Don’t read too much into the PC sales drop just yet

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing, Windows , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

If you’ve been paying any attention at all, you probably know that new PC sales are in the toilet–out of the five biggest vendors, the only one whose sales managed to hold steady in Q1 2013 was Lenovo, while the other four saw a sales decline. So now Slashdot linked to a ZDNet piece stating that Windows is over, and said it must be true because ZDNet always sides with Microsoft.

Let’s not read too much into that. The author of the piece is a longtime open-source advocate. The points he raises are completely valid, but if there’s one person who’s going to take Microsoft to task, it’s Steven Vaughan-Nichols.

Microsoft has a long road ahead, but there is precedent for salvaging the boondoggle known as Windows 8. And I don’t think Windows 8 is the only factor here. Read more

A treasure trove of training material

Dave Farquhar security , , ,

Need to improve your security skills? Need a refresher course to brush up on some skills you haven’t used in a while? Or are you just looking for some CPEs or CEUs to keep your certification valid?

The United States Department of Defense offers a great deal of security training, much of which is freely available to all comers. Your tax dollars paid for it, so don’t feel bad about using it. Besides, if you use it to improve your networks, then your networks are less likely to become a source of attack on government networks, so they’re happy for you to use most of it.

Here’s a hint: Anything that isn’t viewable by the general public is marked ” *(DoD PKI Cert req’d).” If you don’t see that marking, then it’s free for you to view. Just click the link marked “Launch Training.” Read more

Troubleshooting at all layers of the OSI model

Dave Farquhar security, War Stories , , , , , , , ,

I saw this phrase in a job description last week: Troubleshooting at all layers of the OSI model. That sounds a bit intimidating, right?

Maybe at first. But let’s not overcomplicate it. Once you get past the terminology, it’s a logical way to locate and fix problems. Chances are you already do most of this whether you realize it or not. I was already troubleshooting at at least four of the seven layers when I was working as a part-time desktop support technician in college in 1995.

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Rob O’Hara on phreaking, Tesla coils and modems

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing, security , , , , , , , ,

Rob O’Hara posted a podcast about phreaking today. He explains in layperson’s terms how the phone system was controlled by tones, cites it as an example of security through obscurity, and he talks about his own first-person experience subverting the phone system. He was far from the only one who did that.

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The 1 TB-ish SSD: The Micron M500

Dave Farquhar Hardware, security , , , ,

Anandtech has a review of the Micron M500, which is the first 960 GB SSD to retail for less than $600. Micron had to make some decisions to get that combination of capacity and price, so it’s not truly a no-compromises SSD, but like the article states, it’s a not-quite-a-terabyte capacity at the price that the best 80 GB drive was selling for in 2008. That’s a long way to come in five years. At $599, the price is high, but it’s not out of reach. If you really need that much high-speed capacity, you can probably come up with that sum.

And the drive’s reception has been very good. It’s backordered everywhere I’ve looked. Read more

The re-segregation of baseball

Dave Farquhar Baseball , , , , , , , , ,

The Kansas City Star had a piece today about the sharp decline in the number of African-Americans playing baseball. Of course, when I grew up, the Royals relied heavily on African-Americans. George Brett was the star, but without Willie Wilson and Frank White hitting ahead of him and Hal McRae and Willie Aikens or John Mayberry hitting behind him, opposing pitchers would have never thrown Brett a hittable pitch.

Today, the Royals’ starting position players, their five starting pitchers and all of their key relief pitchers are all either white or Hispanic. The only African-American on their roster right now is speedy outfielder Jarrod Dyson.

I think I know why.

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Another benefit of not having debt

Dave Farquhar Saving money , , ,

I’ve written about how not having debt gives you power, though I can’t find the particular post at the moment. But I remember when I got my first mortgage. I went to a party, and my boss was there, along with my five other bosses, and the big boss got this look in his eye when I said I’d bought a house. That look in his eye said one thing: I own you, and I can do whatever I want to you.

And he did. From that day forward, all of the assignments nobody else wanted fell on me. Anything that was destined to fail went to me. And the cycle followed me from job to job, then stopped, like turning out a light, the day after my wife and I paid off our mortgage. It was the closest thing to magic I’ve ever seen. One day, I was the guy who got assignments at 3 PM on a Friday that were going to take me 8 hours to get done–and they had to be done by 8 AM on Monday, and one day, I wasn’t that guy anymore.

I tested it again this month. I turned down a job that offered me a $7,000 pay cut. Nothing unusual about that, right? Not in this case. In this case, rejecting that pay cut meant I didn’t have a job anymore. Read more