The Intelligence Center of computer security firm Mandiant has identified the majority of highly sophisticated attacks on the U.S. to have originated by 4 networks in a bland, twelve story building in Shanghai which houses (allegedly) a super secret cyber warfare unit of China’s Army. “Highlights of the report include: Evidence linking APT1 to China’s 2nd Bureau of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) General Staff Department’s (GSD) 3rd Department ...
MS has done it again. They must have a Division of Dumbassed Moves. Their latest winner? You buy a license to MS Office 2013. Now it’s tied to that computer and that’s it. Anything happens to that computer, or you decide to upgrade to another system, you’d better keep the old one because the license cannot be transferred to the new one. “Under our license we grant you the right to install and run that one copy on one computer (the licensed computer)...
Apple started it, and there are genuine and phony Apple Stores from here to well, China. MS has them in many cities. Even Samsung has one in London. Now, according to Seth Weintraub at 9to5Google , a high level source at Google has leaked that there will be Google Stores open for 2013’s holidays in major cities. There are now Google kiosks at retailers now to explain and demonstrate its products but actual sales are done by the chains themselves in the US and Britain. So, ...
A while back I believe I wrote about this development. Correct, it isn’t Personal Computing, but it is personal for many… too many. Some members of the community have asked me to write about diabetes, especially. So, since this a request, here you go. I tried not to make it too technical/boring. A little background. Insulin is produced (naturally) in the pancreas. Its main function is to facilitate glucose’s entry into cells where glucose is metabolized for energy. Insulin does ...
There’s a really great series of totally free Photoshop basics tutorials on psdtuts+ , for those interested in learning the basics or just brushing up on stuff not used in a while. They are taught by Martin Parhiniak who is a graphics designer and Certified Expert Design Master by Adobe where he worked for three years. Anyway, Martin’s vids are free on the website: http://psd.tutsplus.com/sessions/photoshop-basix/ What’s really nice about these ...
I’m posting this after seeing it on ZDNet since there might be some looking for the Surface Pro. I’d advise calling the store or checking online before running out to buy it. Also, it might be better to call the actual store as the online info might not be accurate or updated as often as you might like. This isn’t a review of the product. Turns out that MS didn’t take pre-orders on the Surface Pro 64 and 128 GB models as they did for the Surface RT. What’s a customer...
Saw this at The Windows Club, and thought it might interest some. If you have W8 (x32 or x64) you can now get the WinZip app for free at the Windows Store. In November, it cost $7.99 (US). So why is MS doing it? Simple. It now offers support for SkyDrive as well as Google Drive cloud services. It has two new features: ZipSend and ZipShare direct connectivity for file sharing, which allows you to email over sized files to friends and contacts, as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and ...
To fix vulnerabilities in its Flash player in both Windows and Apple systems, Adobe has published a patch for: “The first vulnerability, CVE-2013-0633, tricks users into downloading a Microsoft Word document sent via e-mail. As you might expect, the document contains malicious SWF (flash’s file extension) content that can then infect a user’s system. This exploit targets the ActiveX version of Flash Player for Windows, Adobe said. The second exploit, ...
Interesting article at infopackets . Apparently folks are showing a reluctance to upgrade to W8. W8’s share of all Windows PC’s is about 2.5%, which was up from 1.9% in 12/2012. When RT is added, it becomes 2.6%. Three months after Vista became available, it’s uptake rate was 3.3%. Even worse, W8’s month by month growth has slowed significantly, per infopackets (based on an article in Computerworld.nz ), although the week-to-week shows a very modest gain of 2.7% vs....
Interesting news. Dell’s going private in a stock buy back of $24.4 Billion (US) financed by Microsoft and the private equity firm (largest in the world) Silver Lake. Back in 2011, Silver Lake sold Skype to Microsoft profiting $5 billion (US). This turn around profit was made in 18 months, reaping a 70-80%$ internal rate of return, which was far higher than the usual rate. Microsoft purchased Skype for $8.5 billion (US). EBay also profited on the deal having 30% ownership. &l...
Adobe Photoshop as well as other Adobe software are arguably the gold standard of graphics and image manipulation. creativeLive is a great webinar service which is dedicated to professionals teaching all aspects of graphics as well as business (establishing a studio, etc.), and more. This is a great opportunity to get some free teaching. There are reruns if you miss the original webcast. Courses are also available for purchase. The schedule can be found here: http:/...
Well… it won’t be a 1:1, but if you bought a Surface RT, MS stores will be giving trade in credit for it towards a Surface Pro. The stores aren’t offering any details of the deal over the phone (per Neowin ). Your RT had best be in tip top shape though, if you want top dollar. I wonder if this is part of a business plan to market the RT abroad: Refurbished RT’s will cost less than the original, and there are places where that would be a distinct advantage. ...
Was reading Neowin this morning (instead of clearing snow… it’s really coming down) and saw this. I’m not sure how many of you have a Twitter account, so I thought I’d let folks know about it. The bad news: Twitter was hacked and 250,000 accounts were compromised. This was no amateurish attempt, either. What’s the good news here? Not much except they weren’t asleep at the switch. They caught it and stopped it while it was happening. I haven’t read that about many, in fact ...
Granted, PhotoDirector 4 is out (and you can update through PD 3 for $40). This deal is worth $149 (US) deal, good through February 1st 11:59 pm. For this excellent software you pay exactly zero. You do have to be a member of C|net, but that’s free. I installed it and used it and it really does have a lot of features Photoshop has... You can read about the deal here: http://download.cnet.com/8301-32471_4-57566732-10391713/exclusive-free-giveaway-of-cy...
Currently, IE10 is only available for Windows 8. A preview version is available for Windows 7 which was problematic for many. Since then, MS has done quite a bit of work on IE10 and it is a fine browser with many good security features. As for its appearance… meh. I’m neither saying “get it” nor “don’t get it” about IE10 or the toolkit. I’m just telling you of your choices. Some prefer to wait, others not. Both are fine. I tend to be more wait in this area because of IE’s ...