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9651

General Software Discussion / Re: Has anyone discovered any cool Windows 7 third-party utilities?

« Last post by 40hz on November 16, 2009, 01:09 PM »

A friend of mine pointed me to an audio format converter called FanVista. ( http://fanvista.net )

Main features:

  

•     Converting between 12 audio formats: MP3, WMA, OGG, WAV, AAC, M4A, AIFF, FLAC, AC3, AMR, MMF, MP2
•     Extracting and converting audio tracks from video files: AVI, WMV, 3GP, 3G2, ASF, FLV, MP4, MOV, MPG, MPEG,  SWF, RM, RV, DIVX, M1V, M2V, MKV, MPE, MPV, VOB, WM
•     Reading end converting audio tags: ID3V1, ID3V2, MPC, MPEG, MPEG4, OGG, RIFF, APE, ASF, WavPack
•     User friendly interface
•     Fast Converting Speed. Audio format converting is performed directly without any temporary files and thus enables high converting speed and economy of hard disk resource
•     Built-in player
•     Flexible and customizing interface
•     Tray icon
•     Drag&Drop interface
•     Auto format settings for each file
•     Additional features of Windows 7 (progress in taskbar, jumplist in taskbar, special open file and folder dialogs, status icon in taskbar)
•     System requirements: Microsoft Windows XP (with .NET Framework 3 or higher) or Windows Vista or Windows 7, Pentium 4 1.8Ghz or better, 256 MB RAM, 15 MB hard drive space

I haven't gotten a chance to work with it too much, but (so far) it seems to do what it does very well. OGG converts to MP3 with very good quality so I'm happy.  But that's all I really wanted it for anyway.

Also has a nice glassy/modern look to it if you're into the whole Windows blingy thing. (I'm not. )

---

Note: I've been told erightsoft's SUPER media converter utility (my favorite ) also works under Windows 7 but I haven't had a chance to verify how well it works. Has anybody tried SUPER using Win7 yet?

9652

Living Room / Re: Tech News Weekly: Edition 46-09

« Last post by 40hz on November 15, 2009, 03:52 PM »

#7 - Nice to see Microsoft has developed their very own backdoor exploit for Windows.

I know I'll sleep better at night knowing such a thing exists. Especially since it will only be made available to duly authorized members of the law enforcement community - whom experience has shown we can completely trust to never abuse such technologies.

I'm sure the Chinese government will be among the first in line to buy an unlimited institutional license for this puppy.

Hoo-wah Microsoft!!!  Way to go!

9653

General Software Discussion / Re: Is ubuntu's windowing/redrawing slower than windows? Is this X, or Gnome?

« Last post by 40hz on November 15, 2009, 12:29 PM »

X has a huge amount to do with it. It's client/server design and overhead makes it intrinsically slower.

DRI/DRI2 has the potential improve things bypassing the server model and allowing for direct access to video hardware. But it will be a while before it's fully worked out and a bigger selection of drivers becomes available.

9654

Living Room / Re: Netflix might delay new release shipping by 1 month

« Last post by 40hz on November 15, 2009, 11:23 AM »

If the studios had an ounce of brains in their heads they'd release on all channels simultaneously.

There's no real reason why the DVD and rentals can't be available on the same day the film comes out in theaters. Major music groups don't even think of touring until they have their new CD available for sale at the concert itself.

The argument gets made that the studios are trying to protect the theaters. But that's mostly a crock.

People who go to see a film (in a theater) are looking for a totally different experience than the people who merely want to watch a flick at home.* The smarter thing to do would be to upgrade said theater experience: more comfortable seating, nicer screens, cleaner theaters - and a zero tolerance policy towards any idiots who misbehave during a film. Make it more like an event - and charge a premium for the experience. Gain extra points if you also make the movie available on DVD at the theater where it is showing. Why let the people out of your theater without first giving theme a chance to buy their own copy while they're still pumped and talking about what they just saw?

For an industry that complains as much as they do about getting ripped off, the movie people sure seem to feel a need to do everything possible to keep people from giving them their money. It's absolutely insane!

If somebody comes into a store with cash in hand to buy a product, does that store immediately lay down a bunch of conditions before they'll accept it? No, they don't. Nobody in their right mind would do that. And no self respecting customer would put up with it either.

So what does that tell the movie industry about their business model and their customers?

-----
*Note: DVDs don't keep people out of theaters. But they might have the potential to lure some people in if they were released early enough.

Although the average 'home viewer' doesn't go to theaters, the DVD could have the benefit of convincing some of them to go see the movie on a big screen. The problem with releasing a DVD so late is that by the time somebody gets it and decides they want to go see the film, it's already been out of the theaters for six months.

How many times have you watched something on DVD only to wish you could have seen it on the big screen afterwards?

9655

Living Room / Re: Vista : included backup and security software

« Last post by 40hz on November 13, 2009, 08:58 AM »

Please try not to spam forums in order to get SEO for that other security company. And hey, I even added a link for a competitor to the thread, isn't that cool?

-jgpaiva (November 13, 2009, 08:28 AM)

Nice touch doing that!

I'm going to have to remember to do it next time I run into similar behavior in those places where I'm a moderator.

 

9656

Living Room / Re: Netflix might delay new release shipping by 1 month

« Last post by 40hz on November 13, 2009, 06:30 AM »

My issue is that this just appears to be a way for the movie studios to attempt to grab every last dollar out of the customers that make them what they are

-Josh (November 13, 2009, 05:21 AM)

I think you've hit the nail on the head with that point.

And yes, my original post made it sound like I don't have patience and typically I don't when it comes to my job, but for this type of stuff I have no problem waiting. It's the principle I disagree with here.

-Josh (November 13, 2009, 05:21 AM)

Actually you didn't sound all that impatient to me. I was just agreeing in a general way with what Shades was saying. Sorry if my post came across as being directed at you. That was not my intent.

9657

Living Room / Re: Netflix might delay new release shipping by 1 month

« Last post by 40hz on November 12, 2009, 11:50 PM »

Oh yeah....2000 POSTS!!!

-Josh (November 12, 2009, 05:11 PM)

Yay Josh! Looking forward to your next 2000.

-----

I suspect part of it has to do with helping out Blockbuster if the release delay wouldn't apply to out-of-store rentals as some reports have claimed.

Not that I'm a fan of Blockbuster, or pretty much anybody else in the entertainment industry (although I am a mainly contented NetFlix subscriber) - but I can understand why the studios might want to take a little wind out of the 'new-age' rental provider's sails. Otherwise, there's a very good risk of creating a new monster if things continue the way they're going for NetFlix.

Look at Amazon. They went from being a well respected book merchant to something of a pariah for book publishers in the last few years. Ditto for Walmart and all the other "big presence" retailers out there.

Although the movies industry is fighting what will most likely be a losing battle to maintain absolute control over pricing, release schedules, and rights management, there's nothing to stop them from trying. I'm guessing this is just another skirmish in the much bigger war.

From a personal perspective, I'm not all that put out by a one month release delay for NetFlix. I may not be too big on meat on the grill, or cold beer (being an ale drinker myself), but I do find myself in agreement with Shades' attitude regarding mañana and patience as being a virtue. (The presence of  minimally dressed females and the effects of raggeaton on same merits some consideration as well!  )

I dunno. Guess I'm just getting old.

9658

General Software Discussion / Re: Linux Desktop Turns 10: World Yawns?

« Last post by 40hz on November 12, 2009, 05:57 PM »

@zridling - Yeah, Cisco Kid ain't a friend of mine, that's for sure! The only reason it's gone on in court as long as it has is because of the depth of some pockets rather than for any legal merit.

Even Apple had the 'decency' (or at least the legal savvy) to adapt something licensed under BSD rather than GPL when they 'wrote' their 'new' OS.

9659

General Software Discussion / Re: photo alteration, any photoshop expert please?

« Last post by 40hz on November 12, 2009, 05:50 PM »

It might be a lot easier to just contact Audi and ask them if they have a jpg of that particular model in black that you can download. Odds are pretty good they do.

9660

General Software Discussion / Re: At last: MP3 Lossless!!!

« Last post by 40hz on November 12, 2009, 05:40 PM »

Am I the only one who thinks MP3 should've died a slow death by now?

-scancode (November 07, 2009, 11:56 AM)

as someone who hasnt a clue I ask:
are there alternatives that dont involve huge filesizes - or should we just get used to large filesizes ?
(I know, there's loads of space on current hard-drives...)

-tomos (November 07, 2009, 02:42 PM)

I think tomos hit on something with the observation about storage space.

Huge disk space has become so inexpensive that, for archival purposes, file compression has almost become a non-issue.

Nowadays, it's only if you're dealing with streaming media that file compression is still an important consideration.

9661

General Software Discussion / Re: Has anyone discovered any cool Windows 7 third-party utilities?

« Last post by 40hz on November 12, 2009, 05:26 PM »

You can currently get a fully licensed copy of Ashampoo's WinOptimizer 2010 v6.50 for free (e-mail address registration required) courtesy of a find by the folks over at for-free-on-internet.com

This product lists for around $50 if you were to go out buy it.

Link to info:

http://for-free-on-i...latest-v-650-4-free/

If you're looking for an all-in-one optimizer/general utilities package, Ashampoo does one of the better ones.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ADDENDUM:

Running into a problem with this offer. Despite Ashampoo saying this can be used with Windows 7, several people (myself included) are getting this error when they attempt to install WinOptimizer 2010 from the above :



I've got a query in to their Tech Support people. Hopefully this is a minor glitch.

Apologies to anybody who was inconvenienced.


[UPDATE}

Supposedly, the issue is with the installer and not WinOptimizer itself. The published workaround for the above problem is to run the installer after changing it's file properties to use the WindowsXP-SP3 compatibility setting.

I tried it, and it works just fine.

9662

General Software Discussion / Re: Linux Desktop Turns 10: World Yawns?

« Last post by 40hz on November 12, 2009, 12:03 PM »

Not much of surprise about Corel not making it.

When the average person wants to buy a proprietary system, most will choose the well-established Windows environment. Corel didn't have a compelling enough reason for anybody to switch.

And I can't bring myself to feel all that bad about Corel not being able to make it as a NIX standard. Especially since they always seemed to be trying to figure out a way to circumvent the spirit (and legalities) of FOSS and somehow make CorelLinux a fully proprietary product.

You see this all the time. Somebody sees a FOSS product, uses it as the basis for their own product, and then tries to figure out a way to get around the"give back" clause of the GPL. Sometimes it's accidental, as (I'd guess) was the case with the recent issues between Microsoft and the ImageMaster Project. Unfortunately, there's been many times when these attempted 'end runs' have been quite deliberate.

9663

General Software Discussion / Re: Graphic Design question: Services and prices?

« Last post by 40hz on November 12, 2009, 06:54 AM »

It is fantastic.  It is exactly, precisely, 100% the book I was looking for.

-superboyac (November 11, 2009, 09:54 PM)

De nada.

I thought it was a pretty amazing book myself. All substance. (How rare is that in the computer book world?)

The thing that impressed me the most is how broadly applicable Fred Williams' techniques are to all forms of digital illustration. Too bad his book has the word "comics" in the title and uses a lot of Marvel-style art. That's going to automatically turn off a lot of artists and illustrators who could otherwise benefit by reading it.

Why not do a mini review of it in the What books are you reading" thread if you get a chance?
Some other DoCo members might it useful too. And your impressions of the book would be especially interesting since you've got a live project to apply some of it to.

*(https://www.donation...ex.php?topic=20287.0)

 

9664

General Software Discussion / Re: 10 things to do after installing Linux

« Last post by 40hz on November 10, 2009, 07:07 PM »

@urlwolf- Did I read your first comment correctly? You're installing Server 2008-R2 on a laptop???

9665

General Software Discussion / Re: 10 things to do after installing Linux

« Last post by 40hz on November 10, 2009, 12:37 PM »

@iphigenie,

Sounds like you should develop a distro of your own. :p (I mean it!)

-Paul Keith (November 08, 2009, 07:33 AM)

Relatively easy to do if you're using SuSE:

www.susestudio.com

It's still by invitation, but it doesn't take too long to get an admission ticket any more.

9666

Living Room / Re: Large hadron collider shut down by bird dropping bread

« Last post by 40hz on November 10, 2009, 12:05 PM »

For a start, none of us would be frequenting this forum, would we?

-Darwin (November 10, 2009, 11:24 AM)

Frequenting a forum? Heck, we'd still be picking up our phones and asking for an operator to place a call for us.


---

BTW: It's "Hear! Hear!"

9667

Living Room / Re: Large hadron collider shut down by bird dropping bread

« Last post by 40hz on November 10, 2009, 11:10 AM »

+1 with Carol

Something inside me dies every time some pseudo-press pundit or politico characterizes NASA research and the US space program as "an inexcusable waste of public money."

When you look at all the technology that originally came out of the space program, NASA has to be one of the biggest bargains in human history as far as cost to benefit goes.

9668

General Software Discussion / Re: Any XP users switching to Windows 7 yet?

« Last post by 40hz on November 10, 2009, 07:09 AM »

I did somehow end up with a BSOD on both my desktop PC and netbook on the same day, but I have no idea what those were about. I actually wasn't using either computer at the time. They were just idling.

-Deozaan (November 10, 2009, 02:14 AM)

Now that is truly bizarre! And pretty cool too. (Or will be so long as it doesn't keep happening. )

9669

General Software Discussion / Re: Has anyone discovered any cool Windows 7 third-party utilities?

« Last post by 40hz on November 09, 2009, 09:52 PM »

I don't know how cool this is, but it's a nice little  "training wheels" type utility. It gives you easy access to a variety of settings that you'd otherwise have to burrow through the various control panels to get to. It's also portable app so it's easy to delete if you decide you don't want it:

Access Panel for Windows 7 & Vista, x86 and x64

Link: www.thewindowsclub.com/windows-access-panel-for-windows-7-vista

We are pleased to release Access Panel for Windows 7 & Vista, x86 and x64. While you can use Control Panel to change settings which control nearly everything about how Windows looks and works, in some cases to access these very controls ,  or the in-built Windows programs, requires you to engage in multiple clicks or know their names.

Windows Access Panel v 1.0 is meant to minimize your trouble in accessing such programs. It has been tested on  Windows 7 & Windows Vista. It can simply be downloaded and used as a portable application. Place it in your Programs Files and Pin its shortcut to your Start menu and you are all set to a faster way of accessing  the “hidden” Windows system utilities.

9670

Living Room / Re: What books are you reading?

« Last post by 40hz on November 09, 2009, 07:07 PM »

Books? Wow do they still make them things?  

-SteveJohnSteele (November 09, 2009, 06:55 PM)

Yes. They do...  

Ive opened a few PDFs recently does that count?

No. It doesn't...  

Ive been trying to get all my paperbacks in PDF format, then get the PC to read them to me hehe  

Now that sounds like an interesting idea.  

But I was thinking of maybe first trying to find an attractive woman who loves to read aloud, and having her over for tea... Oh wait! I've got one of those already.

Sure beats buying AudioBooks at Barnes & Noble!

9671

General Software Discussion / Re: PDF's

« Last post by 40hz on November 09, 2009, 07:00 PM »

If I recall correctly, "optimize for portability" embeds a lot of printer specific Postscript code into the PDF along with a routine to regularly check for the amount of available virtual memory in your printer.

Unless you're creating a PDF that you only plan on sending to a specific very high-resolution output device (e.g. digital press plate maker, etc.) there's no need to ever use the 'portability' optimization.

9672

General Software Discussion / Re: Any XP users switching to Windows 7 yet?

« Last post by 40hz on November 09, 2009, 06:30 PM »

So you are saying my example is right because you can only see behind you when you turn round and then you can't see what you were looking at Using a mirror is cheating (swine)

-Carol Haynes (November 09, 2009, 06:20 PM)

 

 

(Remind me not to get into a debate with you should the occasion ever arise! )

9673

General Software Discussion / Re: Best free firewall for Windows?

« Last post by 40hz on November 09, 2009, 06:27 PM »

You are wrong Mrs. If you turn down sensitivity level a tad you will see and get over it. Regardless, this thread is about firewall not your concerns for other members well being.

-Bamse (October 30, 2009, 08:39 PM)

@Bamse: Actually, it's a very legitimate concern.

And comments like your previous one don't go over too well here.

Perhaps after you've been here a little longer you'll start to show a bit more courtesy towards your fellow members; and hopefully develop a better appreciation for the social norms at Donation Coder?

Just a thought.  

9674

Living Room / Re: I'm Going to HELL! Please feel sorry for me... :(

« Last post by 40hz on November 09, 2009, 06:02 PM »

Umm...I'd be happy to trade places if you want to.

9675

Living Room / Re: What books are you reading?

« Last post by 40hz on November 09, 2009, 03:42 PM »

I just finished Meg Rosoff's How I Live Now and was completely amazed by the story - and by the fact that this book is categorized as young adult fiction.

From the book: “Every war has turning points and every person too.”



The story revolves around a teenage American girl sent to live with her cousins in England shortly before global war breaks out and England becomes an occupied country.

Rather than serving up another predictable 'post-apocalyptic Mad Max' story, Meg Rosoff actually comes very close to portraying what I'd imagine 'quiet war' and enemy occupation would be like in the 21st century.

A enigmatic and quietly frightening book about war and its consequences. Especially for the young.