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1376

General Software Discussion / Re: How many of you use encryption?

« Last post by mwb1100 on December 25, 2007, 02:32 PM »

Does TC allow you to run it off a usb drive and without admin rights? I would love to have a portable encryption system I can use on any system.

-Josh (December 25, 2007, 12:21 PM)

Unfortunately, no.  This is understandable (same as for BestCrypt Traveler, I'm sure) since there's a device drive involved and only admins can install/load device drivers.  There have been requests on the TC forum for some sort of access through a regular program for non-admin access (like opening an archive) - even if read-only, but there's been no apparent developer interest in that.  You'd have to implement enough smarts about NTFS and FAT filesystems to get that to work for Windows containers; that's very non-trivial, and then you'd have to also deal with Linux and Mac filesystems for completeness.  So, I think this is probably not in the cards.

1377

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: slysoft 20% discount on all products Expires December, 31st 2007!

« Last post by mwb1100 on December 22, 2007, 02:58 PM »

I've never needed to copy a DVD disk yet - ever, though I expect this will change as I move my own storage to DVDs. I hardly watch any movies on DVD, so it's not a concern, but I do buy live (concert) DVDs occasionally, and I want to be able to extract audio tracks off those DVDs.

-tranglos (December 22, 2007, 02:37 PM)

From this I'm pretty sure that CloneDVD will not be something useful to you.  CloneDVD has nothing to do with data storage on DVDs - only DVD video.

However, it's possible that possible that AnyDVD might be very useful to you.  When you say that AnyDVD is useless by itself, that's kind of true; but what it does is make DVDs appear unprotected to other software on your system - not just Slysoft's other software.  I think there's a good chance that AnyDVD would enable the audio extraction software you're trying to use to work on protected disks.  At least, that's the idea - you should try it with the AnyDVD trial before buying, of course.

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Found Deals and Discounts / Re: slysoft 20% discount on all products Expires December, 31st 2007!

« Last post by mwb1100 on December 22, 2007, 01:27 PM »

1. Your description of CloneCD reads in part: CloneCD is not only able to copy CDs but also most DVD formats, such as DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW, DVD+R Dual Layer and DVD-RAM. How much does CloneDVD offer above and beyond that? Or conversely, does CloneDVD copy CDs as well?

-tranglos (December 21, 2007, 09:49 PM)

My understanding is that CloneCD will only make 1 to 1 exact copies of DVD movies.  CloneDVD will re-encode movies so they will fit on media with less capacity.  Many DVDs require dual-layer media for 1 to 1 copies, CloneDVD will make those fit on single-layer media.  CloneDVD also allows you to perform some basic edits (like remove advertisements, alternate tracks,etc.).  As far as I know CloneCD doesn't let you perform any edits.

However, if you're only going to get one thing from Slysoft, seriously consider AnyDVD.  It's pretty much a requirement even for CloneDVD (as CloneDVD does not deal with copy protections or CSS encryption on its own).  AnyDVD lets any video manipulation software deal with DVD movies.  Most CD/DVD authoring suites (Nero, etc.) include software that let you recode movies - as long as they're not copy protected or CSS encrypted.  AnyDVD makes all DVD movies compatible.

Finally - if you're considering buying from Slysoft, they've announced that starting on Jan 1 their products are going to be sold in Euros instead of Dollars (while keeping the numbers the same).  In effect, this is a 40% price increase.  So if you're going to buy you should do it before then.

1379

General Software Discussion / Re: Product Key Explorer

« Last post by mwb1100 on December 21, 2007, 08:39 PM »

Am I a lousy cynic, paranoid, or what?  I see these utilities, and I immediately think that if I run one on my machine, all my keys will be uploaded to some Chinese or Russian website.

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General Software Discussion / Re: How many of you use encryption?

« Last post by mwb1100 on December 20, 2007, 11:02 PM »

Will BestCrypt Traveler allow you to access encrypted containers on a machine where you do  not have admin privileges?

1381

General Software Discussion / Re: teracopy: copy your files faster

« Last post by mwb1100 on December 20, 2007, 03:15 PM »

I'm a little hesitant to post this since there are apparently some problems with Code Sector's product support. But some people seem to like TeraCopy, so for those who might want to take the plunge, there's a 40% discount on Code Sector's products (including TeraCopy Pro) until 26 Dec 2007.  There seems to be 2 codes that work right now - maybe one will last longer than the posted expiration.

Coupon code: Christmas

or

Coupon code: CSD-40D

http://www.codesector.com/buy.php

1382

Living Room / Re: Applications Stealing Focus...

« Last post by mwb1100 on December 13, 2007, 08:30 PM »

Jeff Atwood did a recent blog entry about this:  http://www.codinghor...archives/001011.html

His wrap-up line sums it up nicely:

... please don't steal my focus. I'm using it right now. Really. I am.

1383

General Software Discussion / Re: Software to help share files between home/work?

« Last post by mwb1100 on December 12, 2007, 05:17 PM »

Most of the file synchronization tools support FTP, some also support SFTP and/or FTPS for secure transfers.  there was a recent, long thread discussing SyncBackSE and Super Flexible File Synchronizer:

https://www.donation...ex.php?topic=10657.0

SyncBackSE does not support SFTP yet, with the developer looking into possible future solutions, but no firm commitment.  I don't know what the SFFS story is for secure transfer.

If you have a synchronization tool that you like that does not support FTP or SFTP an alternative is something like one of the following that will map drives to network storage:

• SFTPDrive (http://www.sftpdrive.com) - $40 - per user license
• WebDrive (http://www.webdrive.com) - $60 - per computer license, with an activation scheme
• Jungledisk (http://www.jungledisk.com) - $20.  This does not use FTP, rather it uses Amazon's S3 service.  The license is per-S3 account (essentially a per-user license).

If you're dealing with a work computer situation, one thing to test before you buy is support for proxy transversal if you need that at work.  In my situation, I was unable to get SFTPDrive to connect to some hosts.  Jungledisk works fine (but it only has one host to deal with).  I have not tried WebDrive.  If you buy SFTPDrive from their site, you get a free, non-expiring 3GB SFTP account at joyent.com.  So for about the price of a USB drive, you get about equivalent storage that you don't have to keep in your pocket!  The support forums for both SFTPDrive and Jungledisk are actively monitored by the developer.

I'm using Jungledisk right now for a situation similar to what you're talking about, and it works great.  I do have to pay Amazon a whole $0.08 (that's eight cents) a month for the S3 transfer & storage fees.

1384

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: PhraseExpress vs Direct Access

« Last post by mwb1100 on December 12, 2007, 02:09 PM »

Why not download PhraseExpress - it's FREE for home use today - the $10 is for a commercial license!

-Darwin (December 12, 2007, 01:47 PM)

I haven't tried PhraseExpress, yet.  I did come across one comment that indicated that the free, non-commercial, personal-use license had nag screens:

I've liked using PhraseExpress, after hearing about it on Lifehacker before, but I had a sad experience with v3: after using it for awhile, nag screens start to pop up every few times you execute a macro. I didn't see mention of this on the info-pages, so I was caught unaware by it, and I don't know whether it's a problem in v4. I hope not!

-http://lifehacker.com/software/autocomplete/download-of-the-day-phraseexpress-windows-252889.php

Does anyone know if free use results in nags?

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General Software Discussion / Re: FileBox eXtender now works under Vista

« Last post by mwb1100 on December 03, 2007, 12:06 PM »

Wow.  If I remember right, Hyperionics made Filebox eXtender freeware mainly because they felt they could not support Vista properly.  It's quite a surprise that after making it freeware they continued to work on it to make it so.

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Found Deals and Discounts / Re: slysoft 20% discount on all products Expires December, 31st 2007!

« Last post by mwb1100 on December 02, 2007, 05:15 PM »

This 20% promotion is ALWAYS running. It is nothing new. There hasnt been a day that slysoft hasnt run a 20% off discount for their products. Its a scheme I've seen several companies run.

-Josh (December 02, 2007, 08:13 AM)

Is that correct?  While they've had a promotion in effect most of the time since October, I don't recall anything in the months before when I've sporadically visited their site.

1387

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: XYplorer File Manager

« Last post by mwb1100 on November 28, 2007, 12:41 PM »

Don has released a slightly older version of XY with a freeware license:

http://www.xyplorer.com/free.php

1388

General Software Discussion / Re: Why the Windows Registry Exists

« Last post by mwb1100 on November 26, 2007, 12:14 PM »

BTW, why is there a 32kb limit for the ini file ?

-Armando (November 26, 2007, 11:55 AM)

Remember that Raymond Chen is talking about this from the point of view of Windows APIs.  The 32KB limit is there because Microsoft made it so in the APIs - probably due to the 64KB segment size limit back in the Win16 days.  I'd bet that the limit is 32KB instead of 64KB because the original programmer just happened to use a signed value (with a range of -32758 to 32767) to represent the size instead of an unsigned value, and no one thought that would present a problem because who'd ever need more?

Once programs get written to rely on the 32KB limit (for example because they allocate a buffer of that size), Microsoft is in a bit of a bind - to change something like that they have to either be willing to break some existing programs (almost never a good idea) or they have to come up with a new, parallel API.  They haven't done anything to the INI-related APIs because they went to the registry instead.  Now they support XML configuration for many things.

1389

Living Room / Re: Top 10 Ways to Destroy the Earth

« Last post by mwb1100 on November 26, 2007, 12:41 AM »

Well, now with that information, I can just give the UN a call to say:

I demand the sum... OF 1 MILLION DOLLARS!

And I'll be living on Easy Street in my underground lair.  That and sharks with frickin' laser beams attached to their heads!

1390

General Software Discussion / Re: Upgraded to 64-bit XP, need virtual CD/DVD drive

« Last post by mwb1100 on November 25, 2007, 11:57 AM »

What I meant by this is that I can't see why Alcohol wouldn't have 64-bit drivers, considering how popular it is.

-Deozaan (November 24, 2007, 11:42 PM)

Alcohol does have 64-bit drivers.

One drawback to Alcohol is that it has an aggressive activation scheme that requires re-activation even after very minor system changes. I think that it also requires continual Internet access (it deactivates if it hasn't had an opportunity to check-in within the past few weeks or so) - but I may be confusing this with Daemon Tools Pro which definitely does this.

1391

Developer's Corner / Re: Visual Studio 2005 or 2008?

« Last post by mwb1100 on November 24, 2007, 09:32 PM »

My brief experience with VS 2008 gives me 2 reasons to go with 2008 over 2005:

1) 2008 has a much snappier feel to it - it's like having a new machine
2) I often got annoyed when the Intellisense pop-up would obscure code I was looking at when typing.   2008 has added a feature that makes those pop ups transparent by holding down the Ctrl key.  This is one of those little "how did I live without that?" features.

The vast majority of the new stuff in 2008 is geared towards managed code.  However these 2 things are enough for me.  I'm also looking forward to the improvements I've heard about in multi-thread debugging - such as having a visual cue as to where other threads are when you stopped in the debugger.  I haven't had the opportunity to try it, but it also seems like a little feature that will be hard to live without once you've used it.

1392

General Software Discussion / Re: Upgraded to 64-bit XP, need virtual CD/DVD drive

« Last post by mwb1100 on November 23, 2007, 12:09 AM »

MagicISO offers a Virtual CD/DVD-ROM.  I have no experience with it, so I don't know if it meets all your requirements, but it is freeware and it supports 64-bit:

http://www.magiciso....gicdisc-overview.htm

1393

General Software Discussion / Re: Visual C++ 2008 Express and native x64 output ?

« Last post by mwb1100 on November 21, 2007, 05:08 PM »

Hmm...  this page (which is for VC++ 2005 so it may not apply to 2008) says that you can enable x64 targets in Express by installing the .NET Framework SDK:

http://msdn2.microso...9yb4317s(VS.80).aspx

1394

General Software Discussion / Re: Visual C++ 2008 Express and native x64 output ?

« Last post by mwb1100 on November 21, 2007, 05:04 PM »

I'm not sure, but I don't think VC++ Express supports x64 targets.  For VS 2008 Standard and above, x64 targets are supported, but you have to do a custom install and manually select the option.  I don't see that the Express install lets you do that.  The readme mentions that "x64 (WOW)" is supported, but I think that simply means that the product will work on an x64 platform.  There's nothing that I saw in the readme about what targets are supported.

1395

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: XYplorer File Manager

« Last post by mwb1100 on November 20, 2007, 02:42 PM »

Anyhow, looks like we can close this part of the debate soon.

-luc (November 20, 2007, 11:38 AM)

Oh, really? Do you have some insider information we all others don't have?

-boxstar (November 20, 2007, 12:41 PM)

Don't know if this is what luc was referring to, but DP is on Don's roadmap for XY.  I don't know how soon this means Don will get around to it, though.

1396

Living Room / Re: Surfer dude stuns physicists with theory of everything

« Last post by mwb1100 on November 19, 2007, 08:10 PM »

And here's another surfer dude's dissertation on American history:

What Jefferson was saying was, "Hey! You know, we left this England place 'cause it was bogus; so if we don't get some cool rules ourselves - pronto - we'll just be bogus too!" Get it?

-Jeff Spicoli

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083929/

Now, it's time to party, Bud!

1397

General Software Discussion / Re: Did NSA Put a Secret Backdoor in New Encryption Standard?

« Last post by mwb1100 on November 19, 2007, 06:29 PM »

This reminds me of the rumors that back in the 70's the NSA made the DES encryption standard weaker to enable them to be able to decrypt at will. According to this Wikipedia article (yeah, I know, but it seem to jive with my memory of the situation) http://en.wikipedia...._Encryption_Standard:

• the NSA may or may not have had a hand in determining the values for the DES S-Boxes.  However, whoever did come up with the S-Box values (the NSA, IBM, or both) did it in such a way as to make them more resistant to attacks that at the time were not generally known - ie, stronger rather than weaker
• the NSA may or may not have had a hand in making the DES key a rather short 56-bits, throwing away 8 available key bits for use as 'parity'

It seems like the Dual_EC_DRBG random number protocol is dead in the water - slow and suspect will kill any algorithm.

1398

General Software Discussion / Visual Studio 2008 has gone RTM - free Express downloads, too

« Last post by mwb1100 on November 19, 2007, 12:10 PM »

Visual Studio 2008 has gone to RTM.  The downloads for the free Express versions are available:

http://www.microsoft.com/express

Unfortunately, I could not find a list of what's new & improved.

1399

Living Room / Re: Sherlock Holmes and Texefex

« Last post by mwb1100 on November 16, 2007, 12:51 PM »

The hole is there because the figures aren't the exact same size/shape, it's a pretty old trick.

-f0dder (November 16, 2007, 12:08 PM)

Right, the key is that the 2 triangles are not similar.  They're close, but not exact, so the long diagonal line formed by the 2 long sides of the triangles is not straight.

1400

General Software Discussion / Re: SyncBackSE vs. SuperFlexible

« Last post by mwb1100 on November 07, 2007, 09:57 PM »

And just for completeness' sake - WebDrive is really nice in what it does, great to have an ftp account available as a drive letter at all times. The only problem with it so far - uploading one file in the background takes up exactly 50% of my Core2 Due 2,6 GHz; uploading two files concurrently takes 100%. This is excessive, and WebDrive doesn't seem to have a configurable priority setting. I wonder if there's a way to permanently mark a process low-priority in the Task Manager...

-tranglos (November 07, 2007, 08:20 PM)

If you can get by with SFTP instead of FTP you might want to try SFTPDrive (http://www.sftpdrive.com).  It uses essentially no CPU for me.