CyberCoyote - March 19, 2009

NEWS and NOTES
Business

Minutes for the March business meeting are now available. I know you have been anxious to see them. :^)

Acronis True Image

Gene Barlow and his wife were here today from their User Group Relations operation to describe and demonstrate True Image. Most computers come with a restore CD these days. A drive image is essentially an updated snapshot that can be used in the same way as a restore disk. It has the advantage that it includes all the programs and updates you've added since the computer was new. I believe you can still get True Image and the other products he represents at user group prices ($29 for True Image). Just use "Happy Trails Computer Club", and Order Code UGMAR09 or UGAZACC during the checkout process.

I've learned a few things about drive images that you might want to keep in mind.

  1. Unless you make new drive image backups frequently, you should backup your data frequently and separately. When you restore a drive image, it takes you back in time to when the image was made, and you lose all the data that was added after that.
  2. Some HP computers, and probably others, have built-in recovery systems, and they are also based on drive images. To set them up, they create a non-standard boot sector on your hard drive. True Image won't know how to deal with that kind of setup, and you've wasted your time if you try to a belt-and-suspenders kind of guy and use both systems. You will only be able to restore using the manufacturer's system.
  3. I would use a separate (usually external) hard drive to store backup images. I would not trust the Acronis Secure Zone for storing backups. Just something I've read about on the Web.
TECH TOPICS
Internet Explorer 8

Microsoft released IE 8 today. [download] It will bring a nice step forward to the Web. For years, Microsoft has resisted pressure to do the right thing by respecting website design standards. Instead, they complicated things with clever but quirky alternatives of their own. It wasn't easy for them to make the switch, but I think they're going about it the right way.

The change means you'll need to pay attention to the "broken" page icon (circled in the partial screenshot) when webpages don't work or look right. Clicking it switches IE 8 back to the old non-standard mode so that websites that don't meet Web standards yet will still look OK. CyberCoyote.org has always met Web standards. :-)

IE 8 is more secure, faster, has some nice new features, and should crash less than IE7 or IE6. When a webpage does crash, it usually doesn't bring IE 8 down with it as it did before. I'm trying IE 8 out, but don't expect me to switch back from Firefox. ;-)

My IE 8 installation experience in a nutshell (note that my computer setup is more complex than most): Installation seemed to go OK, except that the progress bar didn't show progress at any step. It took less than 5 minutes to install. I was asked to restart Windows. After I did there was a long wait while it did something with settings. Then I tried to start IE 8, but that failed. Reaching into my bag of tricks, I restarted Windows again. This time IE 8 started. Looks OK at this point. All the while, I was glad that I had created a fresh drive image just before I started this adventure. ;-)

Open that file

You probably run into a file once in a while that Windows doesn't know to open, for example a Raw Image File [*.raw]. Or, maybe you don't like the program that Windows wants to use. (In my case, I refuse to install Apple Quicktime to play Quicktime videos [*.mov].)

OpenWith.org catalogs hundreds of file types. When you look them up they will tell you what it is and show you some free programs that will open it up. You can also download a little program that tells you what the file is and offers to download a free program to open it with.

SECURITY
"Wipe" your hard drive

I recently reviewed and updated my article on purging your hard drive. You definitely want to do that if you're going to sell, give away or recycle your computer. It's also a good idea when you upgrade or retire a hard drive. I describe how to tailor the scrubbing process to your circumstances.

ODDS and ENDS
A bit rattled?

How's this going to end?

State of the economy

Look on the bright side.

RAF pilot

See if you can deliver the goods to the drop zones.

That's all, folks.