If I ask that question to a number of people, I have a feeling I would get all sorts of answers. I think, Hard Disk Drive (HDD) reliability doesn’t necessarily depends on the manufacturer but it also depends on how it has been treated in a machine. In my opinion, a HDD in a machine with multiple power cuts would most likely have a short lifespan than one run with proper care.

Lets talk about the Manufacturer…

People have preference when it comes to HDD Manufacturer. When it comes to the manufacturer, I tend to go for Western Digital (WD) and solely because I had less bad experience with it compared to Maxtor…

I am not saying WD drives never fails, in fact I do have an old WD 80GB IDE drive here which died this morning; but it does have low percentage of failure.

Why does it die?

One person actually asked me this question and the answer is very simple. Any electronic equipment, or any functioning part will die at one point, its the same as human body, it all depends on how its been treated the background of it. When it comes to HDD, its the manufacturer.

How to stop a HDD from dying?

You can’t and you never know when it’s going to die, same as a human being… You never know when you are going to die. It all comes down to to proper care and how its been treated. For example, do not shut your machine down by pulling the plug, it WILL kill the HDD at one point! If you want to shut it down without doing it via the Operating System, press and hold the Power Button for 10 seconds and it should shut the machine down.

Conclusion

Treat a HDD like it is going to die the next minute and back it up on a regular basis. If you don’t have any important information on the disk, then it not a problem. You could either manually back it up on another drive, setup RAID on machine or even back it up to a remote server.

When a Name Server looks up a domain for the IP address, it stores the information into the cache so it doesn’t have to look it up every single time a request is made. For example, if someone looks for www.nishv.com the DNS server will look up the domain and stores the IP address 72.52.178.35 into the cache for a given time so it doesn’t have to look up that domain again for a given period of time.

DNS cache poisoning (also known as DNS cache pollution) is a maliciously created or unintended situation that provides data to a DNS Server that did not originate from authoritative DNS sources.

It happens when an attacker sends malicious data in response to a DNS query. For example, DNS query for www.nishv.com can be redirected to another website.

This method is taking the phishing scam to another level, you might be visiting your bank’s website but without you realising it, you will actually be putting in all the login information into some hackers servers which made it look exactly like the bank’s website. Yes, this is very serious!

How do you patch it?

On the client side (we are talking about Microsoft Windows here), your machines should have been patches automatically if you set the Auto-Update option. If not, I recommend you check the available updates and patch it as soon as possible.

If you use a DNS Server, my recommendation is to use the following command to figure out whether it has been patched or not. If it is not, STOP using it and have a look at this post on OpenDNS for more info.

Use the following DIG command on UNIX


dig +short @{name-server-ip} porttest.dns-oarc.net txt
dig +short @ns1.example.com porttest.dns-oarc.net txt
dig +short @208.67.222.222 porttest.dns-oarc.net txt


and you should get a result similar to this…


nishv@nishv.com [~]# dig +short @208.67.222.222 porttest.dns-oarc.net txt
porttest.y.x.w.v.u.t.s.r.q.p.o.n.m.l.k.j.i.h.g.f.e.d.c.b.a.pt.dns-oarc.net.
"208.67.217.8 is GREAT: 26 queries in 2.1 seconds from 26 ports with std dev 20119"

Or something like this…

nishv@nishv.com [~]# dig +short @4.2.2.2 porttest.dns-oarc.net txt
porttest.y.x.w.v.u.t.s.r.q.p.o.n.m.l.k.j.i.h.g.f.e.d.c.b.a.pt.dns-oarc.net.
"209.244.4.25 is GOOD: 26 queries in 1.9 seconds from 26 ports with std dev 3880"


If you don’t get GREAT or GOOD and gets something like POOR, you should immediately stop using it.

If you manage that DNS server, patch it or decommission it!

This is how to check on Windows

Open up command prompt by going Start --> Run --> CMD or on Vista typing CMD on the Start Search box


nslookup -type=txt -timeout=30 porttest.dns-oarc.net
nslookup -type=txt -timeout=30 porttest.dns-oarc.net ns1.your-isp.com
nslookup -type=txt -timeout=30 porttest.dns-oarc.net NS-SERVER-IP


You must see the GREAT or GOOD, if not your DNS Server is compromised.

You can see Dan Kaminsky’s presentation below…

www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0dHDD9fFM4

This is a controversial question among people whether UK should monitor all Internet and communication activates like the USA. When this subject is brought up, people automatically go on the defensive and starts to argue the fact about privacy and human rights; Granted, privacy is a major issue, and when it involves national security, it will spark some inimitable questions among us.

I am not in favour of the Government breaching privacy and human rights issues; on the contrary, in my opinion, national security should be given priority among other things.

This is a very sensitive issue and when this subject is brought up, people seem to think that all their internet activities are going to be watched, including their internet shopping. This is not the case here, and if the government goes ahead and do such monitoring system, it will cost billions.

I think the word monitoring should be redefined when it comes to this topic and should be balanced in a way that it does not interfere with people’s privacy issues, thus a flagging system to use for such monitoring would an ideal choice. This way, people’s privacy won’t be compromised and at the same time it would allow the government to monitor the internet.

All we see in the news lately is terrorist activities directly linked to the internet and how they used the net to communicate with each other. So, if such system was in place, in theory the chances of stopping such thing would be extremely high.

I think it’s safe to say, UK should monitor all Internet and communication activities so they can rule out terrorism in their home soil.

BT had finally called for action on internet speed and how they are advertised to the customers, and this brings me to the topic on how to choose your ISP (Internet Service Provider).

For an average person, it sounds pretty straight forward and all you have to do is, choose the one who are cheaper and offers you free equipments. This post is mainly going to be concentrating about DSL connection and not Cable, which I will be covering in the coming days…
When choosing an ISP, in my opinion the lesser the contract period the better, so if you are not happy about their services, you can always move on…

When an ISP offers free equipment, you are pretty much tired to a lengthy contract just like a Mobile phone contract, which could last up to 12 or even 18 months. Think about it, it makes sense… they need to get the equipment money from somewhere…!

Do not go with an ISP by looking at their Adverts, what you should do is to research about the ISP, there are some great websites out there who writes reviews and comparison about ISPs, one of them is called broadbandchoice.co.uk… You can always search around Google and find the ones in your Country!

You have to bear in mind, you won’t normally get the Advertised speed, and for example only 15% of the UK people get the advertised speed of eight megabit per second packages actually got the speed… So if your line can only handle only 4 Mbps, then there is no point paying extra money for an 8 Mbps line which you are not going to get the speed anyways..

The speed depends on a few variables but the main two are, you’re Line and how far away from the Exchange do you live… In a nutshell, you need to live within 1 Mile radius of your exchange to get even close 8 Mbps.
And finally, read the terms and condition and especially contract length, what happens If you decide to cancel the contract, What happens when you want to move house, how much is the cancellation fees etc…

If you are one of those people who are confused about the internet speed and how long it will take to download files over a connection… That’s about 90% of the people…

These days it is typically measured in Mbps (Mega bits per Second) and some case Kbps (Kilo bits per second). Note, we are talking about Bits and NOT Byte those are totally different things and if you are curious, 1 Byte = 8 Bits

What people get confused is the fact that when an Internet speed is advertised, for example 1 Mbps (1 Mega bit per second) they would automatically think it takes 1 Seconds to send a 1MB file through the internet connection. Please don’t think it will only take you around 4 Seconds to send a typical .mp3 (around 4MB); in fact it will take a longer…

This will show how long it will take to send 1 MB file through a 1 Mbps internet connection…

1 MB = 1 x 1024 KB = 1024 x 1024 bytes
1 KB = 1,048,576 bytes ( x Eight)
= 8,388,608 Bits

So we have a file size of 8,388,608 Bits, and you have a connection speed of 1 Mbps; let’s just assume that your line is fully capable of transferring at the speed of 1 Mbps…

1 Mbps = 1000 Kbps = 1,000,000 Bps

So you have a line which is capable of Carrying 1,000,000 Bits per second and you have a file the size of 8,388,608 Bits… So how long will it take to send it…?

8,388,608 / 1,000,000 = 8.388608 Seconds which is roughly 8 Seconds…

So whenever you see an advert saying 8 Mbps, don’t think it will take you less than a second to send a typical .mp3 file to your friend!

I hope you find post informative for you and thank you for reading!

Online fraud is one of the growing concerns across the UK and the rest of the world, and organised criminals are consistently stealing identities of others and have been using it for illegal purposes such as credit card fraud, impersonation, money laundering etc.

These criminals have moved onto targeting social networking site such as Facebook / MySpace and trawling for personal profiles containing vital information such as Full Name, D.O.B, Address, Phone Numbers etc. This will enable them to use the data collected and pretend to be someone else, the victim; or it can also be used for marketing scams.

Most internet users have anti virus and firewall protecting their personal computers, but many fail to realise the risks of publishing personal information on social network sites, according to fool.co.uk as many as one in three Facebook and MySpace users are virtually giving away their personal ID which will make them vulnerable for identity theft.

£30.2bn was spent online during 2006 (IMRG, January 2007) and 19.7 Million people are shopping online in the UK and spending an average of £652 each in the last six months (BMRB, Feb 2007) so criminals have moved onto the online word to target people where the big money lies.

There are a few methods to protect you from Social Networking sites…

1. You should only post information on these sites that you would be happy to give a complete stranger at a bus stop.
2. You can restrict the people who can view your profile, i.e. people in your friends’ list.

Sky Broadband is aimed for home users thus a few features like SSH (Port 22), VPN and other tunneling are disabled by the router (NETGEAR DG834GT) they provide. If you want to use these features, you have two choices…

• Use another Router
• Re-flash the firmware of the Sky Router (NETGEAR DG834GT)

Re-flashing the router is risky and I am sure it is against Sky’s Terms and Conditions, because as far as I’m aware, that router is a property of Sky. If you are thinking of doing it, then Good Luck!

Using another router is the smartest thing to do, But for you to use another router, you do need the Sky Username and Password.

This is how you get the Sky Username and Password…

Open up your browser and Copy and paste the following URL to the Address Bar. (Make sure its in one line, not two!)

It will ask for Username and Password, use the follwoing unless you have changed your Router Login info, then use that.

Username:admin
Password: sky

You will get a page that reads “Usage: ping [OPTION]… host”

Now Copy and paste the following URL to the Web Browser’s Address Bar.

http://192.168.0.1/netgear.cfg

This will then download a config file, “netgear.cfg”

Open the file with wordpad or any other Text Editor.

You should see some text like this below :

pppoa_username=001122aabbcc@skydsl
pppoa_password=a0b1c2d4e5
pppoa_idle=0
pppoa_ipaddr=


That’s it, Use those above info with another router, and you should be able to connect to Sky Broadband.

I was rather amused to read an article on TechCrunch couple of days ago under the title “Could Facebook Become The Next Microsoft?” The writer Duncan Riley went onto write that Facebook is going to be the next Microsoft on the web world. Before you read my review on the article, I suggest you read Duncan Riley’s article on TechCrunch Here

Everybody knows about Microsoft and Facebook. I will give a brief introduction about both Companies, so this article will make more sense to the reader…

Microsoft is the leading Operating Systems and software manufacturer in the world. Thousands of companies depend on Microsoft’s to make their revenue by developing third party software for their Operating Systems. Furthermore, there are millions of people and companies who uses Microsoft Software and Operating Systems are familiarised with products and rely on them.

Facebook is a Social Networking Website with some nifty features. These features being, third party applications. This means Facebook will not run the third party applications on their servers, the Facebook Platform is able to communicate with third party applications running on external servers which are not under the control of Facebook, Which means Facebook allows you to pipe information through their API (Application Programming Interface). If you want to know more about how this system works, you should have a read at http://developers.facebook.com/documentation.php

The author of this article Duncan Riley only concentrated on the Facebook Applications which are supported mostly by third parties and he went onto directly compare it with Microsoft. He is directly comparing Microsoft based third party applications (i.e. Software made by other companies, for example Adobe, AutoDesk, Symantec) with Facebook applications. His argument being, If Facebook could control the third party applications like Microsoft is controlling other software developers, then one day Facebook will be the next Microsoft and have some kind of Web OS.

He is pretty much confused the fact that Facebook being a platform will offer opportunities to third party developers. But you need to think about the target audience. Most of the people are forced to use Microsoft Operating Systems and some of its Software…You can argue the fact that it is not true, but if you analyse the situation, you will think otherwise. In the years Microsoft has created an environment where most of the users are forced to use their products.

One main difference being, the users of Facebook have a choice; they have chose to use Facebook, so the target audience of Facebook is far less compared to Microsoft. When it comes to Applications, Facebook pretty much have control over it, but when you compare it to Microsoft and their party applications, it is not the case. By law, Microsoft is forced to work with third party software makers. This is a huge advantage on the software developers side, Microsoft can’t just stop you from making software for their Operating Systems because they don’t like it, or they think you are making more profit from it. This is different when it comes to Facebook, they can just stop you, simple as that. There is no law to protect the third party application makers.

Since Facebook is a web platform, there are a huge security concerns when it comes to third party applications. This is why they don’t let them run it on their servers, otherwise they would get hacked within minutes. The third party applications run on external servers and piped through the Facebook API. This means, the applications will be slow depending on the server / connection it is in… When the external server is down or something wrong with the route between the Facebook servers and the external application servers, it will not work. So, the people who are going to get affected are the end users.

My conclusion being, you can’t just go and compare Microsoft with a Social Networking site with some addons. It is pretty stupid of the writer to go and compare a Software Giant with a website which allows external applications. An average user might think he has a point, but you analyse the facts, the author is completely wrong!

You can’t just go ahead and compare cats and dogs because they have 4 legs.

This is called the sequel; looks like an ordinary car but uses liquid hydrogen as its primary power source. Since it has no motor, you can no longer call this a ‘Motor Car’ and obviously, since it has no engine like an electric car, it is very quiet.

So, how does it work?

Apparently, instead of filling petrol you need to fill this car with Liquid Hydrogen, the hydrogen tanks and placed under the flood board. You can see an illustrated diagram below…

Once you start the car, there will be a chemical reaction going on beneath your feet. (I know it is scary!) So, the fuel cell is turning hydrogen into electricity, and that is what making the wheel turn…

Let’s talk about the pros and con…

Pros:

Environment Friendly: Because it’s using hydrogen, there is no nocuous exhaust fume like Co2 etc, just invisible droplets of steam. Yes, it sounds good but is it practical?

Less noice pollution: Which means, you can get a good night sleep if your house is situated next to a busy road.

Cons:

Cost: This car cost $1 Billion USD to make. Since it’s a prototype, let’s cut the cost into half and commercial price would be $500, 000 USD. GM says it has more potential than any other car because it can hold enough hydrogen to go 300 miles…

Okay, let’s see… Do we have enough Hydrogen to fill cars? The simple answer is NO!

So, what’s under the bonnet? The answer is, Air Conditioning System and a Bunch of electronics… So, in another word, if you have an accident driving this car, you are more likely to die!

One other thing, since it has Hydrogen Cylinders at the bottom of the car, Looks like no one ever thought about what happens if theses an explosion…

Conclusion:

This car is not practical and in my opinion an electric car has more potential than this piece of junk. Do you see all these long containers running on Hydrogen? Short answer is No, Long answer… Yes, but it will only cost $10 Billion USD.

In my opinion, people would rather walk then have a car worth $1 Billion USD, not to mention there is a chemical explosion waiting to happen underneath your floorboard.

GM Says It could be available commercially within 5 years… gee can’t wait!

What’s next? Hydrogen powered Aircraft? Don’t even get me started on that!