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Consider It Fixed: Top Tech Picks

Microsoft Security Essentials: Reasonable Security for Free

I'm awfully sick of bulky security products.  You know, those do-anything-anti-everything products from Symantec, McAfee and the others.  Over the last 6 months, my client call volume increased dramatically with complaints of slowing computers.  My customers were not be assaulted by spyware and adware.  They were under assault from their trusted security vendors raising pigs - bloated anti-everything products.  If you have a 3 year old PC with a 2 GHz processor and 1GB of RAM, you may find the machine nearly useless overnight due to the latest antivirus update.

So, I began a quest to find a great security product based on new criteria – it must be small and use limited system resources.  As well, it must install in under 5 minutes.  Anything that takes longer is such a dead giveaway that it’s bloatware.  I started looking at the options and spent time with a number of products including Kaspersky, Viper from SunBelt Software, and ClamWin, an open source antivirus program.  I started installing Kaspersky on a number of client PCs with good results.  

However, there was a downside to this choice.  Most PC users now have access to ‘free’ antivirus software from their internet service providers.  Comcast and AT&T, my 2 providers, offer McAfee to their users at no additional cost.  It’s quite a tempting offer until it renders your PC somewhat useless.

Now enters Microsoft to offer Microsoft Security Essentials.  I have been testing the product on 4 of my PCs, and I must admit, Microsoft has done a decent job on this product.  So far in my testing, I have not seen any problems.  In fact, it’s proving to be a great product.  I'm especially pleased with its performance on my netbook.  Most netbooks are optimized for long battery life – the opposite of performance.  Most antivirus suites kill any remaining performance in a netbook.  But Microsoft Security Essentials' small profile is perfect for these low performance computers.

Here is what I like about Security Essentials:

• It’s readily available at no cost
• It installed very quickly
• It’s small and doesn’t have much overhead
• It installs on Windows XP, Vista, and Windows 7
• It can catch most common virus and malware problems

If you are interested in trying it, you can download it here: http://www.microsoft.com/Security_Essentials.  Just remember to remove your old bloated antivirus software in the add/remove programs section of the Control Panel before installing it.

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Contact Info: info@consideritfixed.com
                   860-985-7300

How to Run Bioshock on Windows 7

I admit it.  I like to play games on my computer.  My latest gaming obsession is Bioshock. For me, it's a great game and I'm having a blast working through it. 

I recently purchased it for $19.99 from Steam, downloaded it, and got extremely frustrated because I couldn't get it to work with Windows 7.  Every time I started the game, I got a small splash screen saying BIOSHOCK followed by an error message stating, "bioshock.exe has stopped working..."

As tech people do, I went hunting for a solution on Google.  I updated video drivers and Direct X, uninstalled and reinstalled C++ runtimes, uninstalled and reinstalled the game, and tried running it in a variety of Windows compatibility modes.  I still could not get it to work. 

So, I kept digging and I finally found a fix that has been working just fine.  Here is what I did:

1. First, make sure that you meet the minimum hardware requirements and that you are running the latest drivers for your video card.  You know, this is the basic stuff that you need to do for any game issue.
2. Next, go to Control Panel, Hardware and Sound, Manage Audio Devices, and select the Recording tab.
3. Next, right click the empty space below the installed devices and check Show Disabled Devices. 
4. The Stereo Mix should appear.  Right click on the icon and enable it.  Then, click on OK to close the window and then close the Control Panel.
5. Next, locate the bioshock.exe file. Mine is located here: "C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\bioshock\Builds\Release\Bioshock.exe".  Right click on it and select Properties.  Select the Compatibility tab and and check "Run this program in compatibility mode for Windows Vista". 
6. To start the game, double click on the bioshock.exe file.

This is what I did and everything about Bioshock is running great.

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Contact Info: info@consideritfixed.com
                   860-985-7300

Netbooks: A Good Look At The ASUS Eee PC 1008HA

I have been sitting on the fence looking at netbooks.  My quest – a lappy that is powerful enough, that has enough storage, that has a high quality screen with a decent keyboard, and that has the ability to run Windows 7 well.  I’ve been diligently monitoring new product announcements and became aware of the pending release of the ASUS 1008HA.  I was attracted to its integrated design; thin and light; that it uses the newer ATOM N280; that it has a LED screen; and that it has reasonable storage.  I didn’t like that it was reported as having a problem running Windows 7 and that is was extremely difficult to upgrade its RAM and hard drive.  Yes, you can upgrade its RAM from 1GB to 2GB, and the hard drive can also be replaced.  But it requires a complete dissassembly of the machine to upgrade.  I continued to monitor Eee PC user groups and learned that a recent BIOS upgrade fixed the Windows 7 issue.  Then I learned that an ASUS reseller, AGearNotebooks.com, can upgrade the 1008HA to 2GB of RAM and upgrade the hard drive to a number of available options including 500 GB products and SSDs.  So, I purchased the 1008HA from AGearNotebooks.com configured with 2 GB of RAM and a 7200 RPM 320 GB hard drive.  Very cool indeed!

When I received my netbook, I immediately upgraded the BIOS to version 0602.  I then wiped the hard drive and install Windows 7 RC1 (version 7100).  The machine started right up, connected to my wireless network, and proceeded to automatically update several device drivers.  I was impressed – everything worked great on the 1008HA except the trackpad.  It worked but lacked its more advanced functions including scrolling and zoom.  I tried downloading the available XP driver from the ASUS support site, but it didn’t add the missing functionality.  I hunted around and discovered a posting saying the the touchpad driver for the T91 would give me what I was looking for.  So, I installed it, and viola, I now had the advanced functionality that I wanted.  Next, I installed Kaspersky’s beta Windows 7 virus protection, my apps and utilities, and have been using it for a week. 

My initial impressions:

Size – Excellent

Small, light and good looking.  Initially, it had a toy-like quality about it.  How could a serious computer be so tiny.  Now, I’m used to it and love it.

Screen – Very Good

Bright, crisp, and very readable. Not quite as good in outdoor light, but what display is.

Performance – Excellent

The 1008HA has very impressive performance, in fact, better than I expected.  I am running Windows 7, Kaspersky Anti-Virus, Microsoft Office, both IE and Firefox, Feed Demon, EverNote, Dropbox, and Windows Live Writer.  Windows 7 loads quickly and I can easily run multiple applications without noticeable degradation.  As I write this, I am running IE, Firefox, Outllook, and Live Writer. It’s humming along beautifully.

Keyboard and Touchpad – Good

Like all new laptops, it takes a few days of use to adjust to a new keyboard and touchpad.  It took a bit longer than usual for me to get used to the 1008HA.  Perhaps it’s the small size that’s at the heart of this.  Overall, it’s fine.  But I do find the keyboard a bit noisy – some of the keys make a sort of rattling sound.  I initially had a problem hitting the ‘a’ key and often hit the ‘s’ instead.  That problem has stopped.  Like the keyboard, it has taken me longer to adjust to the touchpad.  The touchpad buttons are a one piece rocker.  It doesn’t take much effort to depress it, but it is somewhat narrow, perhaps 3/8”.  So, I need to be right on top of it to press it.  The scroll location is in the typical location (right side vertical) and works OK, but due to its overall small size, it’s a smaller target.  The touchpad also supports zooming with gestures similar to the zoom gestures on the iPhone.  It works OK, but I find that the mouse pointer sometimes move off the screen and it looses its focus.

Ports – Very good

The 1008HA has 2 USB ports; a VGA port much like those found on the new Macbook Pros that requires a special adapter which ASUS cleverly stores on the underside of the netbook; 1/8” audio in and audio out ports; an Ethernet port; and a SD card slot.  The ports are all covered with small doors that give the machine a sleek, sculpted look.  Time will tell how durable they are.  ESATA would have been really sweet.

DVD drive – What do you expect?

There is no DVD drive.  But if you install SlySoft’s free Virtual CloneDrive, your netbook can have a virtual blu ray drive.  I installed Microsoft Office via an .iso file.  You can play blu ray movies the same way.  That’s cool.

Video Camera – Very Good

I installed Skype and had it up and running in no time.  The camera works as it should.

Battery – Very Good

I haven’t had time to do any accurate measurement of battery life.  I have been using the machine on battery, but without much effort at conservation.  I’m getting around 4 hours of battery life in a performance setting which is quite adequate for the way that I work.  So, I have no complaints about battery life.   

AC Power Adapter – Poor

The AC power adapter is small and white to match the white body of my 1008HA.  I just can’t understand why ASUS, who seems to be paying attention to Apple’s design sense, didn’t do anything to make the charger easier to store and transport.  The adapter has long enough cables, but it’s narrow design gives the user no easy way to store the cables.  It seems that a bit of thought in this area would yield a much more useful power adapter that would take up so much less space.  A very small netbook with a bulky, unwieldy power adapter makes little sense.

In summary, after a bit of fooling around and adjusting, I am finding the ASUS 1008HA to be a great netbook.  Its performance is better than expected running Windows 7.  It is small, light and good looking.  The screen is very readable, and the keyboard and touchpad are fine once you spend a bit of time with them.  Upgrading the netbook is a challenge unless you enlist the help from a firm like AGearNotebooks.com.  Then it’s a non-issue.  If I could change one thing, I’d redesign the AC power adapter to match the coolness and integration of the 1008HA – smaller with built-in cable storage a la Apple.  I would recommend this product to anyone looking for a good netbook today.  Tomorrow may be a different story as new products in this category come to market.

Contact Info: info@consideritfixed.com
                   860-985-7300

Microsoft Windows 7: Vista 2.0

Before you read on, you need to understand that I spent the best years of my career life working for Microsoft.  I started evangelizing Windows to corporate America in 1989.  I lived, breathed and knew everything about Microsoft Windows.  I recently began evaluating Microsoft Windows 7 in a most unorthodox way.  I'm evaluating it on a MacBook Pro.  Oh, shame on me!

Here is what I did.  I started a virtual machine (VM) running Windows XP on my Macbook Pro.  I opened Internet Explorer, connected to the Windows 7 download page and downloaded the WIndows 7 image file (ISO) to my desktop.  Next, I opened up Parallels Desktop for Mac version 4 (build 4.0.3810) and setup a new VM using the Parallels profile called 'Windows 7 (experimental)'.  I simply pointed the VM wizard at the ISO file, allocated 2GB of RAM and 32GB of hard drive space, and that was it.  Installation completed without a problem, I restarted the VM, installed Parallel Tools, restarted the VM, and Windows 7.0 came to life in a Window on my Mac desktop.

First impressions are very important.  People adopt or abandon products based on this.  My first impression of Windows 7 was that it looked an awful lot like Windows Vista.  The only immediately noticeable difference was in the look of the Windows Taskbar.  Windows 7 looked good, ran very responsively, and I immediately noticed that it didn't appear to suffer from the lag in performance that Windows Vista did under Parallels.  I do have Windows Vista installed on my Mac, but I rarely use it because I think that the performance is poor.  I use Windows XP under Parallels, because it runs much better and lets me run the same Windows applications as Windows Vista.  So, it's sort of a 'no brainer' to select Windows XP over Vista.  I played around with Windows 7 for a couple of hours, installed Kaspersky's virus protection, Microsoft Office, and Microsoft Money.  All went smoothly and I continued to like what I saw.  The performance combined with the user interface refinements looked good.  You could sort of say that Windows 7 is really Windows Vista 2.  Too bad that Microsoft seems to want to forget Windows Vista.

Next, I started to test some of the settings in Parallels to see how Windows 7 would integrate in the Mac environment.  Parallels offers a few different way to run VMs.  They are referred to as Coherence, Full Screen, Window, and Modality.  I typically use everything by Modality as I still haven't figured out what it's for.  Running Windows 7 under Coherence really caught my attention.  Coherence runs Windows applications in individual windows on the Mac desktop.  It's pretty cool.  But in previous builds of Parallels, there was a rather awkward Windows menu bar that hovered just above the Mac Dock bar.  It was odd and didn't look too good.  In the new build of Parallels, the Windows Taskbar is hidden by default.  So, you start with a very clean,  highly integrated look.  To access the Windows menu system, you can simply click on the Parallels icon or the icon for any of the Windows applications that are running.  I found this to be very cool and totally enjoyed the level of integration and performance that I was seeing.  I found myself marveling at the combined level of integration between the 2 operating systems.  It looks like the computing world will have something very nice to use from Microsoft by the end of this year.  Running it on a Mac makes it even better as you can choose the best of class applications from both worlds.

This image shows Windows 7 running in coherence mode under Parallels running Internet Explorer beside Apple Safari with a Windows Gadget sitting on the desktop.

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Contact Info: info@consideritfixed.com
                    860-985-7300