According to and article in ComputerWorld the maker of the infamous anti-virus 2008 program made 100 million dollars selling the fake anti-virus program.

The CEO of a company accused of making more than $100 million selling harmful “scareware” antivirus products was already a fugitive from U.S. authorities, following his arrest in 2008 on criminal counterfeiting charges.

Shaileshkumar “Sam” Jain is one of three men who were charged by the U.S. Department of Justice on Wednesday for allegedly operating a massive scareware distribution ring.

Read the article here at http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9177498/CEO_of_firm_that_made_100_million_selling_scareware_was_a_fugitive?source=rss_news

Sony has a wearable concept computer out.

Our present need for internet connectivity is so profound that secondary devices like the Nextep Computer are bound to happen. Developed to be worn as a bracelet, this computer concept is constructed out of a flexible OLED touchscreen. Earmarked for the year 2020, features like a holographic projector (for screen), pull-out extra keyboard panels and social networking compatibility, make the concept plausible. Ten years from now is not too far away, so how many of you think we’d be buying such gadgets?

Check out the full article and pictures here.

According to US-Cert the USB battery charger may carry a trojan horse that allows the attacker to take total control of the users computer.

Energizer DUO is a USB battery charger. An optional Windows application that allows the user to view the battery charging status has been available on the Energizer website. The installer for the Energizer DUO software places the file UsbCharger.dll in the application’s directory and Arucer.dll in the Windows system32 directory. When the Energizer UsbCharger software executes, it utilizes the UsbCharger.dll component for providing USB communication capabilities. UsbCharger.dll executes Arucer.dll via the Windows rundll32.exe mechanism, and it also configures Arucer.dll to execute automatically when Windows starts by creating an entry in the HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run registry key.

Arucer.dll is a backdoor that allows unauthorized remote system access via accepting connections on 7777/tcp. Note that Windows XP SP2 and later systems include a firewall by default.

Occasionally product manufacturers produce products that become infected and distributed to the public. Enegizer stated it removed the infected file from production.

Infoworld sums up a few other products with virus here:

This isn’t the first time that a hardware company has planted malware on unsuspecting customers’ PCs. In 2007, Seagate Technology admitted that an unknown number of its hard drives left an Asian manufacturing plant with Trojan horses, while the year before that Apple warned iPod owners that some of the music players carried a Windows virus .

In early 2008, electronic retailer Best Buy confirmed it had sold digital picture frames with attack code that spread to connected PCs.

Below is a report about Square Trade a national warranty service company. They service thousands of makes and models on different computers. This study shows which laptops perform the best and which are the worst.  This can be valuable information when

SquareTrade Reports on Laptop Reliability: Asus and Toshiba come out on top

Manufacturers: Vast Differences in Reliability

When excluding accidental damage and examining hardware malfunctions by manufacturer, Asus and Toshiba come out on top. Apple and Dell both fall in the middle with approximately an 18 percent failure rate; while industry leader HP has the highest failure rate. Over one in four HP laptops in the study experienced a hardware malfunction during the first three years of ownership.

Do you have multiple operating systems installed on your computer? Do you have a partition set up for Vista and one for Windows 7? If so then there may come a time when you want to manage the boot loading process.

EasyBCD makes it very easy to manage the boot process with a great UI. The interface is easy to understand and makes changing the boot records a snap. Here’s what Lifehacker has to say about EasyBCD.

With EasyBCD you can edit the names of entries, add and remove entries onto the bootloader menu, change the timeout on the bootloader selection menu, and tweak boot-related items like enabling PAE mode or run with the debug process enabled. EasyBCD includes support for adding Windows, Linux, Mac, NeoGrub, and WinPE loaders.

If this is your first time tinkering with a bootloader, EasyBCD makes the process fairly simple. By default the application is in basic mode instead of expert mode—in expert mode it won’t prompt you if you’re doing something that could be difficult to undo. For additional information you can visit the EasyBCD wiki.

There are a few bootmanager programs out there that do similar changes. But the ones good ones you must pay for. Not so with EasyBCD. It worked great with my Vista Machine. I have Vista and Windows 7 loaded on my computer, when I restart I want the default to be Vista not Win 7. SEasyBCD made it very easy to make Vista the default boot record. Now Windows starts Vista automatically!



Did you ever need an additional phone line? Perhaps that small business you have on the side needs its own phone number? Or perhaps you’re looking for a cheap long distance alternative?

Skype can solve either of these problems. Skype is an Ebay company that offers free chat, voice and web video chat services. The quality of the service is one of the best the internet has to offer.

But now they offer a very low cost local phone number. It runs about 3 dollars a month. The service has the following features:

• local numbers
• voice mail
• call forwarding
• call recording
• conference calls
• contact manager
• blocking (my favorite)



It’s easy to use and provides a cheap alternative for an additional phone line. You need to have a micro phone or usb phone to use the service. I recommend buying a USB phone for your computer. A USB phone will allow you to use the service like a regular phone.

Anywhere you have an internet connection you have a skype phone. It’s great for business travelers who need a cheap alternative with out the roaming costs. There are even phone apps to turn your smart phone into a skype phone. You could be making free calls with you using your cell minutes.

I recommend checking out Skype, it’s been a valuable tool for me.



FormatFactory is a multifunctional media converter.
Provides functions below:
All to MP4/3GP/MPG/AVI/WMV/FLV/SWF.
All to MP3//WMA/MMF/AMR/OGG/M4A/WAV.
All to JPG/BMP/PNG/TIF/ICO/….
Rip DVD to video file.
MP4 files support iPod/iPhone/PSP/BlackBerry format.
Source files support RMVB.

As the website suggests, this media converter really does a wide variety of formats. I have searched high and low for something like this on the internet. This is really the best piece of software that converts your media into multiple formats. FormatFactory will even rip DVD’s into the major formats.

One of the benefits of this software is that it converts almost any media into the major formats. There is a plethora of media converters out there. However, FormatFactory is the only one that I know of that can do so many different types of media. Other format software can usually only go one way and maybe handle two or three formats. FormatFactory makes it easy to move most file types in there current situation to any format.

The Con of FormatFactory is that it’s a little slow duringhe converting process. I must mention that my computer is about 4 years old.

One of the other features I like is that you can convert a whole folder at one time or you can convert one file at a time. The software makes it easy for me to convert all those .MOV home video files to .WMV. Format Factory is a great piece of software that highly recommend if you’re looking for a media converter. Download it here.

I came across this free software from Google called SketchUp. It allowed me to create a 3D model of my house. Recently I had been wanting to add a patio to the back of the house. I had an break through after failed efforts to accurately describe the plans to my wife, when I recalled the SketchUp program.

Google purchased the SketchUp company to help create realistic models for Google Earth. This 3D software is limited only by your imagination. If you can think it you can create it in this software. Prior to SketchUp I knew nothing about 3D CAD software. After a few minutes in SketchUp I was creating rudimentary 3D objects. Now you are not going to be able to recreate a watch without some time spent learning the software. There is a learning curve involved here. It took me a few hours to recreate my half acre of land that I live on. I was having some fun, so I didn’t mind putting about 8 hours over two weeks of time.

Once I recreated the house, the rest was easy. It gave my wife a great idea of what I was talking about. The model of my house was complete with green grass and shingles on the roof. She was impressed with the realistic model of our house.

Another great feature is pre created models. Users of the software can create and submit models of commonly used or not so common objects. I downloaded a model of a Starwars spaceship for my son to look at. But what I was really looking for was trees and bushes to add to my yard. Check out the community projects freely available for download and importing into your SketchUp program.

There are way to many cool features to mention on this blog, you’re going to have to check it out for yourself. Watch the short movie of me creating a quick house, you can learn how to do this in about 10 minutes. They have a lot of great tutorials, play around and then pick the tutorial of what you would like to learn about. Download SketchUp

Have you ever wanted to install full apps on your usb stick? I tried several different methods of installing applications onto a USB. Some work great for some types of applications and others methods fail completely.

I ran across a great free tool that really goes above and beyond merely installing applications. How about full blow windows on you USB device? Then installing the programs via windows and utilizing them from there. This program really changed the way I think about my USB stick. Note that you don’t have to boot into windows, you can still access the files on it as a normal USB.

Mojo Pac allows you to install windows onto any portable hard drive, then when you plug in your USB device it pops up with mojopac as one of the options for you to choose from. Here is a short movie of what mojopac looks like as you boot into it.

Now you don’t have to worry about what apps are portable and which apps are not. You simply have to make sure that you have enough space on your drive. You have a operation windows XP system running from your USB stick. It’s great for taking applications to clients and or booting into a clients computer using the USB device.

While Mojopac is in use your USB device becomes the C drive the host computer. You can then go in and check it out their “c” drive with virus applications and so on. One of the best tools I have found in along time. You have to check out Mojopac. Did I mention it’s free! Below is a screen recording of me using the mojo pac.

Did you ever want to access all your media files via your TV? Now Orb.com makes is easy if you own any of the new game consoles. Wii, X box 360 and PS3 are all compatible with Orb.com.

What can you do with Orb?

• Access any files on your computer through your TV
• Watch video files
• Play Internet games
• Play internet radio
• Youtube and other video services.
• Check Email
• Play and record TV if you have TV tuner

How it Works

Almost anything you can do on the internet is now available on your TV. I am using the Wii for my gaming console, so this post will be in reference to using the Wii.

• Download orb software on your PC
• Right click on taskbar icon and direct Orb to your network files
• Next go to orb.com via the Wii and log in (you’ll need the internet channel installed) I save Orb.com to my favorites and away you go, the rest is fine tuning Orb

internet + PC + Wii = TV access to files

Once I had Orb installed I started playing with it. Wii uses the Opera browser to access the internet. I could play most flash files, like games and movies. Occassionally it would say I need to upgrade download and install Adobe Flash. Most video files worked write off the bat. A few files I had in my storage drive required me to down load and install. What’s so great about it was that Orb made finding the correct drivers a breeze. If I wanted to play .mov files, Orb told me exactly what to do. Visit www.orb.com/drivers for more information. I have to say that the internet experience is not as good as on a laptop. But again remember what we will be using this for. I’m not going to be writing my blog posts with the Wii virtual keyboard anytime soon, but I will be doing picture slideshows to show friends and family. I have basic cable, occasionally I might watch a NOVA documentary online via the Wii. I really like acessing my music on the TV.

When we’re playing cards or something like that I love being able to listen to my music through the TV. It’s pretty high tech to show friends. If you never heard of musicovery.com you have to check that out. It’s a great tool to find new music and guest will be impressed that you have it on your TV. Enjoy using Orb, tell me what you think about it, I want to know.