The Smorgasbord

PC Mag online has a post about the Phoenix Pre-Boot shell that’s pretty cool. Some computers and laptops have had pre-boot environments for years but they were proprietary to that make and model computer. Now Phoenix has launched downloadable versions at CES 2009 that you can install on any laptop (that has an AMD or Intel chipset with virtualization technology).

What is a “pre-boot shell” you ask? It’s an environment that loads instantly when your PC starts – before you ever get to windows. This is usually based on Linux, and the cool things is now manufacturer are starting to add features that allow you to perform basic tasks without ever booting into Windows. Just need a web browser, or quick access to Amazon or flickR? These pre-boot shells have wi-fi built in so you can do basic web tasks on the fly in seconds without booting. Phoenix claims as much as 25% increase in savings to your battery charge.

I think it’s funny in a way that “once again” Linux is being used as an innovator where Microsoft falls flat. On the one hand you could say that Windows Vista had too many versions to choose from, but on the other hand Linux is so very flexible that it can be used on a phone, for a pre-boot shell, on a thumb drive, or in a cable box.

In a way – the simplistic features of the pre-boot shell remind me of when I tried gOS, the version of Linux that is famously installed on the WalMart budget PC’s that were $199 last year. It has huge icons at the bottom toolbar with most-oft-used web functions, like MySpace, Facebook, eBay, Amazon, Firefox, etc.

If any of you are interested in what the pre-boot shell could be like, I invite you to download a copy of the latest Ubuntu Linux for free, burn it to a CD and run it “live”. You can try out Linux on your Windows laptop or desktop without installing a thing.

Isn’t Linux great?

I was asked the other day by a colleague “how do I print directory file lists for all my external drives”? I would imagine that this is a pretty common task, considering those of us with gaggles of external drives just chock full of digital images, mp3′s, documents, videos, and more! Most people I know are really big digital packrats!

Back in the days of dial-up modems, when broadband was still kind of dreamy – we had these things called “utilities”. Windows was just an operating system, and there were all kinds of things that it “didn’t do” yet…like unzip files, manage themes, burn cd’s, and countless other things. There were lots of software repositories online where you could download freeware “utilities” that did cool things. Those days were kind of lost with the wild west days of the web.

I’m happy to announce there are still a few programmers out there writing and maintaining cool and free downloadable software utilities, and Karen’s Powertools is one of them. Her utility solves the problem of trying to figure out what exactly is stored in a bazillion directories by allowing you to print them a detailed listing, that includes options for date, name, system files, subdirectories and more. If you don’t download it – bookmark it today, when someone asks you how you do this – you’ll remember reading this post and want to forward it on to them!

You can download Karen’s Directory Printer here!

I’ve had a Toshiba laptop with Windows Vista Home on it for the last two years. It’s my main work machine, the one I do all my blogging and web site work on. In that time I’ve had to reformat it back to it’s original “storebought” state twice (the last time about 10 days ago). That’s always a pain because first you have to backup all of your photos, music, and files to an external drive. Then, once you format and reinstall you have to spend a few hours removing all the crap installed from the factory, and installing all the software you need to work.

It’s a dual-core machine with 2GB of RAM, and sometimes it just gets too damn slow for the resources it should have available. I had a virus once, and it was a PITA to remove. A few weeks back the computer got some kind of a glitch, where it would keep trying to load DLL’s that didn’t exist. This was hanging the machine, and it would literally take 5-8 minutes just to open a file folder. I knew the machine HAD to be reformatted and wiped again, because the restore disk only has the option to install from scratch – there is no “repair over the top of existing Windows” like there is from a real original Windows (non-OEM) disk.

I’ve used Ubuntu on my 1.2Ghz 512MB of RAM 7 year old Gateway machine in the basement for the last 5+ years. It stays on 24/7, it has 3 100GB hard drives in it, and I reboot it maybe 5 times a year. I use it almost every night when I play guitar to listen to mp3′s and play along, and I also do web work on it, lookup lyrics, and write content from time to time. It does have WINE of it for Windows emulation, and I did install (and use) TaxCut on it once a few years back with no problems.

I thought about installing Ubuntu on the laptop when I first got it, but didn’t because I have to have a Windows box to login to work remotely using VPN. It requires Internet Explorer, ActiveX, and all that jazz. Since I knew that the laptop had to be reformatted anyway – I decided to try Ubuntu on it and see how it would work before reinstalling Windows. If I had problems, then in with the Vista restore disk and back to MS-land again. I sent to the Ubuntu Web Site and downloaded the 32-bit ISO to burn and install.

If you haven’t used Ubuntu Linux before – you should try it. The install is painless and as easy as Windows, and to most people that don’t know any different – it’s just a “PC”, and they have no problems using it at all. Case and point, we have relatives that were calling me every 3 months because their computer kept locking up and getting viruses. I was sick of it, so I formatted the disk and installed Ubuntu. I installed Java, Flash, Firefox Windows Media plugin and never looked back. I never told them it wasn’t Windows (they aren’t computer people or techie at all) – and they don’t know any different. They think it’s actually some new version of Windows other people don’t have. They’ve had it one year now, and have never called me to ask “how do I do…” anything, and they have not accidentally screwed it up or gotten a virus at all. In fact, both adults in the house were taking online courses at the college using that PC (and printing out papers) with no problems – AND they never called me to setup the printer! I think that’s really saying something about how far Linux has come the last few years.

When you boot from the Ubuntu CD the first option you have is to “boot live and try”, so I decided to try that first and make sure all the hardware worked. Once the desktop came up, I tried a web browser, and everything (including sound) worked great! All drives and hardware components showed up, even my card reader. I plugged in an external drive, no problems there, and the wireless was fine. There was an icon on the desktop “install” – so I took the plunge. In less than 15 minutes I had wiped the disk, installed Ubuntu 8.10 and was on my new desktop.

I set about installing the things I would need to work, Firefox and my required addons, windows and other (quicktime) media codecs, the latest version of Flash, an Acrobat reader, FTP, telnet, some graphics and movie editors, etc. Then I remembered that there were two things I STILL needed Windows for. The first was to login to work via VPN, and the second was to install and edit my Line 6 PodXT tones for my guitar rig. These were both two very specific things I wouldn’t be able to do in Linux at all.

I remembered at work that they were starting to convert the data center over to “virtual machines”. Instead of buying hundreds of rack mounted servers, they were starting to install virtual machines on the mainframe and really big super-computer servers. This had become really big in the IT business world, but had it translated over to mainstream linux yet?

It turns out it has, and Sun is leading the way (or so it appears). Sun has software called Virtual Box, and the personal license is FREE! I was skeptical at first, but downloaded and installed it on my now Ubuntu laptop. I installed the downloaded .deb package, but you can do it from the command line or with Synaptic no problem. USB support is disabled by default, but that’s easily fixed with a tutorial like “how to enable USB in Virtualbox.

Once I installed the software I created a new “Virtual Machine” and called it “WindowsXP”. I gave it 10GB of disk space and 256MB of Ram, 8MB shared video. It said to put in a CD to install, so I popped in an old WindowsXP disk and let it rip! I took about 10 minutes to install and reboot, and about 20 more minutes on Windows famous “first time configuration” runs, and then the “virtual” PC rebooted and presented me with a login screen. I promptly changed the settings to 1024×768 display (my laptop is widescreen 1680px). When I logged in everything was perfect! I fired up an IE browser and downloaded Firefox. I installed quicktime, flash, and acrobat reader. I logged into my desktop PC remotely – no problem! All from within “virtual Windows XP” window on my Ubuntu Linux desktop. When I went to close the Window I was prompted, do you want to “save the state of the virtual machine”, “power off”, or “reboot”.

Wow, I had to think about the power of what all this meant. Let’s say you had an ubuntu box with a 500GB hard drive. You could install Virtual box with WindowsXP, Windows 98, Windows ME, Windows 2000, or even other versions of Linux if you wanted. Personally I would stick with Windows XP, but you could install all your software on it you normally use (like Office), and then “save the state” of the machine. Let’s say you have 3 kids in the house that are notorious for screwing up your PC (or relatives or friends). Give ‘em each their own virtual machine. If they screw it up – make another!

Kids like to play Windows based games, need a Windows PC for work – all “virtual machine”. Guess what? VirtualBox has versions you can download and install for both Windows AND Mac (free!) too! So, you can download on Windows and install Linux virtual machines, or even other Windows virtual machines. Install on a Mac to install Windows or Linux virtual machines! The possibilities are endless, and it’s all FREE!!

I’m glad I downgraded my Windows Vista laptop to Ubuntu and Windows XP – it’s the best thing I ever did!

This “Sata HDD Dock” is one of the coolest things ever! I purchased some cables a long time ago where you can hook up a hard drive via USB, and I thought that was pretty cool. But you still have to deal with the cable. If you have hard drives laying around, or you repair PC’s for family and friends this is just the must have geek gadget tool! It’s a hot-swappable dock, and all you have to do is just plugin your drive in! That’s it! You can get them in Sata and eSata, and most will take 2.5″ AND 3.5″ drives – that means notebook drives too! The ones I looked at even had an eSata cable port on the back of the dock for even faster data transmissions! Who needs a flash drive when you have a port for an entire hard drive!

[nms:sata hdd dock,8,0,0,smorgas.sata.hdd.dock]

Ever lost a password? I did today, and I found a “free password reveal tool”. Actually, what happenned was that I had a password saved in my browser, but I didn’t know what it was anymore and I wanted to change it. When I tried to change the password, it wanted the old one before I could enter a new one…and well, that was the start of a way to figure my password out.

Back in the day (like 10 years ago) I remember when we used to download all kinds of Windows utilities to do handy things, and there was this thing called a “password revealer” that I used to have. When you ran a small executable file it would open a “loupe” (fancy word for jewelers maginifying glass). When you moved the “loupe” over a password field it would turn the dots or asteriks into their real letters, numbers, and characters revealing the real password. w00t!

Now today I wanted to find this utility or a very good reason – I wanted to figure my own password out. Unfortuantely there are people out there who would want to use this tool for ill gotten gains, like hacking your myspace password, breaking into your hotmail account, or for an easy way to steal your yahoo password. What I’m saying is, I’m going to give you a tool you can use to reveal most saved password, but it would be in your best interest to uninstall when you were done to keep prying eyes from getting into your business! Like I said – there’s a reason that less than 100 people per month search for “password revealer”, but more than 2,000 each search for “hacking myspace password”, and “hotmail password stealer”?!?

When your dealing something like looking for a “password revealer” tool – a lot of the search results are spammy or trying to get you to buy some piece of software to solve your problem. I was lucky enough that Lifehacker saved the day (again) with their post Recover Lost Passwords. They linked to a site and post I forgot about – Snadboy’s Revelation 2.0, which is course is a freeware password revealer. It worked for me! If it doesn’t work for you, try some of the other tools on the Lifehacker page, and report back here what works and what doesn’t!

Would you like to access the Internet 100 times faster than you do now? According to Roland’s Emerging Tech blog that reality isn’t too far off. I’ve been using the Internet the very beginning of dial-up and the 1200 baud modem. That’s probably 100 times slower than the broadband we have today. What if I told you that a new way to transfer data for the Internet has been developed and it’s 100 times faster than what we have now?

In Australia at the University of Sydney they created an optical chip based on plain glass that could transfer up to 640Gbps – yes “gigabytes per second”. That’s about a dozen and a half full DVD’s (per second). They say it could be up to 100 faster than what we have “at no additional cost to the consumer”. Well, that’s university people saying that – you sure can bet, even if it doesn’t cost your provider any more – because it’s 100 times faster they’ll jack up the price to who knows what. When I read this article the thing I wonder is if they can make computer parts based on this new glass switching technology and lessen the reliance on silicon. Exiting things are definitely to come.

My HPTouchSmart PC Review shows you how you can buy the PC of tomorrow – today!

You’re probably going to catch some ads on TV about this in the coming weeks (as I did today), but the HP TouchSmart PC is just all over the place now. It’s so sleek and cool, and when you see it you just can’t help want one. What am I talking about?

This post is part of our Tech Reviews series!

Just watch the video, and then you’ll know what I’m talking about…