Modern PC News for the Week Ending July 31, 2003
Commodore.ca |
Cheap Biometrics Aren't Coming Because They're
Already Here
I need to get rid of more passwords for senior
management and at the same time increase security without spending real money.
How can this be accomplished you ask; two words: fingerprint reader.
The new readers are cheap...
really cheap. Compaq / HP's PC card for laptops is just US$170 and the
little reader on the right is just US$149. Better than cheap, they are
available. OK, you'll still have difficulty finding them at BestBuy or
Future Shop, but right now you can source them from dozens of
on-line retailers in the US and Canada.
Now you may say to yourself,
"Wait a minute I saw a TV show exposing the huge flaws in these devices.
You can just take a piece of tape, put it on your 'victims' finger to get a copy
of their fingerprint and then with a little luck, BINGO, you've fooled the
reader." Well I suppose that it technically possible and if you are really
worried about this you can get more expensive units that also check for a pulse.
However you have to ask yourself,
who the Hell is going to get the CEO's fingerprints on a piece of tape???
I mean, come on man... it's just not going to happen! If you are the
President of Royal Bank or the Queen of England then yes, you likely need to
invest in the more expensive equipment. A fingerprint is 100's of times more
secure than a complex, frequently changing password that senior management uses
today.
Companies that are over the top
about security could buy cheap scanners and require a small numeric password
that changes much less frequently than standard passwords. This
combination of biometrics and basic password authentication will surely provide
a ridiculously high level of security not required for 99% of users.
There are lots of other Biometric
devices around but none are as cheap, reliable and accurate as fingerprint
scanners. In the next few years beefier versions of these cheap fingerprint
readers will replace proximity scanners (ya' know those silly magnetic cards we
all carry around your neck on a string unless you've lost yours or lent to our friend because they forgot theirs)
for control or everything from washroom doors to cell phones.
|
Biometric |
Verify |
ID |
Accuracy |
Reliability |
Error Rate |
Errors |
False Pos. |
False Neg. |
|
Fingerprint |
 |
|
 |
 |
1 in 500+ |
dryness, dirt, age |
Ext. Diff. |
Ext. Diff. |
|
Facial Recognition |
|
 |
 |
 |
no data |
lighting, age, glasses, hair |
Difficult |
Easy |
|
Hand Geometry |
|
|
|
|
1 in 500 |
hand injury, age |
Very Diff. |
Medium |
|
Speaker Recognition |
|
|
 |
 |
1 in 50 |
noise, weather, colds |
Medium |
Easy |
|
Iris Scan |
|
|
|
|
1 in 131,000 |
poor lighting |
Very Diff. |
Very Diff. |
|
Retinal Scan |
|
|
|
|
1 in 10,000,000 |
glasses |
Ext. Diff. |
Ext. Diff. |
|
Signature Recognition |
|
|
|
|
1 in 50 |
changing signatures |
Medium |
Easy |
|
Keystroke Recognition |
|
|
 |
|
no data |
hand injury, tiredness |
Difficult |
Easy |
|
DNA |
|
|
|
|
no data |
none |
Ext. Diff. |
Ext. Diff. |
Source (includes evaluation
criteria definitions):
http://ctl.ncsc.dni.us/biomet%20web/BMCompare.html
For an interesting short history
of fingerprinting (including new electronic biometrics) click
HERE.
As an IT professional, it's
really hard to take seriously the issue of urgent PC and software replacement
when the people telling you that it needs to be done are the largest
beneficiaries of it. It gets really difficult to hear " you should replace your
PC infrastructure," when it's Intel, whose processors are on a major number of
machines, telling you to do it. Same goes for software.
Regretfully, many of the benefits
that come from newer software aren't worth the money spent on the software. The
best example is Office XP, which doesn't have enough in it to warrant buying it
if you lave Office 2000. Even Office 97 has more than enough features on
it to still be competitive today, since the majority of users don't even know
all of the features on 97, let alone how to use them. It's even worse on .he
newer office programs.
 The
hum of devices that monitor Internet traffic is the sound that helps police the
web to hunt down individuals illegally swapping songs.
Click the picture to see the video.
We've seen some bizarre PC case
modifications in our time, but this one takes the cake. One Russ Caslis has
built a PC into the Millennium Falcon.
Yes, Han Solo's famous smuggling vessel - 'You've never heard of the Millennium
Falcon?' 'Should I have?' 'It's the ship the made the Kessel run in less than 12
parsecs...' - now comes equipped with 7GB of hard disk storage, USB ports, PS/2
ports, network adaptor, 800MHz Via C3 processor, 256MB of 133MHz SDRAM memory
and the works. Alas there's no CD or floppy, but who needs diskettes when you're
outrunning Imperial cruisers?
...Oh, and he added working blue
engine lights to the back of the ship, activated from a switch panel mounted
inside the ship's cockpit, along with PC power and reset controls. Russ even
mounted six small fans into the vessel's primary dorsal exhaust ports.
You can read Russ' mod notes
here.
 Fast
food is now being served with fast Internet connections as McDonalds is rolling
out wireless web access in select restaurants. $4.95 gets you 802.11 access.
Click the picture to see the video.
The 20-ms line
has now been crossed. And with it, most of the afterglow problem common to flat
panels is solved. For our fourth set of comparative tests of the best currently
available17-inch monitors, we had two questions to address: can you play games
and edit images on them?
...Take
a one-year-old monitor. A year ago, excessive afterglow (blurring at every
movement on screen) meant it was no good for fast action games. And its colors
were not true enough for touching up photos. We realized that two important
factors had a major influence on these issues: response time and contrast
levels.
The response time is the average time required for a liquid
crystal cell to go from active to inactive and back to active again. Roughly
speaking, it refers to the time needed for a pixel to change from black to white
and black again. The time is expressed in milliseconds, and the longer it takes,
the slower the monitor's reaction. There is a direct link with image output, as
well. For example, a 20-ms monitor will display 1/0.020: 50 dark then light
images per second, or a total of 100 images per second.
The contrast level is the ratio between an image's brightest
and dark points. The higher it is, the better the monitor will reproduce
 in-between
shades. In practice, this level gives the number of grays the monitor can
display.
...16-ms and 20-ms monitors may be on the increase, but not a
lot has actually changed. The big names like LG and Samsung did not get their
panels out in time, so for the moment, all the 20-ms monitors have Hyundai
panels and all the 16-ms monitors are from AU Optronics.
Remember that the panel is the main part of a monitor. It is
made up of liquid crystal cells overlaid with red, green and blue filters, neon
tubes and reflectors (see
this chart). Two monitors using the same panel will have a similar,
if not identical, display. So, in spite of some substantial price differences
(double in some cases), you will often find the same quality whatever the brand.
The differences are mainly due to design factors, which make the monitor more or
less attractive, and to more or less acceptable default settings.
...When we tested the first monitors of this kind, the Iiyama
AS4314UTG and Hitachi CML174SXW, we were surprised to find much less afterglow
on the 20-ms monitor than on the 16-ms. We have gone into this matter since
then, and it turns out that the term 16 ms is exaggerated. 16 ms (max.)
would be more accurate. If the manufacturers were really frank about this, they
would indicate that 16-ms panels only display 262,000 colors instead of the
usual 16 million. In fact, AU Optronics uses its extra fast response time to
display 16 million colors in the end. With luck, the color your game needs will
be one of the 262,000available to start with and, if so, the response time
actually will be 16 ms...
Experts were quick to take issue
with the University of Calgary Department of Computer Science's decision last
month to offer a virus and malware course. The course will commence this fall.
Along with focusing on legal, ethical and computer security issues, students
will be shown how to develop computer viruses, worms and Trojan horses.
Jan Hruska, CEO of antivirus vendor Sophos Inc., said in a statement that those
who have engaged in writing viruses need not apply to the company for a job.
"You are of no use to us. The skills required to write good antivirus software
are far removed from those needed to write a virus," he said in the statement.
In a statement on the university's Web site, the U of C outlined the rationale
for offering the course. "In order to develop more secure software, and
countermeasures for malicious software, you first need to know how malicious
software works and the mindset of its creator."
TomsHardware.com |
WinFS is Destined to Supersede FAT and NTFS
If you want A LOT of technical detail you
should read the full article by clicking on the link above.
Around 20 years
ago, Microsoft's widely used MS DOS 2.0 operating system could only handle hard
drives up to 16 MB. Yet, for the few people using PCs back then, what
today seems like a ridiculous memory limitation was not actually a problem,
since "mass storage" in those days was about as expensive as a color TV....
...That was scarcely 25 years ago, but many computer
generations later, the problem has been turned on its head. Developers don't
have to struggle with restrictions on hard-drive capacities; instead, they have
their hands full managing gigantic quantities of data on storage media virtually
unlimited in size. FAT systems were never designed to cope with several hundred
MB of data on disks of 200 GB.
The dilemma has prompted Microsoft to take action with its
next Windows generation. The Windows Future Storage (Win FS) file system will
take its place in Longhorn, the successor to XP. For the first time, a server
technology will manage data on home PCs via a relational database.
Longhorn is
already paving the way to the future with its new filter criteria. It creates
multiple file indexes rather than directory structures, which will subsequently
lose significance.
...there are also
plans to include Win FS in the Windows Server 2003 generation.
German Microsoft employees, meanwhile, seem to think that
integration into Longhorn is by no means a done deal. What is clear, though, is
that Win FS is modeled on the file system of the coming SQL server (Yukon),
whose FS is based entirely on a relational database. NTFS, too, as described
above, already makes a stab at cross-indexing to produce files and folders more
quickly. However, even with far more advanced indexing, Win FS could not make
the claim to a Master File Table à la NTFS.
The new file system is designed to store files based on
various content criteria, e.g., author, contents, names, source medium and the
most recent user. The folder structure shown in the Windows Explorer is thus
reduced to a virtual map. Directory structures provide some guidance but do not
say where data is actually stored, how the system organizes files or the nature
of any data pointers stored with them.
In its latest build (M4), Longhorn contains few hints of the
technology's imminent implementation. One of those is more than 20 MB in size
and bears the name winfs.exe. This file stands for the upcoming Storage Engine.
Currently, however, all existing system files have no function or produce
nothing more than error messages. In the end, Win FS will probably emerge as an
optional file system beside FAT and NTFS. It's also possible that Win FS will
supersede its predecessors, however. That would most likely produce problems for
multi-boot systems, since the only way Windows XP, Longhorn and Linux would all
be able to access one and the same volume would be through complex methods - if
at all.
CNET.com |
Yahoo to Buy Overture for $1.63 Billion
Yahoo announced on Monday its plan to buy search company Overture Services in a
$1.63 billion deal, bolstering its position against rivals Google and Microsoft
in the booming market for Web search advertising.
Yahoo said the deal will allow it to expand its
pay-for-performance search business and to expand contextual advertising
throughout its network. Overture specializes in selling advertising links that
accompany search results on sites such as Yahoo and MSN. It's a market into
which search rival Google has been making inroads.
...The search market will also face new competition from
Microsoft. The software giant recently
launched new software to index Web sites and hired top scientists as part of
its efforts to make headway in the lucrative market.
..."It was really a question of who was going to buy
Overture--Yahoo or MSN," said Li. "The deal would have had big implications for
either company, but I think Yahoo is the better fit, as they were already more
advanced in the paid search market."
...Conceived by co-founders Jerry Yang and David Filo in a
Stanford, Calif., trailer in 1994, much of Yahoo's popularity was built on the
company's search directory, which gave a semblance of order and organization to
the unruly Web. As legend has it, Yahoo was developed by Yang and Filo as a way
to categorize their favorite sumo wrestling Web sites. Even the company
name--originally the acronym "Yet Another Hierarchical Officious
Oracle"--highlighted its directory roots.
But directories, which use human editors rather than automated methods to
rank Web pages, proved unable to keep up with the explosive growth of the Web.
They were largely pushed to the sidelines by so-called algorithmic search
providers such as Inktomi and Google and by the advent of commercial search
providers lead by Overture...
PCMag.com |
Linksys Delivers a Media Hubbub
By Bill Howard
 For
playing MP3 music on your stereo and showing digital photos on your TV, the
Linksys Wireless-B Media Adapter is the new front-runner among digital media
hubs. For $200 (street), the Wireless-B offers essentially the same functions as
the
HP Wireless
Digital Media Receiver ew5000 does for $100 more.
And although the Wireless-B has a few rough edges, the features-to-price ratio
can't be beat.
At 7 by 1 by 5 inches (HWD), the Wireless-B is roughly the size of, well,
just about every other compact Linksys SOHO networking product. The box sits
vertically or horizontally next to your stereo system and television and
connects to your PC via wired or wireless Ethernet. A snippet of always-running
software on the host PC tracks and serves up compressed audio. Like the HP unit,
the Wireless-B also tracks and serves photos. You control everything with yet
another wireless living room remote.
...We saw no noticeable degradation of speed when switching from a 100MB
wired Ethernet connection to an 802.11b wireless connection...
...Still, the Prismiq MediaPlayer, at $250 for a wired Ethernet-only version,
remains our top choice for versatility. It plays PC video and lets you browse
the Web on your TV. HP was a runner-up, and music-only RCA Lyra Wireless RD900W,
at $100, was the best value despite having no on-screen TV display for audio
controls. Now, however, unless you need Prismiq's extras, Linksys is the clear
way to go. Our minor reservations are overcome by the incredibly low price.
Note that Microsoft says this can
not be done but I did this and it works!
A PST file works in a similar way
to a database - when a message is deleted it is only flagged up as having been
deleted, and is therefore not shown to the user. The message is only truly
deleted from within the PST file when either a) another message overwrites
it, or b) when the user compacts the mailbox.
In order to recover deleted
messages from a PST file you need to do the following:
1) Make a backup copy of the PST file being examined.
2) Using a hex editor that you are familiar with replace bytes 7 to 13
of the PST file with FF (they're usually set to 00).
3) Run a tool called "scanpst", which is usually resident in C:\Program
Files\Common Files\System\Mapi\1033 on a windows box. It might not be in this
directory, but should be installed by default.
4) Open the PST file and any recovered messages should have been recovered.
Please note - it doesn't always work.
To watch the Venture story on
super quality Real Player (read CRAP!) click here:
 Call it e-mail hell. Every
week hard drives arrive from all over North America to the computer forensics
lab at Kroll Ontrack, just outside Minneapolis. Once there, technicians give
them life. Computers search and printers produce damning e-mails that can be
used against the individuals who wrote them.
The e-evidence found here can
bring corporations to their knees; it is the business world's newest nightmare.
Virtually any company that has employees generating e-mail is at risk.
...Rene Hamel at KPMG Forensics
in Toronto can find almost anything. He says the e-mail can be on your hard
drive, a computer back-up or even your Palm Pilot.
...Consulting giant Kroll snapped
up an e-evidence company called Ontrack a few months ago. It's like a factory
with a demanding production schedule. They can produce a million pages a day -
much of it e-mails for lawsuits.
It all started a few years ago
with a diet drug that had some nasty side effects. In one of the lawsuits an
extraordinary internal e-mail popped up. A manager wrote "...can I look forward
to my waning years signing checks for fat people who are a little afraid of a
silly lung problem".
...Canada's legal experts say
some people are becoming wary. There's a growing reluctance to put things down
on e-mail. Instead, some are using the phone.
But the technicians at Kroll are betting that people will keep getting burned by
their e-mails. They're expanding their operations abroad, including here in
Canada.
TomsHardware.com |
How to Judge The Quality of Modern Digital Camera's
This is one of those articles that just does
not condence well. As usual Tom's has done an excellent job of providing
relavent information but in the case of digital camera's there are many settings
and options that Toms explains in just one paragraph. Too much info for
this page. You should really read the full article if you are in the
market for a digital camera.
 3-megapixel
cameras, as the name implies, record about three million pixels per photo. As
you'd expect, the 2-megapixel models only record two million pixels. But do not
be deceived into thinking that the number of pixels has a direct effect on the
quality of the resulting picture. It only affects the maximum print size. The
more pixels there are, the more you can enlarge the image to obtain big,
high-quality pictures. For those who like to retouch their pictures though, the
sensor does have an indirect effect on the image quality, because the greater
number of pixels allows better fine-tuning of the image.
So, apart from retouching, a 3-megapixel model allows 20 x
30-cm enlargements, compared to 13 x 19 cm with a 2-megapixel. We shall see that
these values can vary with the quality of the cameras. In this regard, there are
bad 3-megapixels and excellent 2-megapixels. "Quality" in itself is measured in
terms of detail, contrast, color fidelity and exposure consistency.
The manufacturers
often have a lineup of several models among which only the resolutions differ.
Thus, you could have a 2-megapixel that is otherwise identical to a 3-megapixel,
both in ergonomics and in functions. So it boils down to the size of the prints,
which will vary from one to the other. If you never intend to print more than a
10 x 15 cm, there's no point in ruining your budget for a 3-megapixel when a
2-megapixel is quite sufficient. But if you are into posters, then a 2-megapixel
is likely to be inadequate for your needs for an image with more pixels for
bigger enlargements and easier retouching.
...For
image quality, Canon is a bit better than the others. This is also true for
handling, ergonomics, functions, modes and speed. So in many respects, we feel
the PowerShot A70 is the best buy in this range.
MS has stopped developing IE for the Mac.
Why? According to them, because Apple's own Safari web browser, based on the
open source core of Konqueror (popular on Linux), is so much better, because it
is integrated into the underlying OS (Huh? Isn't this what MS has done with IE
on Windows?)
Here's an interesting reaction from a
former MS insider: Microsoft Shows True Color: Yellow
...Microsoft took away the browser market easily because it had the monopoly,
and it benefited (and benefits) from owning the browser market because it
protects that same monopoly...It said that the Internet Explorer technology
would be increasingly integrated into its Microsoft Office applications because
the market demanded it, not because it would squeeze out Netscape and other
pretenders.
...Were that true, it would now appear
rather odd that Microsoft would turn tail and run out of the Mac browser market.
After all, Microsoft owns the vast majority of the office application market on
the Apple platform, making even more money per Apple computer sold than it does
per PC sold.
...It appears Microsoft recognizes the
market reality that once an operating system developer decides to push an
application, it will plow over all the competition.
...We are entering a tech world in which
means of distribution trumps marketing and even trumps product quality.
Microsoft.com |
Usefull and Free (for now :) Windows Server 2003 Webinares
Click the link above to download the content (click the RELATED CONTENT links at
the bottom of that page, if you do not see the seminar you want).
Note that
THIS is a particularly good overview of the changes.
-
VCON02: Windows Server
2003: Dramatic Performance and Scalability Improvements
-
VCON03: Directory
Services: Strategy and Roadmap
-
VCON04: What’s new in
Active Directory in Windows Server 2003
-
VCON05: Universal
Description Discovery and Integration Services in Windows Server 2003
-
VCON06: Securing Windows
with Management Tools
-
VCON07: Windows Server
2003 Storage Technologies
-
VCON08: Scripting Group
Policy Operations
-
VCON09: Windows Server
2003 Server Consolidation: Tips and Tricks from the Trenches
-
VCON10: Building
Scalable Solutions with Windows Datacenter
-
VCON12: Availability and
Reliability for Server Applications
-
VCON15: Migrating
Applications to Windows Server 2003
-
VCON16: Microsoft
Windows Server 2003 Worldwide Deployment
-
VCON17: Migrating Unix
Applications to Microsoft Windows with Microsoft Services for UNIX 3.0
-
VCON18: Deploying a
Secure Mobile Network Access Infrastructure (VPN/Wireless)
-
VCON19: Upgrading to
Windows Server 2003 Active Directory from Windows NT 4.0 and Windows 2000
-
VCON20: Windows Server
2003: Terminal Server Overview and Deployment
-
VCON21: Introduction to
Deploying .NET Applications
-
VCON22: Change
Management of Deployed .NET Applications
-
VCON23: Deploying
Windows File Servers, Windows-Powered NAS, and Distributed File Systems
-
VCON24: Windows Server
2003 Printing - Overview, Deployment and Best Practices
-
VCON25: Windows 2003
Print Server - Advanced Deployment Concepts
-
VCON26: Deploying and
Administering File Replication Service for SYSVOL and DFS
-
VCON28: Securing Active
Directory: From Design to Day-to-Day Operations
-
VCON30: Deploying Active
Directory and Microsoft Metadirectory Services in a Multi-Forest
-
VCON31: Windows 2003
Branch Office Deployment
-
VCON32: Monitoring
Active Directory with Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM)
-
VCON33: Windows
Management Infrastructure: Leveraging the Power of Windows Management
Infrastructure (WMI) Scripting
-
VCON34: Windows Server
2003: Management Capabilities Overview
-
VCON35: Overview of
Microsoft Software Update Services (SUS)
-
VCON37: Managing the
Mobile Client with Microsoft Systems Management Server 2003 Practices
-
VCON38: Managing Complex
Environments with Microsoft Operations Manager 2000
-
VCON39: Managing Your
Enterprise with the Group Policy Management Console (GPMC)
-
VCON40: Identity
Management with Microsoft Metadirectory Services (MMS) and Active Directory in
Application Mode (ADAM)
-
VCON42: Deploying a
Highly Available Site-to-Site VPN with Microsoft ISA Server and Windows Server
2003
-
VCON43: Planning a
Microsoft Windows Public Key Infrastructure Using Microsoft Windows Server
2003
-
VCON44: Windows
Security: Under the Hood
-
VCON45: Building Secure
Web Applications on Windows Server 2003
-
VCON46: Enabling a
Secure Connected Infrastructure through Public Key Infrastructure (PKI)
-
VCON48: Improving Trust
In Your Infrastructure With IPSec
-
VCON49: Securing IIS,
Sharepoint Portal Services, and Web Services with ISA Server
-
VCON50: Transitioning to
Internet Information Services 6.0 (IIS)
-
VCON52: ISA Server
Internals
-
VCON54: Top 13
Operational Security Mistakes - And How To Avoid Them!
-
VCON58: What’s in
Windows Server 2003 for Developers, Part 1 of 2
-
VCON59: What’s in
Windows Server 2003 for Developers, Part 2 of 2
-
VCON66: Detecting and
Debugging Common Application Issues Using the Windows Application Verifier
-
VCON67: Windows
Automated Deployment Services (ADS)
-
VCON68: Deploying and
Managing Web Applications with Microsoft Application Center 2000
-
VCON69: Reed Elsevier
Case Study: Building the Enterprise on Windows Server 2003
-
VCON80: A Step-by-Step
Approach to Deploying Active Directory: Part 1 of 2
-
VCON81: Windows 2003
Active Directory Deployment
-
VCON83: A Step-by-Step
Approach to Deploying Active Directory: Part 2 of 2
-
VCON85: Server
Consolidation: Strategies and Best Practices for Reducing Costs in Windows
Environments
-
VCON87: Jet Blue Airways
Case Study: Windows Server 2003 Joint Development Program
-
VCON90: Windows Media
Services in the Enterprise
-
VCON91: Designing,
Deploying, and Managing a Load Balanced Terminal Server Farm
The MS articles on this
topic are fuzzy at best and so I had someone from MS explain it to me.
Note that to use Shadow Copy, a new piece of software must be installed on a
users machine. Also note that the Shadow Copy client software on the RC2
disk does not work and you will have to download real code from
HERE.
Shadow copies work by making a block-level
copy of any changes that have occurred to files since the last shadow copy. Only
the changes are copied, not the entire file.
As a result, previous versions of files do
not usually take up as much disk space as the current file, although the amount
of disk space used for changes can vary, depending on the application that
changed the file.
For example, some applications rewrite the
entire file when a change is made, but other applications add changes to the
existing file. If the entire file is rewritten to disk, then the shadow copy
contains the entire file. Therefore, consider the type of applications in your
organization as well as the frequency and number of updates when you determine
how much disk space to allocate for shadow copies.
Important: Shadow copies do not eliminate
the need to perform regular backups, nor do shadow copies provide protection
from media failure. In addition, shadow copies are not permanent. As new shadow
copies are taken, old shadow copies are purged when the size of all shadow
copies reaches a configurable maximum or when the number of shadow copies
reaches 64, whichever is sooner. Therefore, shadow copies might not be present
for as long as end users expect them to be. End-user needs and expectations
should be considered when shadow copies are configured.
Deciding When to Create Shadow Copies :
The more frequently shadow copies are
created, the more likely that end-users will get the version that they want.
However, with a maximum of 64 shadow copies per volume, there is a tradeoff
between the frequency of making shadow copies and the amount of time that the
earlier files will be available.
Please refer to
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/techinfo/overview/scr.mspx
Here is a small list of this
features from this fun to use and damn near free operating system:
-
10 minute install - LindowsOS 4.0
takes only a few mouse clicks to install and takes less than 10 minutes on
most computers
-
Click-N-Run lets you install hundreds of
programs, each with one click of a mouse, hassle free!
-
Easy upgrades - Using Click-N-Run you
can make sure your software is always up-to-date, with just one click
-
One click OS upgrade -
Current LindowsOS users can upgrade from LindowsOS 3.0 to 4.0 with a single
click...no other operating system offers such an easy upgrade.
-
Automatic Hardware Detection - Driver
disks are bothersome and often difficult to find, so LindowsOS 4.0 will
automatically detect all of your hardware and install all of the drivers for
you
-
Improved support for
scanners and
digital cameras
- You can connect easily to hundreds of scanners and digital cameras with
LindowsOS 4.0
-
Zero Administration - With your own
customizable
Click-N-Run aisle, you can set up one PC or a whole office with all the
software you need, with just one click
-
Improved Networking
- Read, write, share and browse on a Microsoft Windows network just like you
would on Microsoft Windows computer
-
Expanded
printer support, so more than
1,000 printers from major manufacturers such as HP, Epson, and Canon are now
plug & play
-
The new
WiFi Manager will detect
your card, tell you the strength of your wireless signal and let you surf the
net in seconds
New
Features
-
The new
interactive multimedia
tutorials walk novice users through everything from navigating the
desktop to setting up email to wireless networking and more
-
USB Plug & Play support lets you plug
in an external hard drive, CD-RW, USB Flash drive, Zip drive, etc. and start
using in just a few seconds
-
The New Control Panel lets you change
your background or monitor resolution, add a printer, make shortcuts, etc. You
can modify just about anything you need -- all in one place
-
Improved fonts
make reading text on the screen better than even Microsoft Windows XP
-
Enhanced dialup support
- Out of the box, LindowsOS has the software to connect to Earthlink, Netzero,
Juno, Nethere, Speakeasy and more
-
Automatic Time Sync
- LindowsOS4.0 will regularly connect to NTP servers and make sure your clock
is always correct
-
Add hundreds of software titles to your
computer for just $49.95 with
Lindows Plus
-
LindowsOffice
is a powerful office suite, that will save
in all popular file formats (including Microsoft Office
and WordPerfect Office formats)
-
SurfSafe is an integrated filter that lets you
block out pornography and other objectionable material from your web browsing
and e-mail
-
VirusSafe will scan keep your computer free from
viruses and will even scan for MS Windows viruses so you don't pass any along
to your friends
LindowsCD allows anyone to
run the new and exciting
LindowsOS 4.0 Operating System from any computer without installing
anything. Simply pop the CD in any computer's CD tray and turn on the computer.
LindowsOS will then load and run, right from the CD! This is the ideal way for
Microsoft® Windows users to see what all the excitement is about with Linux and
LindowsOS without removing or effecting their existing Microsoft® Windows system
in any way.
FYI, I have SP4 installed on 7
Windows 2000 Servers and have experienced no problems to date.
-
IPSEC policies may stop
functioning/ get removed.
-
Slow logons from Citrix ICA
sessions
-
Slow Logons from RDP sessions
-
Applications will not or are
slow to close on logout (possible apply a script)
-
If installed after the Novel
Client, you may need a local administrator account to log in and re-add the
machine to the domain.
-
usrlogon.cmd may stop running
-
Mail relay settings may change,
if your server is sending mail this setting may have to be reset in the MMC
-
Web Interface (NFuse) 1.6 (and
other versions) sites may have read permissions set. Users need script execute
permissions.
-
Apparently there is an issue
related to Microsoft Windows 2000 Service Pack 4 and the Citrix ctxnotif.dll.
During the logoff process, the ctxnotif.dll deletes the printers. The process
hangs (which is probably responsible for the longer logoff times) and only has
time to delete the second printer if at all before the winlogon closes all
running processes and logs you off. The script at
http://www.tokeshi.com/raturl/autoendtasks may help logoff issues/
speed.
-
Reported issues with the
ability to access / authenticate when using samba as a domain controller.
Samba 2.2.8a release contains a security fixes and new features/ settings that
supports a new setting: profile acls (S) which is a workaround for issue with
WinXP Service Pack 1 and roaming user profiles. Windows 2000 Service Pack 4
appears to exhibit the same behavior.
-
Printers Remain Installed on a
Terminal Server After You Disconnect from the Terminal Server (seems to
identify issue 9 above)
http://www.tokeshi.com/raturl/Q822143
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;822143
Interesting Related Arcicles:
Internet Explorer Times Out While It Loads Web Pages If Norton Internet
Security 2001 or Norton Personal Firewall 2001 Is Installed Q article: 823087
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];823087
Terminal Server and Connected
Terminal Services Clients Pause When a Terminal Services Client Logs On or Logs
Off Q article: 324446
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?kbid=324446
Problems When More Than One User Accesses the Same File Through Terminal
ServicesQ article: 818528
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?kbid=818528 Solution: after
using the Micrsoft Hotfix to replace the mrxsmb.sys and the rdbss.sys modify
this registry key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MRxSmb\Parameters
REG_DWORD: MultiUserEnabled Value 1
Application Access Violation or Hang After Applying SP4 Q article: 195009
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];195009
Cannot Install Windows 2000
Service Pack 4 on a Computer Where the Hummingbird NFS Maestro Client Program Is
Installed Q article: 822217
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];822217
HTTP Indexing Service Object Is Not Listed in the Performance Monitor Counters Q
article: 821892
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];821892
AWE Hardware Compatibility Test Is Unsuccessful After You Install Windows 2000
SP4 Q article: 822140
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];822140
"Certificate Services Did Not Start" Message Appears in the Event Log Even
Though the Certificate Services Component Starts Successfully Q article: 822626
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];822626
Several Remote Access Service Error Events Appear After You Upgrade to Windows
2000 Service Pack 4 Q article: 823405
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];823405
Scheduled Tasks No Longer Run When You Remove Windows 2000 Service Pack 4 Q
article: 823441
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];823441
Release Notes for Windows 2000 Service Pack 4 Q article: 813432
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];813432
INFO: Windows Media Tools 4.1 Not Available in Windows 2000 Service Pack 4 and
Later Versions Q article: 819758
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];819758
XADM: The Key Management Service Does Not Start After You Install Windows 2000
Service Pack 4 Q article: 818952
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];818952
Frequently Asked Questions About the Microsoft VM and Windows 2000 Service Pack
4 Q article: 820101
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];820101
Overview of the "Impersonate a Client After Authentication" and the "Create
Global Objects" Security Settings (821546.KB.EN-US.2.2) Q article: 821456
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];821546
Some Windows 2000 Hotfixes May Cause a Conflict with Service Pack 4 for Windows
2000 Q article: 822384
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];822384
Errors Occur When You Use a NET Framework 1.0-Based Program on a Windows 2000
Service Pack 4-Based Terminal Server Q
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];823485
Solution: update to .NET Framework 1.1 |
