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October 2002 EduNotes
Stop! Our phone number has changed. Make sure you update your records.
Our new number is (720) 275-4646.
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EduCyber is pleased to present the October 2002 Edition of EduNotes. In
this issue you'll find out about the latest in inexpensive computers and
where you can get yours, a nasty new bug circulating on the Internet,
our new Web Ranking Service, hi-speed USB and a bit of space. Enjoy and
as always, send feedback to edunotes@educyber.com.
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Low - End Computer
If you think the time for super cheap computers faded with the bursting
of the dot.com bubble, think again. Wal-Mart has teamed with Microtel
to provide very inexpensive low-end computers. How inexpensive? The base
price is below $200!
But it is a low-end computer. Working from home and tired of having your
kids mess up your system with their games? This might be the answer you've
been waiting for. The cheapest system comes with the Lindows operating
system. Lindows is a Linux based system that looks a lot like Windows.
For an additional $100 though, you can get the system with Windows XP
installed.
This deal is apparently only available on the walmart.com
web site so don't go asking at your neighborhood store. This system would
be great for a second or third PC on a home network sharing a broadband
Internet connection. It does NOT come with a floppy drive (sounds almost
like a iMac?) nor with a modem although you can purchase them separately.
It DOES come with an 800 MHz processor similar to Intel's Celeron Processor
and 128 MB of RAM which is not bad at all.
A high end computer from Gateway or Dell will come with a Pentium 4 processor
running at 2.8 GHz and 512 MB of RAM, by comparison. So while it's definitely
on the low end, it's also definitely affordable. What is it good for?
Email, Internet browsing, Simple Word Processing or Spread Sheet manipulation.
So if you are need of a computer that does just that, this is the way
to go. Don't buy it if you think you're going to have a computer you can
run high end applications or games on.
Just in time for the holiday shopping . . .
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Bug Alert
There's a new bug out there called BugBear and it ain't pretty. While
some bugs exploit email weaknesses (particularly in Microsoft products)
to send themselves to others and other bugs do nasty things like record
keystrokes (to steal passwords or other sensitive information) and email
this file to someone, the BugBear does both of these things.
If you don't have the latest antivirus updates installed on your computer,
now is a good time to do so. All the major antivirus vendors have updates
to detect this virus available. Most good virus programs will automatically
check for new virus definitions on a daily or weekly basis. Make sure
your antivirus software is checking and it wouldn't be a bad idea to manually
check for a new download anyway.
BugBear doesn't do the same thing on every computer, making it difficult
to detect. It will create files on your computer that it uses to do its
dirty work but those files are based on the serial number of your PC,
the drive letter infected and other variables so each infected computer
will have different file names. The file that records your keystrokes
is created in the windows\system directory and has a dll extension, disguising
itself as an important Windows file.
There are dozens of different subject lines that the bug uses to spread
itself so if you want to check out a suspicious email, visit your antivirus
software vendor's web site for more information. The best way to protect
your computer is to make sure that you have all the latest security patches
applied to your computer, make sure your virus definitions are up-to-date
and do NOT open any attachments, even from people you know, if you are
not expecting an attachment. It's ALMOST enough to make me want to buy
a Mac.
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Increase Your Web Exposure
We are pleased to announce the roll out of our new Web Ranking service.
If you want to increase the amount of traffic to your web site we can
help you by optimizing your pages for the search engines, submitting them
to the search engines, monitoring the results, and tweaking the pages
as necessary to increase their ranking.
One of the best reasons for spending the time and money to get your site
listed in the search engines is that people who visit your site from a
search engine are more targeted; that is, they have followed the link
because they are looking for your goods or services.
How does it work? First, we work with you to determine the key words and
phrases that potential clients would be searching for on the Internet
and then make sure that those words and phrases are highlighted through
the visible and hidden (meta-tags, hyper-links, and other code) parts
of the page that search engines look at. Then we submit your site to the
major search engines and monitor the progress of your site's upward movement
in the engines for the chosen key words. As we measure the results of
the initial work, we make additional tweaks to the site and key words
as necessary.
We also post our reports on your site in a place where you (but not the
rest of the world) can find them so that you can see the progress of your
site in the search engines. Call us today to find out what we can do to
help you increase your web site exposure. Prices vary according to need
and scope of project but are for one year or longer terms.
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Hi-Speed USB
If you like to be on the cutting edge of technology, you'll be interested
in the new hi-speed USB, usually called USB 2.0. If you have purchased
a computer in the last couple of years, it should have a couple of USB
ports. The newer ones will have the ports somewhere on the front. You
can plug all sorts of cool stuff in here, from digital cameras to printers
to mice. And in most cases they will configure themselves and be ready
to go in a few seconds. But the speed at which they could "talk" to your
computer (12 Mbps) was still relatively slow. Using your USB mouse you'd
never notice but try downloading hundreds of pictures or a video from
your digital camera and you'll be doing some fingertapping. Or try transferring
1 GB of data to your USB hard drive.
Enter USB 2.0. Theoretically USB 2.0 can communicate at 480 Mbps meaning
that 1 GB of data could be transferred in less than a minute (even if
it takes a couple of minutes in the real world, that's still much faster
than the 15 to 20 minutes it would take with USB 1.1.
To take advantage of the new USB, you'll need to either purchase a new
USB card or buy a computer that supports USB 2.0.
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Need Some Space?
You've been working hard so give yourself a break and visit a cool web
site. What's cooler that space? Years ago we actually ventured out into
space, traveling as far as the moon. Since then we've been kind of stuck,
only getting out into orbit with the space shuttle. But NASA continues
to look towards the heavens and you can join them with Astronomy Picture
of the Day at http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html.
As many commercial sites continue to take their cool stuff behind the
cash register where they'll gladly sell it for a price, the government
continues to publish wonderful stuff free for the taking and this is but
one example.
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© 2002 EduCyber, Inc. This newsletter is brought to you by EduCyber, Inc.
Visit us on the web at http://www.educyber.com
or call us at (720) 275-4646. Permission is hereby granted to redistribute
all or part of this newsletter as long as this copyright message is included.
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For questions, or to be removed from this monthly newsletter distribution,
email us at edunotes@educyber.com.