Category: Tech Articles

Android 4.4.2 KitKat

Size: 142 x 72.5 x 8.1

Weight: 145g

2.5GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 CPU*

2GB of RAM

16/32GB storage capacity

microSD support up to 64GB

5.1-inch FHD Super AMOLED display (1920 x 1080)

16-megapixel camera with UHD 4K video recording at 30fps

2.1-megapixel front-facing camera

LTE Cat 4 (150/50Mbps)

USB 3.0

802.11 a/b/g/n/ac HT80 MIMO (2×2) Wi-Fi

Bluetooth 4.0 BLE/ANT

NFC

IR Transceiver

2800mAh battery

IP67 Dust and Water Resistant (est. 30 minutes under 3 ft. of water)

Fingerprint scanner

Heart rate sensor

*It has already been suggested the later version of the S5 (“Standard” vs. “Prime” are rumored names I have seen) will be released with an Exynos 2.1 Ghz Octa-Core CPU, allowing even higher on screen resolutions and better game performance, among other performance gains.

On Friday, Feb 21st, 2014, Apple issued an update for iOS. Apple’s website noted a serious flaw in SSL. On Tuesday the 25th, Apple finally released an update for Mac OSX (10.9.2) to address the flaw. I do not know if other, pre 10.9 Mavericks versions of Mac OSX are getting this update, or if iOS 6 users are receiving patches.

Considering Microsoft has supported Windows XP for over a decade and is only soon about to pull the plug, I find it shocking that Apple would only push these patches on their very latest operating systems, considering the severity of the flaw. (more…)

Google has your email. Not just GMail users, but major businesses. Google Apps users store the core of their business in Google’s cloud. Even Twitter uses GMail. I got on GMail very early on, back before users could invite each other, before you were given 5, then 20, then 100 invites to bring other people to GMail. I was excited to use it. The interface, the functionality, it was a leap forward from Hotmail, or the webmail app I had been using on my own domain. There was a time when I was excited to see what the search engine giant would do next. But these days, Google, Microsoft, and now Facebook, are all taking the wrong approach to business. (more…)

Oligopolies, legal monopolies: the laws that allow cable companies to corner the market and smother you. First off, if you think that companies like Comcast/Xfinity and Time Warner weren’t colluding and price fixing, you’re blind. Second, why do we allow cable companies exclusive rights to specific regional areas? The cable companies lobby the government to allow them to continue this way because of the cost of laying out their network. If they had to lower their prices to compete, they couldn’t afford to update their network. We don’t do that for phone companies, and many would argue that the telephone companies had similar, if not much larger, outlays of cash to create their networks nearly a half-century before the cable companies. (more…)

I’m a huge fan of Leo Laporte and TWiT. Lately, Laporte has been catching some heat on his shows for defending Google. In episode 237 of This Week in Google (TWiG), Leo and his panel discussed the growing animosity towards Google. In the most recent episode of TWiT, and reiterated on TWiG, Leo argues that Google is quite forward with their policies. You know that if you use Google products, they are using your information to target ads to you. The more they know about you, the more Google can provide you with a better experience.

Google knows where you are based on the GPS in your Android phone. Google knows what your voice sounds like from the “OK, Google” voice commands delivered via your phone or Glass. Google sifts through your GMail to pull out boarding passes for flights, appointment times so that Google Now can tell you when to leave based on location and traffic patterns, and even what you like to watch based on your YouTube viewing habits. All of this helps the former-search-now-everything giant better know you and deliver a genuinely unique experience when using their ecosystem.

To the end that Google seems to be quite transparent about what they do with your information, I completely agree with Laporte. However, the information isn’t why I feel Google is becoming more “evil” by the day. It is Google’s desire to control everything. Jeff Jarvis just rolled his eyes, but hear me out.

I don’t care if they want to buy Nest and know what the temperature is in my house. I don’t care if they can track me with GPS. I don’t care if they know what my emails say. Do I find it weird that one company wants to be in all of these different businesses? A little. But what concerns me most is Google’s refusal to play nice with other companies. I’m the 3% – I am a Windows Phone user. When Google planned to remove ActiveSync support from GMail was when I cut over to Outlook.com.

Google is slowly dragging you to their platform, as if their services aren’t enough. They are doing this by refusing to offer apps on other platforms. Don’t believe me? Look at the Windows Phone app store. See the picture above? The Google Search app is the ONLY app published by Google, Inc. I know, some of you are already asking “what’s the point of supporting Windows Phone?” But let’s be serious, rather than just ragging on a phone OS with small (but growing) market share. Why wouldn’t Google want their apps to be ubiquitous?

There is no GMail app. The phone can be configured to use IMAP and work quite well, but even Android itself separates the “Mail” app from the GMail app on their own Android platform. They offer a matching app on iOS. Why not offer a premium experience on any platform? Apple forcibly removed Google Maps from iOS, why not bring it to Windows Phone? Google has made the move to kill off support for 3rd party Google Voice apps, leaving those of us with MetroTalk out in the cold, despite not offering a full-featured solution on the Windows Phone platform.

Meanwhile, Microsoft offers a host of apps on Android. From OneDrive, to Office Mobile for Office 365, to Lync, to a full-featured Remote Desktop app, and a stand alone Bing app, for those interested. Even Xbox Music has made an appearance – but can I get Google Play Music for Windows Phone? No.

It isn’t what Google is doing with my data – I’d happily hand over more than they want to know! But I don’t have the option, unless I want to abandon my preferred user experience. There are a few of us crazies who like Windows Phone, and even Windows 8.1, how long is it until only Android and Chromebook users are allowed to access Google’s services? Google spent years making web-apps with the goal of being platform agnostic, but lately they seem to be creating a walled garden, with the sole intention of making outsiders jealous.

In this week’s TWiG, Gina Trapani agreed with Leo that there does seem to be a movement among “normal people” that Google is getting so big it’s scary. Leo thinks it may be a “drum beat” possibly relating to the fear of geek culture, as has been discussed before on his shows. But, in my experience, it’s the geeks leading this charge. Google might not be evil, yet, but their “don’t be evil” mantra can only help but become a whisper. As they dip their fingers in more and more industries, people are going to become increasingly cynical and wonder what their goals are. Their smartest move is to head users off at the pass and explain to the public what some more of their long term goals are for the company at large. It would put a lot of minds, including mine, at ease.

It came out yesterday that Facebook wants to buy WhatsApp, a well known instant messaging client used around the world. Let me count the ways this is a terrible thing. (more…)

This blog post is actually quite personal, I’ve only told this story to a few people. It seemed weird to “brag” about the job I didn’t go for. But it seems like a good time to share my story. If you’re uncomfortable with oversharing, stop now. (more…)

There is an ongoing debate about the legality of emulating video games. Some say it’s like a rental, some say you have to own the game, many vendors would have you believe it’s 100% illegal no matter what. If you want someone else to worry about the legalities while you reap the benefits, look no further than our friends at Archive.org: The Internet Archive.

Recently, Internet Archivists have put together a collection of vintage gaming console information. (more…)

Some recent glitches in Windows (particularly on some Surface 2 devices) have been prompting users for their BitLocker Security Key. Many people don’t know their key, and if you can’t login to your computer to check it, how do you know what it is!? We’re here to help.

Simply visit onedrive.live.com/recoverykey and view the list of keys your computers have automatically uploaded to your Microsoft account! If you know the name of the machine, you can easily figure out which BitLocker key you need, and type it in to unlock your computer!

Whether you encrypted your drive and needed to move it to another computer, or some glitch is asking you for your BitLocker Encryption Key, at least now you can figure our what your BitLocker Key is. I had some keys in there for devices I didn’t any more, so I deleted them from my account to keep it clean. It’s nice to know we can get access to these keys as needed!

UPDATE: As if an upcoming “Google Take-Out” feature wasn’t enough, literally the same day I posted this Microsoft introduced a GMail import tool. Comments on an Engadget article announcing the feature indicated problems importing large mailboxes (~20GB), however it seems that Microsoft is listening, and willing to help. Microsoft has never specified a size of Outlook.com’s mailboxes, simply calling them “virtually unlimited.”

Original post:
Rumor has it that Google is about to create a new “Google Take-Out” feature for Gmail, allowing you to export your mail, contacts, and calendar entries from Google’s email service. That didn’t exist when I moved from Google Apps to a custom Outlook.com domain several months ago. Here is what I did. (more…)

Last week I got a call from someone who couldn’t give me much specific information, except that some application wasn’t installing, and that “it kept saying it needs Win32.” Yesterday I had a chance to check it out, expecting that we would just need to download the proper 32 or 64 bit version of the software. The application he was using (which wasn’t FlexiSign, I don’t even remember what it was called) was installing fine. It was his Roland CX-300 Vinyl Cutter that he couldn’t get installed under Windows 7 64-bit.

Checking the vendor’s website, they have no plans in developing a supporting driver for Windows 7 64-bit, and no plans to develop for Windows 8/8.1 whatsoever. I tried searching for beta drivers, taking parts of the 32-bit driver and inserting them to the 64-bit driver (I do have some experience with this), etc… but all to no avail. The man who had called me said he spent 4 hours on the phone with the either the hardware manufacturer’s support staff, or the software developer (I’m not certain which) trying to make it work (I’m very surprised they didn’t just tell him it wasn’t possible and hang up).

In a last ditch effort I searched the web and found (more…)

I was recently digging through an archive of old 3dfx files that were sent to me more than a decade ago. I don’t even recall who sent them anymore, but there was a treasure trove of internal documentation from within the walls of 3dfx Interactive, Inc. Among them included planning documents to take advantage of new features in the then upcoming DirectX 8 APIs, an audit-list of who has which test Voodoo 5 5500 card, benchmark results from hours of testing, lists of software used for testing, and much, much more (more…)

I was pretty happy when I bought my Microsoft Surface, but that’s because I understood what I was getting. But when I start hearing rumors about this new generation of two-in-ones that ran full-blown Windows on Intel hardware… I had to get my hands on one. Enter the ASUS Transformer Book T100. (more…)

A few weeks ago, I wrote a review on Sprint.com for a phone I picked up in August. The Samsung ATIV S Neo. Unfortunately, the phone has a few issues – and Sprint’s customer service isn’t going to help you fix them. I think this should be known to potential customers. Unfortunately, I received an email stating that my review would not be published until I removed my complaints about Sprint’s customer service. Customer Service is part of the problem with this phone. Not the individual agents – they care, I know they do. The problem is that they aren’t being informed of a much wider issue, and all it does is frustrate those of us with ongoing issues!

Below, I have decided to post my entire, uncensored review of Sprint’s Samsung ATIV S Neo. Enjoy.

I love Windows Phone 8. Just as I loved Windows Phone 7 before it. It gets a bad wrap for not having a lot of apps, but all of the apps that I actually use on a day-to-day basis are right here when I need them. I can do my banking, all of my email and chat programs, social networking, etc… several of the networks can be integrated directly with the phone, even without the specific app installed: Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter can all be updated from the “Me” tile with just a couple of taps

The downside seems to be a known issue with Windows Phone 8 that Spring and Microsoft have refused to officially acknowledge and tell us whether or not a fix is on the way. The overwhelming majority of WP8 users (both this Samsung model and the HTC model) are reporting that the voicemail indicator does not work. You have no idea that you have a voicemail until you actually force yourself to manually call in and listen – hoping “there are no new messages” is all you hear. This is a massive frustration we have brought to Sprint’s attention in the support forums, and they try to go through troubleshooting steps with you each time, as though it is a problem that can be resolved on the headset when it appears that THOUSANDS of WP8 handsets have the issue. Windows Phone 7 had no such problem, and I’ve strongly considered going back to my HTC Arrive because of this.

The phone ITSELF, though, is amazing. The hardware design is beautiful, it’s nearly identical to the Galaxy S4. The processor and memory make for one of the fastest WP8 devices you can buy, the screen supports beautiful 720p resolution, and although it’s no Lumia 1020, it takes beautiful pictures and video, although I do find the flash to be slightly off which can lead to difficulty when trying to use something like the Chase bank app’s Quick Deposit feature where you need to photograph checks. I don’t buy cases for my phones, and even riding in my pocket with change and other items, the back and screen of the phone are scratch free and still beautiful to look at. The large screen can make the phone a bit wide for some peoples hands, mine included, but I don’t mind the size when the image quality is just SO good.

I was scrolling through my Twitter feed when I saw someone post a link to an NBC News article about John McAfee being asked to take a look at some of the problems with the Obamacare website. Look, I don’t care where anybody stands politically, or what opinions one may have of Healthcare.gov. Anybody, and I mean anybody who thinks that asking the guy who appeared in the video below just a few short months ago to take a technological “look-see” at something, is out of their minds! Republican, Democrat, Tea Party, Libertarian… why would anybody want to associate themselves with this? I’m still waiting for an “October fools” follow-up to this article. Warning: the video below is likely not safe for work.

File-Count Audits are a necessity in modern computing and security. Any number of security and auditing tools will automate this process for you, and notify you of discrepencies, but even the smallest IT firms can easily perform this task by hand with a simple search application. First, let’s discuss why.

Recently, companies as large as LexisNexis had their networks compromised by files that could’ve been anything from remote access trojans to botnet zombies. One article on Slashdot mentions that a file named nbc.exe was placed on the servers and resided there for months. Months!? Really? Nobody caught that? The file name is obviously suspicious, but not once did it come up in an audit of new files? People fall for “system.exe” or “OS.exe” or “Windows.exe” all the time – but to have a corporate server with a file named nbc.exe and nobody to take a second glance at it is quite poor.

I get it, some companies have extremely large datasets. Auditing every little change might be practically impossible, or at the very least, excruciatingly expensive (both in terms of financial and system resources!). Still, even when the data you house changes, it isn’t typically going to be executable data. This is an easy thing to spot! Even free tools like the one shown above, WinDirStat, can be used to keep a running count and list of .exe files on your server. Your .exe filecount should practically never change, particularly without your knowledge. Some Windows Update installers / uninstallers might include new .exe files, but typically your server isn’t in a position to have the active number of executable files in flux.

Say you even have User directories on your Active Directory server, and a user uploads a .exe file into their directory. You still have no reason not to audit the contents of those directories, and perhaps enforce a security policy that executables cannot be stored on the server.

Performing a file-count audit once a month, even if it is just of critical filetypes such as .dll, .exe, and .bat; simple behaviors like this can protect you in the long run. Even if you don’t know every file name in every folder, just get a count of how many .EXE files there are, and if that number changes without you doing something, then you can pull the list of executables. Even with nothing to compare it to, I would hope a name like “nbc.exe” would jump out, particularly if it were in a nested folder where nobody would normally place a file. Use common sense and protect yourself, your company, and your customers.

I remember when a 128-bit SSL certificate meant that my transaction was secure. Now we’re wondering what gaps in the security there may be, even when looking at 4,096 bit encryption!

When we’re talking “key length” – we’re talking about those number of bits we use to “measure” encryption for every day purposes. A key allows you to then decrypt the encrypted data (a file, a picture, a credit card number, etc…). With good security practices the key is not related to the crytographic method used to obscure the data, it is merely what allows you to then decrypt the file. Kind of like how your car key doesn’t actually start the engine, it just triggers the ignition to do the rest for you. A higher “bit value” means there are more possibilities for each key, the integer multiplied by powers of two.

All of that aside, when we talk about something being “4,096 bit” – currently considered highly sophisticated encryption – we’re still only talking about a comparitively small amount of data. CPUs are getting faster by leaps and bounds. Memory is so widely available that sloppy coding has been “Standard Procedure” for over a decade. Storage drives are getting physically smaller, while storing more data than ever before in human history. You can walk in to a store and buy a 3TB hard drive. In the 1980’s, terabytes were still theoretical measurements. So I ask – why are we “settling” for encryption like 4,096 bit? Shor’s algorithm seems to be on path to crack every password and read every encrypted document that you’ve ever created, so why not lock things down tighter.

Google has stepped up encryption plans in response to the NSA news going public, but that is only half of the battle. It is also nothing more than a PR battle – Google knew what was going on, they were the ones who complied. To make a sudden scramble and speed up their implementation is only for show, it’s not like they were as surprised about the leaks as the rest of us. It just irks me that they’re going for brownie points with this stunt, being so public about it.

I believe that everything should be encrypted, all the time. HTTPS shouldn’t be necessary anymore, HTTP should simply exist as a secure platform. As should all of the data stored on your computer, and on the web. After the revelations that these large companies have been buddy buddy with the NSA, it’s safe to assume that things like Microsoft’s “Bitlocker” encryption isn’t enough. We need something better, something open source and publicly verified by many independent voices. And not only that, but something that is strong. If I used 2:1 encryption on every files on my hard drive at work, I would still have a massive amount of free disk space. Computational limitations of encryption are of no concern to nmost people as memory, storage capacity, processing power, and bandwidth get larger and larger. Take my 60GB of data, wrap it with 120GB of fluff, so now I have a total of 180GB sitting on my disk drive. So what, I still have 820+ free gigs of storage!

As encryption gets better, crytographic keys need to become stronger. Eventually we’ll move beyond passphrases and keys, passwords and PINs… voice encryption, retinal scans, and finger print identification… those are possible, and just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to security. Heartbeats, thoughts, even the way we breathe are all being experimented with as methods of identification. But who knows what it will take to ensure our security and privacy in the future.

photo credit: Sonny Dickson

Today, I expect Apple to make a mistake. Now, I could be wrong, but here is my brief prediction for today’s press conference.

Apple will announce the new iPhone “5S” – faster than the iPhone 5, 128 GB of storage, and available in traditional white, black, and the new Champagne Gold. Distinct from that will be the iPhone “5C” – a phone nearly identical to the current iPhone 5, but available in a variety of new colors, similar to the old iPod lineup. A rainbow of color available, but on an underwhelmingly basic phone.

Why this is a mistake: Apple is simply leaving money on the table. While I have no doubt that people who already own the iPhone 5 would drop everything just to have a green or blue or pink iPhone 5 (and thus Apple is still going to make money) those same people would also love to have the “upgraded” and higher performing “5S” type model. But the 5S, I believe, is going to remain exclusive, and only be available in one new color – so that the elite status of the iPhone 5S owner can be shown off.

Others have made similar predictions, but I seem to be the only one out there who thinks this is a terrible idea on Apple’s part. Microsoft just picked up Nokia and is going to start gaining steam. Google already has the Motorola team and is working on future Nexus devices. Competition is heating up, and the iOS7 announcement didn’t seem to really “do the trick” for a lot of people. Apple’s responsibility to its shareholders is to profit as much as possible. The person who wants a cool color can also be the person who wants a faster phone. Again, my prediction is that the 5C will be more budget priced and the specs will be nearly identical to the existing iPhone 5, but the “5S” that is likely to launch with the new champagne gold color I expect to add a little bit of CPU performance, possibly even 128GB of storage, because, why not? So will Apple actually make this mistake? Or am I off base and all of the speeds, and sizes, and color options will be available to all buyers? We’ll find out. But I’ll tell you one thing: I expect sales of clear iPhone cases to rise!

image credit: planetpalmbeach.

I’m not prone to conspiracy theories, but some things are just a bit too much even for me. Cisco recently released an advisory about a new piece of DNS poisoning malware which can install a Tor client on a user’s machine. Their suggestion? “Enterprises should consider blocking Tor traffic on their networks.”

This, just days after a massive chunk of Tor sites were compromised under the guise of fighting child pornography. It seemed like a safe thing to do, after all; nobody wants to defend child porn. BUT, privacy advocates everywhere are literally and physically reeling from the crackdown on the Tor network, seen in recent weeks. “Tor” stands for “The Onion Router” and is a service that can anonymize traffic on the web, by allowing multiple shared entry and exit points. Your traffic goes in to “The Onion Router” network, through several layers and bouncing off of several other routers and peers in the network, then gets spit out on of a random exit point, along with all of the other traffic routed out the same exit. In the end, it is virtually impossible to trace back to any one user, without more identifiable markers on their machine (which is what the malware planted in Tor-based sites is doing). We have even seen sites like Silent Circle, and Lavabit shut down their services and Hushmail fold to the feds.

With a sudden attack on Tor and privacy and anonymity protection software is executed by the government, then a well known and major security and networking company advises that most enterprises should start blocking Tor based traffic on their networks… it just feels a bit too “coincidental.” In a time when the discussion has never been larger, the NSA and other federal agencies ordering these crackdowns have NEVER been so brazen. Where most private companies would be experiencing a panic and a PR nightmare, these organizations appear to be moving forward with the cavalier attitude of Don Quixote, oblivious (or unconcerned) to the rubber band-like reaction that lies ahead. I’m not a conspiracy theorist, I’m not even a privacy advocate, but someone out there has forgotten what it means to be subtle when trampling the little people.