Demonstrating quite clearly why you should never jump straight on an update the moment it’s released, and that good backups are imperative, the latest update to AVG’s free antivirus offering prevents Windows 7 64-bit from booting after a forced post-installation reboot cycle. The 271.1.1/3292 (432/3292) definition update, which requires users to reboot their PC after installation, blocks Windows from booting properly and throws up a c0000135 blue screen of death, requiring that you take recovery action.
AVG as you might expect, have promptly pulled the update and included instructions for use of the AVG Rescue CD/USB, which allows you to simply go into the system drive and rename the offending AVG files so they don’t play a part in the Windows boot cycle. Of course you could enter into Safe Mode and remove the offending piece of software, and while there, why not install our current favorite free antivirus solution, Microsoft Security Essentials?
More information [downloadsquad]
4GB Patch is a miniscule application which can be used to patch x86 compatible applications’ executables, so they can gain more than 2GB of virtual memory in x64 systems. It is utterly useful for applications which need a great amount of system’s virtual memory such as, high FPS games, 3D renderization, multimedia tools, etc. If you are dealing with high-resolution graphics, animations, or planning to play a hefty game, just create a patch through it to utilize full system virtual memory.
Since an expert can tweak with application’s executable file to gain more than 2GB of virtual memory in x64 system, this tool offers an easy way to achieve this by automating the lengthy & complex process. To begin, launch the application and just specify the executable file which is to be patched.
The application is designed for Windows platform. Works great on both Windows Vista and Windows 7.
4GB Patch [NTCore]
More information [addictivetips]
Previously relegated to the Google Toolbar and Feedburner, Google URL Shortener finally has a web site of its own.
Google URL Shortener (Goo.gl) now has a simple web interface where you input a URL and receive a shorter one. Nothing revolutionary here, but in addition to keeping track of your previously shortened URLs Google’s touting the following:
- Stability: We’ve had near 100% uptime since our initial launch, and we’ve worked behind the scenes to make goo.gl even stabler and more robust.
- Security: We’ve added automatic spam detection based on the same type of filtering technology we use in Gmail.
- Speed: We’ve more than doubled our speed in just over nine months.
Here’s an added bonus tip from Googler Matt Cutts: if you add .qr to the end of any goo.gl-shortened URL, you get a QR code instead of the URL. For example: http://goo.gl/Uv9n.qr
More information [Google Social Web Blog]
It’s not unusual for hackers and script kiddies to crash their Windows systems while trying to write a malicious code. It’s apparently also not unusual for them to send that malicious code right along to Microsoft when prompted.
According to Microsoft senior security architect Rocky Heckman, when a “hacker’s system crashes in Windows, as with all typical Windows crashes, the user would be prompted to send the error details – including the malicious code – to Microsoft. The funny thing is that many say yes.”
He explains further:
People have sent us their virus code when they’re trying to develop their virus and they keep crashing their systems. It’s amazing how much stuff we get.
More information [ZDNet]
Has this ever happened to you? You’re writing an email online and you try to copy some text from a webpage. But when you paste it in, you get all the original fonts, colors, and spacing. “Wait!” you say, “I just wanted the text!”
This happened to us so many times while building Google Chrome that we added a special shortcut to do just that. Alongside the common Ctrl-V keyboard shortcut for “paste”, Google Chrome supports a similar shortcut, Ctrl-Shift-V, for “paste as plain text”. (And it’s Command-Shift-Option-V on a Mac.)
You can use this shortcut in any rich text editor (like Gmail’s compose window, or when writing in Google Docs) to strip out all the presentation from the original source and just paste in a block of text.
More information [chrome.blogspot.com]
We’ve featured a few ways to make your own iPad or tablet stylus, but they’re either kludgy or require some harder-to-find items. Technology “journalist” Walt Mosspuppet shows us how to make one out of just a candy bar wrapper and a pen.
This method is remarkably clever (you know, for a drunk puppet), and is cheap and simple: you just need a capacitive candy wrapper and a pen. Most candy wrappers should work; I’d guess that you can tell which ones are capacitive by whether the inside is silver—if it just looks like white glossy paper, it probably won’t work.
We actually experimented with a few modifications to this trick, and here’s our version of the stylus. It’s a bit more sturdy, and the only extra thing you need is a bit of tissue paper (or anything else that can act as a buffer between the pen tip and wrapper). First, cut the candy wrapper as shown, with two strips coming out of the top, right next to each other:
Roll the pen over and fold the second strip down onto the pen, so it’s perpendicular to the first strip.
Then, just roll on the rest of the wrapper and tape it all together. You’ll have a quick, easy stylus that’s fairly durable and will work on your touch screen device.
Got any of your own methods for creating easy, at-home styli? Share them in the comments.
More information [mosspuppet]
Cisco and company, you’ve got approximately seven days before a security researcher rains down exploits on your web-based home router parade. Seismic’s Craig Heffner claims he’s got a tool that can hack “millions” of gateways using a new spin on the age-old DNS rebinding vulnerability, and plans to release it into the wild at the Black Hat 2010 conference next week. He’s already tested his hack on thirty different models, of which more than half were vulnerable, including two versions of the ubiquitous Linksys WRT54G (pictured above) and devices running certain DD-WRT and OpenWRT Linux-based firmware.
To combat the hack, the usual precautions apply — for the love of Mitnick, change your default password! — but Heffner believes the only real fix will come by prodding manufacturers into action.
More information [engadget]
