Computer and Technology

Award Pertama

Terimakasih pada blog ANEH81 yang telah memberikan award pada blog saya yang sederhana ini. Ini juga award pertama saya.
Saya juga akan memberikan award ini juga kepada :

In Rev. SmadAV 7 this times has been enhanced to be much faster and lighter in detecting and securing your computer from virus threats in Indonesia. New features added such as Smad-Turbo (Scanning 10x faster), Smad-Theme (Changing the color theme), Smad-Ray (Auto flash is very fast scan). This all makes SmadAV become one of the fastest antivirus and lightest in the world, so SmadAV still be used on computers with lower specifications though.

In Rev. 7 It also adds a database SmadAV introduction of new viruses that spread across much of Indonesia. The development of local virus currently diminishing as active and not the preceding months. Maybe it's because SmadAV already widely used computer users in Indonesia. Thus, local virus in Indonesia now live a little longer to get to extinction.

In addition, too many improvements made to the view that the overall SmadAV SmadAV easier and practical to use. The following is a description of the new features in SmadAV 2009 Rev 7:

Smad-Turbo (Scanning 10x faster)

Smad-Turbo is one of the fastest antivirus scanning feature in the world that belongs only SmadAV Pro. If the Free SmadAV takes you 20 minutes to scan the entire contents of computer files, using this feature you only need to take approximately 1-2 minutes to scan the entire contents of the file on your computer. So, Scanning SmadAV Pro 10x faster than SmadAV Free to use these Smad-Turbo.

Smad-Theme (Changing color themes)

SmadAV Pro has ability to replace colors theme SmadAV who initially green become colors your choice. On the theme color settings you can find your own color choices for the theme SmadAV. After you change the theme color, the color of all SmadAV display will automatically turn into the color of your choice.

Smad-Ray (Auto flash is very fast scan)

After the flash plug-in computer disks, SmadAV will immediately bring the scan results in the form of notification if your flash is infected with a virus or not, the process is very fast only about 1-5 seconds so you do not need a long wait for the results of scanning the new flash plug.
Repair SmadAV view
Display SmadAV long been considered a user who is still too large and not suitable for some users in Mini Laptop / Netbook. In Rev. This time the display 7 SmadAV been smaller and SmadAV can adjust the size to be used in mini Netbook.

Comparison SmadAV Free & Pro

At the donation tab now has added the comparison table SmadAV Free & Pro. You can click on the lines of this table to see the advantages compared SmadAV SmadAV Pro Free.

Completion SmadAV Rev. 2009. 7.1

Addition of new virus database
AutoUpdate for SmadAV Pro on Vista & Win7
Bug fix Scan with SmadAV
Loading Quarantine faster
Send statistics to the server SmadAV
Bug in clearing the virus fusion

Completion SmadAV Rev. 2009. 7.2

Added features in Exception 1-Virus Tools By-User
Added many new virus database
Improved connection with the server program Smadav.net SmadAV
Improved protection registration key anti-piracy

Completion SmadAV Rev. 2009. 7.3

Clean thoroughly for several new viruses
Adding intelligence (heuristic) virus detection SmadAV
Improved update method SmadAV
Replacement of the primary server Smadav.net
Improvement of detection in some programs

Completion SmadAV Rev. 2009. 7.4

Smad-Behavior (Beta), a new feature for the protection SmaRTP computer program based on behavior
Clean thoroughly for 55 new local virus
Completion of cleaning the virus more quickly SmadAV
Added button "More" at the scanner
Changing the folder name "Smad-Lock" to "Smad-Lock (Safe SmadAV)"
Shipping Smadav.net statistics to the server, to prevent piracy SmadAV Pro
Additions to explore the function of quarantine
Improved bug in the file selection dialog when the virus by 1 user

Completion SmadAV Rev. 2009. 7.5

Adding a local database 103 new viruses
Completion of Smad-Behavior to avoid False Positive
Adding some new heuristic techniques
Improvements SmadAV bug that causes hangs when scanning a particular file
Improvement of protection and blacklists to use pirated Pro SmadAV
Improved automatic refresh bug on tree-directory display

Download Smadav 2009 Rev. 7.5

Sources From: SMADAV.NET

Cracking Zip Password Files

Tut On Cracking Zip Password Files..

What is FZC? FZC is a program that cracks zip files (zip is a method of compressing multiple files into one smaller file) that are password-protected (which means you're gonna need a password to open the zip file and extract files out of it). You can get it anywhere - just use a search engine such as altavista.com.

FZC uses multiple methods of cracking - bruteforce (guessing passwords systematically until the program gets it) or wordlist attacks (otherwise known as dictionary attacks. Instead of just guessing passwords systematically, the program takes passwords out of a "wordlist", which is a text file that contains possible passwords. You can get lots of wordlists at www.theargon.com.).

FZC can be used in order to achieve two different goals: you can either use it to recover a lost zip password which you used to remember but somehow forgot, or to crack zip passwords which you're not supposed to have. So like every tool, this one can be used for good and for evil.

The first thing I want to say is that reading this tutorial... is the easy way to learn how to use this program, but after reading this part of how to use the FZC you should go and check the texts that come with that program and read them all. You are also going to see the phrase "check name.txt" often in this text. These files should be in FZC's directory. They contain more information about FZC.

FZC is a good password recovery tool, because it's very fast and also support resuming so you don't have to keep the computer turned on until you get the password, like it used to be some years ago with older cracking programs. You would probably always get the password unless the password is longer than 32 chars (a char is a character, which can be anything - a number, a lowercase or undercase letter or a symbol such as ! or &) because 32 chars is the maximum value that FZC will accept, but it doesn't really matter, because in order to bruteforce a password with 32 chars you'll need to be at least immortal..heehhe.. to see the time that FZC takes with bruteforce just open the Bforce.txt file, which contains such information.

FZC supports brute-force attacks, as well as wordlist attacks. While brute-force attacks don't require you to have anything, wordlist attacks require you to have wordlists, which you can get from www.theargon.com. There are wordlists in various languages, various topics or just miscellaneous wordlists. The bigger the wordlist is, the more chances you have to crack the password.

Now that you have a good wordlist, just get FZC working on the locked zip file, grab a drink, lie down and wait... and wait... and wait...and have good thoughts like "In wordlist mode I'm gonna get the password in minutes" or something like this... you start doing all this and remember "Hey this guy started with all this bullshit and didn't say how I can start a wordlist attack!..." So please wait just a little more, read this tutorial 'till the end and you can do all this.

We need to keep in mind that are some people might choose some really weird passwords (for example: 'e8t7@$^%*gfh), which are harder to crack and are certainly impossible to crack (unless you have some weird wordlist). If you have a bad luck and you got such a file, having a 200MB list won't help you anymore. Instead, you'll have to use a different type of attack. If you are a person that gives up at the first sign of failure, stop being like that or you won't get anywhere. What you need to do in such a situation is to put aside your sweet xxx MB's list and start using the Brute Force attack.

If you have some sort of a really fast and new computer and you're afraid that you won't be able to use your computer's power to the fullest because the zip cracker doesn't support this kind of technology, it's your lucky day! FZC has multiple settings for all sorts of hardware, and will automatically select the best method.

Now that we've gone through all the theoretical stuff, let's get to the actual commands.

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Bruteforce
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The command line you'll need to use for using brute force is:

fzc -mb -nzFile.zip -lChr Lenght -cType of chars

Now if you read the bforce.txt that comes with fzc you'll find the description of how works Chr Lenght and the Type of chars, but hey, I'm gonna explain this too. Why not, right?... (but remember look at the bforce.txt too)

For Chr Lenght you can use 4 kind of switches...

-> You can use range -> 4-6 :it would brute force from 4 Chr passwors to 6 chr passwords
-> You can use just one lenght -> 5 :it would just brute force using passwords with 5 chars
-> You can use also the all number -> 0 :it would start brute forcing from passwords with lenght 0 to lenght 32, even if you are crazy i don't think that you would do this.... if you are thinking in doing this get a live...
-> You can use the + sign with a number -> 3+ :in this case it would brute force from passwords with lenght 3 to passwords with 32 chars of lenght, almost like the last option...

For the Type of chars we have 5 switches they are:

-> a for using lowercase letters
-> A for using uppercase letters
-> ! for using simbols (check the Bforce.txt if you want to see what simbols)
-> s for using space
-> 1 for using numbers

Example:
If you want to find a password with lowercase and numbers by brute force you would just do something like:

fzc -mb -nzTest.zip -l4-7 -ca1

This would try all combinations from passwords with 4 chars of lenght till 7 chars, but just using numbers and lowercase.

*****
hint
*****

You should never start the first brute force attack to a file using all the chars switches, first just try lowercase, then uppercase, then uppercase with number then lowercase with numbers, just do like this because you can get lucky and find the password much faster, if this doesn't work just prepare your brain and start with a brute force that would take a lot of time. With a combination like lowercase, uppercase, special chars and numbers.

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Wordlis
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Like I said in the bottom and like you should be thinking now, the wordlist is the most powerfull mode in this program. Using this mode, you can choose between 3 modes, where each one do some changes to the text that is in the wordlist, I'm not going to say what each mode does to the words, for knowing that just check the file wlist.txt, the only thing I'm going to tell you is that the best mode to get passwords is mode 3, but it takes longer time too.
To start a wordlist attak you'll do something like.

fzc -mwMode number -nzFile.zip -nwWordlist

Where:

Mode number is 1, 2 or 3 just check wlist.txt to see the changes in each mode.
File.zip is the filename and Wordlist is the name of the wordlist that you want to use. Remember that if the file or the wordlist isn't in the same directory of FZC you'll need to give the all path.

You can add other switches to that line like -fLine where you define in which line will FZC start reading, and the -lChar Length where it will just be read the words in that char length, the switche works like in bruteforce mode.
So if you something like

fzc -mw1 -nztest.zip -nwMywordlist.txt -f50 -l9+

FZC would just start reading at line 50 and would just read with length >= to 9.

Example:

If you want to crack a file called myfile.zip using the "theargonlistserver1.txt" wordlist, selecting mode 3, and you wanted FZC to start reading at line 50 you would do:

fzc -mw3 -nzmyfile.zip -nwtheargonlistserver1.txt -f50

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Resuming
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Other good feature in FZC is that FZC supports resuming. If you need to shutdown your computer and FZC is running you just need to press the ESC key, and fzc will stop. Now if you are using a brute force attack the current status will be saved in a file called resume.fzc but if you are using a wordlist it will say to you in what line it ended (you can find the line in the file fzc.log too).
To resume the bruteforce attack you just need to do:

fzc -mr

And the bruteforce attack will start from the place where it stopped when you pressed the ESC key.
But if you want to resume a wordlist attack you'll need to start a new wordlist attack, saying where it's gonna start. So if you ended the attack to the file.zip in line 100 using wordlist.txt in mode 3 to resume you'll type

fzc -mw3 -nzfile.zip -nwwordlist.txt -f100

Doing this FZC would start in line 100, since the others 99 lines where already checked in an earlier FZC session.

Well, it looks like I covered most of what you need to know. I certainly hope it helped you... don't forget to read the files that come with the program

Change Text on XP Start Button

Step 1 - Modify Explorer.exe File

In order to make the changes, the file explorer.exe located at C:\Windows needs to be edited. Since explorer.exe is a binary file it requires a special editor. For purposes of this article I have used Resource Hacker. Resource HackerTM is a freeware utility to view, modify, rename, add, delete and extract resources in 32bit Windows executables and resource files (*.res). It incorporates an internal resource script compiler and decompiler and works on Microsoft Windows 95/98/ME, Windows NT, Windows 2000 and Windows XP operating systems.

get this from http://delphi.icm.edu.pl/ftp/tools/ResHack.zip

The first step is to make a backup copy of the file explorer.exe located at C:\Windows\explorer. Place it in a folder somewhere on your hard drive where it will be safe. Start Resource Hacker and open explorer.exe located at C:\Windows\explorer.exe.

The category we are going to be using is "String Table". Expand it by clicking the plus sign then navigate down to and expand string 37 followed by highlighting 1033. If you are using the Classic Layout rather than the XP Layout, use number 38. The right hand pane will display the stringtable. We’re going to modify item 578, currently showing the word “start” just as it displays on the current Start button.

There is no magic here. Just double click on the word “start” so that it’s highlighted, making sure the quotation marks are not part of the highlight. They need to remain in place, surrounding the new text that you’ll type. Go ahead and type your new entry. In my case I used Click Me!

You’ll notice that after the new text string has been entered the Compile Script button that was grayed out is now active. I won’t get into what’s involved in compiling a script, but suffice it to say it’s going to make this exercise worthwhile. Click Compile Script and then save the altered file using the Save As command on the File Menu. Do not use the Save command – Make sure to use the Save As command and choose a name for the file. Save the newly named file to C:\Windows.

Step 2 – Modify the Registry

!!!make a backup of your registry before making changes!!!

Now that the modified explorer.exe has been created it’s necessary to modify the registry so the file will be recognized when the user logs on to the system. If you don’t know how to access the registry I’m not sure this article is for you, but just in case it’s a temporary memory lapse, go to Start (soon to be something else) Run and type regedit in the Open field. Navigate to:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SOFTWARE\ Microsoft\ Windows NT\ CurrentVersion\ Winlogon

In the right pane, double click the "Shell" entry to open the Edit String dialog box. In Value data: line, enter the name that was used to save the modified explorer.exe file. Click OK.

Close Registry Editor and either log off the system and log back in, or reboot the entire system if that’s your preference. If all went as planned you should see your new Start button with the revised text.

Cannot Use Password to Get Back into Windows XP

Because of the security features built into Windows XP, it is virtually impossible to get back into the system without the password.

You have several options to try and get around this problem.

If you have access to another user account with administrator rights, you can use that account to change the password
of the account that is locked out. You can also use the default Administrator account that is built into Windows XP.

First you need to boot the system into Safe Mode.
1.Restart your system.
2.When you see the blue Dell globe or screen, press the ( F8 ) key about 3 times a second.
3.You should get the Windows startup menu. Use the (Up or Down) arrow keys to highlight (SafeMode)
4.Press (Enter) on (Safe Mode), then press (Enter) on (Windows XP).
5.The system should boot to Safe Mode.

Once you are at the Account Log on Screen, click on the icon
for the user account with administrator rights, or click on the icon
for the administrators account.
Note: For Home the Administrator account isn't normally shown & in Safe Mode you have to press Ctrl+Alt+Delete keys twice to show.
For PRO you can do this in normal mode

When the system has booted to the desktop, use the following steps to change the accounts password.
1.Click Start, Control Panel, Administrative Tools.
2.Click Computer Management.
3.Double click Local Users and Groups, double click the folder Users.
4.Right click on the account name that is locked out, and click on Set Password.
5.You may get a warning message about changing the password, simply click proceed.
6.Leave the New Password box blank, also leave the Confirm Password box blank.
7.Click OK, and OK again.
8.Then close all Windows, reboot the system and try to log in.

There are also applications that can recover the password for you.
The following companies provide these applications at a cost.
iOpus® Password Recovery XP here.
LostPassword.com, here.
Asterisk Password Recovery XP v1.89 here.
Windows XP / 2000 / NT Key here.

If the above information does not help in recovering the password, the only option left is to
format the hard drive then reinstall Windows and the system software.

Mimo Mini USB Monitor

At first we considered making sarcastic comments about paying the same for a miniature 7" monitor that you would for a monitor three times the size. Then we took a closer look at the Mimo Mini USB monitor and realized it is powered entirely via USB, no external AC adaptor or video card needed. This miniature display marvel also runs in landscape or portrait mode and also comes in a touchscreen version. Mimo Mini, we think we love you - full specs after the jump.

Small monitor runs completely off of USB, giving you an extra mini display whenever and wherever you need it.
No extra power needed. The Mimo monitor is powered by USB.
No extra video card. The Mimo has a built in video card that runs over any USB 2.0 connection.
Rotating Portrait or Landscape view. Go vertical for notes and spreadsheets, horizontal to watch a movie.
Great for laptop use. The Mimo stores easily in your bag and is
ready to go simply by plugging it in
740 Model offers touchscreen abilities for control with a finger or stylus
Mac and Windows driver support (intel Mac only). Additional drivers required for touchscreen use of the 740 monitor on Mac OS.
Display size - 7"
Display resolution - 800 x 480
Brightness - 350 cd/m2
Contrast ratio - 400:1
Connections - USB 2.0

Sources From : gadgetmadness

CrunchPad tablet project self-destructs

News site TechCrunch on Monday said that its CrunchPad tablet project has 'self destructed' due to a legal dispute. The touchscreen slate was to have been unveiled soon but is effectively being shut down as the actual developer, Fusion Garage, has claimed it will sell the device without further input from the co-developer and would only carry the CrunchPad name, using site founder Michael Arrington only as a product evangelist.

Arrington has rejected the option and pointed out that the decision, supposedly made under pressure from Fusion Garage's shareholders, amounts to intellectual property theft. TechCrunch had been jointly developing the product and still owns both part of the technology rights as well as the CrunchPad name. The site is filing lawsuits to prevent the sale without its involvement and refuses to accept any counter-offers, comparing it to a contractor betraying its client at the last minute.

"This is the equivalent of Foxconn, [which builds] the iPhone, notifiying Apple a couple of days before launch that they’d be moving ahead and selling the iPhone directly without any involvement from Apple," Arrington wrote.

The project was intended to prove that a web-only, touchscreen device could be made for $300 and was receiving help from multiple sources to reach that price target, including a "major multi-billion dollar retail partner" that would have sold it at cost, steep discounts from Intel for Atom processors, and ad sponsors that would subsidize the cost of the device. It would have carried a 12-inch capacitive touchscreen, run Linux and had just 4GB of storage onboard, instead depending entirely on sites like Hulu, YouTube and others for media and similar features; it could also have theoretically run Google's Chromium OS or even Windows 7.

Many had expected the CrunchPad to stand as an alternative to closed-source and likely more expensive alternatives expected next year that could include, among others, Apple's rumored tablet or a production version of the Microsoft Courier.

Bell launches MiFi 2372 hotspot with HSPA 3G

As promised, Canadian wireless and cable provider Bell on Monday has began offering the Novatel Wireless MiFi 2372 Intelligent Mobile Hotspot. The device uses Bell's recently launched HSPA network and will let up to five users share a single 3G connection over Wi-Fi.

The announcement makes Bell the first to carry the MiFi 2372 in Canada. The device is compatible with Windows, Mac and Linux operating systems and will allow for 7.2Mbps transfer speeds, which is fast enough for streaming video and some forms of online gaming. The MiFi also has a microSDHC memory card slot, letting it double as a thumb drive.

The Novatel router is available for $100 CAD ($94) on a three-year data contract or for $250 CAD ($235) without a contract.

Sources from: electronista

Kohjinsha ships dual-screen DZ notebook

Japanese PC maker Kohjinsha has taken its dual screen notebook concept it showed off at last month's CEATEC show and made it into a production PC. The DZ6HKE16E is the first of the DZ-series of notebooks, and comes with a 1.6GHz AMD Athlon Neo MV-40 CPU, 1GB of RAM. There is also an integrated ATI Radeon HD 3200 graphics chipsets to drive the two 10.1-inch displays, each with 1024x600 resolution and an LED backlight.

For storage, there is a 160GB hard drive preloaded with Windows 7 Home Premium and users can connect to the web over the Wi-Fi connection or gigabit Ethernet port. A 1.3-megapixel camera, Bluetooth 2.1 and a multi-card reader are integrated, while the battery is said to provide 4.5 hours of life on a full charge. The system weighs just over 4lbs. There are also three USB 2.0 ports onboard.

Prices start at the equivalent of $928 in Japan and the PC is now available. A release in North America is unknown.

Sources from: electronista

iBuyPower adds Core i7, Phenom II rigs for NewEgg

Gamer Supreme 979 SLC

iBuyPower this afternoon refreshed the ready-made gaming PCs it ships to NewEgg. All of the Gamer Extreme and Supreme models, ranging from the 922 SLC through to the 979 SLC, use an Asetek-made liquid cooling setup that lets them run coolly while also giving them some performance headroom. The 979 and its sibling 929 also adds the PC builder's own internal USB expansion, which supplies added power to the normally weak front USB ports and also supplies Bluetooth.

The 922 SLC as the relative budget model starts at $990 but still comes outfitted with a 2.8GHz Core i7, 4GB of RAM, a 500GB hard drive and a GeForce GT 220 for its graphics. A lone AMD model, the $1,550 559 SLC, centers on a 3.4GHz Phenom II, doubles memory and storage to 8GB and 1TB respectively, and upgrades the video to a GeForce GTX 295. An Intel alternative at the same price, the 919 SLC, opts for a 2.93GHz Core i7 and a Radeon HD 4890 instead.

At the very high end, the 929 SLC has just 6GB of memory but gets a 3.33GHz Core i7, GeForce GTX 285 video and Blu-ray at its $2,500 price point. The 979 SLC opts for two GeForce GTX 295 cards to provide four-way SLI, adds a DVD burner as a second optical drive, and uses a 128GB solid-state drive as a boot drive while turning to a 1.5TB disk for the brunt of its storage. All the extra features give the 979 a $4,000 price.

The complete line

Sources from:electronista

MS Office 2010 Beta is available for PC, Cell Phone and Browser

18 November 2009 Microsoft announced the product release version of MS Office 2010 Beta. For PC is 32 and 64bit versions and for Mobile Phone is available for Windows Mobile 6.5 phone.

"We are very pleased to announce the beta version for the 2010 version of Office, SharePoint Server, Visio, Project and Office Web Apps for business customers. Mobile Office 2010 also has reached beta milestone. Starting today customers can download the beta products with visiting http://www.microsoft.com/2010. "Said Kurt DelBene, Senior Vice President for Office Business Productivity Group Microsoft.

MS Office 2010 is also available in mobile version. MS Office users on PCs can now use mobile phonenya to perform the same function on the mobile phonenya. MS Office 2010 available for mobile phones that use Windows Mobile 6.5 phone. MS Office 2010 consists of a mobile version of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote and SharePoint

Sources from: KabarIT

Samsung STORY, HD External 2TB 3Gigabit / Secon

Samsung will soon launch a series of new external HD Samsung STORY using the eSATA interface. Samsung has launched the previous External HD 1.5 TB by using a USB 2.0 interface.

Samsung STORY eSATA storage capacity is increased to 2 TB, but also remain available sizes 1TB and 1.5 TB. Not only that, with the support eSATA interface, the process of data transver reach 3Gigabit/detik or six times faster than the predecessor series that uses USB 2.0

Electrical power needs for the latest Samsung STORY series is no longer just 0.1W to 2.5W as used in the previous series. HD is wrapped with a sporty aluminum body which is also used for Head Sink. Inside there is also Samsung Auto Backup software and a program for SafetyKey data encryption SecretZone and password protection. Samsung plans to sell it at the end of this month at a price of $ 299 for 2 TB capacity.

Source from:electronista

How to Bypass BIOS Passwords

BIOS passwords can add an extra layer of security for desktop and laptop computers. They are used to either prevent a user from changing the BIOS settings or to prevent the PC from booting without a password. Unfortunately, BIOS passwords can also be a liability if a user forgets their password, or changes the password to intentionally lock out the corporate IT department. Sending the unit back to the manufacturer to have the BIOS reset can be expensive and is usually not covered in the warranty. Never fear, all is not lost. There are a few known backdoors and other tricks of the trade that can be used to bypass or reset the BIOS

DISCLAIMER
This article is intended for IT Professionals and systems administrators with experience servicing computer hardware. It is not intended for home users, hackers, or computer thieves attempting to crack the password on a stolen PC. Please do not attempt any of these procedures if you are unfamiliar with computer hardware, and please use this information responsibly. LabMice.net is not responsible for the use or misuse of this material, including loss of data, damage to hardware, or personal injury.

Before attempting to bypass the BIOS password on a computer, please take a minute to contact the hardware manufacturer support staff directly and ask for their recommended methods of bypassing the BIOS security. In the event the manufacturer cannot (or will not) help you, there are a number of methods that can be used to bypass or reset the BIOS password yourself. They include:

Using a manufacturers backdoor password to access the BIOS

Use password cracking software

Reset the CMOS using the jumpers or solder beads.

Removing the CMOS battery for at least 10 minutes

Overloading the keyboard buffer

Using a professional service

Please remember that most BIOS passwords do not protect the hard drive, so if you need to recover the data, simply remove the hard drive and install it in an identical system, or configure it as a slave drive in an existing system. The exception to this are laptops, especially IBM Thinkpads, which silently lock the hard drive if the supervisor password is enabled. If the supervisor password is reset without resetting the and hard drive as well, you will be unable to access the data on the drive.

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Backdoor passwords

Many BIOS manufacturers have provided backdoor passwords that can be used to access the BIOS setup in the event you have lost your password. These passwords are case sensitive, so you may wish to try a variety of combinations. Keep in mind that the key associated to "_" in the US keyboard corresponds to "?" in some European keyboards. Laptops typically have better BIOS security than desktop systems, and we are not aware of any backdoor passwords that will work with name brand laptops.

WARNING: Some BIOS configurations will lock you out of the system completely if you type in an incorrect password more than 3 times. Read your manufacturers documentation for the BIOS setting before you begin typing in passwords

Award BIOS backdoor passwords:

ALFAROME ALLy aLLy aLLY ALLY aPAf _award AWARD_SW AWARD?SW AWARD SW AWARD PW AWKWARD awkward BIOSTAR CONCAT CONDO Condo d8on djonet HLT J64 J256 J262 j332 j322 KDD Lkwpeter LKWPETER PINT pint SER SKY_FOX SYXZ syxz shift + syxz TTPTHA ZAAADA ZBAAACA ZJAAADC 01322222
589589 589721 595595 598598

AMI BIOS backdoor passwords:

AMI AAAMMMIII BIOS PASSWORD HEWITT RAND AMI?SW AMI_SW LKWPETER A.M.I. CONDO

PHOENIX BIOS backdoor passwords:

phoenix, PHOENIX, CMOS, BIOS

MISC. COMMON PASSWORDS

ALFAROME BIOSTAR biostar biosstar CMOS cmos LKWPETER lkwpeter setup SETUP Syxz Wodj

OTHER BIOS PASSWORDS BY MANUFACTURER

Manufacturer Password
VOBIS & IBM merlin
Dell Dell
Biostar Biostar
Compaq Compaq
Enox xo11nE
Epox central
Freetech Posterie
IWill iwill
Jetway spooml
Packard Bell bell9
QDI QDI
Siemens SKY_FOX
TMC BIGO
Toshiba Toshiba

TOSHIBA BIOS

Most Toshiba laptops and some desktop systems will bypass the BIOS password if the left shift key is held down during boot

IBM APTIVA BIOS

Press both mouse buttons repeatedly during the boot

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Password cracking software

The following software can be used to either crack or reset the BIOS on many chipsets. If your PC is locked with a BIOS administrator password that will not allow access to the floppy drive, these utilities may not work. Also, since these utilities do not come from the manufacturer, use them cautiously and at your own risk.

Cmos password recovery tools 3.1
!BIOS (get the how-to article)
RemPass
KILLCMOS

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Using the Motherboard "Clear CMOS" Jumper or Dipswitch settings

Many motherboards feature a set of jumpers or dipswitches that will clear the CMOS and wipe all of the custom settings including BIOS passwords. The locations of these jumpers / dipswitches will vary depending on the motherboard manufacturer and ideally you should always refer to the motherboard or computer manufacturers documentation. If the documentation is unavailable, the jumpers/dipswitches can sometimes be found along the edge of the motherboard, next to the CMOS battery, or near the processor. Some manufacturers may label the jumper / dipswitch CLEAR - CLEAR CMOS - CLR - CLRPWD - PASSWD - PASSWORD - PWD. On laptop computers, the dipswitches are usually found under the keyboard or within a compartment at the bottom of the laptop.
Please remember to unplug your PC and use a grounding strip before reaching into your PC and touching the motherboard. Once you locate and rest the jumper switches, turn the computer on and check if the password has been cleared. If it has, turn the computer off and return the jumpers or dipswitches to its original position.

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Removing the CMOS Battery

The CMOS settings on most systems are buffered by a small battery that is attached to the motherboard. (It looks like a small watch battery). If you unplug the PC and remove the battery for 10-15 minutes, the CMOS may reset itself and the password should be blank. (Along with any other machine specific settings, so be sure you are familiar with manually reconfiguring the BIOS settings before you do this.) Some manufacturers backup the power to the CMOS chipset by using a capacitor, so if your first attempt fails, leave the battery out (with the system unplugged) for at least 24 hours. Some batteries are actually soldered onto the motherboard making this task more difficult. Unsoldering the battery incorrectly may damage your motherboard and other components, so please don't attempt this if you are inexperienced. Another option may be to remove the CMOS chip from the motherboard for a period of time.
Note: Removing the battery to reset the CMOS will not work for all PC's, and almost all of the newer laptops store their BIOS passwords in a manner which does not require continuous power, so removing the CMOS battery may not work at all. IBM Thinkpad laptops lock the hard drive as well as the BIOS when the supervisor password is set. If you reset the BIOS password, but cannot reset the hard drive password, you may not be able to access the drive and it will remain locked, even if you place it in a new laptop. IBM Thinkpads have special jumper switches on the motherboard, and these should be used to reset the system.

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Overloading the KeyBoard Buffer

On some older computer systems, you can force the CMOS to enter its setup screen on boot by overloading the keyboard buffer. This can be done by booting with the keyboard or mouse unattached to the systems, or on some systems by hitting the ESC key over 100 times in rapid succession.

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Jumping the Solder Beads on the CMOS

It is also possible to reset the CMOS by connecting or "jumping" specific solder beads on the chipset. There are too many chipsets to do a breakdown of which points to jump on individual chipsets, and the location of these solder beads can vary by manufacturer, so please check your computer and motherboard documentation for details. This technique is not recommended for the inexperienced and should be only be used as a "last ditch" effort.

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Using a professional service

If the manufacturer of the laptop or desktop PC can't or won't reset the BIOS password, you still have the option of using a professional service. Password Crackers, Inc., offers a variety of services for desktop and laptop computers for between $100 and $400. For most of these services, you'll need to provide some type of legitimate proof of ownership. This may be difficult if you've acquired the computer second hand or from an online auction.

DirectX explained

Ever wondered just what that enigmatic name means?

Gaming and multimedia applications are some of the most satisfying programs you can get for your PC, but getting them to run properly isn’t always as easy as it could be. First, the PC architecture was never designed as a gaming platform. Second, the wide-ranging nature of the PC means that one person’s machine can be different from another. While games consoles all contain the same hardware, PCs don’t: the massive range of difference can make gaming a headache.

To alleviate as much of the pain as possible, Microsoft needed to introduce a common standard which all games and multimedia applications could follow – a common interface between the OS and whatever hardware is installed in the PC, if you like. This common interface is DirectX, something which can be the source of much confusion.

DirectX is an interface designed to make certain programming tasks much easier, for both the game developer and the rest of us who just want to sit down and play the latest blockbuster. Before we can explain what DirectX is and how it works though, we need a little history lesson.

DirectX history
Any game needs to perform certain tasks again and again. It needs to watch for your input from mouse, joystick or keyboard, and it needs to be able to display screen images and play sounds or music. That’s pretty much any game at the most simplistic level.

Imagine how incredibly complex this was for programmers developing on the early pre-Windows PC architecture, then. Each programmer needed to develop their own way of reading the keyboard or detecting whether a joystick was even attached, let alone being used to play the game. Specific routines were needed even to display the simplest of images on the screen or play a simple sound.

Essentially, the game programmers were talking directly to your PC’s hardware at a fundamental level. When Microsoft introduced Windows, it was imperative for the stability and success of the PC platform that things were made easier for both the developer and the player. After all, who would bother writing games for a machine when they had to reinvent the wheel every time they began work on a new game? Microsoft’s idea was simple: stop programmers talking directly to the hardware, and build a common toolkit which they could use instead. DirectX was born.

How it works
At the most basic level, DirectX is an interface between the hardware in your PC and Windows itself, part of the Windows API or Application Programming Interface. Let’s look at a practical example. When a game developer wants to play a sound file, it’s simply a case of using the correct library function. When the game runs, this calls the DirectX API, which in turn plays the sound file. The developer doesn’t need to know what type of sound card he’s dealing with, what it’s capable of, or how to talk to it. Microsoft has provided DirectX, and the sound card manufacturer has provided a DirectX-capable driver. He asks for the sound to be played, and it is – whichever machine it runs on.

From our point of view as gamers, DirectX also makes things incredibly easy – at least in theory. You install a new sound card in place of your old one, and it comes with a DirectX driver. Next time you play your favourite game you can still hear sounds and music, and you haven’t had to make any complex configuration changes.

Originally, DirectX began life as a simple toolkit: early hardware was limited and only the most basic graphical functions were required. As hardware and software has evolved in complexity, so has DirectX. It’s now much more than a graphical toolkit, and the term has come to encompass a massive selection of routines which deal with all sorts of hardware communication. For example, the DirectInput routines can deal with all sorts of input devices, from simple two-button mice to complex flight joysticks. Other parts include DirectSound for audio devices and DirectPlay provides a toolkit for online or multiplayer gaming.

DirectX versions
The current version of DirectX at time of writing is DirectX 9.0. This runs on all versions of Windows from Windows 98 up to and including Windows Server 2003 along with every revision in between. It doesn’t run on Windows 95 though: if you have a machine with Windows 95 installed, you’re stuck with the older and less capable 8.0a. Windows NT 4 also requires a specific version – in this case, it’s DirectX 3.0a.

With so many versions of DirectX available over the years, it becomes difficult to keep track of which version you need. In all but the most rare cases, all versions of DirectX are backwardly compatible – games which say they require DirectX 7 will happily run with more recent versions, but not with older copies. Many current titles explicitly state that they require DirectX 9, and won’t run without the latest version installed. This is because they make use of new features introduced with this version, although it has been known for lazy developers to specify the very latest version as a requirement when the game in question doesn’t use any of the new enhancements. Generally speaking though, if a title is version locked like this, you will need to upgrade before you can play. Improvements to the core DirectX code mean you may even see improvements in many titles when you upgrade to the latest build of DirectX. Downloading and installing DirectX need not be complex, either.

Upgrading DirectX
All available versions of Windows come with DirectX in one form or another as a core system component which cannot be removed, so you should always have at least a basic implementation of the system installed on your PC. However, many new games require the very latest version before they work properly, or even at all.

Generally, the best place to install the latest version of DirectX from is the dedicated section of the Microsoft Web site, which is found at www.microsoft.com/windows/directx. As we went to press, the most recent build available for general download was DirectX 9.0b. You can download either a simple installer which will in turn download the components your system requires as it installs, or download the complete distribution package in one go for later offline installation.

Another good source for DirectX is games themselves. If a game requires a specific version, it’ll be on the installation CD and may even be installed automatically by the game’s installer itself. You won’t find it on magazine cover discs though, thanks to Microsoft’s licensing terms.

Diagnosing problems

Diagnosing problems with a DirectX installation can be problematic, especially if you don’t know which one of the many components is causing your newly purchased game to fall over. Thankfully, Microsoft provides a useful utility called the DirectX Diagnostic Tool, although this isn’t made obvious. You won’t find this tool in the Start Menu with any version of Windows, and each tends to install it in a different place.

The easiest way to use it is to open the Start Menu’s Run dialog, type in dxdiag and then click OK. When the application first loads, it takes a few seconds to interrogate your DirectX installation and find any problems. First, the DirectX Files tab displays version information on each one of the files your installation uses. The Notes section at the bottom is worth checking, as missing or corrupted files will be flagged here.

The tabs marked Display, Sound, Music, Input and Network all relate to specific areas of DirectX, and all but the Input tab provide tools to test the correct functioning on your hardware. Finally, the More Help tab provides a useful way to start the DirectX Troubleshooter, Microsoft’s simple linear problem solving tool for many common DirectX issues.

Cara Menambah Backlink dan Page Ranking

Link Berantai, tepatnya. Jika Anda ingin menambah Backlink di Blog atau Web Anda, tidak ada salahnya Anda mencoba yang satu ini, karena untuk mengikutinya tidak ada biaya sepeserpun. Bahkan selain menambah Backlink, Anda sekaligus juga bisa beriklan. Hanya menampilkan link sebelum anda..
Untuk mengikuti Arisan ini, hanya satu syarat yang dibutuhkan, yaitu KEJUJURAN.

Lakukan semua langkah-langkah yang dicantumkan di bawah ini, dan Copy-Paste Postingan di bawah mulai dari
------ Copy mulai di sini ------sampai dengan ---- SELESAI ----.

------ Copy mulai di sini ------

Mohon baca baik-baik lalu terapkan dengan benar....
Sebuah filosofi mengatakan "Honesty is The Best Policy (Kejujuran adalah politik/strategi terbaik)", inilah yang akan kita buktikan....apakah konsep kejujuran bisa kita olah menghasilkan traffic dan popularity yang lebih hebat dari konsep rumit para expert webmaster atau pakar SEO..?...
Saya yakin bisa asal konsep ini di jalankan dengan benar...,bila ini di terapkan pada web anda sesuai ketentuan maka:
-Web anda akan kebanjiran traffic pengunjung secara luar biasa hari demi hari, tanpa perlu repot-repot memikirkan SEO atau capek-capek promosi keberbagai tempat di dunia internet.
-Web anda akan kebanjiran backlink secara luarbiasa hari demi hari, tanpa perlu repot-repot berburu link keberbagai tempat di dunia internet.
Yang perlu anda lakukan adalah ikuti langkah-langkah berikut :

a.) Buat posting artikel seperti posting saya ini, atau copy-paste posting ini. Beri Judul terserah anda (sebab itu merupakan SEO buat blog anda sendiri ).
b.) Anda hanya perlu meletakkan Link-Link di bawah ini pada postingan anda.

1. http://www.bayipertama.blogspot.com/
2. http://www.barumenikah.blogspot.com/
3. http://www.invest77.com/
4. http://www.pabrikweb.blogspot.com/
5. http://www.brokerlink.info/
6. http://zona-usaha.blogspot.com/
7. http://oce-modifblog.blogspot.com/
8. http://eko-wijayanto.blogspot.com/
9. http://dorara-marii.blogspot.com/
10.http://comtech-new.blogspot.com

c.) Anda harus mengunjungi kesetiap blog yang ada didaftar atas sekarang juga (1x saja sudah cukup)
(supaya tidak lupa)

PERATURAN :
1. Sebelum anda meletakkan Link-Link di atas di dalam postingan blog anda, silahkan anda hapus Link nomor 1, Sehingga link no 1 hilang dari daftar link dan setiap link akan naik 1 level ke atas. Yang tadinya no 2 naik menjadi no 1, yang tadinya no 3 menjadi no 2, yang tadinya no 4 menjadi no 3 dan seterusnya. Setelah itu masukkan Link anda pada urutan Paling bawah ( nomor 10 ).
2. Dilarang Merubah Urutan daftar link
Jika blogger yang ikut dalam konsep ini berhasil di duplikasi oleh blogger lain yang akan bergabung, misalnya 5 blogger yang bergabung maka Backlink yang anda dapat adalah
Ketika posisi anda 10, jumlah backlink = 1
Posisi 9, jml backlink = 5
Posisi 8, jml backlink = 25
Posisi 7, jml backlink = 125
Posisi 6, jml backlink = 625
Posisi 5, jml backlink = 3.125
Posisi 4, jml backlink = 15.625
Posisi 3, jml backlink = 78.125
Posisi 2, jml backlink = 390.625
Posisi 1, jml backlink = 1.953.125
Dan semua Dari kata kunci yang anda inginkan, bayangkan jika itu berhasil dari segi SEO anda sudah mendapat 1.953.125yang entah dari mana asalnya yang tersebar di mana-mana. Belum lagi jika ada yang mengunjungi blog anda dari Link List di atas secara otomatis anda mendapat traffic blog juga.
Ingat Anda harus memulai dari urutan paling bawah ( no 10 ) agar hasil backlink anda Maksimal, Jangan salahkan saya jika anda tidak menjalankan konsep ini dengan benar dan Link anda tiba-tiba berada pada urutan no 1 dan menghilang pada Link daftar. Jadi mulai lah pada urutan paling akhir.( no 10 ).
ingat kunjungi 10 blog yang ada dalam daftar yang anda terima sekarang juga (supaya tidak kelupaan)

Bisakah kita berbuat tidak fair atau tidak jujur menyabotase konsep ini, misalnya "menghilangkan semua link asal" lalu di isi dengan web/blog kita sendiri...?....Bisa, dan konsep ini tidak akan menjadi maksimal untuk membuktikan Kejujuran adalah strategi/politik terbaik.....Tapi saya yakin bahwa kita semua tak ingin menjatuhkan kredibilitas diri sendiri dengan melakukan tindakan murahan seperti itu...

---- SELESAI ----

Catatan:
- Sekali lagi saya ingin mengingatkan, KEJUJURAN Anda sangat diharapkan untuk berjalannya Arisan Backlink ini.
- Kunjungilah semua alamat yang tertera di atas, meskipun hanya 5 detik.
- Hati-hati dalam memasang Link-link ( yang berjumlah 10 buah Link), karena dengan banyaknya Link yang dipasang, bisa saja Anda keliru/tertukar dalam pemasangannya.
- Anda bisa menambah sedikit basa-basi sebelum/sesudah postingan yang harus di Copy-Paste.

Letakkan link anda di urutan paling bawah! (No.10)
Jadi setiap org yang memposting urutan berada di bawah, jika link anda diletakkan di atas kerugian tetap di anda sendiri karena link anda akan hilang jika artikel di sebarkan lagi, tentu percuma anda mengikuti program ini. Jadi urutkan dengan benar.

1. http://www.bayipertama.blogspot.com/
2. http://www.barumenikah.blogspot.com/
3. http://www.invest77.com/
4. http://www.pabrikweb.blogspot.com/
5. http://www.brokerlink.info/
6. http://zona-usaha.blogspot.com/
7. http://oce-modifblog.blogspot.com/
8. http://eko-wijayanto.blogspot.com/
9. http://dorara-marii.blogspot.com/
10.http://comtech-new.blogspot.com/

source from: dorara-marii
thanks to dorara

Firefox Speed Tweaks

Yes, firefox is already pretty damn fast but did you know that you can tweak it and improve the speed even more?

That's the beauty of this program being open source.
Here's what you do:
In the URL bar, type “about:config” and press enter. This will bring up the configuration “menu” where you can change the parameters of Firefox.

Note that these are what I’ve found to REALLY speed up my Firefox significantly - and these settings seem to be common among everybody else as well. But these settings are optimized for broadband connections - I mean with as much concurrent requests we’re going to open up with pipelining… lol… you’d better have a big connection.

Double Click on the following settins and put in the numbers below - for the true / false booleans - they’ll change when you double click.

Code:
browser.tabs.showSingleWindowModePrefs – true
network.http.max-connections – 48
network.http.max-connections-per-server – 16
network.http.max-persistent-connections-per-proxy – 8
network.http.max-persistent-connections-per-server – 4
network.http.pipelining – true
network.http.pipelining.maxrequests – 100
network.http.proxy.pipelining – true
network.http.request.timeout – 300

One more thing… Right-click somewhere on that screen and add a NEW -> Integer. Name it “nglayout.initialpaint.delay” and set its value to “0”. This value is the amount of time the browser waits before it acts on information it receives. Since you’re broadband - it shouldn’t have to wait.

Now you should notice you’re loading pages MUCH faster now!

A Basic Guide the Internet

The Internet is a computer network made up of thousands of networks worldwide. No one knows exactly how many computers are connected to the Internet. It is certain, however, that these number in the millions.

No one is in charge of the Internet. There are organizations which develop technical aspects of this network and set standards for creating applications on it, but no governing body is in control. The Internet backbone, through which Internet traffic flows, is owned by private companies.

All computers on the Internet communicate with one another using the Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol suite, abbreviated to TCP/IP. Computers on the Internet use a client/server architecture. This means that the remote server machine provides files and services to the user's local client machine. Software can be installed on a client computer to take advantage of the latest access technology.

An Internet user has access to a wide variety of services: electronic mail, file transfer, vast information resources, interest group membership, interactive collaboration, multimedia displays, real-time broadcasting, shopping opportunities, breaking news, and much more.

The Internet consists primarily of a variety of access protocols. Many of these protocols feature programs that allow users to search for and retrieve material made available by the protocol.

COMPONENTS OF THE INTERNET

WORLD WIDE WEB
The World Wide Web (abbreviated as the Web or WWW) is a system of Internet servers that supports hypertext to access several Internet protocols on a single interface. Almost every protocol type available on the Internet is accessible on the Web. This includes e-mail, FTP, Telnet, and Usenet News. In addition to these, the World Wide Web has its own protocol: HyperText Transfer Protocol, or HTTP. These protocols will be explained later in this document.

The World Wide Web provides a single interface for accessing all these protocols. This creates a convenient and user-friendly environment. It is no longer necessary to be conversant in these protocols within separate, command-level environments. The Web gathers together these protocols into a single system. Because of this feature, and because of the Web's ability to work with multimedia and advanced programming languages, the Web is the fastest-growing component of the Internet.

The operation of the Web relies primarily on hypertext as its means of information retrieval. HyperText is a document containing words that connect to other documents. These words are called links and are selectable by the user. A single hypertext document can contain links to many documents. In the context of the Web, words or graphics may serve as links to other documents, images, video, and sound. Links may or may not follow a logical path, as each connection is programmed by the creator of the source document. Overall, the Web contains a complex virtual web of connections among a vast number of documents, graphics, videos, and sounds.

Producing hypertext for the Web is accomplished by creating documents with a language called HyperText Markup Language, or HTML. With HTML, tags are placed within the text to accomplish document formatting, visual features such as font size, italics and bold, and the creation of hypertext links. Graphics and multimedia may also be incorporated into an HTML document. HTML is an evolving language, with new tags being added as each upgrade of the language is developed and released. The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), led by Web founder Tim Berners-Lee, coordinates the efforts of standardizing HTML. The W3C now calls the language XHTML and considers it to be an application of the XML language standard.

The World Wide Web consists of files, called pages or home pages, containing links to documents and resources throughout the Internet.

The Web provides a vast array of experiences including multimedia presentations, real-time collaboration, interactive pages, radio and television broadcasts, and the automatic "push" of information to a client computer. Programming languages such as Java, JavaScript, Visual Basic, Cold Fusion and XML are extending the capabilities of the Web. A growing amount of information on the Web is served dynamically from content stored in databases. The Web is therefore not a fixed entity, but one that is in a constant state of development and flux.

For more complete information about the World Wide Web, see Understanding The World Wide Web.

E-MAIL
Electronic mail, or e-mail, allows computer users locally and worldwide to exchange messages. Each user of e-mail has a mailbox address to which messages are sent. Messages sent through e-mail can arrive within a matter of seconds.

A powerful aspect of e-mail is the option to send electronic files to a person's e-mail address. Non-ASCII files, known as binary files, may be attached to e-mail messages. These files are referred to as MIME attachments.MIME stands for Multimedia Internet Mail Extension, and was developed to help e-mail software handle a variety of file types. For example, a document created in Microsoft Word can be attached to an e-mail message and retrieved by the recipient with the appropriate e-mail program. Many e-mail programs, including Eudora, Netscape Messenger, and Microsoft Outlook, offer the ability to read files written in HTML, which is itself a MIME type.

TELNET
Telnet is a program that allows you to log into computers on the Internet and use online databases, library catalogs, chat services, and more. There are no graphics in Telnet sessions, just text. To Telnet to a computer, you must know its address. This can consist of words (locis.loc.gov) or numbers (140.147.254.3). Some services require you to connect to a specific port on the remote computer. In this case, type the port number after the Internet address. Example: telnet nri.reston.va.us 185.

Telnet is available on the World Wide Web. Probably the most common Web-based resources available through Telnet have been library catalogs, though most catalogs have since migrated to the Web. A link to a Telnet resource may look like any other link, but it will launch a Telnet session to make the connection. A Telnet program must be installed on your local computer and configured to your Web browser in order to work.

With the increasing popularity of the Web, Telnet has become less frequently used as a means of access to information on the Internet.

FTP
FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol. This is both a program and the method used to transfer files between computers. Anonymous FTP is an option that allows users to transfer files from thousands of host computers on the Internet to their personal computer account. FTP sites contain books, articles, software, games, images, sounds, multimedia, course work, data sets, and more.

If your computer is directly connected to the Internet via an Ethernet cable, you can use one of several PC software programs, such as WS_FTP for Windows, to conduct a file transfer.

FTP transfers can be performed on the World Wide Web without the need for special software. In this case, the Web browser will suffice. Whenever you download software from a Web site to your local machine, you are using FTP. You can also retrieve FTP files via search engines such as FtpFind, located at /http://www.ftpfind.com/. This option is easiest because you do not need to know FTP program commands.

E-MAIL DISCUSSION GROUPS
One of the benefits of the Internet is the opportunity it offers to people worldwide to communicate via e-mail. The Internet is home to a large community of individuals who carry out active discussions organized around topic-oriented forums distributed by e-mail. These are administered by software programs. Probably the most common program is the listserv.

A great variety of topics are covered by listservs, many of them academic in nature. When you subscribe to a listserv, messages from other subscribers are automatically sent to your electronic mailbox. You subscribe to a listserv by sending an e-mail message to a computer program called a listserver. Listservers are located on computer networks throughout the world. This program handles subscription information and distributes messages to and from subscribers. You must have a e-mail account to participate in a listserv discussion group. Visit Tile.net at /http://tile.net/ to see an example of a site that offers a searchablecollection of e-mail discussion groups.

Majordomo and Listproc are two other programs that administer e-mail discussion groups. The commands for subscribing to and managing your list memberships are similar to those of listserv.

USENET NEWS
Usenet News is a global electronic bulletin board system in which millions of computer users exchange information on a vast range of topics. The major difference between Usenet News and e-mail discussion groups is the fact that Usenet messages are stored on central computers, and users must connect to these computers to read or download the messages posted to these groups. This is distinct from e-mail distribution, in which messages arrive in the electronic mailboxes of each list member.

Usenet itself is a set of machines that exchanges messages, or articles, from Usenet discussion forums, called newsgroups. Usenet administrators control their own sites, and decide which (if any) newsgroups to sponsor and which remote newsgroups to allow into the system.

There are thousands of Usenet newsgroups in existence. While many are academic in nature, numerous newsgroups are organized around recreational topics. Much serious computer-related work takes place in Usenet discussions. A small number of e-mail discussion groups also exist as Usenet newsgroups.

The Usenet newsfeed can be read by a variety of newsreader software programs. For example, the Netscape suite comes with a newsreader program called Messenger. Newsreaders are also available as standalone products.

FAQ, RFC, FYI
FAQ stands for Frequently Asked Questions. These are periodic postings to Usenet newsgroups that contain a wealth of information related to the topic of the newsgroup. Many FAQs are quite extensive. FAQs are available by subscribing to individual Usenet newsgroups. A Web-based collection of FAQ resources has been collected by The Internet FAQ Consortium and is available at /http://www.faqs.org/.

RFC stands for Request for Comments. These are documents created by and distributed to the Internet community to help define the nuts and bolts of the Internet. They contain both technical specifications and general information.

FYI stands for For Your Information. These notes are a subset of RFCs and contain information of interest to new Internet users.

Links to indexes of all three of these information resources are available on the University Libraries Web site at /http://library.albany.edu/reference/faqs.html.

CHAT & INSTANT MESSENGING
Chat programs allow users on the Internet to communicate with each other by typing in real time. They are sometimes included as a feature of a Web site, where users can log into the "chat room" to exchange comments and information about the topics addressed on the site. Chat may take other, more wide-ranging forms. For example, America Online is well known for sponsoring a number of topical chat rooms.

Internet Relay Chat (IRC) is a service through which participants can communicate to each other on hundreds of channels. These channels are usually based on specific topics. While many topics are frivolous, substantive conversations are also taking place. To access IRC, you must use an IRC software program.

A variation of chat is the phenomenon of instant messenging. With instant messenging, a user on the Web can contact another user currently logged in and type a conversation. Most famous is America Online's Instant Messenger. ICQ, MSN and Yahoo are other commonly-used chat programs.

Other types of real-time communication are addressed in the tutorial Understanding the World Wide Web.

MUD/MUSH/MOO/MUCK/DUM/MUSE
MUD stands for Multi User Dimension. MUDs, and their variations listed above, are multi-user virtual reality games based on simulated worlds. Traditionally text based, graphical MUDs now exist. There are MUDs of all kinds on the Internet, and many can be joined free of charge. For more information, read one of the FAQs devoted to MUDs available at the FAQ site at

Bit Torrent Tutorials

The first things you need to know about using Bit Torrent:
-- Bit Torrent is aimed at broadband users (or any connection better than dialup).
-- Sharing is highly appreciated, and sharing is what keeps bit torrent alive.
-- A bit torrent file (*.torrent) contains information about the piece structure of the download (more on this later)
-- The method of downloading is not your conventional type of download. Since downloads do not come in as one
big chunk, you are able to download from many people at once, increasing your download speeds. There may be
100 "pieces" to a file, or 20,000+ pieces, all depending on what you're downloading. Pieces are usually small (under 200kb)
-- The speeds are based upon people sharing as they download, and seeders. Seeders are people who constantly
share in order to keep torrents alive. Usually seeders are on fast connections (10mb or higher).

In this tutorial, I will be describing it all using a bit torrent client called Azureus. This client is used to decode the .torrent files into a useable format to download from other peers. From here on out, I will refer to Bit Torrent as BT.

Which BT client you use, is purely up to you. I have tried them all, and my personal favorite is Azureus for many reasons. A big problem with most BT clients out there, is that they are extremely CPU intensive, usually using 100% of your cpu power during the whole process. This is the number one reason I use Azureus. Another, is a recently released plug-in that enables you to browse all current files listed on suprnova.org (the #1 source for torrent downloads).

Before you use the plug-in, take a look at /http://www.suprnova.org, and browse the files. Hold your mouse over the links, and you'll notice every file ends in .torrent. This is the BT file extension. Usually, .torrent files are very small, under 200kb. They contain a wealth of information about the file you want to download. A .torrent file can contain just 1 single file, or a a directory full of files and more directories. But regardless, every download is split up into hundreds or thousands of pieces. The pieces make it much easier to download at higher speeds. Back to suprnova.org. Look at the columns:

Added Name Filesize Seeds DLs (and a few more which aren't very useful.)

I'll break this down.
Added: Self explanitory, its the date the torrent was added.
Name: Also self explanitory.
Filesize: Duh
Seeds: This is how many people are strictly UPLOADING, or sharing. These people are the ones that keep .torrent files alive. By "alive", I mean, if there's no one sharing the .torrent file, no one can download.
DLs: This is how many people currently downloading that particular torrent. They also help keep the torrent alive as they share while they download.

It's always best to download using a torrent that has a decent amount of seeders and downloaders, this way you can be assured there's a good chance your download will finish. The more the better.

Now that you should understand how torrent files work, and how to use them, on to Azureus!
First, get JAVA! You need this to run Azureus, as java is what powers it. Get Java here: /http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.2/download.html
Next, get Azureus at: /http://azureus.sourceforge.net
Next, get the Suprnovalister plugin from /http://s93732957.onlinehome.us/storage/suprnovalister.jar

Install Java JRE before you do ANYTHING.

Install Azureus, and then in the installation folder, create 2 more folders. ./Plugins/suprnovalister (For example, if you installed Azureus to C:\PROGRAM FILES\AZUREUS, create C:\PROGRAM FILES\AZUREUS\PLUGINS\SUPRNOVALISTER). Next, put the suprnovalister.jar file that you downloaded, in that folder.

Load up Azureus, and if you want, go through the settings and personalize it.

The tab labeled "My Torrents" is the section of Azureus you need the most often. That lists all your transfers, uploads and downloads. It shows every bit of information you could possibly want to know about torrents you download.

In the menu bar, go to View > Plugins > Suprnova Lister. This will open up a new tab in Azureus. Click on "Update Mirror". This will get a mirror site of suprnova.org containing all current torrent files available. Once a mirror is grabbed, choose a category from the drop-down box to the left and click "Update". Wah-lah, all the available downloads appear in the main chart above. Just double click a download you want, and bang its starting to download. Open the "My Torrents" tab again to view and make sure your download started.

After your download has finished, be nice, and leave the torrent transferring. So people can get pieces of the file from you, just as you got pieces from other people.

Alternatively, if you don't want to use the plugin... you can just head to suprnova.org and download files to any folder. Then go to File > Open > .torrent File in Azureus.

This should about wrap it up for the Bit Torrent Tutorial. If you guys think of anything I should add, or whatnot, just let me know and I'll check into it.

Central processing unit

The Central Processing Unit (CPU) or processor is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, and is the primary element carrying out the computer's functions. This term has been in use in the computer industry at least since the early 1960s (Weik 2007). The form, design and implementation of CPUs have changed dramatically since the earliest examples, but their fundamental operation remains much the same.

Early CPUs were custom-designed as a part of a larger, sometimes one-of-a-kind, computer. However, this costly method of designing custom CPUs for a particular application has largely given way to the development of mass-produced processors that are made for one or many purposes. This standardization trend generally began in the era of discrete transistor mainframes and minicomputers and has rapidly accelerated with the popularization of the integrated circuit (IC). The IC has allowed increasingly complex CPUs to be designed and manufactured to tolerances on the order of nanometers. Both the miniaturization and standardization of CPUs have increased the presence of these digital devices in modern life far beyond the limited application of dedicated computing machines. Modern microprocessors appear in everything from automobiles to cell phones and children's toys.

History :
Computers such as the ENIAC had to be physically rewired in order to perform different tasks. These machines are often referred to as "fixed-program computers," since they had to be physically reconfigured in order to run a different program. Since the term "CPU" is generally defined as a software (computer program) execution device, the earliest devices that could rightly be called CPUs came with the advent of the stored-program computer.

The idea of program computer was already present in the design of J. Presper Eckert and John William Mauchly's ENIAC, but was initially omitted so the machine could be finished sooner. On June 30, 1945, before ENIAC was even completed, mathematician John von Neumann distributed the paper entitled "First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC." It outlined the design of a stored-program computer that would eventually be completed in August 1949 (von Neumann 1945). EDVAC was designed to perform a certain number of instructions (or operations) of various types. These instructions could be combined to create useful programs for the EDVAC to run. Significantly, the programs written for EDVAC were stored in high-speed computer memory rather than specified by the physical wiring of the computer. This overcame a severe limitation of ENIAC, which was the considerable time and effort required to reconfigure the computer to perform a new task. With von Neumann's design, the program, or software, that EDVAC ran could be changed simply by changing the contents of the computer's memory.[1]

While von Neumann is most often credited with the design of the stored-program computer because of his design of EDVAC, others before him, such as Konrad Zuse, had suggested and implemented similar ideas. The so-called Harvard architecture of the Harvard Mark I, which was completed before EDVAC, also utilized a stored-program design using punched paper tape rather than electronic memory. The key difference between the von Neumann and Harvard architectures is that the latter separates the storage and treatment of CPU instructions and data, while the former uses the same memory space for both. Most modern CPUs are primarily von Neumann in design, but elements of the Harvard architecture are commonly seen as well.

EDVAC, one of the first electronic stored program computers.
As a digital device, a CPU is limited to a set of discrete states, and requires some kind of switching elements to differentiate between and change states. Prior to commercial development of the transistor, electrical relays and vacuum tubes (thermionic valves) were commonly used as switching elements. Although these had distinct speed advantages over earlier, purely mechanical designs, they were unreliable for various reasons. For example, building direct current sequential logic circuits out of relays requires additional hardware to cope with the problem of contact bounce. While vacuum tubes do not suffer from contact bounce, they must heat up before becoming fully operational, and they eventually cease to function due to slow contamination of their cathodes that occurs in the course of normal operation. If a tube's vacuum seal leaks, as sometimes happens, cathode contamination is accelerated. See vacuum tube. Usually, when a tube failed, the CPU would have to be diagnosed to locate the failed component so it could be replaced. Therefore, early electronic (vacuum tube based) computers were generally faster but less reliable than electromechanical (relay based) computers.

Tube computers like EDVAC tended to average eight hours between failures, whereas relay computers like the (slower, but earlier) Harvard Mark I failed very rarely (Weik 1961:238). In the end, tube based CPUs became dominant because the significant speed advantages afforded generally outweighed the reliability problems. Most of these early synchronous CPUs ran at low clock rates compared to modern microelectronic designs (see below for a discussion of clock rate). Clock signal frequencies ranging from 100 kHz to 4 MHz were very common at this time, limited largely by the speed of the switching devices they were built with.

Discrete transistor and Integrated Circuit CPUs :
The design complexity of CPUs increased as various technologies facilitated building smaller and more reliable electronic devices. The first such improvement came with the advent of the transistor. Transistorized CPUs during the 1950s and 1960s no longer had to be built out of bulky, unreliable, and fragile switching elements like vacuum tubes and electrical relays. With this improvement more complex and reliable CPUs were built onto one or several printed circuit boards containing discrete (individual) components.

During this period, a method of manufacturing many transistors in a compact space gained popularity. The integrated circuit (IC) allowed a large number of transistors to be manufactured on a single semiconductor-based die, or "chip." At first only very basic non-specialized digital circuits such as NOR gates were miniaturized into ICs. CPUs based upon these "building block" ICs are generally referred to as "small-scale integration" (SSI) devices. SSI ICs, such as the ones used in the Apollo guidance computer, usually contained transistor counts numbering in multiples of ten. To build an entire CPU out of SSI ICs required thousands of individual chips, but still consumed much less space and power than earlier discrete transistor designs. As microelectronic technology advanced, an increasing number of transistors were placed on ICs, thus decreasing the quantity of individual ICs needed for a complete CPU. MSI and LSI (medium- and large-scale integration) ICs increased transistor counts to hundreds, and then thousands.

CPU, core memory, and external bus interface of a DEC PDP-8/I. made of medium-scale integrated circuits

In 1964 IBM introduced its System/360 computer architecture which was used in a series of computers that could run the same programs with different speed and performance. This was significant at a time when most electronic computers were incompatible with one another, even those made by the same manufacturer. To facilitate this improvement, IBM utilized the concept of a microprogram (often called "microcode"), which still sees widespread usage in modern CPUs (Amdahl et al. 1964). The System/360 architecture was so popular that it dominated the mainframe computer market for the decades and left a legacy that is still continued by similar modern computers like the IBM zSeries. In the same year (1964), Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) introduced another influential computer aimed at the scientific and research markets, the PDP-8. DEC would later introduce the extremely popular PDP-11 line that originally was built with SSI ICs but was eventually implemented with LSI components once these became practical. In stark contrast with its SSI and MSI predecessors, the first LSI implementation of the PDP-11 contained a CPU composed of only four LSI integrated circuits (Digital Equipment Corporation 1975).

Transistor-based computers had several distinct advantages over their predecessors. Aside from facilitating increased reliability and lower power consumption, transistors also allowed CPUs to operate at much higher speeds because of the short switching time of a transistor in comparison to a tube or relay. Thanks to both the increased reliability as well as the dramatically increased speed of the switching elements (which were almost exclusively transistors by this time), CPU clock rates in the tens of megahertz were obtained during this period. Additionally while discrete transistor and IC CPUs were in heavy usage, new high-performance designs like SIMD (Single Instruction Multiple Data) vector processors began to appear. These early experimental designs later gave rise to the era of specialized supercomputers like those made by Cray Inc.

source : WIKIPEDIA or LINK