"This site may harm your computer"

Great post over at Google's Online Security blog to help protect us all when searching sites through Google.

It's always good to have the extra protection against malware or botnets and scammers out there.

Google is even gracious enough to tell us some about how to clean up your site (if you have one) with links to various sources of information to help out.

If you see the warning on a site in Google's search results, it's a good idea to pay attention to it. Google has automatic scanners that are constantly looking for these sorts of web pages. I help build the scanners and continue to be surprised by how accurate they are. There is almost certainly something wrong with the website even if it is run by someone you trust. The automatic scanners make unbiased decisions based on the malicious content of the pages, not the reputation of the webmaster.

Go check it out and read the rest of the post at the link.
Via - Google Online Security Blog

Asustek expects to ship $200 Eee PC in 2009

Finally, the promised $200 netbook from Asus will hopefully make an appearance. Certainly have been a bit above that price they originally promised.

A few other interesting points is that: 1. Asus is going to phase out 7 and 8.9 inch netbooks to gradually be replaced by 10 inch versions and 2. Asus netbooks have a 70/30 split between physical drives and SSD's, along with a 7:3 ratio of XP vs Linux.

I hope they follow through with their $200 netbooks next year. Looking forward to see how Windows 7 will be on the netbooks as well.

Via - DigiTimes

GTA 4 PC delayed; Minimum Specs released

Well, unforunately those of us waiting for the PC version of GTA IV will have to wait two more weeks to spend some time in Liberty City.

The date has been pushed from November 18th to December 2nd with no reason given for the delay.

Minimum System Requirements

* OS: Windows Vista - Service Pack 1 / XP - Service Pack 3
* Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo 1.8Ghz, AMD Athlon X2 64 2.4Ghz (I'm screwed -Zach)
* Memory: 1.5GB, 16GB Free Hard Drive Space
* Video Card: 256MB NVIDIA 7900 / 256MB ATI X1900

Recommended System Requirements

* OS: Windows Vista - Service Pack 1 / XP - Service Pack 3
* Processor: Intel Core 2 Quad 2.4Ghz, AMD Phenom X3 2.1Ghz
* Memory: 2 GB (Windows XP) 2.5 GB (Windows Vista)
* 18 GB Free Hard Drive Space
* Video Card: 512MB NVIDIA 8600 / 512MB ATI 3870

Via - Shacknews

Left 4 Dead TV ad

Left 4 Dead '30 Second' TV ad

I'm totally looking forward to Left 4 Dead. Zombies + Co-Op = win for me.

Safer than ever for 1st-gen hardware?

Quite the interesting read over at Gizmodo. I am largely in agreement over the whole thing.

Used to be, diving into a whole new product line was something only for the crazy ones, those who live dangerously, the mavericks. "Wise men wait to buy" was the refrain that rang through the web, with fear of hardware defects and half-baked features tempering the go! go! buy! buy! fever of a new product announcement.

But things are different now.

Read the rest of it at Gizmodo

Welcome to Windows 7

Microsoft has opened a new site up where you can find information on their new OS Windows 7.

So what is Windows 7?

It's the next version of Windows for PCs, and it's the result of working hand-in-hand with our partners and with people who use Windows in the real world every day. We're paying particular attention to the things they're telling us are important to them and will make their PCs work the way they want them to—things like enhanced reliability, responsiveness, and faster boot and shut-down. We're also trying to make their everyday tasks easier, like connecting and syncing devices, browsing the web, and managing a home network.

Of course, we're also working on new capabilities, so people will be able to do things with Windows 7 that were difficult (or perhaps impossible) to do with PCs before. Finally, we're working hard to ensure that Windows 7 will run on any PC and work with any program that works today with Windows Vista, so upgrading from Windows Vista will be easy.

Check it out at: Windows 7

A digital dark age?

That's what Jerome P. McDonough seems to think.

What stands a better chance of surviving 50 years from now, a framed photograph or a 10-megabyte digital photo file on your computer's hard drive?
The framed photograph will inevitably fade and yellow over time, but the digital photo file may be unreadable to future computers – an unintended consequence of our rapidly digitizing world that may ultimately lead to a "digital dark age,"

It's certainly an interesting topic, but I just can't see it happening. Backwards compatibility has been a fairly common thing. Plus you get a lot of people that don't always upgrade and switch so fast, so someone down the road will likely be able to use the obsolete data just fine.

Via - PhsyOrg

Notebook Shipments Surpass Desktops in the U.S. Market for the First Time

According to the IDC. Not all that surprising. It was bound to happen eventually.

The third quarter of 2008 (3Q08) saw notebook shipments into the U.S. market surpass 50% share, topping quarterly desktop PC shipments for the first time in the history of the industry. The share of notebooks shipped in the U.S. in 3Q08 stood at a solid 55.2%, according to preliminary figures from IDC's U.S. Quarterly PC Tracker.

I finally purchased my first laptop this quarter too. It's quite nice. ;)

Via - BusinessWire

Ubuntu 8.10 Released

Canonical has announced the availability of Ubuntu 8.10, aka Intrepid Ibex. I haven't yet tried it out, but I will probably download it later to check it out. I'm no linux-freak/guru, but I do enjoy checking them out.

I like the fact that I can now install with my USB stick.

The latest Ubuntu release brings the best of open source together on a platform that with 18 months free updates. With hundreds of improvements and the addition of full 3G support, more and more users are assessing why Ubuntu wins more and more converts with every release.

To learn more about the new features: Ubuntu 8.10 and download here

Windows 7 Taskbar Demo

Looking pretty good. :)

Blu-ray is dead

So says ZDNet. I think a lot of good points are made. Although I personally think digital distribution will take hold in a few years as studios open up to it and internet providers keep upping the speeds they offer.

Blu-ray is in a death spiral. 12 months from now Blu-ray will be a videophile niche, not a mass market product.

With only a 4% share of US movie disc sales and HD download capability arriving, the Blu-ray disc Association (BDA) is still smoking dope. Even $150 Blu-ray players won’t save it.

Via - ZDNet

15 Technologies That Will Change Everything

Well, the folks over at PC World have compiled a list of the 15 newest tech that will change things in the future.

Memristor circuits lead to ultrasmall PCs. Intel and AMD unleash massively multicore CPUs. Samsung TVs respond to your every gesture. These and other developing technologies will fundamentally change the way you think about--and use--technology.

Via - PC World

Jack Thompson Disbarred...

What a shame......NOT. I honestly haven't heard any Jack Thompson crap lately, but this still puts a smile on my face.

http://kotaku.com/5070145/jack-thompson-now-officially-disbarred

Web Workflow Software

Before I did freelance web design, I worked in a small studio for about a year, but I couldn't believe what I learned in that year.  I found that getting settled in with the programs you need to use to complete the tasks at hand was vital to work flow efficiency.  Up and coming web designers starting a business or just looking to get some practice under their belt don't have a lot of money, so here's a list and brief review on the best (and mostly free*) programs I've found and use.  

* when I say free, I mean free. no nag screens, limited uses or crippled programs :)

Web Hosting

You'll need a place to put files (HTML, CSS, Images,...)  online so that they can be publically viewed.  I've had experiences with quite a few web hosting sites and the best one I've found (especially for the price) is 1&1.  The best deal for a basic web server is the $4.99/month deal found under their Shared Hosting Packages.  You get seemingly unlimited space and monthly transfer volume as well as tons of features that some web hosts charge extra for.   I have yet to be disappointed or wish it had something it didn't.  I took a screenshot of the control panel to show how uncluttered and intuitive it is.

FTP Client

CoreFTP LE (Lite Edition) - I've tried Filezilla, SmartFTP, and CuteFTP, but they all had flaws or bugs.  CoreFTP was the last one I tried and there's a reason I haven't tried any others ;).  It's got a very simple interface that I picked up on pretty quick.  The best way to explain it is it "just works".  Some of the others (I'm looking right at you SmartFTP) add so much stuff to the interface and feature list that it takes away from the basic usage of the program.  CoreFTP sticks to the basics and makes them as quick as possible.  A neat thing it does that, surprisingly most of the others don't do, is upload entire folders.  Maybe it's just a setting with the others, but I would think they should do it automatically.

Download: http://www.coreftp.com/download.html

HTML Editor

PSPad - At the studio I worked at, I used Macromedia Homesite 5.  It's been around awhile and long been replaced by Dreamweaver.  I loved its simplicity in focusing on one thing, editing live code.  I found PSPAD and it is almost identical to Homesite.  When I first tried it out, I was so happy when I first loaded it up.  It has tons of helpful, thoughtful features.  I will concede that there's so much stuff in this program, it will take you a bit to find some of the more specific things, but it leaves all the basic stuff right in front of you.  It's the best free alternative to the expensive web designer's crutch called Dreamweaver.  

Download: http://www.pspad.com/en/download.php

Graphics Editing

I personally use Photoshop CS3, which clearly isn't free, so I'll make another recommendation, but not much beyond that.  lol.  GIMP is the ever popular free graphics editing software.  I've used it briefly and it's certainly a switch from PS, but works well with good results.

Download: http://www.gimp.org/downloads/

Web Browsers

You'll need all the major browsers to check your pages and make sure they all look the same so here's a list and link to all the major ones...

Microsoft IE7: Download (bottom left select box)

Mozilla Firefox: Download

Opera: Download

Google Chrome: Download (recommended for initial layout)

Apple Safari: Download

That about it for this topic.  If I forgot something, which I almost undoubtedly did, leave a comment!  Hopefully this helps out people that want to get setup properly on a budget :)  If this gets good response, I'll write up another article to help up the aspiring web design or photographer.

Gmail adds emoticons!

I'm a sucker for emoticons. Sometimes it's just hard to get a point across in just plain old text and a little smiley helps to show your intentions. Helps to alleviate some misunderstandings at times.

Anyway, the black and white days of text-based emails have had their day. Following the evolutionary path blazed by colored labels, we present, in all their technicolor glory, emoticons in your mail.

Now if only they'd add some to Blogger. ;)

Via - Official Gmail Blog

Intel Shows off New Laptop Cooling

Intel wants to use the laminar concept used on jet engines to cool laptops in the future. I think this sounds like an awesome idea. Even my little Acer netbook gets a bit warm after awhile.

A computer that sits comfortably, coolly on your lap. The world's largest chipmaker expects a crush of ultrathin laptops from PC makers in 2009 and unveiled cooling technology this week to make sure these svelte air-flow constrained designs stay cool.

Via - CNET

Good Old Games Goes Public

Good Old Games has opened their digital distribution to the general public.

GOG.com will be offering many of the classic PC games DRM-free for low prices ranging from $5.99-9.99.

“The success of the Early Access Beta showed us that there is huge demand for DRM-free classic PC games, and it helped us to prepare the site for the public launch. We are endlessly grateful to the users for their support and assistance,” said Adam Oldakowski, Managing Director of GOG.com. Don't wait, create your GOG.com account and dive into the world of classic PC gaming.

Via - Good Old Games

Amazon Moves to Digital Distribution

Not only is Amazon moving into digital distribution, they have also acquired casual game maker Reflexive.

The move will bring "a huge new group of customers into play," the CEO claimed, with the company pledging its intent to "provide the best distribution platform anywhere, and to continue working openly with all the participants of the casual games space."

Via - Shacknews

Far Cry 2 Review Round-Up

Ubisofts anticipated sequel to Cryteks original sandbox shooter Far Cry has just been released and so far the reviews are quite positive.

I've actually been looking forward to Far Cry 2 and will be picking it up sometime in the near future.

Here's what a some reviewers had to say:

"After playing Far Cry 2, I'm simply unable to go back to straight and simple first-person shooters. This game has executed my expectations. Would you, could you, go back to games with similar gunfights as this, but along a more rigid axis? I think your own expectations are going to rise dramatically. And I think you really should play this game."
- PC Gamer UK

"Ubisoft Montreal has done some great things with Far Cry 2; the product of putting a gigantic development staff and what must have been a gargantuan budget behind developing a new kind of first-person shooter on a new engine. The formula still needs work in terms of enemy AI, quest structure, and giving the player more to do to fill in all that open space, but as it is, it's still a standout achievement. More importantly, it has nowhere near as many bugs as something like S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl, a title that bears many similarities. Add to the roughly 25 hour single-player campaign a remarkably easy-to- use map creation tool and a full multiplayer suite, and you've got one of the most complete overall gaming packages of the year, as well as one of the most ambitious."
- IGN

"Overall, Far Cry 2 is a game in which you can quite literally get lost for hours at a time. But that feeling of exploration is precisely what makes the game so much fun; your creativity never feels stifled when approaching a mission, and the game's overall structure of side tasks, friends, rewards, and upgrades is a diverse ecosystem rivaling the landscape itself. No matter whether you're a PC fan whose played through the similarly structured Crysis or a console owner new to the world of open-ended first-person shooters, you won't be disappointed by Far Cry 2."
- Gamespot

"Far Cry 2 can make you excited and happy, but it won’t ever leave you scared or crying. It just lacks that last inch of emotional impact or philosophical pretension to take it from a truly fantastic game to an inspiring piece of craftsmanship...We mark out of ten, and ten is a score reserved for games that go that extra mile and do something to move the genre as whole forward. Far Cry 2 just misses that target, but it should still definitely be on your ‘Must Buy’ list."
- Bit-Tech

Also of note, Guru3D has Graphics Performance review that you should check out to make sure your rig can handle Far Cry 2.

" Pretty much any 'somewhat' modern PC will allow you to play the game, even with high image quality settings enabled."

To finish things off, if you need to upgrade and want Far Cry 2, XFX is bundling the game with their 9 series cards and EVGA and BFG with their 200 series.

E3 back to the good old days

Our prayers have been answered, fellow gamers.  After going into its business-geared stage for the last two years, Electronics Entertainment Expo is going back to the flambouyant, megasized gaming expo we all came to know and love...........with a catch.  The public still isn't allowed.  There was a bit of speculation around whether the public could attend the early June '09 gathering, but according to this Gizmodo article, it sounds like it won't be this time around.  

While that's a bit saddening for the hopeful would-be attendees, atleast we can count on seeing a more exciting company turnout, booth babes and and the wonderful explosion of anouncements from the gaming industry.  

"The video game business will be twice as big in 2009 as it was in 2006 when we had the last real E3 Expo - so get ready for some fireworks!" said Laurent Detoc, president of Ubisoft North America.

Sounds pretty good to me!  It is still a ways off (June 2-4, 2009), but I'll certainly be paying attention once it comes around.

Awesome! Gmail Canned Responses

Now I don't use my Gmail much for back and forth communications with a bunch of people, but this is certainly a great feature for the lazy among us.

If you're sick of typing out the same reply every time someone emails you with a common question, now you can compose your reply once and save the message text with the "Canned responses" button. Later, you can open that same message and send it again and again.

Via - Official Gmail Blog

Wii with a HDD

Now why couldn't this be available from the get go? I'm sure lots of Wii owners would certainly welcome this feature. Thankfully for the employees at Nintendos World Store, they don't have to worry about swapping in and out game discs now.

I wish my Wii had a hard drive.



From - GoNintendo

Alan Wakes Up

And releases a new trailer! Today Remedy and Microsoft have released a new cinematic trailer for the highly anticipated title Alan Wake. Hopefully things have been smoothed out. ;)

Alan Wake 'Cinematic' trailer HD

New screens also available at http://www.alanwake.com/

AMD planning netbook products?

I hope this news from Fud is true. Certainly wouldn't surprise me to see AMD eventually make the leap into the market. The new netbook craze has certainly made a big splash on the notebook market and another competitor is more than welcome. Still waiting to see some VIA Nano products as well.

A netbook version of AMD's 780G chipset coupled with a low power CPU would make for a great product if you ask me.

Android Open-Sourced

Now I am by no means a phone aficionado, I'll leave that to Zach, but this is some interesting news. With this news and the appeal that Android has, one day down the road I could see myself using an Android device in the future. I'm curious to see what will come from this open-sourcery.

Android is the first free, open source, and fully customizable mobile platform. Android offers a full stack: an operating system, middleware, and key mobile applications. It also contains a rich set of APIs that allows third-party developers to develop great applications.

News and source code at the Android Open Source Project

Awesome flash game

I came across what must be the highest quality flash game I've ever played.  It's called Robokill and is made by Rock Solid Arcade.  Robokill is fantastically in-depth with levels, inventory, items and money like an RPG, but the gameplay is as simple as aim with the mouse, click to fire, and WASD to move around.  Not to mention it looks fantastic.  I played for a good 2 hours or so on the first "episode", of which there are three, but it'll cost you $9.95.  

Here's the link.  Have fun!!  http://www.rocksolidarcade.com/games/robokill/

Age of Chivalry mod

I'm really glad that Steam is now open to mods, without it I might not have gotten around to trying out the HL2 mod Age of Chivalry. I recall reading about the mod before, but with the advent of mods on Steam I finally gave it a whirl.

Age of Chivalry, I think, is a fun mod that is certainly different than what is typically out there. There is this enjoyment you get when you hack off someones head or land an arrow into someones skull that you just don't get from your typical shoot'em up FPS.


Age of Chivlary Cinematic Trailer

I would recommend that people should give it a shot. So go ahead and get it through Steam and to learn more about the mod to visit the website: Age of Chivalry

Acer Aspire One

So I finally picked up something I've been craving for a while now, as Zach can atest too, my first netbook. In all honesty, the first laptop I've ever owned too. Win-win I'd say.

Grabbed the Acer Aspire One. Managed to pick the last one in stock at the local Wal-Mart this this past weekend. Quite happy with the purchase.

Just a heads up to a more detailed write up on it in the coming week or two.

Google Android powered T-Mobile G1 Gizmodo Review

So a pretty good review popped up on Gizmodo about the new T-Mobile G1.  Obviously the big deal with this phone is Google's Android operating system running it.  I have an HTC Kaiser/Tytn II(AT&T Tilt) and I cannot wait for a cooked rom to come out for Android and not just a program running over windows.  This review serves as a nice introduction into Android from a real-world perspective.  Anyway, here's the link...  w00t

Some Useful Web Designer Goodies!!

Excellent Quick HTML Reference

I do freelance web design and I'm sure I'm not the only one that has trouble remembering the little things.  I always forget exactly what to put in the header :P  I did a quick search and found this awfully nice HTML reference sheet ingeniously laid out too.

http://www.htmlgoodies.com/beyond/reference/article.php/3472851

Bookmarked :)

Free and Easy to use PHP Login script

I've been on a quest to find a simple, effective login script to password protect a single backend webpage.  My quest ended at Sava's Place.  At the bottom of the scripts page, you'll find "Sava's Password Protect Script".  It's really easy to use, incredibly effective (I tried cracking it using regular methods and couldn't), and simple. 

To use:

1. Download the script here: http://savasplace.com/redirect.php?fileid=3

2. Unzip the file and find password.php

3. Upload password.php into the directory containing the page you want to protect.

4. In your web browser, put in www.yourdomain.com/folder/password.php?code

5. It will then give you a single line to put at the top of specific pages you want password protected.

Enjoy!

New Mechwarrior??

A thread on [H]ardForum caught my attention about a mechwarrior crysis mod.  It's called Mechwarrior: Living Legends and it's a complete conversion mod :).  I loved mechwarrior 1 and 2 and I'm hoping this recaptures that sort of fighting style.  Here's the website where you can get updates and info about it: www.mechlivinglegends.net

While its still in the pre-alpha stages, they put out a decent video:

Looks pretty cool and can't wait for some mech action :)

EDIT:  Thanks to nano for the heads up, here's a video they released not too long ago showing a couple mechs in action :D

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. + Oblivion Lost Mod 2.2 = :D

I remember before Stalker came out and it had a lot of hype around the whole concept of an open world FPS. Needless to say I was incredibly intriguied and got it the first day I could. Upon installing though, I was initially disappointed with my 6800GT I had at the time cause I had to really turn the graphics down.

Didn't put me off completely and I started playing. I enjoyed it ever now and then, but there were tons of things that really killed the atmosphere. Accuracy of the guns, retarded/hacker-like AI, horrid performance in some areas, and the overall "quality" of the game. I stopped playing probably half way through.

Eventually I got the 8800GTS 640mb version so I hoped that it would fix the performance problem. Nope......still ran like crap in certain areas. So I put the game away for who knows how long. I was browsing [H]ardForum and came across this guy raving about this mod for stalker, so I thought why not and installed it one last time with the official 1.0005 patch.

Pros

WHAT A DIFFERENCE!!!! The guns work at a distance! Which they need to because the AI will tear you a new one in close quarters. The idea of the mod was to bring back some of the features in the original concept that THQ cut out to save time. That means there's cars you can actually drive around :). They added quite a few new guns and updated the sounds of most of the original guns the game came with. I think the balance is really what stood out most. They really went through and tweaked every little aspect of the game to make it more enjoyable. That's just to name a few noticable things, but there's is a huge list of changes (found in the download links) that I won't go into detail about, but it really adds up to a more complete game.

Cons

There are some cons with the mod I didn't experience with a vanilla install of the game. First, it's crashed two or three times on me for some reason. Not sure if this is the mod, or something else going on with my computer. Second, it's a rough start to the game.

Medical supplies are very limited and this mod makes things more realistic so when you get shot, you bleed everytime. When your health gets too low, you can only walk and you sway back and forth from loss of blood. I'm all for realism, but it just gets frustrating in the beginning. Everything levels out after about an hour or two of playing.

Installing

So if you gave up on stalker and didn't get through the whole game, re-install the game and follow these links...

First, install the 1.0005 patch. Download here: http://files.filefront.com/STALKER+v10005+Patch+US/;9029415;/fileinfo.html

Here is a link for the Mod itself: http://stalker.filefront.com/file/Oblivion_Lost_22_for_1005;93039

There's steps included in the mod on how to install it, but here's a quick run down:

1. After you patch the game, go into C:\Program Files\THQ\S.T.A.L.K.E.R. - Shadow of Chernobyl and find "fsgame.ltx".

2. Open it with notepad and make the $game_data$ read like this......

$game_data$ = true true $fs_root$ gamedata\

3. Copy the "gamedata" folder found in the mod folder straight into "C:\Program Files\THQ\S.T.A.L.K.E.R. - Shadow of Chernobyl"

4. Start the game, create a new game (required) and enjoy!

I'm really glad I found this mod because I knew Stalker had TONS of potential and while this mod doesn't perfect everything, it makes it incredibly immersive and far more enjoyable by removing those fun killing quirks that gave Stalker its reputation.

*** UPADTED *** So I finished the game!! (kinda) I must've missed over this when I was reading the list of features for the mod, but it takes out the final cutscene.....meaning there's no end to the game. THERE IS NO ENDING WITH THIS MOD. I ran around for HOURS looking for somewhere to go, but ended up just going in circles.

"The game is open-ended, so you can forget about the "Game Over". There is no
final movie, the end of the storyline has been changed, because in this mod the
Zone doesn't come to its end, there is no green around you, Marked One now know
he is Strelok, and he still wants be stalker, and he goes back from the NPP and
continues his businesses."

Just a heads up.