What You Need to Know about All Things PC
Volume 4 Number 15Click here to return to the back issues page.Click here to return to the main newsletter page.
The Naked PC - http://www.TheNakedPC.com What You Need to Know about All Things PC Publisher: Lee Hudspeth and T.J. Lee Editor in Chief: Dan Butler Contributing Editor: Al Gordon This issue is for Thursday, July 26, 2001 - Vol. 4 No. 15 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Table of Contents ** 01. Letter from the Publisher ** 02. Further Snooping Around on the Internet (by Dan Butler) ** 03. iPAQ - A Handheld that Means Business (by Al Gordon) ** 04. System Warts - Installing Windows 2000 Dual-boot with Windows 98 SE (by T.J. Lee) ** 05. OmniPage Pro: Recognizing a Good Thing (by Al Gordon) ** 06. Banning Hand-held Cell Phone Technology Misses the Mark (by T.J. Lee) ** 07. The MP3 Empire Strikes Back (Against WMA) (by Al Gordon) ** 08. Featured Product - CTBIOS and Motherboards.org ** 09. Featured FAQ - "Connecting Windows NT to Windows 95 with a Null-Modem Cable" ** 10. Featured Web Site - Assistive Technology Catalog ** 11. Newsworthy - a potpourri of current events and interesting stuff ** 12. We Get Mail ** 01. Letter from the Publisher Before we begin, if you have a Web site please consider adding our spiffy new animated icon (courtesy of none other than Linda Caroll -- lindacaroll.com) to your site thereby proclaiming your support for The Naked PC. It really does help us. On this page you'll find our animated and static banners along with HTML code you just cut and paste to add the banners to your site. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?banners Speaking of which, many thanks to Werner Moecke for being the first person to add our new blushing The Naked PC icon to a Web site and becoming a proud member of the Naked Horde! Amok Shing would be pleased. See the Curriculum Vitae of Werner Moecke at: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?banner1 Dan has penned a new installment in his "Snooping" series and talks about email and postcards. Al Gordon continues his reviews of the top hand-held PDAs with the iPAQ from Compaq. He updates us on how MP3 is handling the threat posed by WMA, and he may have found the ultimate optical character recognition software. Jim takes a break from our latest book project (more on this in a future issue) to share some annoying system warts he's experienced lately and offers some tips on controlling Windows 2000's dual boot process. He also takes a look at the "cell- phones in car" brouhaha and points out banning hand-held cell phones in cars may not make anyone any safer. Lee checks in with this issue's three Featured items. Reader support is what keeps The Naked PC free. To this end you can help us by passing a copy on to co-workers and friends (no spam please). TNPCer David C. sent a copy to his brother Richard who is now a very happy The Naked PC reader. Thanks David! We even make it easy to refer people to The Naked PC... check out our Refer page: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/refer/ +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ "The Book That Should Have Come with Your Computer" "This book should come with every PC - it has become MY BIBLE." "I find information in this book that I can't find anywhere else." These are just a few of the comments we've received on this book. The hard copy version went OUT OF PRINT over a series title issue with the publisher, but WE BROUGHT IT BACK in this book-on-a-CD-ROM searchable PDF format! Written by the same guys who bring you this newsletter, T.J. Lee, Lee Hudspeth, and Dan Butler tell you what every computer user needs to know. If you use computers you need this book! Check it out! http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/a/tr.cgi?tugpc2 +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ ** 02. Further Snooping Around on the Internet (by Dan Butler) The first two installments of this series (TNPC #4.12 & #4.13) covered the information your Web browser identifies about you and how Internet advertising agencies use "cookies" to track your online activities. In this installment we'll discuss email messages. Many people worry about entering their credit card information on a Web site but don't think a thing about sending personal details in an email to another person. If you have a need to send email with sensitive or personal data I recommend you encrypt that email before you send it. Sending an email is the physical equivalent of sending a postcard. Your message goes from you to the recipient, but anyone handling the postcard can easily read the message you are sending. Just as you wouldn't think of sending sensitive personal information via a postcard, you should consider encrypting personal information before sending it via email. The current Sircam virus points out just how your email or other documents could end up in the wrong hands when you least expect it. As an aside I refuse to use Microsoft products for my email and once again have not worried to any great degree about problems from the ongoing viruses. More on that in a future article. How then, do you encrypt your email from prying eyes? I personally use and recommend PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) from Network Associates. Good luck finding understandable info on the product from their Web site! Best to just get the product from Amazon. There is also a free version for personal use only available from MIT. PGP Home page: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?dan1 MIT PGP Page (free for personal use only): http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?dan2 PGP from Amazon.com: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?dan3 Most of the links at the MIT site are old or broken. The program you download from that site, however, is current. After you install the program read through the "Intro to Cryptography" guide that should be installed as part of the program. You'll find it quite helpful. PGP uses Public Key Encryption. There isn't enough space in this article to fully describe Public Key Encryption. In a nutshell you generate two keys: one public, one private. You pass your public key to other people and they use it to generate encrypted email or other data to send to you. Your private key decrypts any data encrypted with your public key. Without your private key and its passphrase you won't be able to decrypt the message. Make sure you keep a good backup of your private key and remember the passphrase! If you own a copy of "The Book That Should Have Come With Your Computer" you'll find screenshots and more discussion of PGP messages in Chapter 13. PGP can encrypt more than just email messages. In fact you can encrypt any file on your system. Handy for keeping prying eyes out of your data files. Another handy option lets you make a self-decrypting file. Use this to send sensitive data to someone who doesn't have PGP installed. Simply give them the password over the phone. A quick note: one of the install options is the PGP VPN Tunnel. I recommend you do *not* install this unless you know what it is, what it does (and the implications thereof), and are sure you will use it. Stick to the plain PGP installation options. You can reach Dan Butler at: mailto:danbutler@TheNakedPC.com ** 03. iPAQ - A Handheld that Means Business (by Al Gordon) The hottest new thing in handhelds these days is Compaq's iPAQ Pocket PC. The device itself, as readers of TNPC #3.15 know, is not new; it was introduced in the spring of 2000. What is new is that: a) The range of peripherals that use the iPAQ's expansion sleeve technology has grown to the point where they meaningfully increase the unit's functionality, and, b) you can actually find one to buy. For all of last year and much of this, the iPAQ has been handheld computing's incarnation of the famous Yogi Berra-ism: "nobody goes there any more; it's too crowded." In the case of the iPAQ it was: nobody can buy them; they are selling too fast. I put the question to Cindy Box, Compaq's director of marketing for the iPAQ. "They did go into the retail channel as well as to corporate" customers, she said, "but they sold very quickly. They were never sitting on the shelves." "The demand was overwhelming," Box said, while production was "constrained by a shortage of key components." Compaq has been "moving aggressively to catch up with demand," she said, "although there is still a backlog." The shortage has not been entirely a problem for Compaq. The iPAQ has been positioned as a handheld equivalent of a sports car-- sleek looks, high-performance, and a hefty price tag to match. A color 3600 series iPAQ without any accessories runs $500 list-- and street. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?al1 Only recently has Compaq started to make deals. The 3635--a 32 MB RAM color unit bundled with a sleeve for CF expansion cards lists for $600, but now has a $50 rebate. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?al2 Compaq also offers a less expensive monochrome, 16 MB RAM 3100 series. Here the unquestioned best deal is the 3135 bundle with the CF sleeve, which at $299 (after $50 rebate) is cheaper than the 3100 alone. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?al3 The money buys you a sharp-looking silver toned unit that, without a sleeve, is comparable in size (and, thus, as portable) as standard-size Palm OS handhelds. As with all Pocket PCs, you are going to need a relatively large pocket. But it is easy to carry. The iPAQ comes with an 206-MHz Intel StrongARM 32-bit RISC Processor, the fastest in any handheld. And it has the biggest and brightest screen, which pleases my middle-aged eyes. It carries the usual Pocket Office suite--Pocket Outlook, Word, Excel, and Internet Explorer and Windows Media Player. The latter allows the handheld to double as an MP3 player--an expensive option on Palm OS Handspring Visors and Sony Clies. If you plan on using a handheld as a media player, Pocket PC are a lower-cost solution than the Palm platform. Pocket PCs use Microsoft's ActiveSync 3.1 software for connections to your desktop. Users who always complain that Microsoft products are too intrusive into their systems, will no doubt feel the same about ActiveSync. Personally, I liked the instant linkage with desktop Office and the ability to treat a Pocket PC as essentially another drive on my PC in Windows Explorer or My Computer. However, the expansion sleeves are the true "killer" feature. When I tested the iPAQ a year ago, before the expansion peripherals were rolled out, I thought it was really cool and full of promise. But at the end of the day, you really couldn't do anything on it that you couldn't do on, say, a Palm Vx. Now, the iPAQ is a handheld that literally means business. "The iPAQ Pocket PC Expansion Pack design gives our customers the flexibility to add the functionality they need to the iPAQ Pocket PC," Box said. "It also allows them to remove that functionality and add other functionality if they desire. We're focused on providing mobile professionals with the functionality they need to get the access to the information they want in their hand wherever they are." The CF expansion slot--and don't buy an iPAQ without at least the CF sleeve--allows users to attach a wide array of devices: CF memory storage, of course, but also modems, network cards, barcode scanners, links to cell phones. And many more are under development. Even more options open up with the PCMCIA expansion sleeve, as it allows notebook cards to be used with the handheld. This is not for the budget-conscious, though, as it is a $150 item clearly intended for business use. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?al4 Among the key peripherals here is the Sierra AirCard 300, which both the GoAmerica and OmniSky wireless services use to provide a wireless Internet link for the iPAQ. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?al5 More of this in a later article, but the wireless connectivity is a key productivity tool. The iPAQ allows you to manage email, tap into the Web, and do some basic document work while in the field- -without needing a notebook and with the ability to sync up with your desktop commuter or your corporate network. Box sees wireless being an even more central feature of future incarnations of the iPAQ. Expansion sleeve technology has been licensed to other companies. According to Box, the first third-party sleeves will be released later this year. The idea is to combine functions that otherwise would require more than one card into one unit. For example, a GPS expansion pack would allow for both the hardware to connect to the Global Position Satellite network to track your location and also provide the hefty additional memory needed to store the mapping software needed to make use of the positioning data. While Compaq does make a sleeve that holds two PC Cards, good luck finding one to buy anywhere. And if you do, the slender iPAQ turns into something of a brick. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?al6 Compaq released a v.1.77 ROM update for the iPAQ, which has fixed a few operational glitches. With the upgrade installed, my test unit ran well and with a high level of stability. Again, as noted here before, if all you intend to do with your handheld is carry an electronic address book and calendar, don't waste your money on this level of technology. But if you want to be able to attend to business from the palm of your hand, the iPAQ offers impressive capabilities. You can reach Al Gordon at: mailto:al@TheNakedPC.com +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ MICRO-LIGHTS the Super POCKETFLASHLIGHT! Micro-Lights are the BRIGHTEST flashlights for their size in the WORLD. Reliable, incredibly bright light for any situation. A Micro-Light is small enough to clip to your key chain, carry it in your pocket or purse and you won't even know it's there. But you'll never, ever be caught in the dark! Instant light in emergencies, or just when you have to find something under your desk or the sofa. The Red, Orange, or Yellow lights run for 120 hours on a single lithium battery! Carry a Micro-Light for a week and you'll never go anywhere without one again. SHIPPING IS FREE IN THE USA! http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/a/tr.cgi?pocketflashlight +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ ** 04. System Warts - Installing Windows 2000 Dual-boot with Windows 98 SE (by T.J. Lee) Don't you just hate computers some days? For some client testing I recently installed Windows 2000 Professional on systems here at the Naked PC Underground Labs (located deep in the heart of Central California) that were already running Windows 98SE. All I wanted to do was add Windows 2000 on a separate partition and be able to boot up either version of Windows. Windows 2000 is supposed to make this easy and it did allow me to do what it refers to as a "clean install" where it purports to peacefully co-exist with my previous operating system. Windows 2000 partitioned the necessary free space allowing me to assign a portion of my unused hard disk for its use and when done it booted up to a menu allowing me 30 seconds to choose an operating system for the current session. Windows 2000 was the menu default but I could highlight the "Microsoft Windows" second OS option and hit Enter (or just wait for the 30 second count-down to expire). If I made no choice and did not touch the keyboard Windows 2000 would boot when the 30- second countdown was complete. One of the first things I wanted to do was change this default menu setting and find a way to disable the countdown timer. You'll find the instructions on how to do this with a Windows 2000 dual boot system on this supplemental page: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?jim1 Okay, I managed to tweak the boot menu to my heart's content and now had two complete and separate operating systems. Ha! On my Windows 98SE partition I have Office 2000 installed. On my Windows 2000 partition I planned on installing Office XP but having had some experience with Microsoft installations I decided I'd test my Office 2000 applications under Windows 98SE before installing Office XP under Windows 2000. In theory the two operating system installs were separate and distinct with only enough of a Windows 2000 footprint on my Windows 98SE partition to allow for the dual-boot process. But unhappily that was not the case. As a consultant I load a number of add-ins when I fire up applications like Excel and Word. Most of these I've written myself and consist of tools that help me in my daily tasks. But when Excel or Word loaded any template or add-in I was suddenly getting the dreaded "Compile error in hidden module" error. This error is usually indicative of something in one of the VBA DLLs getting corrupted or overwritten. No doubt Windows 2000 decided to update some file or setting (or both) better left alone. In Excel I was getting not only the compile error but an error message I've never encountered before (and I go back with Excel to when it came with its own run-time version of Windows) about a workbook that contained a reference to the workbook and could not be closed. That one really had me scratching my head. I thought of waving the rubber chicken over the PC a few times but opted for the uninstall and reinstall shuffle to try to jog Office 2000 back into it's pre-Windows 2000-on-the-same-PC-state. Uninstall Office 2000. Reinstall Office 2000. No joy. I look up the content of the four folders where Word and Excel keep their extraneous start up files (two folders each). C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office\XLStart C:\WINDOWS\Application Data\Microsoft\Excel\Xlstart C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office\Startup C:\WINDOWS\Application Data\Microsoft\Word\STARTUP Now the files in these folders have not changed from before the Windows 2000 install and no new files magically appeared but some of the add-ins rely on Registry entries so I figured Windows 2000 may have played fast and loose with my Registry settings. I remove all the files in these folders and start adding them back one by one. Joy. I'm able to determine which files are triggering the error messages and I uninstall and reinstall them and get everything back to normal. Whew! You'd think all this stuff would work better than it does by now wouldn't you? You can reach T.J. Lee at: mailto:tj_lee@TheNakedPC.com ** 05. OmniPage Pro: Recognizing a Good Thing (by Al Gordon) Optical Character Recognition (OCR) usually is akin to the joke about the talking dog, "It's not that he does it so well, but that he does it at all." And then along comes OmniPage Pro 11.0 from ScanSoft. Last year, I looked at the Peabody MA-based OCR giant's mid-market Pagis Pro Millennium Scanning Suite last year (TNPC #3.11). I wanted to check out its professional OmniPage product lineup, added when ScanSoft acquired rival Caere, Inc. A company spokesman suggested I hold off until Version 11 hit the market--and now I see why. The bottom line in determining the value of an OCR program is very simple: by the time you get through fixing recognition errors, did the process take less time than re-typing yourself would have? And did it make fewer typographical errors? Very simply, the answer for OmniPage is "absolutely yes"-- bordering on "oh wow!" It is the most accurate recognition engine I have ever used. On good to moderate quality documents, it makes almost no text recognition errors. I rarely saw more than two on three per 250 words, and most of those were caught by its internal correction system. Note I said, TEXT recognition. OmniPage's "TruePage" technology, which attempts to make the layout of the electronic document match up with the hard copy, does a fine job. But think of the output as a good first draft. You are going to have to manipulate the electronic file to make things exactly right. Also, I found that some tables did fool the program, especially when borders were done in something other than solid rules. The killer addition to OmniPage 11 is its ability to scan Adobe Acrobat PDF files and turn them to editable Word, html, text, etc. files. It allows you to use--and hey, let's not be violating anyone's copyrights, out there--excerpts from reports that were published in PDF, convert to a format with a smaller file size, and generally make the material easier to work with. OmniPage, of course, also has all the expected bells and whistles: Office integration, the ability to clean up faxes, and so on. For whatever marketing reason, ScanSoft has a theoretical $500 list price for the full version of OmniPage 11, But you have no need to pay anything close to that. The upgrade version has an affordable street price of $130: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?alocr2 As ScanSoft spokeswoman Jane Van Saun points out, "anyone with ANY previous OCR software can upgrade ... And almost anyone with a scanner has some type of OCR bundled with it." Also, the upgrade is available to users of Microsoft Office XP, which uses the OmniPage OCR engine in its OCR utility. If somehow you still aren't eligible, PaperPort Deluxe 7.0 has been released and for $55 you get the state of the art in document management software plus the upgrade rights to OmniPage. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?alocr3 You can reach Al Gordon at: mailto:al@TheNakedPC.com ** 06. Banning Hand-held Cell Phone Technology Misses the Mark (by T.J. Lee) As a consultant I've had to troubleshoot a number of technology related problems. Some hardware specific such as bad motherboards, hard disk errors, RAM parity, cabling, etc., and problems more involved with procedures and information automation. The most important thing is to go for a true cure and not just fix some particular symptom. This leaves the underlying problem untouched. I read about the state of New York recently banning yakking on hand-held cellular phones while driving and it occurred to me that the politicians involved would do well to consider this fundamental axiom of consulting. I've been following this debate for a while now and there's indication of similar laws being bandied about in other states here in the USA as well as other parts of the world. On one side you have safety concerns and on the other the "personal freedom" point of view. Insurance companies, law enforcement agencies, government bureaus, and local municipalities contend that talking on a cell phone distracts the driver and therefore pose a threat to the public safety. Others think they do not and if government bans cell phones today there's no stopping what they'll ban in the future. Personally I don't use a cell phone in the car. I just don't want to be that "reachable" and I don't spend 10 hours a week or more commuting to the office anymore. I say this only to point out that I don't have a personal stake in the issue. But after reading two studies on this topic I'm intrigued with how science and politics seem to be reading from different texts where this safety issue is concerned. The New York law bans only hand-held cell phone models. The hands-free models are getting a free pass presumably because they allow you to keep two hands on the steering wheel and therefore must be safer. Now I think that anything that distracts the driver of an automobile is to some degree dangerous. That includes tuning the radio, eating a sandwich, and breaking up an altercation between two siblings in the back seat (a scenario with which I have some personal experience). Dialing a phone is a distraction but to what extent is talking on the phone and what's the difference between holding a phone in one hand and using a hands-free model? The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration here in the US has conducted studies that show talking on the phone causes you to have a longer reaction time in braking and that cell phone usage *does* increase the risk of a crash. If you look at the study carefully it's interesting to note that the highest risk to the automobile occurs when the driver talking on the phone is in "easy" driving conditions such as: straight road, good weather, and/or familiar surroundings. If you're driving late at night, in a storm, down a mountain road, you're safer talking on a cell phone than if you're heading to the local store on a clear, pleasant Saturday afternoon. To me this indicates that it is the conversation, not the physical cell phone in hand, that is the most potentially dangerous distraction to the driver. You're safer talking in dangerous driving conditions because your brain recognizes the danger you're facing and shifts more of you concentration to driving than following the phone conversation. You're in more risk chatting on your way to the local store because you feel safe and so focus more on the conversation instead of your driving. Which begs the point that a hands-free cellular phone that allows you to operate it without making you a one-handed driver is not appreciably safer than a handheld. I'm afraid that banning hand-held phones in cars while allowing hands-free models misses the underlying problem. It's not the juggling of the phone that puts drivers in the more significant danger; it's the amount of concentration that gets focused on the conversation instead of piloting the automobile. You can reach T.J. Lee at: mailto:tj_lee@TheNakedPC.com +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ PRIME for Office Utilities CD If you use Microsoft Office, and by that we mean Office 97, Office 2000, or Office XP, then you need to read this! From the Publishers of The Naked PC newsletter come the ultimate utility sets for Office. On one CD you get PRIME for Word, PRIME for Excel, and the amazingly useful PRIME DocLauncher for Office utilities. Hundreds of features! For one low price you get the utilities plus our ebook "How To Save Time with Office" that will show you how to use each utility to unlock the true potential of your Office applications. Order now and while you can still get our introductory discount price! http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/a/tr.cgi?pcgcd3 +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ ** 07. The MP3 Empire Strikes Back (Against WMA) (by Al Gordon) Microsoft's Windows Media format has been challenging long- dominant MP3 as the digital recording compression of choice lately because of Microsoft's Windows Media Audio's (WMA) superior sound quality at 64 kbps--so-called "FM radio quality." WMA at that rate is a good choice because it has half the file size as 128 kbps "CD quality" MP3 recordings, while giving a comparable sound in most digital audio players. The truth of the matter is that most portable headsets won't capture full CD fidelity and, even if they could, outside noise would obscure it anyway. The extra file size is just wasted, with WMA format you get to put twice as much music on your player. An important tip: don't WMA-encode with Microsoft's Windows Media Player; it has "digital rights" encoding that limits the files to use on the same PC that recorded them. Use a third-party WMA encoder instead that allows for unrestricted recording. With WMA's strong feature set, the MP3 developers, Thomson Electronics and Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits, have countered with "MP3Pro"--equal or better sound at 64 kbps and a still smaller file size. I do not have the most sensitive ears in the world, but it sounded good to me. Eventually, this standard will be available in a wide range of quality levels--it is expected to make "CD quality" MP3 much closer to real CD quality. But for now, 64 kbps is all you can do, as MP3Pro exists only in the form of Thomson's RCA "demonstration" player. Look for more developments by fall. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?almp31 You can reach Al Gordon at: mailto:al@TheNakedPC.com ** 08. Featured Product - CTBIOS and Motherboards.org Troubleshooting a problem with your computer or performing upgrades can require you to look up your motherboard manufacturer for updates or other information. But it can be tricky trying to find your motherboard manufacturer or model number by opening the chassis and just snooping around. The good news is that there are some helpful tools available for just such a case. Some motherboard identification tools ask you to enter a "BIOS ID" in order to determine your motherboard's manufacturer and other information. The quandary is, how do you figure out your BIOS ID? If you're fast, you can watch it scroll by on screen during your PC's boot-up cycle. A simpler way to get it is with the free tool CTBIOS. The application's text is in German, not English, but the ID is clearly labeled "ID-String" or "OEM ID" so the non-English language shouldn't be a problem. In some cases CTBIOS itself will tell you your motherboard's manufacturer and Web site. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?fprod Once you have the BIOS ID, you can use Motherboards.org's MOBOT-- a large online motherboard information database--to track down your board's manufacturer and model. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?fprod1 ** 09. Featured FAQ - "Connecting Windows NT to Windows 95 with a Null-Modem Cable" If you have a PC running Windows NT 3.5x or 4.0 but no network card, and you want to connect it to a Windows 95 PC, this FAQ tells you how. First, the bad news. Unlike Windows 95 and 98, Windows NT does not include the handy, built-in Direct Cable Connection feature. (If you want to learn more about that feature, just ask your Win9x help system "direct cable connection" then choose the appropriate topic.) You can connect the two PCs with Windows NT as the host and Windows 95 as the guest, or vice versa. The steps for setting up the connection either way are covered in the article. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?ffaq +++-----------------------------------------------------------+++ WANT TO GET YOUR WORD OUT? Classified ads in The Naked PC can be yours for ridiculously low prices. Get your message out to over 72,000 TNPC subscribers. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/tnpcadvertising.html?v4i15 +++-----------------------------------------------------------+++ ** 10. Featured Web Site - Assistive Technology Catalog Microsoft offers a Web page where you can search its "Assistive Technology Catalog" for information on Microsoft operating systems that help make computers accessible for people with disabilities. You can search by the following categories: any product, training, keyboard enhancement, on-screen keyboard, screen enlarger, screen review, or voice input. The catalog records include manufacturer contact information, product name(s), product description, and order instructions (phone, fax, email, and Web). Other links on this page include technical support, accessible documentation, keyboard assistance, research, and free resources, all related to accessibility. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?fsite The site also offers the free Microsoft Word document "Windows 2000 Professional Compatible Assistive Aids." The document covers screen review, screen magnifier, speech recognition, alternative input and control, and Braille utilities. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?fsite2 ** 11. Newsworthy - a potpourri of current events and interesting stuff *-* Snap! Crackle! Pop! Music companies are implementing technology in new CDs that prevents you, the consumer, from copying the CD disc to your computer. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?news1 *-* Be advised that the "Sircam" worm-virus is making the rounds. Here at The Naked PC's underground lab we've seen the incoming messages generated by the virus side of this nasty increase over the last two weeks so it appears to be picking up speed. Of course if you just delete every goofy message you get from anyone (especially people you know) that has an attachment you were not expecting, you shouldn't have to worry about getting infected. As we've recommended here before (and shall continue to do so), remember to always run an up-to-date anti-virus program with its email scanning feature turned ON. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?news2 *-* PC phone home! Phone home! New technology launched down under will let a stolen computer drop a dime to the local constabulary so the cops can drop by and recover the machine. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?news3 Get more Newsworthy bits on The Naked PC Web site: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/newsworthy/ Have you come across something newsworthy? Drop us a line: mailto:hottips@TheNakedPC.com ** 12. We Get Mail TNPCer Eugene P. points out that proxies like Naviscope and other ad-blockers and pop-up killers often have very large resources needs and take up what he feels is "an excessive amount of system resources." Renowned columnist and Access guru Helen Feddema dropped us a note here at The Naked PC pointing out how handy her Micro-Light was at illuminating the dark crannies inside her printer whilst ferreting out a particularly nasty paper jam. Having a light that actually fits inside the printer does help! (Micro-Lights are a sponsor of The Naked PC so this is a blatant plug and you should visit The Naked PC Store and check them out.) http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/415/tr.cgi?mail1 Be sure to stop by the Letters to the Editor page for more: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/letters/index.html **PLEASE SUPPORT THE NAKED PC BY VISITING OUR ADVERTISERS** +++----------------------- classifieds -----------------------+++ HALLOWEEN IS COMING! 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At Machesta International we have some amazing stuff so come by our site and check things out. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/a/tr.cgi?defense +++-----------------------------------------------------------+++ DISCLAIMER Personal computers are individual machines with performance that can vary with components, software, and operator ability. The Naked PC is not responsible for the manner in which the information presented is used or interpreted. Also, although we work hard to provide you with accurate Internet links in The Naked PC, we are not responsible for Internet links herein that represent sites owned and operated by third parties. We are not responsible for the content, accuracy, performance, or availability of any such third-party sites. Hey, anyone still reading out there? REDISTRIBUTION POLICY We encourage you to forward this newsletter to your friends, associates, and colleagues for their review and enjoyment. 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