Oct 2003 - WINdows usERS Computer user group

WINdows usERS
October
Bits & Bytes & Xp
In This Issue
Bits & Bytes & Xp. . . .
Follow-up Digital Photo
Presentation . . . . . . .
President’s Message. . .
Review of DVD X Copy
XPress . . . . . . . . . .
IOGEAR RF Mouse . .
PowerProducer . . . . .
General Meeting. . . . .
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8
Follow-Up Digital
Photo Presentation
By Rudy Wolf
During the digital photo
presentation that I made at the August
11 General Meeting I recommended
that the digital zoom on many digital
cameras not be used because of
possible pixelization caused by
digital zoom. This statement was
based on speaking with other users
and having experienced the effect
with a digital video camera.
However when I returned home I
decided to see how my camera
performed. I am using a Sony F-505
that has a 5X optical zoom an a 2X
digital zoom. Having never used the
digital zoom I did not even know how
it worked. Well, I found that the
digital zoom is either On or Off, there
is no multiplication of the initial on
condition or, in my case, wide angle.
Also, because there are no presets as
on my film camera, there is no
reliable way to compare intermediate
zoom i.e. 2X, 3X etc. My test
Continued on page 3
2003
By Siles Bazerman
A Little Bit of This
I
knew I should not have written
about the transplant to HAL last time,
as things have changed. Right after
sending the article out I was faced
with a family emergency. A business
computer, needed right now to fill
orders, died. The CPU fan quit
causing the CPU to overheat and fail.
Also, apparently, it also caused
motherboard failure. Since the
motherboard and CPU were the same
as in HAL, he gave up these two
items to my daughter-in-law’s
computer on a holiday weekend. It
was just a quick swap with all the
cards and other hardware remaining
the same. All that changed was the
MAC address of the built in NIC, and
that was not enough to cause a need
for reactivation, or even a repair
install. I had nothing better to do that
evening anyway.
HAL, in the meantime, received
one of the AMD motherboards and
CPU I had tried earlier. Again a quick
hardware swap, and since I had used
this combo before I had a backup
copy of my C drive available. I keep
my programs (mostly) on C and my
data files on D. As you have probably
guessed, this is not the first time I
have done this. After setting the
BIOS I then booted my Powerquest
V2i protector CD and restored C
drive for this system. Off and running
with a minimum of time spent. HAL
now has an ECS
K7S5A Pro
motherboard and an
AMD 2400+ Athlon
T- bred B CPU. I
had already installed
the latest BIOS from
ECS, but wanted to
play a little, so I installed a modified
BIOS by Honey X. Overclocking
followed, and I have a system
running very stable at 2200Mhz as a
2700+ CPU with a front side bus of
147. All the hardware needed tor
these swaps was In my garage, with
the exception of a better fan for HAL.
The original fan was so noisy at full
speed that I would get tired of
computing after a very short time.
Since HAL had already been
activated once in this configuration,
after restoring the system no
activation was needed. Remember I
always stress backups.
A Little Bit of That
For the last month or so, all of the
internet Usenet groups as well as
many subscription mail lists have
been full of messages about sudden
computer shutdowns, strange
displays, and other abnormal
behavior. Computers—not people.
There has been the largest
proliferation of virus/worms/trojans
in computer history. These include
W32/Blaster.Worm,
W32/Nachi.Worm, varients such as
SoBig, and the latest (as of this
Continued on page 5
Telephone Help Line
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
PROGRAM/SOFTWARE NAME
PHONE
TIME
CompuServe
CorelDraw 5
CorelDraw & Ventura
& PhotoPaint
Hardware
Internet
Novell, NT & Networking
Quicken & Quickbooks
Windows 95,98,Me,Xp
Word for Windows
WordPerfect Windows
Cathy Grammer-Margolin
George Margolin
Sunny Lockie
949-645-5950
949-645-5950
949-644-0103
Jonathan Means
Cathy Grammer-Margolin
Jonathan Means
Max Lockie
Siles Bazerman
Cathy Grammar-Margolin
Sunny Lockie
714-542-1653
949-645-5950
714-542-1653
949-720-8170
714-897-2868
949-645-5950
949-644-0103
6-10 p.m. & weekends
Most times
6-10 p.m. weekdays
9 a.m.-10 p.m. weekends
6-9 p.m.
6-10 p.m. & weekends
6-9 p.m.
6-10 p.m. & weekends
9 a.m.-8 p.m.
6-10 p.m. & weekends
6-10 p.m. weekdays
9 a.m.-10 p.m. weekends
President
Terry Currier
Vice President
George Margolin
949-645-5950
inventor@pobox.com
Secretary
Ken Kamber
714-637-4496
kkamber@stanfordalumni.org
Treasurer
Rudy Wolf
Membership
General Meeting October 11
Orange Coast College
9:00 a.m.-12:00 noon
in Science Room #149
KODAK
WINNERS Notepad is published
monthly by WINNERS, PO Box
9274, Newport Beach, CA, 92658. A
subscription is included with all paid
memberships in WINNERS. Other
non-profit user groups may reprint
WINNERS Notepad articles without
prior permission, provided proper author, title and publication credits are
given.
WINNERS, contributors and editors of Notepad do not assume liability for damages arising from the
publication or non-publication of any
advertisement, article, editorial, or
other item in this newsletter. All opinions expressed are those of the individual authors only and do not
necessarily represent the opinions of
WINNERS, its Board of Directors,
the WINNERS Notepad, or its editors.
Page 2
PURPOSE
WINNERS, a computer association, is a volunteer organization
providing a forum for sharing information and experiences related to
Windows-based software, encouraging ethical use of computers and software, and offering service to our
communities.
MEMBERSHIP
Annual membership is $20.00 for
individuals; $5.00 each additional
family member.
MEETINGS
WINNERS generally meets the
second Saturday of each month from
9:00 a.m. to 12 noon at Orange Coast
College in the Science Building,
Room #149, 2701 Fairview, Costa
Mesa.
714-774-2018
tcurrier@aol.com
Louise McCain
714-528-3715
rudywolf@pobox.com
714-964-8031
swpglhmom@aol.com
Publicity
Steve Dela
714-775-8373
stevede@aol.com
Programs
Terry Currier
By-Laws
Max Lockie
714-774-2018
tcurrier@aol.com
949-644-0103
mlockie@pobox.com
Editor/Publisher
Sunny Lockie
949-644-0103
sundesigns@pobox.com
Board Members
Cathy Grammer-Margolin 645-5950
inventor00@pobox.com
Ray Howard
714-966-1468
candr321@bigfoot.com
Ed Koran
562-427-2560
Edk246@aol.com
Charles Schreiber
714-378-1253
cschreib@csulb.edu
Info/Message Line
949-644-0295
Website: http://windowsusers.org
FUTURE MEETING DATES
«
«
«
«
October 11
November 8
December 13
January 10
FOLLOWUP ON DIGITAL PHOTO
Continued from page 1
consisted of two photos in each mode one at “normal”
and one at maximum optical zoom (5X). That means
(on my camera) with digital zoom on it should be the
equivalent of 10X optical zoom. My subject consisted
of several lines of text on a 8.5 X 11 inch sheet of paper.
One line was printed at 144 point, one at 72 point, one at
36 point, one at 18 point and one at 9 pont. The camera
was mounted on a tripod approximately 18 feet from the
subject.
When looking at the results I was pleasantly
surprised. The degree of pixelization was minimal and
when printed as a 3.5 X 5 print I could see no individual
pixels. What was visible was a halo around the black
lettering, see below.
This halo becomes more visible when photo
enhancement is made.
A point that I failed to make when the discussion
turned to purchasing of cameras was that since a camera
may cost from $100 to $400 it may be a good idea to
purchase or borrow a memory card that fits the camera
you are thinking of purchasing, snapping some shots at
the store, then looking at them at your leisure. XP
comes with a viewer and there are shareware programs
available that can be tried for 30 days without cost. You
can use these programs to make enhancements, crop etc.
Presidents
Message
T
his month we have nominations and elections
for the WINNERS Board of Directors. The term of
office for the BOD is two years. The BOD meets
once each month usually the first Monday after the
WINNERS General Meeting. If you would like to
run for the office, you can contact Charles
Schreiber cschreib@csulb.edu or just tell him at the
October meeting. Those up for reelection are:
Terry Currier
Max Lockie
Sunny Lockie
Louise McCain
Steve Dela
Ed Koran
Rudy Wolf, after many years of great work with
our funds as treasurer, has decided to take a break.
So we will need one person for a one-year term to
replace him. The officers of WINNERS are elected
by the BOD after the election. This will be my last
month as president, since by our constitution the
president cannot serve more than two consecutive
years. I want to thank everyone for helping to make
WINNERS a good place to learn new things and yet
still have fun doing it.
I especially want to thank Rudy for all the time
and effort he put into the treasurers office. He did a
great job and we will miss him at that. He is still
sticking around so we will still have benefit from
his insight.
5X (maximum) optical zoon; no corrections
I will not be able to make it to this Saturday’s
meeting. I am going to help my son move up to
Stockton – yeah would you believe it some people
actually move TO there? He is taking a job up
there. I will miss him, but now I will have more
room for my computer accessories.
This month we will have a representative from
Kodak come and show us their latest digital
cameras. I saw his presentation at TUGNET,
another user group, and it is very good. He also
gives tips on how to take the best pictures.
10X optical zoon; no corrections
Terry Currier
Page 3
REVIEW
DVD X Copy XPRESS
By Terry Currier
L
ast month I reviewed the DVD
X Copy from 321 Studios. I
commented about the DVD X Copy
XPRESS. Well, I now have that and
it is well worth it. There are two great
things about it I wanted to tell you.
First, it does a great job of putting
the movie onto one DVD disk. Most
of the time a two-hour movie will be
over 7Gb in volume. DVD X Copy
XPRESS really does put all of that
onto a 4.7Gb disk. From the options
you can choose the audio language,
subtitles and the temp path. DVDs
sometimes have more than just
English on them. For example my
The Hours has English and French
on it. If you don’t need the subtitles,
why copy them? The temp path is
where it will copy the movie to
before writing it to the DVD disk. I
put it on my E drive because there is
plenty of room. Choosing to cut out
the other languages and subtitles if
you don’t need them insures you can
make it fit on one disk. You can also
choose the video formation of full
screen or widescreen (if the movie
itself has that option). You can, of
course, just check the entire disk
box and it will do that.
The second great thing is that it
no longer says to not do anything on
the computer while it is in use. That
includes while it is burning. Be
warned, though, it will run much
slower. I mean if you bring up
Microsoft Word after starting the
process, you might as well go and
get something to read while waiting.
It will take about five minutes to
start up another program,.but, you
can do that. The best advice is to
bring it up before you start the
process. Word processing especially
had no problems while it read and
burned the disk.
Recommended computer
requirements:
• Pentium 4 1.4GHz with 512Mb
of RAM
• Windows XP/2000/98/ME
• 12GB of Free Hard Disk Space
• A DVD recordable drive con-
nected to your computer (+R(W)
or -R(W))
• Blank 4.7Gb DVD-R(W) or
DVD+R(W) disc (for recording)
By the way, I have a 1.7GHz
Pentium 4 with 768Mb of RAM.
My E drive has 36Gb of space left
after I partitioned it. My DVD
burner is a CenDyne external drive
with dual capabilities of the +ordisk. This works well since I have a
DVD in the computer I can have it
read the DVD and it will
automatically start the burn after the
reading is done. For connection it
can use USB or Firewire. I like it
because it is fast. I would not
recommend it, though, since they
just went out of business.
One last thing is that I noticed on
their website 321 Studios has
released DVD X Copy Platinum.
They describe it as “The ultimate
DVD movie backup software. Make
perfect quality, customized backups
with advanced TDF technology.
Includes DVD X Rescue ($69.99
value)–FREE!” The Platinum is
$149.99 with a $30 mail-in rebate.
DVD X Copy XPRESS is $69.99
with a $10 mail-in rebate.
http://www.dvdxcopy.com
Page 4
BITS & BYTES & WINDOWS XP
Continued from page 1
writing) Swen worm. Read this name
backward (News) and you have a
clue as to where it finds some of the
address it sends to. This worm will
mine address books, newsgroup
listings and other on line sources for
both a TO and a FROM address.
Therefore, you can not depend that
the email and attachment are really
from a friend.
It does clog the internet with traffic
and mailboxes with hundreds of fake
emails a day. Also if the worm is
detected by an ISP and returned, it
goes to the false address, further
clogging the mail box. It or some of
the other worms out there in the wild
may have been responsible for
several anti-spam sites closing down
due to denial of service (DOS)
attacks which overwhelmed them.
This was the objective of Blaster
against a Microsoft update site. It
would have attacked this site and then
spread to the entire Microsoft server
system. It was detected before the
activation date and the one site shut
down, foiling the attack.
All the vulnerabilities exploited by
these attacks were preventable as
critical updates were issued and
posted at the update sites months
before. Many, many people, including
IT professionals, did not bother to get
and install these patches. They spent
multiple amounts of the time fixing
the problems than they would have
spent preventing them.
How can you protect yourself from
these attacks?
1. Download and install all critical
and security patches.
2. Use an anti-virus program at all
times. Be sure it scans your email.
3. Use a firewall, hardware or software.
4. Use, if at all possible, an ISP that
blocks spam and viruses.
Practice SAFE HEX
REVIEW
IOGEAR therefore
Wireless Mouse
By Terry Currier
T
hey call it the Phaser Mouse
because it looks like a phaser from
Star Trek. The IOGEAR RF Wireless
Mouse (GMR322R) is used for doing
presentations. Hooking it up to the
USB or PS/2 port it becomes a
wireless mouse that you can use to
control the computer from up to 5o
feet away. It uses radio frequency
(RF) waves to link the Phaser to the
base you plugged into the computer.
It has three buttons on the top with
the left corresponding to the mouse’s
left and the right corresponding to the
mouse’s right button.
The center activates the laser
pointer. It is a strong light—the only
thing that would have made it better
is an attachment to make the red dot
become an arrow. I’ve picked up
cheapie laser pointers (not as bright,
though) at the swap meet with
different attachments including
making it look like an arrow. The red
dot is just small. Any way I can tell
you that my kitten just loves chasing
that red dot, even up a wall. On the
top is a track ball for controlling the
direction of the curser. On the bottom
is a trigger which activates the left
mouse button (used to forward a slide
in PowerPoint).
That said, how does it work? Just
great! I’ve tested it from a far
distance—no problem. Even more
impressive, I’ve put it on my
notebook in my computer room and
walked down the hall with walls in
between and the base unit still
received the signal. This means the
presenter does not have to worry
about being in direct line of sight for
it to work. They can be away from
the computer, even behind people in
the audience and it will still work. I
found it to be comfortable in my hand
and easy to use.
It is powered by two AA batteries.
Works with Windows 98, 98SE,
2000, ME, and XP. It comes with a 3
year warranty. Pricegrabber.com
shows the price range from $51-$70.
If you do presentations, this is
something that makes you look more
professional by allowing you to move
around on the stage without having to
stand next to the computer.
By the way, if you
want to compare it with
others, you can look at
the RemotePoint
Navigator that also uses
radio frequency and
works up to 50 feet away.
It comes with a one year
warranty and cost $150.
Page 5
REVIEW
PowerProducer
From CyberLink
By Terry Currier
I
f you have a digital camera or want
to convert your VCR tapes over to
DVD format, you will be looking at
video editing programs.
PowerProducer is an easy-to-use
program with the ability to capture,
lot of time to learn it. I actually
don’t have a digital video camera
but like most parents have lots of
video from when the kids were
young, and a few now. The idea of
converting them over to DVD so
they could have a copy also
appealed to me.
You can split, merge or trim the
films. It is very easy for you to
simply watch the film and mark off
where you want the film to start or
end, thus removing those
embarrassing moments where you
put your hand into the punch bowl.
Heck, don’t show the finished
product for another month and
people might forget about your
tripping over your own feet. There is
also a slider-bar on this page so if
you can quickly move to a certain
spot without having to watch the
whole tape.
This is where you could really
have some fun with certain events
that could have more than one
camera filming. You could actually
bring in both sets of the film and
slice/split your film to get another
angle. For example, bringing in one
film you would split it. Then bring
edit, create an author menu, and burn
the final project onto a disk. Besides
DVDs, it can also support and burn
VCD, SVCD and MiniDVD. VCD is
a Video CD, a SVCD stands for
Super Video CD conceived in China
it is between a CD and a DVD. A
MiniDVD on the other hand is like a
DVD, but burned onto CD media
(and they warn you it may not be
playable in many DVD players).
Nowadays there are a lot of video
editing programs on the market. The
high-end programs will cost
hundreds of dollars and take a
hundred hours to learn. I did not
have either. Yes, PowerProducer is
on the low-end side at only $50, but
it does everything I need to do, and
with ease so I don’t have to spend a
Page 6
So I brought in my VCR
and put a tape in. With
PowerProducer I just clicked
on starting a new project,
what type of disk it was to go
to and then I was on the
Capture/Import page. I
clicked the VCR button and
started the VCR and the
video appeared in a window
within PowerProducer,
which works like a VCR
itself. It will show the length
of the time recording and
size so you know if it will fit.
That done, you can add
other films, and then click on
the Editing Titles. Once
there, you can change titles
for each film you imported.
another film in merge it with the first.
Trim where you want that to end and
remerge with your first and wow, you
are a movie editor. FYI, when you
merge it does bring both together and
you won’t see a pause. So if you want
one you will have to split the files.
I also tried just bringing in a
number of the funny commercials
I’ve downloaded to see how that
would work. They were very easy to
work with. From the import page I
just clicked on the ones to bring in. In
the editing mode could also edit them
marking where to start and stop
before burning the final project. I
could also rename them and reorder
them very easily. They have a
drag-and-drop storyboard approach to
arrange the clips.
Once you’re done with the editing
you go onto the preview mode to see
how it will look. Click on the
authoring in the upper left and you
get to add special effects. You can
add special effects to your titles and
chapters. If your title only contains
one chapter, you may add an effect to
this chapter (i.e. the title).
PowerProducer choices for special
effects are Emboss, Inverse, Focus,
Find Edges. One I had fun with was
the TV effect which will make the
video appear in 9 different small
screens. You can also correct color
from this menu. Lastly, you choose
the menu background. Choose
different picture styles from business
to vacation.
CyberLink viewer complete with the
pause, fast forward, start over or go to
the end functions.
PowerProducer can separate your
video file into chapters while you are
capturing it. You can have it look for
breaking into a set number of
chapters or have it look for
differences in the video.
After all that, you can preview
how it will look on the disk. After
you are satisfied with the preview,
click Next to go to the burning stage.
PowerProducer will burn the finished
project onto the type of disk you told
it to at the start. If you included more
material than will fit on the disk, it
will have you burn a second to finish.
When done you will have a disk that
you can pop right into a CD-ROM
drive and will autorun with a
Finally if you have a lot of digital
pictures PowerProducer makes it easy
to create a slideshow album to present
them. Click on Create Slideshow then
Create an Album. A dialog box will
appear for you to select your photos.
When you create an album the pictures
again are arrange in the storyboard.
You can drag and drop in whatever
order you want. If you want you can
also add background music for a
slideshow, select a album and then
click Background Music. You can
have the music (MP3 or wav file) fade
in or fade out. The music can be Auto
Repeat or Play only once. You can
also trim your audio file, drag the
Mark In and Mark Out sliders in order
to trim the unwanted portions out.
After working with
PowerProducer, if you want to move
up look at PowerDirector which has
the same features however, but
greater ability to grab footage and
jazz it up with the help of motion
effects, transitions and titles.
Requires: 450-MHz CPU; 128MB
RAM; 1GB hard drive space;
Microsoft Windows 98 SE, Me, 2000,
or XP
Company Info: CyberLink USA,
510-668-0118
www.gocyberlink.com
Page 7
General Meeting
KODAK
Election of the Board
October 11 9 a.m. to 12 noon
Orange Coast College
Science Building Room #149
SAN DIEGO
FW
Y.
405
ADAMS AVE.
ORANGE COAST COLLEGE
MERRIMAC
PARKING
Lewis
Center
Room #149
MERRIMAC WAY
FAIRVIEW DR.
HARBOR BLVD.
Science Bldg