Messages

76

General Software Discussion / Re: windows 7 beta available for free Jan 9 (!)

« on: January 10, 2009, 03:40 PM »

Hmmm... It appears that there are only 10 keys*. I have them in an easily paste-able list, but I'm not sure if I should post them.

* At least using the method Deozaan posted earlier, some people are saying that some keys they got yesterday are different.

77

General Software Discussion / Re: windows 7 beta available for free Jan 9 (!)

« on: January 10, 2009, 12:24 PM »

Here's how to get your license key for Windows 7 Beta. I just tried this and it worked for me.
...

-Deozaan (January 10, 2009, 10:21 AM)

Worked for me too! Thanks a ton!

78

General Software Discussion / Re: Another 'Lifetime' license bites the dust

« on: January 09, 2009, 11:27 PM »

Why not just make it the "lifetime" of the exact unit you got? If the unit is broken, clearly its lifetime has run its course.

79

General Software Discussion / Re: windows 7 beta available for free Jan 9 (!)

« on: January 09, 2009, 11:21 PM »

Aw, direct links no work no mo. Well, they didn't at the time, now they are again...

cmpm, any chance of you getting it from that other source and comparing the 2 isos? Hopefully you got the x64 version.

I'm fairly confident I'll get a beta key whenever they release them, so I could use the 30 day demo until then.

80

General Software Discussion / Re: windows 7 beta available for free Jan 9 (!)

« on: January 09, 2009, 06:53 PM »

Simple MD5 or SHA1 would be enough.

-fenixproductions (January 09, 2009, 06:48 PM)

True-dat.
As big of a nerd that I am, I don't think I've ever successfully checked an MD5 (or any other checksum). I've heard Directory Opus will calculate them, is there a "built into Windows" solution available?

I realize more and more that I apparently have no qualms about going off topic.

81

General Software Discussion / Re: windows 7 beta available for free Jan 9 (!)

« on: January 09, 2009, 06:17 PM »

Yeah, bittorrent is the way to go for files like these. Microsoft would have to release some kind of small "ISO checker" program that people could download to verify that the torrent is complete/legitimate after it's finished downloading.

Actually, I wish MS would release something like this for all their CDs. I really want a Vista w/ SP1 ISO (since slipstreaming isn't supported any more) but I can't find anyone with a real (pressed) copy and I don't trust non-official torrents for software I've actually paid for.

The page now says:

Thanks for your interest in the Windows 7 Beta. The volume has been phenomenal -- we’re in the process of adding more servers to handle the demand. We’re sorry for the delay and we’ll re-post the Beta as soon as we can ensure a quality download experience.

82

General Software Discussion / Re: windows 7 beta available for free Jan 9 (!)

« on: January 09, 2009, 04:37 PM »

I hope the 2.5 million copies haven't been downloaded... I doubt that many people got through that server mess.

If they think they're serving 2.5 million ~3gb downloads I hope they're prepared.
http://www.techcrunc...-a-bad-black-friday/

83

General Software Discussion / Re: windows 7 beta available for free Jan 9 (!)

« on: January 09, 2009, 12:50 PM »

Oh cool! I got all the way to the registration page! At some point they even sent me a "confirm this is your address" e-mail.

What I did was logged in over at live.com, because the first time it looked like it was going to hang there.

I actually got a different error the second time I tried, and it actually had the words "productkeys" in it... exciting!
After hitting continue I either get the screenshot I posted above, or this...

Which apparently has some secure and some nonsecure items, it only stays up for a second, at which point it changes to this...

84

General Software Discussion / Re: windows 7 beta available for free Jan 9 (!)

« on: January 09, 2009, 12:33 PM »

http://technet.micro...center/dd353205.aspx

-cmpm (January 09, 2009, 11:40 AM)

Thanks for the link! I got this far...


Is that where you stopped as well f0dder?

85

General Software Discussion / Re: windows 7 beta available for free Jan 9 (!)

« on: January 09, 2009, 01:54 AM »

So, 7 minutes to go and the RSS feed doesn't really work. I wonder if there's any reason to think we'll be able to actually download the ISO tonight...

86

General Software Discussion / Re: windows 7 beta available for free Jan 9 (!)

« on: January 08, 2009, 02:14 PM »

I'll be installing it on at least one computer. It's definitely going on my laptop and I'm considering putting it on my main computer too if I can.

I heard that they're only allowing 2.5 million downloads, can anyone confirm this?

87

General Software Discussion / Re: Firefox not safe at all

« on: January 07, 2009, 05:54 PM »

I must say, putting quotes around the word "report" thoroughly amuses me.

Sorry I don't have anything meaningful to add to the topic.

88

General Software Discussion / Re: The Monkeys Have Hit The Button

« on: January 05, 2009, 02:56 PM »

I'm in!
What's this thing again?

j/k... I have a vague idea, and will research it myself.

89

General Software Discussion / Re: Software Database.

« on: January 04, 2009, 05:33 PM »

I use KeePass to keep track of my licenses. You can even set it up to fill in serial numbers just like passwords on web sites. Here's an example...
(I guess I didn't set this one up to automatically fill out the form, but you get the idea.)

That is actually a valid license for EncSpot that anyone can use.

Here's another one that will fill out the registration automatically...


If the program has some kind of registration file or something (like AnyDVD), you can use the "Attachment" function on the bottom. So far I haven't ran into any licenses that wont work with KeePass.

90

General Software Discussion / Google Experimental

« on: January 04, 2009, 02:32 AM »

Whoa, I happen to notice this link on the bottom of my Google search results today...

Google Experimental

Looks like Google is trying to make themselves better again. There's a few "experimental" modes you can try...

Search Wiki with sound
Do you like SearchWiki? Do you enjoy having the power to remove results from your search results pages? Now you can do so in style by having a sound effect play along with the animation whenever you remove a result.

Alternate views for search results
See results on a timeline, map, or in context of other information types. With these views, Google's technology extracts key dates, locations, measurements, and more from select search results so you can view the information in a different dimension.

Keyboard shortcuts
Navigate search results quickly and easily, minimizing use of your mouse. Current keyboard shortcuts include:

Key
Action

J
Selects the next result.

K
Selects the previous result.

O
Opens the selected result.

<Enter>
Opens the selected result.

/
Puts the cursor in the search box.

<Esc>
Removes the cursor from the search box.

Accessible View
Navigate search results quickly and easily, with just your keyboard. As you navigate, items are magnified for easier viewing. If you use a screen reader or talking browser, the relevant information is spoken automatically as you navigate.

Current keyboard shortcuts include:

Key
Action

j or DOWN
Selects the next item.

k or UP
Selects the previous item.

l or RIGHT
Moves to the next category (results, sponsored links, refinements).

h or LEFT
Moves to the previous category (results, sponsored links, refinements).

<Enter>
Opens the selected result.

/
Puts the cursor in the search box.

n
Moves to the next result, and fetches more results if necessary.

p
Moves to the previous result, reloading earlier results if necessary.

=
Magnifies current item

-
Shrinks current item

A
Switches to Accessible Search Results

W
Switches to regular Web Search Results

For now, you need to use the Firefox 3 web browser with this experiment. This note will be updated as other browsers are added. Magnification already works with Google Chrome and Apple's Safari.

I pretty much stopped looking after checking out the Timeline mode of the Alternative view for search results mode (which is in the screenshot above). I've been wanting something like this for a while!

91

Found Deals and Discounts / Parallels Workstation 2.2 (newest) for Windows and Linux for free (ends ????)

« on: January 01, 2009, 05:40 AM »

If anyone's interested Parallels is apparently giving away version 2.2 of Parallels Workstation (the latest version as far as I can tell) for free!

Go here!

I filled out the form (name, e-mail, company, and phone) and got the following email almost immediately...

Dear [Hirudin],

Thank you for your interest in Parallels Workstation 2.2!

Your permanent activation key is listed below:

PRODUCT : Parallels Workstation 2.2 for Windows & Linux

ACTIVATION KEY : 3[XXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX]

I don't know how long this will be going on, so act soon!

I found out about this on this slickdeals.net thread...

92

General Software Discussion / Re: "XPLinux" Running Windows XP and Kubuntu on one joint desktop

« on: January 01, 2009, 05:35 AM »

If anyone's interested Parallels is apparently giving away version 2.2 of Parallels Workstation (the latest version as far as I can tell) for free!

Go here!

I filled out the form (name, e-mail, company, and phone) and got the following email almost immediately...

Dear [Hirudin],

Thank you for your interest in Parallels Workstation 2.2!

Your permanent activation key is listed below:

PRODUCT : Parallels Workstation 2.2 for Windows & Linux

ACTIVATION KEY : 3[XXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX]

I don't know how long this will be going on, so act soon!

I found out about this on this slickdeals.net thread...

93

General Software Discussion / Re: How do I get rid of MSN: check out these awesome pics from the awesome party

« on: December 30, 2008, 02:33 AM »

I consider myself a pretty big computer nerd, and I fell for some Phishing recently... I think.

As a dabbler in several web services I had a Blockbuster Online (BBO) account for a while. One way or another I decided it didn't fit my needs so I canceled it and started up with Netflix again. Well low* and behold I get this e-mail that says something along the lines of "Sign back up with Blockbuster Online and we'll send you $25 to your PayPal account!" I'm 90% sure Blockbuster has actually run promotions like this before, so I didn't think much of it. I was on the fence as to whether I wanted to sign up again so I kept the message.

Well, somehow I remembered the expiration date of the promotion. On the last day I decided to give it a shot. I opened up the e-mail and clicked on the link. I've had Thunderbird warn me of "suspicious" web links, but I'm not sure if that feature was implemented in the version I was using. One way or another, no "hey dummy, this isn't the address you think it is" message popped up. I proceeded to enter my username and password (actually KeePass did) and I clicked the "sign me back up" button.

About 3 minutes later I realized that I didn't actually check the link. When I did check it, I noticed it went to some strange URL (I don't remember what it was). I immediately changed my PayPal password (KeePass' password generator is great) and my BBO password. Then I sent a message to BBO inquiring as to whether it was a legitimate promotion or not, to which I received a canned, unhelpful response.

Anyway, sorry to go off topic... I just figured that I'd try to ease the shame of being phished a little. Show your friend all my nerdy posts if you want .

Thanks to the non-helpful BBO e-mail response I'm not even sure it wasn't a real promotion. I did some searching and all I could find was a person from around a year earlier with a similar e-mail, that linked to the exact same domain, that was also wondering about the legitimacy of the whole thing. I was using Firefox at the time, I was pretty disappointed the big, red warning didn't pop up alerting me I was about to do something stupid.

*I have a feeling that's not the correct spelling of "low"

94

General Software Discussion / Re: KMPlayer going commercial?

« on: December 24, 2008, 08:16 AM »

I happen to go to the KMPlayer forum earlier today... To my surprise they've released a new, "Pandora" branded version! I haven't used it yet, but it looks pretty good.

95

General Software Discussion / Re: mp3 Audio OUTPUT volume normalizer? Any such thing?

« on: December 21, 2008, 06:51 AM »

There's a few different types of tags that can be in MP3 files. The most common type is "ID3" (and now-a-days ID3v2). Another type is "APE". For some reason APE tags are less supported than ID3, and it would appear that sometimes they actually cause problems.

For instance the music software "J River Media Center" does not currently support APE tags (I think I heard it's coming in version 13), so anything written within an APE tag cannot be read or written using Media Center.

Some programs write the ReplayGain settings into APE tags (why I wonder) I guess others use the standard ID3 tag for ReplayGain (I suspect this is what Media Center uses).

...
You can and should turn that 'feature' off as it uses an non-standard tag (APE) to hold the info
...

-GHammer (April 24, 2008, 06:14 PM)

anyone know what is meant by the bit in bold

-tomos (December 21, 2008, 05:34 AM)

I'm not sure what program GHammer is referring to, but it must place the ReplayGain info into APE tags. Perhaps he's talking about dbPoweramp, which for some reason seems to have started using APE tags in version 13 (while version 12 didn't).

...
does that not stop it from completing it's main purpose ?
...

-tomos (December 21, 2008, 05:34 AM)

Yeah, sounds like it to me. I would guess GHammer is suggesting that a different ReplayGain (which is the same as mp3gain I think) implementation is a better way to go. Media Center has an "Analyze Audio" option that will scan your whole collection. You can set it to skip songs that have already been scanned. It also has a very cool option that lets you choose how many processes you want to do at once. So if you have a multi-core CPU you can get your collection scanned much more quickly.

96

General Software Discussion / Re: DVD to iPod Touch in 48 hours

« on: December 19, 2008, 12:58 AM »

StaxRip is a good'en.

There's a program called "SUPER" that a lot of people use. I tried it, but didn't like it for some reason and deleted/uninstalled it very quickly.

97

General Review Discussion / Re: Zaine's review of Compression Tools is cited in an excellent book on Compression

« on: December 13, 2008, 08:34 PM »

That's awesome!

98

General Software Discussion / Re: Another 'Lifetime' license bites the dust

« on: December 12, 2008, 05:54 PM »

Are there really programs out there that quit working after the license period has expired?

If you buy Quicken right now I'm pretty sure you're locked into their product line, but if you don't feel like buying their UPGRADED (everyone else is writing that in all caps, so I decided to as well) product you can still use their old version if I'm not mistaken.

If you create a document in Office2007 right now you can use it from now until the end of time (or the next Y2K-type bug/limitation pops up).

99

General Software Discussion / Re: Another 'Lifetime' license bites the dust

« on: December 12, 2008, 02:41 PM »

I'm a big fan of AnyDVD, but I did not opt to upgrade to AnyDVD-HD. I still get all the updates I want*. I think SlySoft has really proven themselves capable of and willing to provide updates to old customers. The only gripe I have with them is I bought CloneCD back before it was sold to the current owners, I was forced to buy it again in order to get updates. Now, I don't use either of them as ImgBurn does everything I need.

Lets just be thankful that SlySoft hasn't adopted the Nero strategy: add a bunch of crap that hardly anybody wants, don't change the core program, and steadily increase your prices of every new "version".

The pre-change announcement shows a lot of integrity in my opinion. The stuff I'm hearing about Total Commander really makes me want to try their program, and maybe even buy it even though I already have "DOpus".

*I only actually download about 1 out of 5 of the updates that are available, they're so frequent I get tired of downloading them all the time.

100

Living Room / Re: Finally a DonationCoder.com License Key for Time Travelers..

« on: December 12, 2008, 01:42 PM »

HAHAH!! I'm so glad I'm a charter member, I don't know anything about it, but that Ultimate .Net XP Pro+ Extreme! 2010 license sounds like the best one.