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The
mind, once expanded to the dimensions of larger ideas, never returns to
its original size.
~Oliver Wendell Holmes
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Kerrville
Texas
830-895-5016 |
Welcome to
another issue of our weekly newsletter!
Something
for everyone.
No
one can dispute that the human brain is the greatest computer of all
time! But sometimes it requires a little nudge to grow new
cells. I also happen to
believe that hardware computers are very useful tools
which can
help to provide that nudge. That's why this
newsletter is not just full of computer-related information, but also
includes entertainment and educational items to tickle the brain cells.
There's something of interest for everyone in here so feel free to
share this issue and pass it along to your
friends and family...
What's In Here?
Lots of cool,
fun, and
informative stuff every week!
I'm dubbing this
week's issue
the Independence Day Edition.
On July 4th, 1776, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the Continental Congress adopts the
Declaration of Independence, which proclaims the independence of the
United States of America from Great Britain and its king.
Our Ctrl-Alt-Backspace
section includes special click-links to transport you
to educational and informational websites
about Independence Day.
Click any of
these links to go
directly to your favorite section...
Missed an
issue?
Check
out
past issues here...
 Hear
Ye! Hear Ye!
Sometimes
we have
special sales, important notices about virus outbreaks or
other technical
bulletins. Call 830-895-5016 if you're
interested in any sale items we might list here. But please click here to read our disclaimer before
visiting or downloading software from any third-party websites.
Watch Out PayPal, There's a New Checkout Payment Processor on The Block
"Google on Thursday unveiled its much
anticipated online payment processing system designed to offer shoppers
with a Google account a quick way to pay for things." Click to read entire article...
http://tinyurl.com/m5h7m
 External Hard Disk Drives?
External hard disk drives that connect to a PC's USB ports have rapidly
become an excellent backup medium. Just make sure that you never use it
as your primary storage site otherwise you defeat the purpose of having
a backup appliance. Meanwhile, after having installed several of the
"off-the-shelf" big brands, I've discovered that I can build
external hard disk drives for much less than the cost of the big
brands. Plus, I can use the same hard drives in these units that
companies such as Maxtor and Western Digital use in theirs.
One of the major advantages my units have over the big guys is that
mine can be later upgraded with even larger hard drives. We start with
an 80 Gigabyte drive unit and can assemble one with up to 400 gigabytes
of backup space. In most cases, I can custom build a unit for you,
deliver, set up, and install the backup software for just about the
same price as you would pay for a similar sized "off-the-shelf" unit.
Plus you don't have to hassle with setting up the backup software. Call my office at 895-5016 if you're interested to have one custom built for you.
- Supports
IDE Hard drives up to 400GB !
- Ultra
Light Aluminum Case
- USB
2.0
interface via standard USB
2.0 A-Male to B-Male cable
(included in package)
- LED
indicates Power and Action status.
- ON/OFF
switch to shut down hard drive
when inactive without having to
disconnect.
- Includes
Stand for positioning enclosure
upright
- Supports
480Mbps high-speed data transfers
- Supports
Wakeup ability
- Hot-swappable
- Easy
access on PC or Notebook
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Kingston USB Flash Drives
& Automatic Backups
DataTraveler
USB Flash drives are ideal for home office, small business, schools and
promotions. They're affordable and put mobile storage in nearly
anyone's hands. Call us at 895-5016 and let us show you how to get the
most out of these units as a convenient backup media.
Click here to learn more...
http://www.kingston.com/flash/wmv_files/using_dt.wmv
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Latest Virus
Threats
Trojan.Deoplive
Trojan.Deoplive is a Trojan Horse that captures screenshots and distributes them via the Winny and Share file sharing networks.
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/trojan.deoplive.html
Trojan.Emcodec.E
Trojan.Emcodec.E is a Trojan horse that drops and executes a copy of a
member of the Trojan.Zlob family. The Trojan masquerades as an
installer for ZipCodec 6.0.
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/trojan.emcodec.e.html
 Fun
& Educational Stuff
Each
week we stumble across interesting, educational and fun sites on the
internet.
We hope you enjoy this section of our
newsletter as much as we do! But please click here to read our disclaimer before
visiting or downloading software from any third-party websites.
Can You Destroy A Hard Drive in Five Seconds?
"You are on a U.S. military aircraft, transporting hard drives with
important, classified information, when you collide with another plane
and are forced to land near an enemy intelligence agency. There is no
time to delete the files, and the drives are in heavy-duty steel cases
so that they are difficult to destroy. You have a few minutes before
someone finds you, grabs the drives, and searches them for even the
smallest trace of useful data. What would you do?" Click to read entire article...
http://tinyurl.com/kltmd
What Will Happen When the Big One Hits?
Here's a Japanese animation that simulates the effect of a large meteor striking the Earth...
http://youtube.com/watch?v=3JHdYBet_4Q&search=Meteorite%20Collision
Montenegro
"Montenegro, the world’s newest
nation, declared its independence on June 3, 2006. It is about the size
of Connecticut, with a population of 650,000. The country got its name
(literally, “black mountain”) from the dark, mountain
forests that cover the land." Click to read entire article...
http://plasma.nationalgeographic.com/places/countries/country_montenegro.html
Free Wi-Fi Hotspot Locator
"The Wi-Fi-FreeSpot™ Directory
is a listing of Wi-Fi enabled locations that offer Free Wireless High
Speed Internet Access. USA State-by-State listings come first with
Europe and other regions of the World listed further down the page." Click to read entire article...
http://www.wififreespot.com/
Internet2 Gateway
"Internet2 is a university-led effort to develop advanced
network applications for research and education. Most Internet2
applications make use of Abilene, a high-performance computer
network that provides bandwidth, responsiveness, and reliability
that’s far superior to the normal Internet." Click to read entire article...
http://www.exploratorium.edu/i2/index.html
DeathStar Firepower
"Exactly how powerful is the Death Star? With a little bit of physics
and a little bit of math, we can determine just how much power
you would need in order to blow up a planet." Click to read entire article...
http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/Tech/Beam/DeathStar.html
Genealogists Discover Royal Roots on Every Family Tree
"Actress Brooke Shields has a pretty impressive pedigree -- hanging from
her family tree are Catherine de Medici and Lucrezia Borgia,
Charlemagne and El Cid, William the Conquerer and King Harold,
vanquished by William at the Battle of Hastings." Click to read entire article...
http://www.physorg.com/news70988476.html
Don't Forget to Check Ancestry.com
I didn't even have to login to check my mother's maiden name and
discover tons of relative names listed in the 1930 United States Census
in her home town...
http://tinyurl.com/r94yw
Which Operating System Are You?
"Take this quiz to find out which OS most matches your personality. You
need to answer all the questions to get an accurate result." Click to take the quiz...
http://bbspot.com/News/2003/01/os_quiz.php
What Are Eleutherodactylus
"There are 16 species of
Eleutherodactylus on the island of Puerto Rico. As the scientific name
implies, Eleutherodactylus frogs have individual (non-webbed) fingers
and toes. They do not pass through a tadpole stage and thus do not
require a water location to reproduce. Instead, after fertilization by
the male, eggs are laid by the female in humid areas. When the eggs
hatch, a fully-formed “froglet” (a tiny replica of the
adult frog) emerges." Click to see pictures...
http://www.elboricua.com/Wildlife.html
Why We Must Flee The Planet Earth
"Stephen Hawking is best known for
thinking about time, space, and those teratoid trash mashers known as
black holes. But in a recent talk in Hong Kong, the famous
physicist digressed from his usual subject matter to tell the audience
that they'd better get off the island, and he didn't mean
Kowloon. Instead, the Cambridge don was urging the crowd to get
off the whole, gosh-darn planet." Click to read entire article...
http://www.space.com/searchforlife/060629_seti_thursday.html
 Web
Hosting
Tips
Do
you
have a domain website hosting account with
us? If so, you'll want to check this section for handy tips
to
help make your website standout from the crowd. Sometimes
we'll
give tips about working with your Plesk Control Panel. But please click here to read our disclaimer before
visiting or downloading software from any third-party websites.
Need A Good Community Calendar Your Employees Can Access?
Then
just set up an extra common email account in your Plesk Control Panel,
assign it a password you'll share with your employees, and then use the
Horde Calendar feature. Check out and click the screenshot below for a
full view. You'll notice it has lots of features you can even
export and import to and from your Windows Outlook email.
(click image for larger view)
How To Use Your Horde WebMail in Plesk Control Panel
Check out this flash
tutorial that will show you how to use your Horde WebMail in Plesk Control Panel...
http://tinyurl.com/ld2zg
 Linspire
Linux Tips
Linspire
Linux is a great operating system designed to be the easiest of all
desktop linux distributions.
If
you haven't tried it for yourself yet, ask for a free demo CD the next
time we service your computer. But please click here to read our disclaimer before
visiting or downloading software from any third-party websites.
Looking for a good computer aided drafting (CAD) software for Linux?
Then try PythonCad from Linspire's CNR Warehouse. Click for more information...
http://linspire.com/lindows_products_details.php?package_name=pythoncad
(click image)
|
The modern, full-featured Linspire Five-0
operating system combines the stability, security and affordability of
Linux with a familiar, easy-to-use desktop environment. You'll get all
the features of other operating systems - but not the high costs and
viruses. Save money and protect your computer today with Linspire
Five-0!
$59.95
HINT:
Enjoy the best of both world's! Let us install a second hard drive in
your PC, install Linspire 5.0 so you can safely surf the internet
and receive email using Linspire Linux and still get to use your Windows XP for all
your regular Windows applications. |
Linspire Linux Tip of
The Week
Don't
forget to check the archive link at that page for previous tips...
http://www.linspire.com/tooltips.php
Latest
Linspire Letter....
http://www.linspire.com/linspire_letter.php
Michael's Latest Minute...
http://www.michaelrobertson.com/
 Microsoft
Windows
Tips
Microsoft Windows is
still the operating system that most people are familiar with.
Many businesses have based their requirements around
this
commercial operating system and so it remains the cornerstone of our
onsite support service. But please click here to read our disclaimer before
visiting or downloading software from any third-party websites.
Windows XP Backup Made Easy
" Most people think about backing up data about 10 minutes after it's too
late to do any good. If you realize that you really need a good backup
program after your hard disk crashes or your teenager decides
to clear out some of your files to make room for new music downloads,
you're setting yourself up for a data disaster. Are you prepared to
lose your e-mail address book (and all your messages)? What would you
do if your entire collection of digital photos disappeared tomorrow in
a puff of electrons? Do you have backup copies of your
electronically-filed tax return or your crucial correspondence?" Click to read entire article...
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/setup/learnmore/bott_03july14.mspx
Free Notable
Software Download...
Comodo Antivirus
" Developed by one of the
world’s leading IT security providers, Comodo AntiVirus 1.1 beta
leverages multiple technologies (including on demand & on access
scanning, email scanning, process monitoring and worm blocking) to
immediately start cleaning or quarantining suspicious files from your
hard drives, shared disks, emails, downloads and system memory." Click for more information...
http://www.antivirus.comodo.com/overview.html
(click
the image)
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 Logout
I
hope you've enjoyed this edition of our weekly newsletter. I try to
make each week's edition different and special by including meaningful
computer tips and links to fun, educational, and scientific websites.
If
you have any items of interest you might like to see addressed in the
future, or you have any Fun Stuff links of your own that you might like
to share, drop me an email and we'll see if we can include them for you.
Visit
the following website if you want
to subscribe or (gasp!) unsubscribe...
http://lists.bictx.com/mailman/listinfo/brightideas
Meanwhile,
don't forget to keep your computer's anti-virus current and your
critical and security patches up-to-date for the most reliable
computing experiences on the internet.
Happy Trails~
Tomas
Bright Ideas ComputingTM
Kerrville,
Texas
http://www.bictx.com
830-895-5016
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Please
make sure that you possess the fundamental and required skill sets
before you implement any advice or attempt to perform any
troubleshooting steps we, or other websites, might recommend. You
should also be advised that we have no control over how you perform any
troubleshooting steps nor do we have any control over the content of
other third-party websites you might visit that are listed in our
weekly newsletter. We also do not know if you have patched your
computer with the latest security updates nor do we know if your
anti-virus definition files are fully up-to-date.
Therefore,
in
no event shall Bright Ideas ComputingTM or any
of its third-party product
or service providers be liable to any person for any special,
incidental, indirect, consequential, or punitive damages of any kind,
including, without limitation, those resulting from loss of use, loss
of data, or lost profits, in connection with any advice provided by
Bright Ideas ComputingTM, damages resulting from
visiting or downloading software from third-party
websites or damages resulting from implementing any advice from those
third-party websites, whether or not you are advised of the possibility
of such damages.
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