Online Computer Tips Monthly Newsletter - January 2007
Latest Virus/Security Alerts:
PDF files pose security risks
A recently discovered security weakness in the widely used Acrobat Reader software could put internet users at risk.
Experts warned of links with malicious JavaScript to PDF files hosted on Web sites. This could allow access to all information on a victim's hard drive.
Depending on the browser, the JavaScript can read the user's files, delete them, execute programs, send the contents to the attacker. The security problem exists because the Web browser plugin of Adobe's Acrobat Reader allows JavaScript code appended to links to PDF files to run once the link is clicked.
To mitigate the threat, users can upgrade to Adobe Reader 8, the latest version of the Adobe software released last month.
December's Poll Results:
Do you use a wired or wireless mouse?
78%
Wireless - 22%
Tip of the Month:
Microsoft Calculator Plus
Microsoft Calculator Plus has an improved interface over the standard Calculator that comes with Windows XP. The new calculator also boasts some nice features such as the ability to perform exchange rate calculations and various types of conversions, such as currency and weight and conversions between different measurement units for area, temperature, volume and more. It also includes all the mathematical functions offered in Microsoft Calculator.
Vulnerabilities in Microsoft Excel Could Allow Remote Code Execution
When using vulnerable versions of Office, if a user were logged on with administrative user rights, an attacker who successfully exploited these vulnerabilities could take complete control of the client workstation. An attacker could then install programs; view, change, or delete data; or create new accounts with full user rights. Users whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less impacted than users who operate with administrative user rights.
This vulnerability affects Excel 2000, 2002, 2003, 2004 for Mac and Office X for Mac.
Click here for more details and to download the patch.
For more detailed information and other steps you can take to keep your computer safe click here.
If you are planning to add some new hardware or even build your own computer then you need to check out Toms Hardware for the latest information and reviews of all types of computer hardware. Click here for details.
Readers Question of the Month:
Poor video game performance
Scott writes in with a hardware question Q. Every time i run Microsoft Flight similator x the graphics cause my computer to slow down or temp. freeze up. Do i need to install a better graphics card?
A.
Poor performance with games can be caused by many reasons. The most common is a lack of memory. Flight Simulator should not be as intense as many of the other 3D games out there but it will take some memory to run. If you don't have at least 512MB of RAM in your system you should look into getting more. Windows XP will run on less but I find it needs 512MB or more to run at its best. RAM is cheap and easy to install so it makes for a good upgrade.
If your computer has onboard video rather than a separate video card it is most likely using system RAM for its memory which means that its taking away from your total RAM to apply to the video card. These onboard cards usually don't allocate enough memory to themselves for high end gaming. I would look into an AGP video card with at least 128MB or more of onboard RAM for your game. If you already have an AGP video card then you can upgrade it to a higher model.
It may also be freezing up if your card is not using a supported chipset for the game such as NVIDIA or ATI etc. It should say on the box what the requirements are.
Hitachi says it will come out with a 3.5 inch 1 terabyte drive for desktops in the first quarter of 2007. The new drive will cost about $399.
A terabyte is a trillion bytes, or a million megabytes, or 1,000 gigabytes. The drive can hold about 330,000 3MB photos or 250,000 MP3s. An hour of standard video takes up about 1GB, and an hour of high definition video takes up 4GB. A single terabyte drive takes up less space than four 250GB drives, which lets IT managers conserve on computing room real estate.
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