Number 298 - March 2008

UPDATE
Beginners    In Connected or Discombobulated? the author describes what he considers to be the downside of connectivity. Whar ever happened to social interaction? What do you think about the points he makes? Communications    In How Safe Is Instant Messaging? the author provides some common-sense rules for using Instant Messaging or IM Operating Systems    In Moving on to Vista Parts - 1 - 4 we include, in this one newsletter issue, all four parts of the evaluation of Vista by Neil Stahfest of Tacoma Area PC User Group. Neil is a pretty savvy guy and I think you will find his articles interesting and his advice valuable.    In What's a Good Computer to Buy? the author Doug Fairchild of the Victoria user group gives us a fairly detailed discussion of what to look for in a new computer. It is always helpful to have articles like this to bring us up-to-date because the features and capabilities of computers and their ancillary components are constantly changing and improving. We think you will find this article useful.    In Do Your Drivers Need Updating? the author describes some specialized software that is designed to analyze your computer hardware drivers and advise you as to which need to be	updated. It mentions an online site www.driveragent.com and a few others that are worth visiting if you suspect your hardware is not working up to snuff. Hardware    In WEP Is Not Secure the author points out that the old WEP encryption code used by most Credit Card companies can be easily cracked by hackers. He recommends that they use the more secure WAP code but many balk at the expense. That means that customers' credit card numbers are at risk. Read it and decide what you need to do about it, if anything.    In Life on a Smart Drive the author suggests carrying all of your important files, including programs for creating and manipulating them, on a flash drive. Just plug into a local computer and modify them, then unplug and walk away taking your files with you. This may well become true with the new U3 flash devices coming available. Read the article and learn. General Interest    In the article Data destruction--it's harder than you think, we repeat information that old timers have seen before but perhaps newbies have not. The article is a couple of years old so a couple of the referenced sites may not come up, but the main points still hold true and there are other ways of handling the problem as you will see. See also the Editor's note about BCWIPE an old freebie utility which overwrites and essentially wipes out those files you wish to be rid of.
Number 298 - March 2008