Ho hum. Another day, another batch of updates.

Microsoft released its regularly scheduled monthly updates last night. Your computer may have restarted automatically last night or it will tonight.

If you are using Live Mesh, there is an update that reportedly improves a number of features. Mesh may prompt you to install it at some point soon - I'm not sure if it's completely automatic.

You might want to take a look at the available updates proactively. Go to the Microsoft Update page. In Windows XP, you'll arrive at a web site where you can click the Custom button; in Vista, you'll open up the built-in update program where you can click on View Available Updates.

In addition to any required updates, you'll likely see some "optional" updates. Some of those are interesting! I found the Live Mesh update listed there today. If you're on Windows XP, you might find Windows Search 4.0, a truly useful tool. Perhaps you never got around to Internet Explorer 7, which is significantly safer to use than IE6.

Be careful installing hardware updates that way. If your hardware is working, you may want to be conservative and not install an updated video driver or network card driver. I have mixed feelings about suggesting that because many of the new drivers can be a significant improvement, but installing hardware drivers through the Windows Update system does not always go smoothly and I don't want you to blame me.

The other optional updates are likely to be safe. See if there's anything you're missing!

Labels: IE, search, software, Vista, web_services, WinXP

posted by bruceb at 12/10/2008 10:51:00 AM | permalink

Vista's built-in utility for screen shots is just perfect for most people. If you haven't found it yet, click on the Start button, type in Snip, and click on Snipping Tool. It's got all the basic tools to capture an entire window or a region, add some simple annotations, and do something interesting with it - send it by email, save it as a JPG, or put it on the clipboard so you can paste it into another program. Here's my thoughts about the snipping tool, and here's an explanation and some tips from Microsoft.

My computer has decided it doesn't like the snipping tool. About half the time I get this message:

As always, there are lots of people online with the same problem and the usual mishmash of advice and abuse and digressions. For many people, the problem can be cured at least temporarily by running "Office Diagnostics" from the Options / Resources menu in an Office 2007 program. No one seems quite sure why that works. It worked for me sometimes but it never lasted and I couldn't find a permanent fix.

I tried an inexpensive screen clipping program, Window Clippings, which worked fine but left me unsatisfied. It was kind of uninspiring - each thing I looked into wasn't quite as elegant or simple as I was hoping, and all the dialogs said "Kenny Kerr's Window Clippings," which looked silly. I know, that's not a big deal, but I kept looking at "Kenny Kerr" and wishing it didn't say that. What can I tell you? I'm shallow.

So I revisited a name I hadn't looked at for years, SnagIt, screen capture software that was first used on adding machines, or possibly abacuses, I think. It's been around forever.

It's expensive, $49.95 (free 30 day trial), and just wonderful. While I wasn't looking, SnagIt turned into a beautiful, full-featured office application. There are a variety of ways to capture screen shots - all the ones you'd expect plus a few you might not think of, like capturing an entire web page including the part that is scrolled off screen. An editor opens up to work with the snips with many of the features of a full-fledged graphics program, so it's a single click to add shadows, pointers, annotations, or more. It's a very pretty design and I'm finding the controls to be thoughtfully laid out and intuitive.

I'm going to pay the money and send you all screen shots bristling with arrows and circles, just because I can.

Labels: software, Vista, WinXP

posted by bruceb at 11/26/2008 01:44:00 AM | permalink

That rumbling you feel is a seismic shift in the field of security software. This will affect every single one of you and cause major changes in the entire industry.

Microsoft announced today that it will deliver free antivirus and anti-spyware software for all Windows computers, beginning in the second half of 2009.

Windows Live OneCare will be phased out and it will no longer be sold after June 30, 2009.

From the press release:

"Code-named "Morro," this streamlined solution will be available in the second half of 2009 and will provide comprehensive protection from malware including viruses, spyware, rootkits and trojans. This new solution, to be offered at no charge to consumers, will be architected for a smaller footprint that will use fewer computing resources, making it ideal for low-bandwidth scenarios or less powerful PCs. As part of Microsoft's move to focus on this simplified offering, the company also announced today that it will discontinue retail sales of its Windows Live OneCare subscription service effective June 30, 2009."

Here's the Microsoft press release, and the post on the OneCare blog. There are a few more details in this interview with Microsoft's senior director of product management.

As far as I know, this is completely unexpected. No one seems to have had a clue it was coming. There have been rumors about an imminent new version of Windows Live OneCare; now there's no word whether it will ever be seen. When Microsoft officially released Small Business Server 2008 last week, one of its features was a new product, Windows Live OneCare for Server, and central management for up to 25 workstations running OneCare. To me, that was one of the compelling features of the new SBS, but it is now dead on arrival; it should not be installed and will not be supported after June 30, 2009.

I can easily imagine that Microsoft is frustrated. Windows is frequently blamed for the onslaught of viruses and malware but computer users around the world have resisted buying subscriptions to security software for a variety of reasons: they can't afford it; they don't understand that it's necessary; they don't keep it current or they never activate an expired trial subscription; or their computers are underpowered for the security suites that are currently available. It's a particular problem outside the United States, where the percentage of unprotected computers is much higher. The press release suggests that Microsoft particularly wants to provide protection for emerging markets and the new low-powered netbooks and OLBCs.

Microsoft claims that it will deliver new software (not a repackaged version of OneCare) which includes only the security protection, with the simplest, least intrusive, and smallest footprint possible. It will not be automatically included with every copy of Windows but it will be free and presumably so easy to obtain that it might as well be built-in.

I assumed that Microsoft had not done this up to now because it would be attacked as "anticompetitive" by the other security software companies. Apparently Microsoft thinks it can avoid those claims - or who knows, maybe it thinks it's the right thing to do and is willing to see how it plays out. Norton, McAfee and the rest will have to adapt - maybe by criticizing Microsoft's software, maybe by adding value to it with other features, maybe by exiting the field and finding something else to do.

ONECARE SUBSCRIBERS: Do not let your subscriptions lapse! OneCare will be fully supported and updated through June 30, 2009 and we will have much more information before then about our options. If your subscription expires on April 30 and you have to pay $49.99 for two months of updates, I'm going to insist that you renew without hesitation. I don't want anyone running a PC without current anti-malware protection - this is not an excuse to procrastinate!

COMPUTER BUYERS: If you buy a new computer, get it protected! If you have to pay $49.99 for OneCare and you don't get a full year out of it, so it goes. You'll get three months or six months or eight months, and that's just fine. Or get another product, I don't care. As long as your security, backup and update needs are covered, I don't care - but this is not an excuse to procrastinate.

[Update 11/20: It's likely that Microsoft will keep OneCare updated for the entire subscription term. See this post and watch for more information to follow.]

A few more points:

Microsoft Equipt was the ill-fated subscription package bundling OneCare with Microsoft Office 2007 Home and Student Edition, sold only through Circuit City. Microsoft never committed to it, Circuit City is defunct, and Equipt is being withdrawn from the market.

How could this major decision be made with so little notice that it kills a key feature of a major product launched last week? Is the SBS team angry, embarrassed, or resigned?

OneCare includes features that its users depend on - printer sharing, backups, system maintenance, attention to Windows and other Microsoft updates, control over the firewall, and control over startup programs. Everything that needs attention is reported by a single icon, and necessary actions are described in a consistent interface. If OneCare is discontinued, will something else be developed to provide those functions? Don't tell me that products from third parties will take over - I'll cry, really I will.

Will the new software run on servers? Small businesses really need easy software to protect servers and provide centralized security management. The choices now are difficult and expensive.

This is a remarkable change that will affect all of us. I hope it's for the better but boy, are there a lot of questions left to be answered. More to come!

Labels: computers, Microsoft, OneCare, SBS, security, software, Vista, WinXP

posted by bruceb at 11/19/2008 12:05:00 AM | permalink

Windows Live Mesh has just been updated, as of about noon on Thursday 10/30. If you are using it already, you will be notified to install the update; it will stop working until the update is installed on each computer running it. If you are not using it yet, it has been fully opened up to everyone - read about it, make sure you have your Windows Live ID set up, and you are free to sign up.

Windows Live Mesh is a place to store files online, a program that runs on your computer to keep folders in sync on multiple computers, and a way to get remote access to your computer from anywhere. Live Mesh now supports Macs, and limited testing has begun for Windows Mobile devices. (Click here for more information about the Windows Mobile client.) You will be able to take a picture with your cell phone and have the photo show up immediately on your PC and your Mac, or share files with anyone by sharing a Live Mesh folder so they can access it online or synced to their own computer.

The remote access is extremely well designed and will make it unnecessary for most people to pay for a subscription to LogMeIn or GoToMyPC. Connecting from one computer in your Mesh to another one is a single click - hover over the Mesh icon and click on "Connect." Files can be transferred between the local computer and the remote computer by dragging and dropping copying and pasting them.

[Addendum 10/31: Although files can be transferred between the local and remote computers by copying and pasting them, Live Mesh does not currently support dragging and dropping them. Live Mesh Remote Desktop also apparently does not implement any support for printing at all, so you can work on your remote computer but you can't print something directly on your local printer. Those will be compelling reasons for some of you to use LogMeIn Pro instead of Live Mesh for remote access!]

Other updated features:

• Tips for new users.
• Better support for large monitors in remote sessions.
• Permission levels for shared folders - creator, owner, contributor, reader.
• Drag and drop files between your PC and Live Desktop.
• Multiple file upload to Live Desktop.

Microsoft showed only a couple of applications built on the Mesh framework at the PDC this week. The BBC demonstrated a Meshified version of its iPlayer, an extremely popular service in England for watching TV shows online. The Mesh version will remember what you've watched and spread that information to all your devices. If you watch part of a show on your computer, the episode will start where you left off when you tune in on your cell phone or on another computer.

But that's just a taste of what's coming. Under the hood, Live Mesh has been moved to the Windows Azure framework that Microsoft announced at the PDC underlying all of their upcoming web services, and it's powerful stuff indeed. You are watching and taking part in a transition that will affect you just as deeply as the initial shift to the Internet. I'll write more about that in the next few days!

Labels: Apple, file_sharing, Internet, Microsoft, mobile, remote, software, Vista, web_services, WinXP

posted by bruceb at 10/30/2008 12:51:00 PM | permalink

If you don't have enough memory ("RAM") in your computer, it will run very, very slowly. Once you have a reasonable amount of memory, performance won't change very much if you add more. Memory has been so cheap for the last few years that most people don't need an upgrade but I still run into underpowered systems occasionally, usually when someone has complained to me about how slow their computer is.

You can check how much memory is installed by right-clicking on My Computer (WinXP) or Computer (Vista) and clicking on Properties. You'll see the amount displayed there. Typical business computer users should have a minimum of 512Mb RAM for Windows XP and 2Gb (or 2048Mb) for Vista. If you have less, then add more or replace your existing memory sticks with higher capacities and you'll get an instant, noticeable speed boost, typically for less than a hundred dollars.

Memory is easy to install - once you've done it a couple of times, it takes less than a minute. (It's a little unnerving the first time because it takes a harder push than you expect before the tabs click into place to hold the memory.) The difficulty has always been the process of buying the correct type of memory from the hundreds of choices. It would be nice if the industry had settled on generic memory chips that you could pick up at Costco but no luck - it's a blur of different shapes and sizes and speeds and acronyms. I long ago stopped helping people upgrade memory and started sending them to a hardware outlet - even Best Buy! - where there are shelves of inventory and the store can find the part that will work.

There is an online tool that looks genuinely helpful and might even tempt me into doing upgrades again. Crucial, a long-established memory manufacturer, has a memory scanner on its web site that will identify all the details about the memory currently installed on your system and show you the compatible upgrades from its inventory, right down to the available slots and the details of whether the memory sticks have to be purchased and installed in pairs. It's a lovely tool! You can buy directly from Crucial and in no time you'll feel all speedy again.

[Addendum 10/29 10am: My enthusiasm is tempered a bit by the experience of the very first person who tried this and reported back to me - the Crucial scanner confidently proclaimed that his computer has no memory at all and therefore is at its maximum and would he like to buy an upgrade? Sigh. Okay, maybe it works most of the time.]

Labels: computers, hardware, Vista, WinXP

posted by bruceb at 10/29/2008 12:32:00 AM | permalink

Microsoft rushed out a critical security update today that should be installed without delay on every Windows computer. It will have been installed overnight on Wednesday on many computers.

Please make sure this update is installed on your computer!

If you use Windows Live OneCare and it is green on Thursday, the patch was installed.

Otherwise, please check your computer! Go to Windows Update and check for updates. If any critical updates are listed, install them.

This is discussed in Microsoft Security Bulletin MS08-067 ("Vulnerability in Server Service Could Allow Remote Code Execution (958644)").

Apparently a vulnerability was privately reported to Microsoft, which realized it was "wormable" - capable of propagating across multiple computers very quickly. There was already evidence that it was being exploited in the real world, raising the spectre of a global attack like the SQL Slammer Worm that had a devastating impact in 2003.

The security problem, and the patch, apply to virtually every version of Windows. I'll be patching servers tonight. It may not be a direct threat to many of you but it's difficult to evaluate that, since details of the exploit are not being published for obvious reasons. As near as I can tell, it does not get through firewalls but once it's inside a network it can spread to any unpatched system with printer sharing turned on, which is virtually every computer.

Windows Live OneCare was updated to stop the exploit this morning, and I assume the other security vendors have issued updates as well. But don't count on security software - get the patch installed!

Labels: SBS, security, Vista, WinXP

posted by bruceb at 10/23/2008 09:45:00 PM | permalink

Microsoft released security updates on Tuesday night, following its normal monthly schedule. Your computer should have restarted during the night.

We're all overwhelmed by updates but we're stuck with them. The holes fixed today are the ones that the bad guys will be hammering on tomorrow. You should be installing the updates for Windows and other Microsoft products when they're released. Some of them will not be installed automatically - it's up to you to take care of the ones that require extra clicks!

Take a minute to check your settings!

(1) If you're running Windows Live OneCare, the icon should be green. If it's not, it may be waiting for you to install updates manually. Open OneCare and follow the instructions and keep the icon green!

If OneCare is green, you're covered for everything else I mention here. Go be productive.

(2) If you have a little gold shield (Windows XP) or update icon (Vista) by the clock, it's waiting for you to download and/or install updates.

• The Vista update icon is supposed to look like the figure at the left. I wondered about that! I couldn't have told you that by looking at the little blob down by the clock.

(3) Click on Control Panel / Automatic Updates (Windows XP) or Control Panel / System and Maintenance / Windows Update (Vista), and make sure your computer is set to automatically install new updates.

(4) Visit the Microsoft Update web site (Windows XP) or Control Panel / System and Maintenance / Windows Update (Vista), and make sure your computer automatically installs updates for Windows and other Microsoft products. The updates for Microsoft Office are just as important as the ones for Windows.

Updates for other programs can also be important but keeping up with the security fixes for Windows is a fundamental requirement of using a computer today. Be safe out there!

Labels: Microsoft, Office, security, Vista, WinXP

posted by bruceb at 10/16/2008 12:05:00 AM | permalink

I've set up more new computers in the last few months than in the year before that. A lot of you are retiring your trusty Windows XP computers and sitting down to Vista for the first time.

Welcome to Vista! It's a great operating system.

You'll be able to get started right away. These are the new features that I point out to my clients - things that set Vista ahead of Windows XP that you might not discover right away. Go read about each one!

Vista's Favorites list can be made into your best friend, a customized list for one-click access to the folders you use most often. It's so easy to customize that it would be a shame not to use it.

"Breadcrumbs" give you an easy, intuitive way to move through folders and subfolders, a huge improvement over the folder navigation in Windows XP.

The snipping tool is a built-in utility for quick screen shots that can be dropped into an email or document or photo.

Shadow copy is a feature in Vista Business and Vista Ultimate that automatically makes extra copies of your folders twice a day and tucks them in a safe place. You can restore files as they existed in the past, regardless of whether they've been edited or deleted in the meantime.

Don't hunt for programs - search for them! When you click the Start button, your cursor is immediately blinking in a search bar. Start to type in the name of a program! You'll see it immediately appear at the top of the Start menu. It's far faster than looking for a program by combing through the "All Programs" list.

Have fun!

Labels: software, Vista

posted by bruceb at 10/10/2008 12:42:00 AM | permalink

You might find something you can use in this collection of tips from David Pogue. Take a look! These are just examples from a much longer list:

• You can enlarge the text on any Web page. In Windows, press Ctrl and the plus or minus keys (for bigger or smaller fonts); on the Mac, it's the Command key and plus or minus.
• You can also enlarge the entire Web page or document by pressing the Control key as you turn the wheel on top of your mouse. On the Mac, this enlarges the entire screen image.
• You can tap the Space bar to scroll down on a Web page one screenful. Add the Shift key to scroll back up.

Lots more. (He's wrong about the recycle bin, though - it doesn't have to be emptied manually.) And don't forget the keyboard shortcuts that I wrote up last year.

Labels: Apple, computers, Vista, WinXP

posted by bruceb at 10/04/2008 12:05:00 AM | permalink

I set up a new Dell Inspiron 518 desktop computer today - a nice home computer, a lovely case bristling with USB ports and shiny black plastic that will attract dust like nobody's business, fast and well-equipped, shipped with the correct configuration and working out of the box, as usual with Dell.

Dell ships computers with less preinstalled software than most other manufacturers, even from the Home & Home Office division, so setup is easy. There were a handful of third party apps to take off - Google's cluttered "Google Desktop" widget/search program and the rarely used Google Toolbar, one or two others. Dell is starting to load on more of its own homebrewed applications, though, so new Dell computers still have too many helpful startup screens and popup windows and balloons and taskbar icons. I remove most of them right away - in my experience, more people are annoyed than helped by the incessant notices from the "support center" and the well-meaning advertisements for services like Dell's online backup and the rest.

Maybe it's just me but I don't like the "Browser Address Error Redirector," licensed by Dell from Google. If you try to go to a nonexistent web page - a typo in the address, say - this redirects your web browser to keep you from seeing a "page not found" message. Instead, you'll get suggestions for what you might have been looking for, along with lots and lots and lots of advertisements (sample on the right).

I'd rather see a "page not found" message. I uninstall it.

The latest Dell software was introduced a few months ago - a dock that parks itself at the top of the screen to fool you into thinking you bought a Mac by mistake.

Programs are grouped, so a click on the applications icon might provide access to Word, Excel and Powerpoint. (Umm - which one of those icons would that be again?) The dock is intended to scoop up the normal desktop icons so the rest of the desktop is pristine. Here's a writeup with a few more details about the Dell dock. If you have a Dell computer running Vista and a dock would make your life complete, you can reportedly download and install it from this page.

Who uses things like this? Is there such a demand for an enhancement to Vista's desktop and menus that this is a great addition to every home computer shipped by Dell? I don't get it. I'm an old fogey. Don't get me wrong, I'm not insensitive to how personal some of these choices are. You can use the Dell dock and I'll be happy for you. Lots of people love their Macs and feed them special treats at dinner and put them to sleep on a little pillow and apparently nobody feels the same way I do - when I look at a Mac screen, I see a stupid, juvenile design that makes me so happy that I work in a PC world.

Labels: Apple, computers, Google, software, Vista

posted by bruceb at 10/03/2008 01:11:00 AM | permalink

Make a firm commitment not to be fooled into installing malware on your computer!

In this study, researchers created fake popup windows that should have been alarming, and put them in front of people at unexpected times. Most of the people clicked the OK button so quickly it was clear they didn't give it a moment's thought - they just wanted the dialog box to get out of the way as quickly as possible, with no thought to the consequences.

It's up to you to protect yourself. It doesn't matter what security software you're running - if you click OK, you have given the bad guys permission to kidnap your family and empty your bank accounts. Researchers find too many people who would click Yes in any window, even if it looks like the one on the right, with nothing more than a snort of annoyance at the distraction.

Vista adds "User Account Control" as a critical security feature. Before any significant change is allowed, Vista greys the screen, stops the change from occurring, and asks you if you want to allow it to happen. When a laboratory tried to research rootkits (the latest name for "bad programs that hide themselves on your computer," since "virus," "adware" and "spyware" weren't confusing enough), they had to disable User Account Control because the rootkits were stopped in their tracks by it.

If you're a Vista user, then, you have an important security tool built into the operating system, and it will protect you unless you click OK on the User Account Control window without thinking about it. Rootkits are the most dangerous kind of attack and Vista can stop them dead, regardless of your security software, but only if you say No.

And if you turn off User Account Control and complain about how oh so annoying boo hoo it is to have to click OK an extra time, I have little sympathy. Responsibility for your computer is in your hands.

Labels: computers, security, Vista

posted by bruceb at 9/25/2008 12:05:00 AM | permalink

Running a Vista Media Center Extender in the living room requires a computer in the house running Vista Home Premium or Vista Ultimate. Your home computer can send your photos and music to the living room without working very hard, so it's quite possible to use the same computer that you're using at your desk.

There is a caveat, though. The most important trick for a Vista Media Center Extender is delivering TV shows to the TV, and your home computer probably isn't ready to do that without an extra bit of hardware to plug in the Comcast cable and act as a TV tuner. Once the hardware is set up, the Vista Media Center software is easy to set up - it automatically identifies your cable provider and channel selection, downloads a program guide, and handles program recording.

There are inexpensive USB devices that add TV tuner functions and are reported to work quite well, but I got an ATI TV Wonder HD-650 for a hundred bucks to put inside the PC, since it seemed to have the fewest trouble reports. In this category, as with so many others, there are always reports of horrible problems on Amazon and the online forums, requiring an intuitive weighing to decide which ones can be discarded because you're luckier or smarter than those people.

When shows are recording and being streamed into the living room, the computer is working a bit harder, enough that it might slow down your work on the computer occasionally. I also wanted to set up the Media Center computer to do some time-consuming, processor-intensive jobs - converting DVDs into files that could be stored on the computer's hard drive and played on the Extender. My desktop computer gets restarted pretty regularly as a side effect of testing too much software, which would play havoc with recording a show and might interrupt somebody's experience in the living room.

That's why a lot of people set up a separate computer that is dedicated to doing the Media Center chores. It can be a home-built PC, if you want to save some money. I opted to buy a Dell Inspiron 530 with a lot of memory, since basic computers are so absurdly cheap. I got a good video card but that's optional - I don't plan to ever have it hooked up to a monitor. It's sitting off in the corner and my interaction with it is all done from my desk using Remote Desktop.

A new dedicated computer and the HP Extender gives me a rock solid foundation for more living room entertainment than I have time for. It looks and sounds fabulous.

One more part of the story before we're done - a few scary notes about audio and video formats tomorrow.

Labels: audio, computers, hardware, photos, video, Vista

posted by bruceb at 9/22/2008 01:39:00 AM | permalink

HP has been creating devices for years to bring Windows Media Center to the living room. There are two new Vista Media Center Extenders being marketed under the "MediaSmart" name that have some very interesting features. The HP MediaSmart Connect is sitting in my living room doing exactly what I was hoping.

The previous living room occupant was HP's Z558 Digital Entertainment Center, a computer running Windows XP Media Center in a box with a full complement of inputs and outputs for audio and video. It was fairly quirky to set up - getting the display to fill the screen took long experimentation, for example, and it wasn't very good at finding media stored on a different computer. It worked for several years but it always ran hot, which eventually doomed it - the proprietary video card died once from overheating and was almost impossible to replace, and the fans have lately been getting louder and louder until they became an unbearable distraction.

There are several new Vista Extenders on the market which overlap in their primary purpose, to bring Vista Media Center to the TV from another computer in the home. HP has developed an HD TV with the MediaSmart technology built into the guts of the TV - an interesting idea that would make setup much more simple if you need a new TV, but it requires a firm belief that the technology running a Vista Media Center Extender will last as long as the TV. I don't know if I would make that bet.

The HP MediaSmart Connect stood out for me, though, when I read some favorable reviews. It's a small box, 8 1/2 inches square and less than two inches tall, and completely silent. It has the right outputs to connect to my TV and audio receiver - HDMI, component video, and analog and digital audio. It has built-in wireless networking but I have a network cable running to the living room so I never had to find out if the wireless connection would be jerky or slow, a frequent complaint. HP is reportedly going to lower the price in the next week, giving it a list price of $299 and a likely street price of $249. (Gadgets like this require exactly the same calculation as software: if you get the wrong thing, it doesn't matter if it was cheap; if you get the right thing, the price is almost irrelevant in the long run.)

The remote control bristles with buttons, since there are just too many functions for it to be simple, but at least the remote is sturdy and solid in the hand, which is not always true of the competitors.

The Vista Media Center experience is satisfying but it would be more or less the same with any Extender. What sets the MediaSmart Connector apart is the proprietary software added by HP.

HP has built an interface that includes seamless access to Vista Media Center in its entirety - but there's also an attractive, simple interface that provides access to photos, music and videos that runs completely apart from Vista Media Center. HP provides optional software to run on the home computers that delivers the photos, music and videos to the MediaSmart Connect. Browsing photos with Vista Media Center is quite nice, for example - thumbnails, the ability to browse by tag or folder name, etc. - but some people will prefer to browse the same photos with HP's software, shown at left. Both views are available at any time.

HP then gave its box one more ability that was important to me: the HP MediaSmart Connect is able to connect to other software running on a home computer in addition to the program supplied by HP. It can display lists of media from any standard UPNP or DLNA server.

That means the HP MediaConnect can display music, photos or video sent around the network by a wide variety of programs, including some of the ones I mentioned yesterday. In my case, that means it connected immediately to the UPNP server built into J River Media Center, the program I depend on to keep my embarrassingly large music library organized. I've spent hours sorting my music by genre and creating playlists and smartlists, and in just a few minutes, there were those playlists on the TV, ready to be played at the click of a button. I started playing one ("Audio -- Recently Imported -- Two Months -- shuffle") and wiped a tear from my eye, because I had never been able to go back and forth elegantly between Windows Media Center and J River Media Center before.

That probably isn't important to you. There are a hundred reasons why this works for me and might not work for you. Maybe you'd be frustrated that the experience is not troublefree - I can't see cover art for music albums, I've wrestled with video formats (that story comes later), and the interface is sometimes a little slow, for example. You might be fiercely interested in streaming high-definition video or 5.1 surround sound, which I can't tell you about because I don't care.

The good parts far outweigh any negatives in our living room. Vista Media Center has a tremendous program guide for live and recorded television that I can reach with a single click of a button. I can browse through thumbnails and start a slide show of last month's family photos. I can play my video and music collection. All of those things are handled by an interface that's easy to navigate from the couch with a single remote control. That's good stuff!

All of this requires a computer in the house doing the work, and some hard experience to discover which formats work and which don't work. I'll tell you more later about how I'm handling those things.

Labels: audio, hardware, network, photos, software, video, Vista

posted by bruceb at 9/19/2008 12:59:00 AM | permalink

Since the market for living room computers never developed, Microsoft decided to focus on "extenders," a different way to deliver media to your television.

Huge numbers of people already have a computer in the house running Windows Vista Home Premium, holding photos and music. An "extender" is a small box for the living room that connects to the computer over a wireless or wired connection to display the photos on the television and play music on the living room speakers. If the computer is set up for it, the extender can also handle all the TV programming and record TV shows like a Tivo. It works exclusively with a remote control - no keyboard or mouse! - and looks great from across the room. Here are some cute animations from Microsoft about how it works.

Extenders are not a new concept, and Microsoft is not the only company offering products that work this way. Apple TV is a box that streams music and video from your computer's copy of iTunes to the living room, hemmed in by Apple's fairly restrictive selection of supported formats and features. There is a rich selection of third party software and hardware that will send streams out onto a home network - Twonky, Tversity, music devices from Roku Soundbridge and Sonos, and much more. Tivo supplies software to send photos and music to the Tivo in the living room. Do-it-yourselfers and gadget freaks and technical types are having a wonderful time squabbling about the pros and cons of various setups.

Microsoft gets more attention in the mainstream because the technology it has chosen is elegant and because, well, because it's Microsoft, I guess. Media Center Extenders are based on a simple concept. The small living room box connects to the computer over the home network and displays the Vista Media Center interface, exactly as if it was running directly on the computer. Under the hood is a specialized version of Remote Desktop, which many businesspeople use to connect to their office computers from home.

All the work is done on the computer, but the computer can stay in the room suited for it. Multiple extenders can be connected to the same computer, and the computer can be used normally while it's sending media to the other rooms. The physical connections to the television for audio and video can be difficult but mating the computer with the extender is pretty straightforward.

Some people already have this technology without knowing it, because an XBox 360 can be a Media Center Extender. Chances are the XBox 360 is already on the home network to get updates and play online, so the only setup involves a bit of fumbling to bring a new blade to life in the XBox dashboard, full of photos and music. Microsoft recently announced that the XBox 360 dashboard would be completely overhauled to make it look like Media Center.

In addition to the XBox 360, there was a first generation of extenders from Linksys and others for Windows XP Media Center Edition, but they were slow and cranky and became obsolete when Microsoft rewrote everything for Vista. A new generation of extenders are now being introduced with some attractive features.

I don't have an XBox 360 - noisy things that fail a lot. (If you're interested, a good article appeared a few days ago about the XBox 360's sad history of hardware problems.) Instead, I'll tell you tomorrow about HP's MediaSmart Connect, which is the best of the extenders on the market now.

Labels: Apple, audio, hardware, Microsoft, network, photos, software, video, Vista, WinXP

posted by bruceb at 9/18/2008 12:05:00 AM | permalink

Your photos are on your computer.

Your music is on your computer.

It makes sense that computers should be able to record TV shows - it's kind of a computery thing to do, right?

It's probably occurred to you that it makes sense to store movies on a computer instead of buying them or getting them from Netflix.

Your new HD TV is basically a big computer monitor.

So why don't you have a computer in your living room?

You have no idea how many people have tried to figure that out. Microsoft introduced Windows XP Media Center edition, intended for living rooms, and no one cared, so it built an updated version of the Media Center interface into Vista, and still no one cared. (If you have Vista Home Premium, look around for "Windows Media Center" on the menu and start it up. Never seen it before, have you? The interface is designed to be seen from across the room. It's quite a nice design, just a little pointless on a desktop PC.)

There are lots of manufacturers making living room computers running Vista Media Center - Niveus, Avideus, Alienware, VelocityMicro, and many more. Many of them are very expensive and some of them are only sold through audio/video specialists, because it turns out that getting your media into the living room is frighteningly complicated.

Your needs are different than mine. Nobody will have the same setup, which is part of why this is so difficult. The best I can do is tell my story in the next couple of days and hope that it helps you think things through if you decide to go down this road.

For today, let me just give you a few of the considerations that make this so hard.

• Computers are noisy. A fan that's acceptable under your desk can quickly come to sound like a jet plane when you're watching television.
• Your living room doesn't have room for something that's shaped like a computer. The media center PCs have to be designed like a piece of audio equipment. That makes them too small to have adequate ventilation, so they run hot and need big fans, which gets back to the noise problem.
• Normal people find it virtually impossible to hook up a new television to cable and speakers, which is why Best Buy and the other retailers are getting deeply involved in sending installers to your home. A media center PC adds a new tangle of cables, each with its own quirks and requirements and possible incompatibilities - HDMI, component video, optical audio, S-video, and oh so many more. Your television connection might be analog cable or digital cable, it might require a converter box or a CableCard (a hellishly complex bit of equipment in its own right), it might be DirecTV, you might have an antenna for HD signals, and the setup will different for every one. Trust me - the Best Buy geek isn't going to set up your media center PC.
• You don't have a network cable running into your living room. Sure, all the new stuff claims to work over wireless connections but maybe you've noticed - wireless connections are not the most stable, troublefree items in our tech toolbox, are they?
• There are an endless number of proprietary formats and programs that will become barriers to making everything work. I'll touch on this more later. You'd like to think that someone could give you instructions for how to get a movie from the camcorder and see it in the living room but there is no guarantee that anything will work - and if it works today, it might not work tomorrow.

Pretty depressing, huh? There, there. I feel your pain. But I'm a survivor - I've got pictures running in a slide show, I've got music playing from my library, and I've got a lovely collection of movies to browse through, and it's all down in my living room where it belongs. It took some money and some persistence and things aren't perfect but it can be done! More to come.

Labels: audio, computers, Microsoft, photos, video, Vista, WinXP

posted by bruceb at 9/17/2008 01:35:00 AM | permalink

Apple reacted quickly to the reports that the latest iTunes update has caused some Windows systems to crash badly. Last night Apple posted another version of iTunes that rolls back the offending hardware driver to an older version. If your system is blue screening, all you have to do is uninstall iTunes, uninstall Apple Mobile Device Support, and then reinstall iTunes from last night's release.

That's absurd, of course. As one person commented:

"A kernel level device driver (like the USB driver that Apple installs rather than using the one built in to the OS) will always have the ability to take down the OS.

"This is true for any OS since a kernel level driver is the interface between the OS and hardware.

"That's why it requires Administrator level permission to install (it did), why it needs to be very well written and tested before it gets sent to users (it wasn't) and why the installer should notifiy users that a device driver is being installed (they weren't) and only be installed if absolutely needed to support new hardware (it wasn't)."

You might want to take my suggestion: uninstall iTunes, uninstall Apple Mobile Device Support, uninstall Apple Software Update, uninstall Quicktime, install J River Media Center for your iPod, and return your iPhone.

Incidentally, are you aware of what a disaster the new iPhone has been? iPhone users are screaming bloody murder about absurdly short battery life, dropped calls, AT&T's terrible coverage with its much-vaunted 3G network, and much more. New software was released for the iPhone last night but there is little confidence that it will actually fix the list of problems it purports to address. Apple promises that this update will deliver all of the following improvements, each one of which has been a source of anguish for iPhone users for the last couple of months:

• Decrease in call set-up failures and dropped calls
• Significantly better battery life for most users
• Dramatically reduced time to backup to iTunes
• Improved email reliability, notably fetching email from POP and Exchange accounts
• Faster installation of 3rd party applications
• Fixed bugs causing hangs and crashes for users with lots of third party applications
• Improved performance in text messaging
• Faster loading and searching of contacts
• Improved accuracy of the 3G signal strength display
• Repeat alert up to two additional times for incoming text messages
• Option to wipe data after ten failed passcode attempts
• Genius playlist creation

Labels: Apple, audio, mobile, phone, software, Vista, WinXP

posted by bruceb at 9/12/2008 10:43:00 AM | permalink

New slogan for Apple: iTunes ain't done till Windows won't run!

After its iPod conference this week - more of a non-event than usual for Apple - a new version of iTunes started to roll out to Windows users. For some people, it's causing crashes and even causing blue screens after it installs broken drivers without any disclosure or warning.

The problems don't affect everybody - like so many computer problems, these are likely to be caused by unfortunate conflicts with other programs if they're installed on the same computer. It's still being investigated but one writer suggests that any of these factors might cause the iTunes upgrade to crash the computer:

• Roxio disc burning software
• An HP USB printer
• Logitech software/hardware

This writer thoroughly investigated the 80Mb (!) download delivered by the iTunes installer and discovered that it was installing two hardware drivers, including one that has a long history of causing blue screens (fatal crashes) on Windows systems. Apple is also delivering the MobileMe software and a program set to automatically load the MobileMe software when your computer starts up, whether you're using the service or not. That's the service that was a disastrous failure for the first few weeks after it was released a couple of months ago, and is still barely limping along. It's irrelevant to most people.

Apple was roundly criticized a few months ago when it used its "software update" service to distribute its buggy and insecure browser, Safari, without adequately warning people. This time it's taking the approach of not giving any warning at all that this upgrade includes anything other than a facelift for iTunes and Quicktime.

If you use iTunes, you can't really avoid this update - about all you can do is hope for the best. Personally, I'm happy to stick to my longstanding conviction not to install any Apple software on my Windows machines. Apple has proven over and over that they write crappy software for Windows. Ed Bott comments:

"Nice marketing strategy: Tweak Microsoft for an operating system that crashes, then ship code that crashes Windows. Thank goodness I'm not a cynic or I'd think this was a deliberate marketing strategy."

Labels: Apple, audio, computers, mobile, software, Vista, WinXP

posted by bruceb at 9/11/2008 12:05:00 AM | permalink

Microsoft's Live Mesh service, now in beta testing, has the most promise of any of the online services. With an easy setup, you can make your files available on multiple computers, you can share files with other people, and you can access your computers remotely, all for free. At the moment it only works on Windows PCs but soon it will be possible to add Windows Mobile devices and Macs.

Let me take you through a simple setup to help you get started.

Your use of the Live Mesh service starts with your Windows Live ID, the free email address and password that Microsoft uses to set you up with its services. Here are the instructions to set up a Windows Live ID. Have your Windows Live ID in mind before you start, and make sure your Live ID account shows "United States," per my instructions.

Now go to the Live Mesh web site, www.mesh.com, and click on Sign In. Provide your Live ID credentials and accept the license agreement on the next screen.

You should be taken directly to the main Mesh screen, shown on the right.

Click on the "Add Device" button. You'll be adding the computer you're sitting at by installing a small piece of software. It will take 3-4 minutes to install the software. (It hasn't frozen. Wait for it.) When it's done, you'll have a distinctive new icon by the clock.

Now click on the "Live Desktop" icon on the main Mesh screen. You'll be looking at your "Live Desktop." It will have icons for files and folders but don't get confused - these folders are online, not on your computer.

Add a folder and give it a recognizable name - "My Synced Files," say. Now close the browser window! You're done with "Live Desktop" for now.

Minimize all your open programs so you can see your computer desktop. Within seconds, a shortcut named "My Synced Files" will appear on your desktop.

When you click on it, you'll be asked where that shortcut should lead. By default, Mesh offers to set up a new empty folder on your desktop with the same name. Take that choice for now. The folder on your desktop will quickly turn to a translucent blue. It's now part of the Mesh system.

It's just a folder. You can put any files you want into it. You can fill it with Word documents and open them and edit them just like any folder. It's just a folder.

But everything in it will be automatically copied to the online folder. Every change will be copied online. If you delete a file from My Synced Files on your desktop, it will be deleted from the online copy automatically. You don't have to do anything, it just happens.

So put some files and folders into "My Synced Files"! Don't go nuts. Put in 50 files, not 5,000. It works with 5,000 but you'll get impatient and think it's broken. Put in some folders full of files.

The reward comes when you sit down at a different computer.

If you have a second computer, go to the Mesh web site on the second computer and log in with the same Windows Live ID, then click "Add Device" to install the software. After it's installed, you should have the same shortcut on your desktop to set up "My Synced Files."

• If that shortcut doesn't show up automatically, then go back to the Mesh web site and click on Live Desktop. When you right-click on "My Synced Files" and click on "Change Sync Settings," you'll be able to change your second computer to sync "When files are added." You'll immediately have the same shortcut on your desktop to click on to establish that you want "My Synced Files" to appear on your second computer desktop. Within minutes, the "My Synced Files" folder on your second computer will be filled with all of the files that are on the first computer.

From now on, when you change a file in that folder on one computer, the changed file will be there on the other computer right away, automatically. The two computers will always be in sync.

Let's reiterate. Once this is set up, you will work with your files on your computer, in the folders on your desktop, just like before. You don't need to "upload" files to Live Desktop - just save them into "My Synced Files." In fact, normally you'll never visit Live Desktop from one of your own computers except to set up a new folder.

Try that to get started! It's only a taste but you'll be past the hard part. Here are just a few things to look into when you've gotten your bearings!

• You can add existing folders on your computer by right-clicking the folder name and clicking on "Add folder to your Live Mesh." I'm syncing my Internet Favorites folder on my desktop and laptop, for example.
• You can share a folder that's been made into a Mesh folder. It's easiest to do that from Live Desktop - open the folder in Live Desktop, then click on the bottom of the right hand column where it says "Members."
• The person you invite will get a nice email invitation. It will lead them through installing the software and giving them shared access to the Mesh folder. Remember, they need to have a Windows Live ID ready, and they need that email invitation to lead them to your folder.
• You can share a Mesh folder; you can't share subfolders inside the Mesh folder.
• You can log into www.mesh.com from another computer and see all the files in Live Desktop. You should be able to download them or open them at that new computer but I've seen some bugs in that process.
• More interesting - you can log into www.mesh.com from any computer, click on one of your computers, and click on "Connect." If the computer is turned on, you'll start a remote desktop session that allows you to control the remote computer as if you're sitting at it. This is very, very cool.

This is a beta service. Test it carefully, with backups of important data, but by all means test it! This is one of those times when you can gain new powers that you do not currently have. Enjoy!

Labels: file_sharing, Internet, Microsoft, remote, Vista, web_services, WinXP

posted by bruceb at 9/05/2008 12:05:00 AM | permalink

Windows Search 4 is an important upgrade for Windows Vista and Windows XP, enabling lightning-fast searches through your files and email for any word or phrase, anywhere. Here's more information about Windows Search.

It's possible to do natural language searches in Vista with Windows Search! Natural language search lets you search using expressions like email from maddie yesterday or music by bowie or stones or email sent directly to me.  You can search for files by typing modified yesterday, modified last week or files created last month.

Natural language search is turned off by default. To turn it on, click Start / Control Panel / Appearance And Personalization / Folder Options. Then click the Search tab and check Use Natural Language Search. (This only works in Vista - not available in Windows XP.)

Windows Search already has a rich syntax for advanced searches - here's the complete search syntax. Those searches will still work after turning on natural language search.

Boolean searches are possible with Windows Search but normally Boolean terms have to be capitalized -

hoover AND dam

hoover NOT herbert

After turning on natural language search, the Boolean terms no longer have to be capitalized.

Natural language search lets you use any column header as a search term. To see what's available, right-click a column heading in any folder and choose More. You'll find a complete list of column headings, any of which may be used in natural language search.

I haven't seen any downside - it's not clear why this isn't enabled by default. If you're using Vista and starting to explore Windows Search, turn on natural language search!

Labels: search, Vista

posted by bruceb at 8/26/2008 12:33:00 AM | permalink

If you're sending a student off to college with a new laptop, Microsoft has a pretty good deal. A student with an email address at an educational institution (typically the email addresses end in .EDU) can buy a copy of Microsoft Office Ultimate 2007 for $59.95 through this web site.

This suite includes far more software than the Home & Student Edition in the stores for $100-140. This is the suite with all the Office programs, including Outlook, Powerpoint, Publisher, OneNote, Access, and more.  Most students will only use Word and Powerpoint, of course, but it's still a great price.

There's also an upgrade to Vista Ultimate for $64.95, much cheaper than the normal upgrade price. Most student laptops come with Vista Home edition, with all the multimedia programs; upgrading to Ultimate adds shadow copies for some extra protection, an improved backup program that a student would never use, and mildly amusing eye candy in the form of animated desktops. (Here's a comparison of the Vista versions.) The discounted price is nice but the upgrade is anything but essential.

Labels: Microsoft, Office, software, Vista

posted by bruceb at 8/24/2008 12:37:00 AM | permalink

If you're running Windows Vista, here's a safe way to reclaim some hard drive space.

Before Vista Service Pack 1 is installed, Vista makes an extra copy of all the system files that are updated by the service pack. They're used to restore the system if you decide to uninstall Vista SP1.

You'll never uninstall Vista Service Pack 1. If it's going to cause any problems, you'll know it right away. Once the system is running with Service Pack 1, you'll keep it forever as a big improvement over Vista's original release.

You can remove those archived files with a tool included with Vista SP1.

Click on Start / All Programs / Accessories / Command Prompt.

At the prompt, type  vsp1cln.exe

Hit Enter, then type Y to start the cleanup process.

You'll recover 1-2Gb of space. Not bad! Most of us don't have issues with hard drive space any more but it's always nice to know that you've freed up a bit more.

Labels: Vista

posted by bruceb at 8/18/2008 12:46:00 AM | permalink

Microsoft has put up a web site for "The Mojave Experiment," with film footage of people responding favorably to what they believed was a brand-new secret operating system, then catching their reactions when told they were looking at Vista. It's pretty effective advertising! And the video wall on the web site is pretty cool. Go take a look!

Labels: business, Microsoft, Vista

posted by bruceb at 7/29/2008 10:47:00 AM | permalink

Windows Search 4 was released last month as an upgrade to Windows Search 3.01 (Windows XP) and the built-in search capability in Windows Vista. It is an important upgrade for every Windows user; it will be pushed through the Windows Update system soon. Here's more information about Windows Search 4.

For the first time, Windows Search 4 can be installed on servers running Windows Server 2003 or Windows Home Server. This gives businesses an important new tool for finding information but there is one new trick to learn.

Many offices with Small Business Server have almost all important business files in a shared folder on the server, which is mapped to a drive letter and is universally referred to by its letter - "The file is stored on the N: drive." Normal people in small businesses don't have to be aware that the file is really in something like \\sbsserver\Company.

When the server is running Windows Search 4, it compiles an index of the business files. When a user with Windows Search 4 searches for something in the shared folder on the server, the server does the work of searching its index and providing the results. The search is completed nearly instantly and it is consistent for all users.

(The underlying technology is referred to as "remote query" or "remote index discovery." A computer with Windows Search 4 responds to a search query from a remote computer by consulting its own index and sending the search results. This works between any computers with Windows Search 4, not just searches on a server - a Vista computer can do a remote query on a shared folder on another Vista computer, etc.)

This is a significant improvement over Windows Search 3.01, which required each individual computer to compile an index of the files on the server. That created a lot of network traffic and search results were uneven - there was always a question of whether an individual computer's index was up to date or complete.

Note the requirement for this to work: Windows Search 4 must be installed on the server and on the workstations. As far as I know, the only way to tell if it has been installed is to look in Add/Remove Programs.

Putting this to use requires a simple technique for searches.

HOW TO USE WINDOWS SEARCH

SEARCHING OUTLOOK AND FILES ON YOUR COMPUTER

Use the toolbar by the clock (Windows XP) or the search bar above the Start button (Vista) to search files stored on your own computer and everything in Outlook.

SEARCHING FILES ON THE SERVER - WINDOWS XP

Open the folder with the business files. (Example: open My Computer and click on the N: drive.)

Click the Search button and do the search from Windows Search on the left.

SEARCHING FILES ON THE SERVER - VISTA

Open the folder with the business files. (Example: open Computer and click on the N: drive.)

Use the Search bar in the upper right corner of the window.

As far as I know, there is no way to do a single search that covers Outlook and files in a shared folder.

Now go find something interesting!

Labels: network, Outlook, SBS, search, software, Vista, WinXP

posted by bruceb at 7/28/2008 01:43:00 AM | permalink

Microsoft will be using new advertisements and other marketing tricks to turn around the public perception that there is something wrong with Vista. A CNet writer just ran across one idea that worked well. Microsoft gathered a group of Windows XP users who had negative opinions of Vista, and gave them a preview of a new operating system under development at Microsoft code-named "Mojave."

The users were enthusiastic. More than 90 percent gave positive feedback on what they saw in "Mojave."

Then Microsoft told them that they were looking at Vista, not some mysterious project in development. With cameras rolling, Microsoft got some invalusable footage of people saying, "Oh, wow!"

It's long past time for Microsoft to fight back. Vista's problems are not technical or compatibility issues - those have been unimportant for a long time. The real problem is turning around years of attacks by Apple and by commentators with little perspective and too much space to fill.

Labels: Vista

posted by bruceb at 7/25/2008 12:40:00 PM | permalink

From a column today by Ed Bott:

"Sony is finally taking on its crapware problem. For the past two months, I've been using an astonishingly light and agile Sony VAIO notebook and loving every minute of it. The best part of all was that this machine was absolutely, completely, unequivocally crapware-free, which meant I was able to be productive within a few minutes of unboxing.

"That's a huge switch for Sony, which has taken a beating as 'the poster child for negative experiences' with new PCs running Windows Vista. And it was a happy surprise for me. When I wrote about my hands-on experiences with two older VAIO notebooks earlier this year, I called it a 'truly miserable experience.' It took a crapware-cleansing clean install to fix a 2007-vintage Sony notebook, and I spent hours replacing outdated drivers and removing unwanted software from a 2008 model (if you haven't read that installment, see Fixing Windows Vista, one machine at a time).

"In a March interview, Sony Vice President Mike Abary assured me that Sony was 'listening and taking action.' The first phase, he said, was a new program called Fresh Start, in which Sony promised to remove all trialware and unnecessary software for customers who chose the Fresh Start option as part of a custom-configured VAIO. Sony announced initially that it would charge $49.99 for the privilege of ordering a crapware-free PC and then quickly reversed its decision.

"In early May, I ordered an ultraportable notebook from Sony's website, configuring it to order and choosing the Fresh Start option (no extra charge).

"The notebook arrived a few days later, and I've been using it since then for a variety of real-world tasks. The bottom line? Sony's Fresh Start delivers exactly what it promises: a crapware-free PC. It runs Windows Vista remarkably well, and the hardware has been a sheer delight to use."

Details further on in the article about performance, battery life, drivers, and where to buy a Vaio with the Fresh Start option (online only - a Vaio purchased in a local store will come loaded with crap).

Labels: computers, hardware, software, Vista

posted by bruceb at 7/21/2008 02:13:00 PM | permalink