Knowing what kind of memory to purchase and install is not as difficult as one might think. On the surface, this is an imposing task for someone without much computer experience. There’s a lot to find out before I make my purchase. What kind of memory do I need to purchase? How many open slots do I have for memory? How much is too much memory? How much is too little memory?

However, like any new task, an easy-to-follow set of instructions and a willingness to learn go a long way. This is a task worth learning for anyone who wants to boost the performance of a computer by adding memory. Plus, it isn’t that difficult to find out how much memory is currently installed, what memory module sizes by the computer, and how much memory is already installed on the computer.

Whenever I want to upgrade the memory for one of my computers, I usually go straight to the hard case. Obviously, the computer needs to be turned off for this task. Once the case is open, I can easily identify how many empty modules I have as well as discovering how many I already have installed.

Unfortunately, if all of the slots are full, I will need to remove some of the memory modules in order to install larger modules. However, I need to refer to my operating system manual and find out the maximum amount of memory that my computer can hold.

Installing more memory than the machine can handle is not going to give me access to the extra memory. In fact, it can create processing problems for me if I install more than my computer can use. My computer might not even be able to recognize that I have sufficient memory to complete a task if I have installed more memory than my computer can handle. In most cases, the manual for the operating system will list a recommended memory allotment as well as the maximum memory allotment. I can also examine the operating system of my computer to get this information.

If I consult the manual for my computer system, I will be able to identify the type of memory that I need to install. Additionally, I should be able to locate specific information on the minimum, maximum, and recommended memory for my specific computer model.

On a system with Windows, finding some answers to the above questions can be as simple as going to the start menu. From start, navigate to the control panel and locate the system properties or information. From this location, I should be able to pick up some information on my computer’s memory. For a custom made computer, it will be necessary to check the manual for the motherboard in order to determine the specifications for the type of memory utilized.

Why can’t I play back a CD that I’ve recorded on my computer on my car or home system CD player?

When I first bought a CD burner, the first thing I did was drag and drop a bunch of music files onto it and then burned away. While this worked fine on my computer, it didn’t work in my CD player. Oops. I did it wrong. I’m so used to dragging and dropping files onto various media devices, that I didn’t realize that there was a different process for audio CDs.

Instead of treating the CD like a standard storage medium, you must use the correct format for audio CDs. CD burning software generally gives you options such as Data CD or Music CD. It’s important to pick the correct one. Otherwise, if you store your music using the Data CD, the structure will be set up much like your computer files are stored on your hard drive. CD players aren’t set up to read these types of files. Instead, use the Music CD setting and you should be fine.

However, even that doesn’t always solve the problem. Older CD players may not be compatible with CD-Rs. Most newer ones don’t have an issue and can accept your homemade CDs though many continue to have problems with CD-RW discs. In order for CD-Rs to work, a perfect combination of the media itself, the recorder, and the player must exist. Bad CDs, the wrong recording technique, or an incompatible CD player can all affect the music playback (or lack of playback as the case may be.)

Another concern with audio CDs and standard consumer CD players is that CD players only read the “first session.” So, if you have a multi-session audio CD, your player will only play the first session, not any sessions recorded afterwards. Your CD burning software should have settings for making single versus multi-session discs.

The music files themselves pose yet another problem. Standard CD players require the correct format. Use the .wav format for audio CDs rather than MP3 or other formats. If you burn the wrong formats to CD, you may be able to play the music on your computer but your car or home stereo system will likely have problems with playback unless they are MP3 compatible.

Finally, Digital Rights Management issues come into play. Depending on where you purchased your music and the rights you purchased, you may not be able to copy the files at all. For example, if you have an unlimited music subscription to Rhapsody and a Rhapsody-enabled MP3 player, you can download music to your MP3 player but you can’t burn the music to CD unless you purchase additional rights. Similarly, different Digital Rights Management licenses exist restricting how many “burns” you can make or how you can use the music file. You may be able to burn the file to disc one time. After the file is burnt, you will be blocked from future burns.

Burning CDs takes a bit of trial and error. If you have a compatible CD player and use the proper music CD format and .wav files, you should be able to successfully play your audio CDs. If one of the factors of the equation is off, then you’ll run into problems.  

One of the many new buzzwords on the Internet is “Virtualization”. Articles talk about how it can save energy and money in datacenters, or how it offers us some flexibility on our home PCs - but what, exactly, is it?

Did you know you can have Virtualization for free? Read on …

What is Virtualization?

Virtualization describes the process of running one operating system within another, entirely contained, so that it “thinks” it is running on a stand-alone machine. This allows us to run, say, Linux in a window on our Windows desktop, as though we had another computer inside out current system. Our Linux system will be (theoretically) unable to tell that it isn’t running on a standalone system, allowing us to run our favorite Linux program side by side with our Windows applications. Of course, it can also work the other way, allowing us to run those must-have Windows programs while taking advantage of the stability, security, and freedom of Linux, or the stability, security, and ease of use of Mac OSX.

Virtualization is accomplished through a very low-level black art programming process that captures all system calls and translates them to a language the native operating system speaks. There are lots of possible events, so it’s still possible to find programs that won’t work in a virtualized environment, but there are fewer and fewer every revision of the major players.

The primary providers of virtualization software are, in no particular order, VMWare, Parallels, VirtualBox, and Qemu. VMWare and Parallels are closed source commercial programs, Virtual Box has a closed source, free version, and an open source free version. QEmu is a free, open source project that, unlike the other virtualization programs, allows you to run operating systems from other architectures (such as PPC, the old Mac architecture) as well.

VMWare and Parallels are both excellent products, and you can’t go wrong with either one. They both have excellent support and excellent performance, and work very well with all three major X86 operating systems. They both update their systems frequently, and each update improves the performance and stability of their offering. But this article is about Free Virtualization.

VirtualBox is an amazing product. It’s one of those programs you’ll start up and use for days, and suddenly you’ll realize what a great product it is. Not just ‘this is great for a free application!’, but ‘wow, this is a great application, AND it’s free!’. It’s fast, versatile, and stable. Sun Microsystems purchased the product recently, and they’ve brought all versions up to the same version (1.6 as of this writing).  It supports four “Host operating systems”, Windows, Mac OSX, Solaris, and several varieties of Linux in native packages. It supports a seamless integration mode that allows your guest operating system’s windows to display on the desktop of the host OS (if the guest OS has the VirtualBox extensions installed). What this means is that you can run FireFox on your Ubuntu system, and have an IE window open right next to it as though they were both running on the same OS at the same time.  You can do this with Linux guests or Windows guests. As of this writing the Mac OSX EULA doesn’t allow it to run in virtualization. It’s also important to note that if you run Windows in a virtualized system, you still need to purchase a license for it.

When you fire up your virtual system for the first time, you’ll be asked to configure it. You’ll choose setting for the amount of memory and hard drive space you want to provide to it, and what hardware devices - like floppies, CD-ROMs, sound, and the like. Once that’s complete, you’ll have to install your guest operating system the same way you would on a real computer - put the CDROM in the drive and press the power button on the VirtualBox menu. From there, it’s just like installing on a standalone machine! When you’re done, you’ll be running a completely separate, encapsulated operating system right on your desktop.

This ability is a boon for all types of users. Web Developers can test their web pages in every browser on every operating system without rebooting or maintaining multiple systems. Windows users can ‘try out’ Linux without risking damaging their main system. Linux users can use those Windows programs they have to have, without rebooting. Mac OS X users can run the Windows programs their work requires without leaving their OS of choice. And now you can have virtualization - fast, reliable, stable virtualization - for free, from virtualbox.

Wifi, short for “Wireless Fidelity”, is the generic name applied to common wireless networking devices. It comes in two common flavors and two not-quite-as-common, all based on the IEEE 802.11 standards. 802.11b and 802.11g are very common, at 11mbps and 54mbps, respectively. 802.11a was an early update of the base 802.11 standard offering 54mbps, but at a much higher frequency than the later 802.11g systems.

Most wireless installations you’re likely to encounter are based on 802.11g, but 802.11n is coming on strong even though it’s a draft standard, because it offers speeds up to 300mbps, faster than the common wired networks in most homes. If you decide to go with 802.11n, you should verify the interoperability between your Access Point and your systems, as draft standards tend to be more variable in implementation from one manufacturer to another.

Chances are if you’ve purchased a laptop in the past year, it has wireless capabilities built in, as do many current desktop systems. Before you install a wireless network in your home - or allow someone else to do so - you should understand a few important things about wireless security and risk assessment. You also need to decide what information and access you need to protect. For instance, if you have a console game system that connects to the internet, your risk exposure is fairly low; you might lose stored high scores if the system was compromised, or someone might cheat during a game, but it doesn’t expose things like medical records or financial records. If you have a computer attached to the network, chances are it has more important information - financial information, medical information, information that would make identity theft simple. Other types of information represent a different kind of value, such as digital pictures stored on your computer that would be painful to lose, although not financially damaging.

Another asset you want to protect is your network bandwidth, for several reasons. You don’t want the Department of Homeland Security showing up at your door because someone compromised your wireless connection and was surfing Al Qaeda’s web site using your IP address. You also don’t want the FBI showing up at your door because your next door neighbor connected to your AP and started downloading and uploading copyrighted content.

So how do you protect your network? How do you make sure that “bad guys” aren’t using your assets for their purposes? Well, you can make it difficult, but it’s very difficult to make it impossible. The first step is encryption. Your wireless network is broadcast into the air just like a radio station, although with a much more limited range. Anyone can capture that signal and read your traffic if you don’t act to stop them. The simplest form of encryption is called WEP (Wireless Encryption Protocol). It’s already been compromised - it will only keep honest people honest, or non-techies from casually abusing your connection. If you have someone next door who’s serious about it, they’ll get through WEP in no time. The next step up is WPA (Wireless Protected Access). WPA is much more secure than WEP, and comes in several flavors. For most home installations, you’ll need to use WPA-PSK (the PSK is “pre-shared-key”) or WPA2-PSK. “Pre-Shared-Key” means that you must already have the password before you can join the wireless network. In most cases it will be a passphrase. WPA-PSK is a good choice for a home network if you select an appropriately difficult passphrase. Don’t use words or birthdays or social security numbers or addresses. Try and think of phrases that are mangled the way you see things written on license plates. That makes them easy to remember but hard to guess.

The next step in making sure that no one is hijacking your network is “MAC address access control”. The AP is configured so that it will only allow computers with known and pre-selected MAC addresses to connect. MAC stands for “Media Access Control”; it’s the numbers that the local wireless uses to differentiate between different machines at the very lowest networking level. MAC addresses are (theoretically) unique, so when you put your computer’s MAC address in the AP, you can be reasonably sure that you’re safe, although a very perceptive hacker might “spoof” your MAC address - by causing his machine to pretend to be your own. That’s why this must be combined with WPA or other wireless encryption protocol. Most APs show the connected MAC addresses and allow you to select yours from that list before you enable MAC address control. If you lock yourself out, don’t despair - you can usually connect to the wired interface and fix the problem.

Even though you’ve secured your home wireless network fairly well, it’s not impossible to hack it. This means that certain data must be protected even though the base wireless protocol is encrypted. So when you connect to your bank, make certain that your connection is protected by SSL - most browsers give visual feedback in the case of a lock or a green address bar to let you know you’ve connected to a secure (the URL will begin with ‘https’) site. The same thing applies to any site that you might send information to that you wouldn’t want someone you don’t know to have. Your Insurance company’s web site, your mortgage site, your fitness club membership site… anything that might have sensitive information on it.

Wireless networking can be a risky proposition. If you follow the general guidelines provided here, though, you will have a network as safe as you can make it, and you will be able to carry on your online business with confidence.

Computer security is extremely important in these days of trojan horses, spyware, and malware, and it is very important that every computer user maintain the highest security they can reasonable manage. The means of accomplishing that goal can be confusing and seem contradictory to the less-than-tech savvy computer user, but if you read, understand, and follow the advice in this article, you’re on your way to a more secure computer.

There are a few very important steps to maintaining the security of your PC running Microsoft Windows, and the first and most important is to keep your system updated for security patches from Microsoft. Millions of Windows users are compromised (hacked) every day because of security holes that were patched literally months before by Microsoft, but not by the particular user. You can skip updates that aren’t security related, if you’re concerned about the affect of the patch on your software or hardware, but don’t neglect the security patches. Internet Explorer is a very common vector for malware, so pay special attention to updates to that program.

You should also make sure that your Windows Firewall is turned on and configured. The firewall is designed to protect your system from network attacks by blocking certain types of network traffic. It’s important to understand that firewalls can cause problems with some software, so if your software stops working when you turn the firewall on, turn it back off and see if it fixes the problem. If it does, contact the vendor of the software to find out the information you need to configure your firewall so the software can work properly.

The next extremely important step is to make certain you have a “virus scanner” in place - although it’s important to note that virus scanners don’t just watch for viruses any more. Most providers have an adware blocker and a firewall included at the very least. But make sure you have something scanning for viruses on a regular basis, and make sure that the product you choose also scans email attachments and quarantines anything suspicious. The product you choose should also examine everything you download from the Internet for malware and viruses. Many new products even watch the sites you surf and warn you if they are somehow fraudulent or dangerous.

The fourth step for the home user is to make certain you have a hardware firewall. Such devices aren’t expensive anymore, and even if you only have one computer, the “internet router and firewall” (as they are often called) is an invaluable ally in the battle against the bad guys on the Internet. The router/firewall should be configured to provide NAT services, and you should turn off “upnp” (Universal Plug and Play) unless you need it for network gaming. The UPNP service allows software or hardware inside your network to configure your router in whatever fashion it chooses, so when you’re done playing, you should turn it off.

The hardware firewall protects you against many pro-active attacks, because nothing on the Internet can address your system directly once it is installed.  Hackers on the Internet can only attack the ‘front door’ of your network - the firewall. Most of these attacks are automated scripts that are designed to take advantage of vulnerabilities in Windows, and since your firewall isn’t running Windows, they’re wasting your time. Most hardware firewalls have a logging function, so if you’re interested, you can get an idea of just what kind of attacks are being thrown at your network.

The final - and most critical - step is to manage your own behavior. Downloading software from untrusted sources on the Internet is a good way to get your system infected or hacked. Opening email attachments without scanning them carefully is another activity to avoid. A good practice is to scan all expected attachments, and delete all unexpected attachments. Whether you recognize the sender or not is not a good criteria for the safety of the file. Many trojan horses take over the victim’s email contacts and send a copy of themselves to every email address in the list. Always be suspicious of executable attachments from anyone.
 
The steps outlined here won’t turn your network into a virtual Fort Knox. To be completely secure, you’d need to disconnect from the Internet - but that would defeat the purpose most people have in mind when they obtain a computer. The trick is to balance access with risk. If you only play games on your computer, a virus infection is probably no more serious than simply re-installing - but if you do a lot of online banking and the like, a trojan might just set you up for something much more ominous. Only you can be certain what risk you’re willing to accept, but the steps outlined here will go a long way towards reducing that risk to a reasonable level.

Ensure the Safety of your Personal Information on the Web

Your bank offers you access to a website for managing your account, and your mortgage company soon follows suit. Then your credit cards send you notices that you can log in and check balances or pay bills. Pretty soon, the company that holds the note on your automobile sends you a notice that they have created an account for you where you can log in and pay your bill, followed suddenly by your electric company, water company, and gas company, all offering the same web-enabled, value-added websites for account management and billing. Many consumers are understandably and rightly concerned - that’s a lot of your life now on the web! How secure is it? What should you watch out for? What services should you use and which should you avoid? How should you manage all of the passwords and accounts? Read on, and those questions, and others, will be answered.

Web based access to financial information is convenient, but is it secure? It can be. Banks and credit card companies now have legal requirements for security - that’s why you’ll encounter “enhanced security” notices on those accounts. They will usually want you to provide questions and answers that can be used to further validate your identity, much like the venerable “What is your mother’s maiden name?” that we’re all familiar with from phone authentication procedures. Some such sites will force you to authenticate your browser, by sending you an email with an authentication code - this security step depends on the general wisdom that the more bits of identity you control, the more likely you are to be, well, you.

What this means from their perspective is that you have the account name and password - needed to log in - and you have the username and password for that person’s email address. Each identity fragment we require reduces the probability that someone is pretending to be you, although no such procedure can be absolutely certain, this type of process can get pretty close.

It’s important to be certain that your communication with any of these types of sites is encrypted. Many current sites offer the login and password box on an unencrypted page, but still direct that login information to a secure page in a secure manner. You can test this by first using a random username and password, click “Login” and watch the browser address bar - if it immediately switches to an “https” address, it’s probably a secure system. Again, if you have questions, don’t hesitate to call the provider and ask them to explain their security to you.

There are two considerations to take into account when you’re asked to create an account on your provider’s website. The first is their handling of re-registration. Credit card management sites often allow you to re-register with the same information and transfer your account to the new registration. In this case, there is no imperative to registration because it doesn’t add to your account security. If the provider registers your account to one registration and refuses to connect it to another, you may want to register regardless of whether you need the website features - this keeps someone else from registering as you, and with many sites, alerts you if someone tries. In any event, read through the features the website offers very carefully and decide if you will need any of them. If so, go ahead and register; if not, call the provider and see if they can permanently prohibit your account from being registered on the web site.

When you decide you should create an account, make certain you choose a password that’s very difficult to guess, and a unique password for each site. Passwords that are difficult to guess are made up of a combination of numbers, letters, and symbols, both upper and lower case. One way to make the passwords more memorable is to pretend they’re custom license plates like you see on cars around down - “IH8Fr0gz”, or “L8rMa+e”, for example. As long as you get a combination of upper case, lower case, and numbers, that is at least 8 characters, you will have a fairly secure password.

This can make it difficult to remember all of the password combinations, however. There are a couple of ways of approaching this problem of tracking them. There is one school of thought in security that says you should simply commit them to memory, that any attempt to record them in any way is a breach. This is fine if you have 2 passwords to remember, or if you have a photographic memory, but for most of us, it’s just not rational. Instead, we can use a piece of software called a “password keeper”. These programs allow you to enter various combinations of information - say, website address, username, and password - and then save them to an encrypted file that you access with a name and password. This way you only have to remember one name and password, which gives you access to all of the others. If you do this, make certain the program you choose has very hard encryption, and make sure your password is both memorable and difficult to guess - any compromise of this system exposes all of your usernames and passwords, so protect the file carefully.

The second process is similar, only for encryption we substitute “a safe place”. Many security advisers caution against recording passwords at all, but the real problem appears when people write them on sticky notes and attach them to the monitor. Instead, ideally, we would record the authentication information on pieces of paper and lock them in a physical, locked safe. If this is impractical, we can try storing those passwords and usernames where we keep our other financial records. After all, if you’re trying to protect your credit card account, anyone who finds your records already has anything they can get from that web site. Same with your bank - if they find all of your loan records and statements, they’ve got all the information they can get from the web site. A significant second advantage of this particular method is that if anything should happen to you, your wife, husband, daughter, son, best friend - anyone you trust enough to share the combination of the safe with - will be able to access those sites for information.

When you’ve made your own accounts as secure as you can, what remains is the security of the website itself. Every website is different, and has a different Webmaster, who may make different security decisions than the next fellow, based on differing assessments of risk. All security decisions are trade-offs of risk and access. We can make a site so secure no one can access it, or we can make it so convenient that anyone can - even people we don’t want accessing it. If you have any questions, contact the support address on the website and ask them what their security is like - don’t be shy, because it’s your information they need to protect. Most commercial sites are as secure as their engineers know how to make them, but, inevitably, some get compromised; there’s no process that results in complete, bulletproof security.

This brings us to the discussion of phishing. “Phishing” is a generic term that describes the process of sending emails or redirecting web access to get users to give up their login and password to important sites, by fooling them into thinking they’re logging into the actual site . In a common scenario of this type, you might receive an email from someone claiming to be your bank, asking you to log in to their website and update your username, password, social security number, and other important account information, and often threatening to close your account if you don’t. They even provide you with a convenient link that says “mybank.com”, and include icons and logos from your actual bank website. The most important thing you should know about this type of attack is this: no legitimate site should ever send you such an email. Your first response to an email like this should always be profound suspicion. Dead giveaways for scams like tNote (Online Security for the Web), 24 May 2008, 12:52his are URLs that look similar to your bank’s actual site. For instance, if your bank is at “mybank.com”, you may find URLs in these sorts of emails that direct you to “mybank.info”, or even “mybankinfo.to” - and sometimes, the most brash of them will have a bare IP address like “10.2.3.2/myinfo.php”. Frequently there will be significant spelling or grammatical errors in the email, as well, as there are certain parts of the world that originate the bulk of this kind of email, where English is a second language. These are all red flags, but never forget that no one should ever send you a legitimate email like this, and if you receive one, always contact your provider by phone to report the phishing attack, because they may need to alert other users to the attack’s existence. If you received such an email, you can guarantee thousands of others have, as well.

There are a few of things to remember here. Make good passwords and protect them, create accounts only when it’s beneficial to you, make certain your provider is using encryption, beware of phishing attacks, and if you have any questions, call your provider. They have your information on their website, and they’re responsible for protecting it once you’ve done your share as described here. The web can be a scary place when you start thinking about information and security, but if you pay attention to this guideline, you’ll be better prepared to face the risks with confidence.