What You Need to Know about All Things PC
Volume 4 Number 24Click 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, November 29, 2001 - Vol. 4 No. 24 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Table of Contents ** 01. Letter from the Publisher ** 02. Plantronics S-10 Telephone Headset (by T.J. Lee) ** 03. No Electronic Christmas Cards, Please - Ruminations on the Written Word in Our Digital World (by Dan Butler) ** 04. Review of HP's Jornada 560 Series Handhelds (by Al Gordon) ** 05. Norton AntiVirus: Resolving Subscription Problems and Upgrading to Version 2002 (by Lee Hudspeth) ** 06. Continuing Review - eXPeriencing Windows XP: Part 2 (by Al Gordon) ** 07. Featured Product Review - SwissTech Tools (by Dan Butler) ** 08. Featured FAQs - Transferring PowerPoint Presentations to VHS or CD-ROM (by T.J. Lee) ** 09. Newsworthy - a potpourri of current events and interesting stuff ** 01. Letter from the Publisher Welcome to our Holiday Extravaganza issue. The spirit of the season has us lining up for that holiday cheer (or maybe this is the line for the 8:30 PM showing of Harry Potter, it's hard to tell). Anyway... Since the Holidays are soon upon us we thought we'd see what reviews we have on hand here in The Naked PC Labs in case any of you are looking for gift ideas for the computer person in your life. As Christmas is just around the corner (and we're not one to miss the opportunity for a blatant plug) we want to remind you about TheNakedPCStore.com Holiday Special. If you buy two Photon II (or the new Photon III) Micro-Lights and an Accessory Kit, we give you an Easy Hang Up anti-telemarketing device free. That's a $19.95 value as our gift to you. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?publet1 Jim's been tossed out of his comfy digs and forced to get a real job; he reports from the field on his latest adventure with telephone headsets. Anyone who works at a keyboard should consider this must-have option for dealing with the telephone while typing. Dan chimes in with some seasonal thoughts on the written word as opposed to those generated via computer, and offers holiday gift ideas with a review of the handy SwissTech key ring tools. More from Dan on PGP and encryption security in future issues. Al provides a review of HP's Jornada 560 hot new series of handhelds. He also continues his series about Windows XP and whether you can, or should, upgrade. Maybe XP can go under the tree after all, depending on your hardware. Lee steps up on the soapbox with a cautionary tale about Norton AntiVirus subscription service woes and how he's been trying hard to solve them. Speaking of Al, no sooner had he razzed Roxio for providing the Window XP's CD burning engine but not issuing XP updates to its own CD products, than Roxio posted the updates on its Web site. For details, click here: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?publet2 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). We even make it easy to refer people to The Naked PC... check out our Refer page: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/refer/ +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ You Can Laugh At Money Worries -- If You Follow This Simple Plan Do you sometimes have more month than money? Ever wonder how to dig out of the hole of debt? Maybe someone you know is struggling. In today's uncertain times with tens of thousands being laid off, this is one step you can take now to make your future more certain. This proven multimedia course will show you everything you need. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/a/tr.cgi?financial +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ ** 02. Plantronics S-10 Telephone Headset (by T.J. Lee) I've talked about telephone headsets and down and dirty solutions for the small office home office worker in past issues of The Naked PC. I really like having my hands free when dealing with the phone so I can type any notes necessary or just get other work done while talking. As many of you know I've worked out of my house for the past 10 years or so and I've tried a number of different solutions. The first decision is if you can be tethered or if you need the additional freedom of a cordless solution. Before moving to Central California my office was such that a tethered headset was all I needed. I used an inexpensive $60 Plantronics SP-05 for years. I added a 12-foot telephone handset extension cord and I could not only get to every corner of my office but I could make it to the kitchen and even reach the coffee maker. When I moved, the layout of my new house demanded a cordless solution and rather than spend $300-400 for a full-blown state of the art cordless headset from Hello Direct, I went low tech and bought a cordless telephone with a belt hook and headset jack at the local Radio Shack for about $80 total (as discussed in TNPC #2.23). I do have two complaints about this solution. First, I seem to go through a couple of the cheapie $20 generic headsets each year. Second, the volume controls would not let me turn up the incoming volume enough to hear the person I was talking to comfortably without my own voice screaming in my ear. Granted this was a problem only with some of the people I talked to on the phone, usually those also using a headset of some kind, but it was quite annoying. Once again I'm working outside of the house and after my first day on the job I asked my new boss what practical joker picked out the phone system? The handset was designed to torture the person that tried to cradle it between shoulder and ear. I was directed to the speaker button and that was that. Well, I don't like putting people on speakerphone any more than most callers like being on one, so once again I was thinking headsets. A tethered solution would work just fine so I dug my old Plantronics SP-05 out of the back of equipment closet and hauled it down to my new office. But no matter what configuration I tried I could not get it to work with the office's digital phone system. The SP-05 is long out of date according to the helpful folks at Plantronics, and only works on about 40% of the phone systems on the market today. But the S-10 model (retail $99) is the current replacement for the SP-05 workhorse. I tried out the S-10 and I think it's a winner. It has the same straightforward hookup as the SP-05 and there's a ten-setting configuration slide switch on the side that lets you click through the settings to find the one that works best with your phone. That's a lot better than the SP-05's four settings that forced you flip two switches through various combinations of on/off. But the killer feature for me was the dual volume controls. You have one control for the earpiece (the S-10 comes with a single-ear headset) and another for the microphone. There is no annoying feedback where you hear your own voice in the earpiece, and I like this a lot. The headset comes in the traditional over-the-head configuration but it can be switched to a hook-on-the-ear set up. I didn't think much of that looking at the pictures but decided I'd give it a try. It's surprisingly lightweight and while it takes a bit of practice to slip it on your ear I think I'm getting hooked on the unobtrusiveness of the small earpiece. And my hair, such as it is, remains unmussed. The unit's sound is great and again it would be easy to add an extension to the headset cord if I want more "freedom." http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?jim1 You can reach T.J. Lee at: mailto:tj_lee@TheNakedPC.com ** 03. No Electronic Christmas Cards, Please - Ruminations on the Written Word in Our Digital World (by Dan Butler) Recently I was discussing the differences in digital documents and handwritten documents with another gentleman online (hi Bob!). Here is what I discussed with him. With Holiday cards in the making, you too may find these thoughts timely. On my desk are many scraps of paper. Some are written in red, some blue, some black, some pencil. Some are printed documents that I've scribbled a note on. A few are documents someone else has handwritten to me and I have jotted a note on. With all those varied documents I can still distinguish one from the other and find exactly the one I'm after. With computer printed documents they are all the same. My old dog-eared address book has lined out items and penciled in updates. I see the old addresses for people and it brings back memories of when I visited them at the old address and other things. It's a time line of my life. Think of the love letters some save and revisit year after year. There is a look, a smell, a touch that is unique to each one. They take the owner back in the same way a high school yearbook does. What would this experience be like if each of those documents were printed from a computer? Even a typewritten letter was signed with a certain pen, on a certain stationary, chosen by the sender. A special stamp they liked. All that is lost today. What is the value of a personally written, carefully worded note today? What will it be in 10 years? 20 years? These are things I ponder and these thoughts I endeavor to pass on to my children. So as you compose notes this season make the extra effort to create something cherished enough to be revisited by the receiver of your gift. You can reach Dan Butler at: mailto:danbutler@TheNakedPC.com +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ Christmas! Beat The Crowds! The BRIGHTEST flashlights for their size in the WORLD make great Christmas presents! Great for giving to friends, family, employees... give the gift of light that fits in any purse or pocket, a Micro-Light is small enough to clip to your key chain. With a Micro-Light you will never be caught in the dark! Shine a Red, a White, and a Blue light! Joggers love Micro-Lights when running at dusk or at night. HOLIDAY SPECIAL: Get an EASY HANG UP for FREE when you buy two or more Micro-Lights and an Accessory Kit! A $19.95 value... yours at no additional cost! The Easy Hang Up makes a GREAT stocking stuffer. SHIPPING IS FREE IN THE USA! http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/a/tr.cgi?pocketflashlight +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ ** 04. Review of HP's Jornada 560 Series Handhelds (by Al Gordon) Yes, Virginia (as we say in the holiday season), there is such as thing as "new and improved." Case in point: HP's new Jornada 560 series handhelds and the Microsoft Pocket PC 2002 operating system. The $600 Jornada 565 (or 564) has 32 MB of RAM. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?al1 The $650 568 (also sold as the 567) has 64 MB. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?al2 (In HP's marking practices, the 564-65 and 547-48 numbering simply reflects the kind of retail outlet selling it.) For pictures and more links, please see my supplemental page: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?al3 What I particularly like about the 560 is the way HP sweated the details--small as well as large--in making improvements on the previous 540 series. The 560 steps up the Intel StrongARM 206 MHz processor, adds 16-bit color at PPC 320x240 resolution, and the OS is now flash upgradeable. And, of course, it uses PPC 2002, which adds numerous interface enhancements ranging from fun--you can change its look with downloadable "themes"--to increased value for mobile professionals--more Internet and networking capabilities. This is all great stuff that means the 560 series runs faster, has more legible screens, and greater potential for future expansion than the 540. However, some of these features were previously seen on the Compaq iPAQ and are part of Microsoft's Pocket PC 2002 specification. What sets the new Jornada apart from the pack is a series of key advancements that make it a leader in user friendless. Weight, for example: The 560 checks in at about 7 ounces, about the same as a "naked" iPAQ and down about 25% from both the 540 series and the iPAQ with a Compact Flash (CF) memory card sleeve. (The Jornada has a built-in CF card slot; the iPAQ needs an add-on jacket.) HP accomplished this by using a sleek silver color plastic for its casing, adding a nice esthetic touch as well as shaving ounces. Battery power is from a rechargeable Lithium-Polymer pack that is removable and replaceable, cell-phone style. HP claims 14-hours of battery life, but let's face it, with a back-lit color screen that's highly optimistic. The 560 also uses a watch-type disk battery for backup power to guard against data loss when the main power cell runs down. That was a major flaw in most earlier handhelds. As another safeguard, HP sets aside some flash memory for backups of crucial files. Another of the nice little touches is the new stylus. The 540s had a flat stylus (it looked like a Popsicle stick with a point) that fit into the unit's flip-up cover--and, therefore, was useless if you took off the cover. The new stylus adopts an industry standard "stick" design and fits into the handheld's body. And, happily, the Targus Stowaway folding keyboard from the 540 works with the 560. A nicely designed navigational "joystick" button resides below the screen, surrounded by the standard handheld hot keys. Moreover, HP endeared itself to me by being the first Pocket PC to pass my "Annoying Voice Recorder Button Test." Voice recording is built into Pocket PCs and to emulate dictating machine design, the practice has been to put the record button at the top of the unit. So positioned, a user is guaranteed to turn on the recorder when inserting the handheld into its sync cradle or into a carrying case. HP finally figured out that if the button is recessed a little bit, accidental activation can be virtually eliminated. Not lost in the changes, however, is HP's long-standing advantage over other Pocket PC handhelds: you actually can find them in the stores. In fact, there is a $50 rebate available, and I found some retailers ready to make deals. As always with reviews of handhelds, my caveat remains: if you just want a portable address book and calendar, buy an inexpensive Palm OS unit. Pocket PCs make sense only if you are looking for a handheld with significant mobile communications and document capabilities. If you do, then the new Jornada is a worthy choice that would look great under the tree. You can reach Al Gordon at: mailto:al@TheNakedPC.com +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ Christmas Stocking Stuffer Alert! "The Book That Should Have Come with Your Computer" may not have come with your--or a friend's--computer, but you can do something about it. This book-on-a-CD-ROM fits nicely into Christmas stockings, and brings the warm glow of knowledge and power to any PC user. "This book should come with every PC - it has become MY BIBLE." 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. As Chris Pirillo at Lockergnome said, "It's amazing how much stuff you'll find on the care and feeding of your system in this book." If you use computers you need this book! Check it out! http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/a/tr.cgi?tugpc2 +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ ** 05. Norton AntiVirus: Resolving Subscription Problems and Upgrading to Version 2002 (by Lee Hudspeth) About a month ago my Norton AntiVirus 2001 subscription service mysteriously and unexpectedly expired, while showing 275 days left. I'll spare you the tedious history of all the tricks I tried, including the time-honored swinging a rubber chicken around my head while hopping up and down on one foot. I read all the relevant knowledge base articles, followed all the procedures (some of which didn't precisely match my particulars, but you know that drill)... sigh. With an expired subscription, I was not able to get daily virus definition updates. When I tried calling the 800 number for Symantec's subscription services group, all I got was a busy signal (twice on two different days and at different times). I knew from long experience that a "scorched earth" approach was the only way to solve my problem. For those of you who find yourselves in similar circumstances, I hope my working notes help you get your own anti-virus services working again. (These notes are also a good roadmap to upgrading your anti-virus software.) 1. Bought a copy of the latest Norton Antivirus 2002 ("NAV 2002") at a local software superstore. 2. Kept the NAV 2002 box, to which is affixed the UPC sticker. This sticker--the original, not a photocopy--is REQUIRED in order to get the mail-in $20 rebate. The sticker also includes the product serial number that I later discover I needed registering online. (Keeping the box's UPC sticker is a good tip for *any* software product you buy.) 3. Backed up the affected system. 4. Verified that the PC's emergency disk worked. 5. Completely uninstalled the previous version (NAV 2001 version 7). When the uninstaller finished, it reported that some elements could not be removed, so I clicked the Details button on that dialog box. I screen captured information about the five open elements, paste the screen shots into a WordPad document, and printed it as a checklist. A reboot eliminated all of the open elements. However, the folder C:\Program Files\Norton AntiVirus\Quarantine still existed, containing two zero-byte files. I manually deleted these files and the two folders, and continued. 6. Installed NAV 2002. (Soapbox on) This may sound like a statement of the obvious, but I find that being in a hurry when installing software is the SINGLE most dangerous thing you can do. Typically, I'll miss some subtle requirement that renders the install completely useless, and I have to uninstall and start all over again. So, even though I have performed thousands and thousands of installs in my career, I always take the time to scan the User's Guide "Install" chapter for notes and caveats, and I always carefully read the text on each dialog box the installer presents to me. In this case, there was a big "gotcha" waiting at the end. The dialog box that announced in large bold type "Norton AntiVirus 2002 has been successfully installed" also included--in teensy weensy type--the text, "WARNING: If the Norton AntiVirus CD is in your CD-ROM drive, remove it before restarting your computer." Folks, most packages don't ask you to remove the CD. People are creatures of habit and if I hadn't been careful, I would have left the CD in the drive. NAV's designers should either modify the installer to not require the customer to do something non-standard, or they should put the warning text in a separate dialog in the same large, bold font as the text that announces a successful install. (Soapbox off) 7. On reboot, NAV 2002's Information Wizard was not able to send my registration data over the Internet. It didn't report why, just that it couldn't. I had two options: try using NAV's Help, Product Registration feature or go to the Web site. When I skipped the Wizard's registration process--due to its failure--I then accepted the defaults on all the post-install tasks and configuration settings. (Note: later the Help, Product Registration feature failed to register me, so I had to go online and fill out some forms, which worked. Go figure.) Then the LiveUpdate tool ran, and it got stuck on the same process that was causing problems with NAV 2001: Confirming Subscription Status. After an interminable six minutes, the program figured out that I was "okay" and let me do a live update. Next the Rescue Disk tool ran and created a six-floppy rescue set (although this PC has an Iomega Zip 250 drive attached, I skipped the Zip Rescue option). I tested the rescue set's boot floppy; after all, why bother to create a rescue set if you don't test it! After a successful test of the boot floppy and a reboot, NAV 2002 began a system-wide scan. Oddly enough, it got stuck scanning one particular--known to be uninfected--file so I had to abort the Wizard-induced full system scan and manually restart it. This time the scan finished. 8. I followed the steps in my previously published article that describe the optimal settings for any anti-virus package. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?lee1 9. I performed a test using the publicly available EICAR test file; NAV 2002 passed. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?lee2 Total time on this entire operation: three and a half hours, and counting. Folks, I'm not happy about the problems I've recently encountered with Norton AntiVirus: premature subscription expiration; INEXCUSABLE busy signal on the subscription services phone number; and the tool's inability to register me with its own built-in registration features. I'm going to be in contact with Symantec about these problems and I'll keep you posted. Meantime, I'm reviewing competing anti-virus products, and will share those reviews with you in future issues too. Have you had subscription problems with Norton AntiVirus? Have you had upgrade, uninstall, or reinstall problems with Norton AntiVirus? Are you, like me, about ready to jump ship? If so, I'd like to hear from you. You can reach Lee Hudspeth at: mailto:LeeHudspeth@TheNakedPC.com ** 06. Continuing Review - eXPeriencing Windows XP: Part 2 (by Al Gordon) To XP or not to XP, that is the question. The pricing and product activation issues described in my previous article will be a deal breaker for a lot of users (as the email following that article made clear to me). http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?al4 If you get past that, then XP does offer Windows 9x and Millennium users a vastly more stable OS, while Windows 2000 users get much better application compatibility. But it is not absolutely certain that you can upgrade to XP. The OS is highly demanding of hardware resources and older PCs just won't run it. Generally, the clear rules of thumb are: -- If your PC is less than a year old, upgrading to XP is no big deal. Just make sure that you have at least 256 MB of RAM. -- If your PC is more than three years old or does not have at least a Pentium III 500, forget it. You won't be happy. That, of course, leaves a wide range of iffy-ness. To look at some of the possibilities, The Naked PC Secret Testing Labs investigated the upgrade capabilities of its three-year-old Dell Dimension PIII/500 desktop. Dell Technical Support does not recommend upgrading it to XP. In addition, the people at Dell were kind enough to loan me an Inspiron 8000 laptop. Special kudos go to Dell here because other companies declined to participate in upgrading tests, lest it be perceived that they were encouraging customers to upgrade old PCs rather than buy new ones. The Inspiron 8000 was chosen because it was being retired from the review fleet (it has been superseded by the 8100) and had not been designed with XP in mind. Accordingly, it was of the right vintage to test XP upgrading. Kingston Technology provided the needed memory upgrade modules. I took the desktop to 512 MB and the notebook to 384 MB. Never having done a notebook memory upgrade before, I was leery about the potential difficulties. No problem. You simply take the battery and other slide-in modules out of the notebook, open up one panel and snap in the new module. It turned out to be easier than opening up a desktop and maneuvering to the memory slots on the motherboard. The upshot of it all: the Inspiron, which has a 1 GHz PIII mobile processor, had no trouble with XP. The only major problem was some video flicker, which was easily resolved by a new video driver for XP from Dell's support Web site. All things considered, it looks as if the "no problem" window extends out to two-year-old units. With XP in place, the Inspiron gained formidable multimedia capabilities such as improved support for its combo DVD/CD-R/CD-RW drive and substantially improved multitasking. The desktop was more problematic. There are times when XP clearly is taxing the hardware. Doubling the memory helped some, for example, when switching from one running application to another. But you can see a time lag in launching a new app when others already are running. And high-graphic displays, such as XP's more elaborate thumbnails for photos and art, can be painfully slow. A processor and/or video card upgrade might improve things. But eventually you come to a point where you are spending more on hardware upgrades than makes sense. You can reach Al Gordon at: mailto:al@TheNakedPC.com ** 07. Featured Product Review - SwissTech Tools (by Dan Butler) They're tiny, and they're very versatile. Screwdriver(s), Pliers, Wire Cutters/Strippers, Knives--SwissTech has them all and they fit securely on your key ring. Even if you don't work around computers all day you just never know when you might need a tool. SwissTech tools let you carry a little toolbox in your pocket or purse. Just in the first few weeks of carrying these handy tools they have earned a permanent spot on The Naked PC key rings. You can see some pictures of these tools in action here: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?dan1 How has The Naked PC staff used these tools? I'm so glad you asked! Lee and his youngest son were playing fort with a large cardboard box. Thinking a window might be nice he started searching for a knife (Lee, not his son!). That's when he remembered his brand new UtiliKey on his key ring. About a minute later his son's fort was sporting a neatly cut window. Jim was helping the Make-A-Wish foundation surprise a five-year old with a new computer. There were about six people there setting up a miniature computer desk to hold the system. But there was a small nail sticking out of the desk. Screwdrivers were in plentiful supply but definitely the wrong tool for the job. No one had pliers or a suitable tool with which to pull it out. The pliers on Jim's MicroPlus did the job nicely. While camping with my family, the rope holding the latch to our cabin decided to snap. We were effectively locked out of the cabin. At midnight. After examining the situation I used my handy pocket tool to remove the latch and just a few minutes later we were inside the door. In each of these cases the SwissTech tools solved an immediate need. The point is, you never know when a screwdriver, knife, or pliers will be just what you need. Think of them as problem solvers. In the past you might have thought, "I wish I had that tool..." Now you will. When we saw the quality of these tools we immediately added them to TheNakedPCStore.com. The SwissTech tools we now carry are: the MicroTechnician ($10.99), the UtiliKey ($10.99), and the MicroPlus ($14.99). The MicroTechnician and MicroPlus are small pliers that fold up and lock to your key ring. How small? 1 7/8" x 1" x 1/4" when folded shut. When the tool is folded shut it will not open and stays firmly hooked to your key ring. The legs of the pliers have Phillips and flat screwdrivers. Behind the pliers you'll find a wire cutter and metal shear (although that's a bit of poetic license on SwissTech's part in our opinion--don't plan on slicing much in the way of sheet metal). The MicroPlus has two more screwdrivers than the MicroTechnician- -a second smaller set of Phillips and flat micro screwdrivers. The jaws on the MicroPlus pliers have more "teeth" to them for gripping on to objects as well. Both tools are very sturdy and built for years of use. The UtiliKey is a handy tool that looks like a key. It clips to your key ring until you need it. When you open this "key" it automatically releases from your key ring and you'll find a flat and serrated knife blade, Phillips and flat screw drivers (small), an eyeglass screwdriver (even smaller), and a bottle opener. Be aware that the knife is *very* sharp. Be careful when using the other tools on the key. For example, the serrated edge of the UtiliKey would cut through your car seat belt should you be stuck. It's on your key ring and you'll easily find it right when you need it most. A side bonus is that these tools are so cool to play with. Folding and unfolding either of the Micro tools will have everyone saying "Let me see that...". But be careful, they'll want to keep it! All of these tools are warranted by SwissTech against defects in materials and workmanship for the life of the user. If you own one of our Photon Micro-Lights II you'll be pleased to know that both the UtiliKey and the MicroPlus screwdrivers are small enough that they can be used to open the light's case when changing the batteries. (The Photon III doesn't need a screwdriver for battery changing.) So, which will you choose? If you need a small screwdriver for glasses or changing batteries in your Micro-Light II then you'll want the MicroPlus or the UtiliKey. If having a handy set of pliers is important then either the MicroPlus or MicroTechnician will suit your needs. Frankly I would buy both the 8-in-1 MicroPlus and the UtiliKey. The MicroPlus is only $5 more yet gives you so much more flexibility. The UtiliKey gives you the knife and hides on your key ring until you need it. Together they give you plenty of options and make great stocking stuffers. Order your tools here: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?dan2 You can reach Dan Butler at: mailto:danbutler@TheNakedPC.com ** 08. Featured FAQs - Transferring PowerPoint Presentations to VHS or CD-ROM (by T.J. Lee) TNPCer Marcus G. wrote in wondering where he could find information on transferring PowerPoint presentations to VHS video tape or CD-ROMs; the purpose being to produce auto-running presentations that can be easily distributed. For transferring PowerPoint to VHS video, check out the "Recording Your PowerPoint Presentation to VHS" page on Sonia Coleman's Digital Studio site. This tutorial is complete with detailed hardware information and wiring diagrams. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?ffaq To make an autoplay CD-ROM for PowerPoint Presentations there are a number of third party programs like GST PowerLaunch 2 by GS Technologies (priced at around $60). The GST Wizard walks you through the process of getting your presentation files onto a CD and it creates the autorun.inf for you. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?ffaq3 There's also the do-it-yourself tutorial called (as you might guess) the "Autorun CD (do it yourself)" page. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?ffaq2 ** 09. Newsworthy - a potpourri of current events and interesting stuff *-* Scientists at Intel, IBM, and elsewhere predict that before the end of this decade we'll be using Terahertz transistors that could switch on and off one trillion times per second. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?news1 *-* Tired of the aggravating sound of cell phones ringing when you're at a restaurant, church, hospital, museum, library, or other "quiet place?" Enter MuteTone, a new product from a Hong Kong company. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?news2 *-* More weird science... scientists at Lucent Technologies have created a single-molecule nanotransistor that, at one-billionth of a meter, is ten times smaller than any previously manufactured transistor. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/424/tr.cgi?news3 Get more Newsworthy bits on The Naked PC Web site: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/newsworthy/ Have you come across something newsworthy? 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