by smartphone and tablet users like crazy and it is just one example of a Linux based OS that is taking the world by storm.  But for desktop and laptop users there remains a need for a full fledged desktop OS and there are many out there to choose from.  My personal favorite is Ubuntu Linux which you can check out at ubuntu.com.  It’s not for everyone but I can easily say that it is a very ideal choice for the average user.  Keep an eye out for future posts; I intend to record a new introductory video for Ubuntu 12.04 when it is released this coming April.

Just wanted to put a quick shout out to the person who recently sent me a request for an estimate on the cost to replace the LCD panel on their Acer Aspire D255 netbook. I am sorry but the email address that you left for me to respond to must have been mistyped. This is partially my fault for not having a more robust “Ask Dave A Question” box that asks the user to confirm their address by having them type it twice. I’ll be working on upgrading this box soon to add this feature. In the mean time, in the off chance you happen to see this post, the cost to replace your screen would be $30 labor plus the cost of the part, which in your case is $65, for a total of $95. There are slightly different models of the D255 out there so I would have to see the laptop to confirm the part number before ordering. Please contact me again if you are interested.

And just so everybody else out there reading this knows, I now charge a flat rate of $30 labor per device to replace LCD panels on all netbooks and laptops!

Did you know that dust can act as a weak conductor of electricity?  This is something my dad taught me a long time ago while working under the hood of a car, taking care to clean the surface and leads of the battery off so that it was spotless.  He said that if dust were allowed to build up on top of the battery it would eventually discharge the thing and you wouldn’t be able to start your car.  Granted, it might have to sit for a few days for that kind of problem to occur but it does occur, and similar problems can happen with computers.  In fact I’ve encountered a few computers that had dust built up inside of them for a long time which did result in the CMOS battery discharging.  This caused a problem if the power went out because the role of the battery is to keep track of the time, date, and a lot of other hardware settings in the BIOS.  If these are forgotten, you’ll get a couple errors messages when you turn your computer on after the power has gone out and your computer will think it’s the year 1980-something.

In the last month I’ve fixed three different computers just by blowing dust out of them.  These systems would turn on, reach the POST screen (which typically is the logo of the manufacturer or the BIOS) but would just hang there indefinitely.  Blowing the system out with a can of air (or in one case an air compressor) was all it took to bring the systems back to life.  Dust is just as much of a problem for laptops, but not so much for getting the motherboard dirty (because they’re fairly well sealed off from the outside air) but for clogging the heatsink fins so that the cooling fan can’t push air past the fins to keep your CPU cool.  The side effects of this are a noisy laptop that runs hot, or even powers itself off abruptly as a failsafe.

All CPUs these days have internal temperature sensors with a threshold for a certain amount of heat.  If that threshold is exceeded the processor will either throttle itself down in speed to the point where the system runs far slower than usual or the BIOS takes over and just shuts the system off completely.  So if you have a hot, noisy laptop that shuts off every now and then, you probably need to go buy a can of air.

You’ll find cans of air in the electronics section of just about any major retail store.  You need to be careful with these things because they contain a liquid that itself can conduct electricity and short your electronics out.  To prevent the can from shooting this stuff out it’s important to always hold it level and upright, not sideways or upside down.  This liquid also has an extremely low boiling point, which causes it to feel very cold when it’s not under pressure.  You can feel this by touching the can after using it for a little bit, and even hear the liquid boiling away inside to replenish the can with more compressed gas.  Something fun kids like to do with this stuff is spray it at glass while holding it upside down to produce a cold frost on any surface.  So you need to be careful not to do this to your own skin by accident or you might get a little frost bite.

These things can go pretty quick so I like to shoot the air in short bursts to try and save air while maintaining higher pressure.  Be sure to use that little straw that comes with these things to get a more focused shot of air into the areas that need it most.  I would also recommend you do this outdoors as the dust particles could make you sick if you inhale them.  Be sure to shoot everything, especially the inside of the power supply (that grey box your power cord plugs into) from all sides.

On laptops the only thing you can really dust out is the heatsink and your keyboard.  Some laptops have exhaust vents that only come out the back of the laptop, while others come out the side.  What I like to do is position the laptop in such a way so that I can shoot air directly into this exhaust vent against the normal flow of air produced by the fan while the laptop is running.  Having the laptop on while you do this is a good thing because the fan will help blow dust you’ve loosened back out and also help break it apart into smaller particulates that can fit through the fins.  Also shoot air into the intake of the fan.  Go back and forth between the exhaust and intake a few times until you can’t produce any more dust with your air.  Just beware that if you have never done this before you might have so much dust built up on the backside of the heatsink that loosening it up might cause a large chunk to get wedged in the fan, preventing it from spinning.  This isn’t much of a problem if you can remove the bottom panel from the laptop to access the intake of the fan but not all laptops let you do this and you might have to dismantle the entire machine to reach the fan and pull the fat dust bunny out with some tweezers.

I like to keep a can of air in the glove compartment of my car so I’ll always have something on hand to clean a system out when I make house calls.  But you should keep a can nearby and clean your system every 3 to 6 months to help improve air flow in your system so it can stay cool as well as reduce the possibility of something important being shorted out.

From the looks of things, I’ve been writing a lot more music than I ever have before in my life and to help keep it all organized for you I’ve created a new page to host it from.  You’ll find a link to “dave’s music” on my websites main menu, and you can go directly there now by visiting http://www.davestechsupport.com/music

From here you’ll have access to my SoundCloud uploads which are finished projects, learn about my other works in progress and read a little about the making of some of my songs.  It’s not much to look at right now but I’m going to try and make things look a little more fancy in the coming months.

I’ve recorded a new screencast introducing Ubuntu 10.10. This video gives beginner Ubuntu users a brief tour of the operating system, and covers installing updates, proprietary drivers, customizing appearance, and installing software via the Ubuntu Software Center as well as with downloaded *.deb files, all in less than 10 minutes.  Enjoy!

All good things come to an end…  Fortunately, Virtual Dave isn’t one of them.  I’ve recently made the decision to drop my own remote assistance software in favor of using a new open-source VNC launcher called Gitso.  This launcher has a few benefits over the previous iterations of my older “Virtual Dave” software:

• Lightweight:  It’s written in Python and loads very fast.
• Simple:  Sometimes losing a couple “bells and whistles” is a good thing.
• Multiple platforms:  Gitso works on Windows, Ubuntu Linux and Mac OS X.
• Active Development Pipeline:  A feature request I submitted was approved for the next version less than a half hour after I submitted it.
• Open-Source:  Free as in freedom.

There are a lot of features in the coming versions of this software I have been looking for in a VNC tool for a long time.  And who knows, I might learn a thing or two about programming in Python with this little tool.

In the previous post I mentioned Nine Inch Nails organizing a fund raiser to help Eric De La Cruz get a heart transplant.  They’re doing this by asking for large donations and in exchange they give you and a guest VIP access to any concert you want to attend.  I’m here writing this to let everyone know that my sister and I are now officially VIP attendees of the upcoming KC concert on Wednesday the 27th, and it’s an experience I’ll be telling people about for years.

Now most of you out there (or at least anyone who isn’t really into NIN) are probably saying, “Why would anyone spend that much money just to get backstage and gum it up with people they may never see or speak to again?”  Well… let me put it this way.  Imagine you could meet any single person in the whole world who you’ve wanted to meet for over a decade but couldn’t. Just think of your favorite actor/actress, or author, celebrity, musician, mad scientist perhaps… I don’t care who, just think of someone who you’ve always wanted to say, “Thank you.” to in person because that’s just how much of an influence they’ve had on you and you want them to know.  Then one day, you’re offered that one chance.  That’s kinda what this is like.  An opportunity to do something you’ll never forget for the rest of your life.

Besides, all the money is going towards a worthy cause.  I’ll get to honestly say that I met my favorite musician of all time (one of just a small handful of life long goals/dreams I have) and contribute towards saving a human life in the process.  And I’ll be proud about it for the rest of my life.  I imagine myself decades from now thinking back on the life I lived and appreciate such an experience more so than, say, the experience I’d probably get from spending that kind of money towards something completely material, like an expensive HDTV.  I couldn’t imagine myself retired years from now telling my grandkids about the day I bought a new HDTV and expect them to marvel at my totally boring story.

For me, the things that matter in life aren’t things (stuff) at all.  The things that matter in life are experiences, events, people, emotions, passion, romance,  ideas, adventures, thrills, challenges and also remembering that one of these days you’re gonna die.  Because if you do like most young people and tell yourself it’s too far away to bother thinking about it right now, you might start to procrastinate and regret not doing the things that would otherwise hold their value to you forever.

So, here’s to being ALIVE and happy to finally get to do something I’ve always wanted to do but never believed would ever occur.

Oh, one last thing.  THANKS DAD!  You’ve always been there if I needed a favor or help with about anything and that means the world to me.