mr.geek.nz - changelog

I seem to be spending a lot of my time removing Spyware/Malware/Virus infections from XP machines, today was no different. As a part of the process I always bring the machine up to date with all the latest security fixes from Microsoft.

Only today I got a nice message about not being a genuine copy of windows.

Having already looked the machine over I knew it had a sticker on the side, then a thought occured to me and I had another look at the sticker, ¨XP Home¨ and the machine had ¨XP Pro¨ installed.

A little while back we bought a shiny new replacement for our aging AS/400. The new bit of kit features a POWER6 processor and the ability to run Linux inside of OS/400 as a virtual partition.

IBM have worked with both Novell and Redhat on this, and they are the “approved” Linux Distributions. We run a number of Linux servers all using Debian, so for us that doesn’t suit.

I had a quick google and not much came up about running Debian on this kit, but what I did find seemed to indicate it was possible, and I’m pleased to report that a standard PPC Debian install disk will get you up and running quickly and easily.

It’s been a long time since I had much to do with Symantec products, they used to be really good but for a long time I have found them to be full of bugs, resource hogs, and bloatware. The reason for this little rant today is because I’ve been at at a new clients for the last 3 days converting them across to our business system and as a part of that I removed their Symantec Corporate Anti Virus solution and installed our Trend Corporate Anti Virus solution.

I’ve never had a problem stopping IE7 being installed or removing it once it had been installed because all of the XP machines I have done it on have “upgraded” to IE7 from IE6.

In this case removing IE7 is really easy, Control Panel -> Add Remove Programs -> Uninstall IE7, and your left with IE6

With a new machine that comes preinstalled with IE7, IE7 is not listed, instead it is in the windows components section, removing it here still leaves it installed. (Do a windows update and you still get Ie7)

I moved a while back and I haven’t had a phone line to get broadband, but I have have had access, until recently.

About 2 blocks from my place is a Telecom Wifi Hotspot using an inbuilt antenna on my notebook I could just manage to get the signal, but it wasn’t good enough to actually use, and anyway it costs $9 an hour!!!

Unless you have an Xtra broadband or mobile broadband account, in which case it’s free until December 31 2007.

So I arranged to get an account I could use legally, and grabbed a nice big antenna from the spare parts room at work.

As part of my job I get to maintain our clients computers, which means one day I might be working with the latest and greatest equipment, and then next I’m elbow deep in an old clunker that is full of dust, dead insects, and large vicious dust bunnies.

Some of these old computers are running, of all things, MS-DOS. We actually have clients who still run DOS, it’s all they need, it’s reliable, and it just goes, and goes, and goes.

This is the last of my Caldera/SCO products. This time it’s the Linux Technology Preview, which is a boxed set of an upcoming release, in this case a release including the “new” 2.4 kernel.

As you can plainly see the box announces in the inclusion of the 2.4 kernel which of course Caldera/SCO stated they never released.

Not much to see on the back of the box, but I’ll throw it up just to be complete.

The contents are pretty boring, a simple printed install guide, and two cd’s.

I’ve heard that a new channel will launch on Freeview this Sunday, this is the first of TVNZ’s new digital channels.

Depending on your receiver brand/model is may see it automatically, or it may require a rescan.

I did a bit of quick checking and this is what I could find out about the new channel:

• advertising-free programming.
• between 50% and 70% local content.
• TVNZ Kidzone, 6am – 4pm.
• TVNZ Family, 4pm – 8.30pm.
• TVNZ Showcase, 8.30pm to closedown.

Lets hope it has good shows etc.

My Peltier Fridge has been running for a few days now, and last night I went to get a nice cold beer out of it, and covering about a third of the bottom of the inside of the unit are ice crystals.

The crystals are about 2 mm high at present and I am really hoping that it doesn’t get much worse. I really need to get my hands on a temperature gauge.

As some of you know I collect old computers (btw if you have anything, including big iron, drop me a line) and I am also interested in the environment. I just stumbled across a computer recycling centre in the USA that has been hit with a whole pile of violations for having “old” computers, it looks like the non profit behind it is going to be fined out of existence.