XP Downgrades Till 2020

Wish we had this bit of news to report when we recorded Episode 9 earlier in the day. 


It seems that Microsoft has extended the downgrade period for Windows XP.  Odd thing is its for select versions of Windows 7. Only users of Windows 7 Ultimate and Professional OEM versions are allowed the downgrade. 


Microsoft spokesman Brandon LeBlanc summed up the policy change by stateing, "Our business customers have told us that the removing end-user downgrade rights to Windows XP Professional could be confusing,"


http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9179109/Microsoft_extends_Windows_XP_downgrade_rights_until_2020?taxonomyId=125&pageNumber=2

FireFox and plugin-container.exe

In a past update to FireFox (3.6.4), Mozilla added a program to help isolate Adobe Flash, Apple Quicktime, and Microsoft Silverlight from the main browser in XP and Linux. The program is called plugin-container.exe. Problem is, it has a habit of eating up system resources.

Until recently, this hasn't been the case on my XP system. I am currently on FireFox 3.6.6 and its only now becoming a problem. Whats even worst is it wasn't a issue the night before. Which is causing a major problem when I'm trying to watch Netflix. Once Netflix starts up the program launches and then the system slows to a crawl. To get it back to normal I have to close out FireFox and then go into the system process to close out plugin-container.exe.

Thank you Mozilla for giving me a good reason to switch to Chrome.

Producer Mike

Addition:

Trying other XP PCs using FireFox I am running into other problems. Namely in Netflix, where I can't pause the movie and then start playing it again without Silverlight crashing. This isn't happening when I do it in IE on the same system. So I know its a FireFox issue not Silverlight.

There was also an issue when playing Flash based games. I've had another XP system that FireFox locked up while trying to transition from one Flash game to another or out of a Flash game. So much for the added program isolating these crashes from the browser. Granted the Browser stays open but its locked up forcing me to close it out.

Kin Sees Early Demise

Not even 2 months after the initial release of the Kin phone, Microsoft announced Wednesday that they will be dropping it to focus fully on Windows Phone 7. No reasoning was given for why they are dropping the kin so early. Nor have any sales figures for the phone been released. But anonymous sources told The Wall Street Journal that employees who developed the kin "will be folded into a team working on a forthcoming operating system for cellphones".

Analyst have said that Microsoft has had a tough time selling the Kin phones. The Kin was focused on the younger audience. It focused on text messaging, email and social networking to attract teenage customers.  Problem is teenagers usually don't have their own money to be buying a smart phone. Not to mention the fact that they are too young to enter into a contract with a carrier.

It's often a hard sell when your target audience isn't the one who will be paying for the phone. Sure you can convince them that they've gotta have it. But then they have to go and convince their parents how much they need it. In my opinion, Microsoft fell a bit short on their ad campaign. It just didn't seem like the kind of campaign that could attract the teen audience.

Producer Mike

!!!IT LIVES!!! Verizon iPhone Rumors.

Once again, we get a report saying that Verizon Wireless will be receiving the iPhone. This time around its coming from USA Today. They claim that two people familiar with the plan gave them this information but declined to be named. They did mention that reps from both Apple and Verizon declined to comment; so the rumor is still just a rumor.

These rumors continue to swirl and have been since day one of the original iPhone. But its stories like this, and people like us, who relay the stories that help keep these rumors alive. It seams people want to keep these rumors alive in hopes that Apple will come to their senses and open the iPhone up to other US carriers. At least that is the hope of this author.

Time will tell. But lets keep pushing for an iPhone on Verizon in the next 12 months.

Producer Mike

Japan gets Space Dust

Some time this weekend the Japanese Spacecraft "Falcon" returns to earth. The craft was launched in 2003 on a mission to intercept a near earth asteroid. It met with the asteroid in 2005 and spent a few months on the surface. Japanese officials hope the craft returns with a cubic millimeter of asteroid dust. The craft was designed to hold up to 10 milligrams of material.

The 7 year round trip journey has been fraught with many misshapes. Some of which have left questions as to weather the probe was able to gather any samples at all.

You can find out more here.

Producer Mike

Why Google? Why?

Recently Google has changed there Google.com page to feature a nice big pictures rather then there usual white background with there colorful logo. They have been known for the ever changing and innovative use of there logo in the past. So why have they gown the way of Bing and moved to a plain white logo on a picture background?

Google claims they are trying to make our search experience more relevant, useful and fun through personalization. This all started with iGoogle where you are given options to customize your Google front page experience. This is great for those who enjoy playing around with features. But for myself and many others Google is a very good tool and doesn't need all that. But that was why Google.com and iGoogle.com where separate so those that wanted the extras could have them.

Now everyone that uses the main page will have the photo background. The good news is that it can be changed. You can customize it to use photos from your PC, Picasa account or a public gallery.

So what about the changing logo? Will there be no more seasonal and holiday logo changes? Will we not see another Pac-Man like logo again? It just seams to me that Google is too easily giving up its identity to be like Bing. The sad part is that Bing had to go the way of the big flashy photos to try and pull people away from Google.

You can find out a bit more about the new Google front page and how to change the image by checking out there blog post from last week.
Google Blog: Freeze frame!

Episode 004 Show Notes

In this Episode Zach and Mike cover the announcement of the forth coming iPhone 4 and some of its more note worthy features. They also cover the up coming Farmville app for the iPhone and talk about the new gaming Znga plans to introduce to keep there customers hooked. Also haw Zynga has taken over merchandising in 7 Eleven stores.
http://blog.games.com/2010/06/09/farmville-for-iphone-and-ipod-touch-official-demo/

Zach talks about the way Google has improved there indexing to bring about better search results.
http://www.informationweek.com/news/storage/data_protection/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=225600155&subSection=News

Zach goes on to talk about the architect behind WebOS has left Palm to work for Apple.
http://www.boygeniusreport.com/

Producer Mike then brings up a non tech related story about surfing Crocodiles.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5j71vPb-NrUpOPcyVVA9ANNmT4XHAD9G7EV780

Zach closes out the show discussing the Archos Tablet and the new Western Digital WD HD Box.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16855501044&cm_re=archos_tablet-_-55-501-044-_-Product

http://www.engadget.com/2010/06/09/western-digital-announces-wd-tv-live-plus-hd-with-netflix-stream/

Listen Now:
Episode: 004, Surfing Crocs

Episode 003 show notes

Episode 003 was recorded a day later then usual due to the holiday weekend. Zach gave us a slight review of his Garmin Nuvi 1250.

We went on to discuss some of the recent tech related headlines.
Woman sues Google over bad Directions:

http://www.pcworld.com/article/197752/woman_sues_google_over_bad_directions_update_it_was_dark.html

Department of Justice Investigates Apple:

http://blog.syracuse.com/entertainment/2010/05/us_department_of_justice_investigates_apples_itunes_practices.html

We then covered Our new site where we have these show notes and will post frequent updates. We will also have tech bios of ourselves posted in the next week or 2.

We then went on to discuss our main topic The State of PC Gaming. Zach mentioned a couple of good game trailer he saw.

http://www.swtor.com/media/trailers/deceived-cinematic-trailer

http://www.mafia2game.com/

This led us into discussing the current state of Netflix and gaming rental services similar to Netflix.

We rounded off the show with a discussion of the new AT&T data plans.

http://money.cnn.com/2010/06/02/technology/att_iphone_ipad/

If you have any Comments, Questions or Suggestions then feel free to email us at: ntechduo@gmail.com

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