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Test Your Anti-Virus July 28, 2009

Posted by Kathy in Internet, Software.
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Have you wondered whether your anti-virus is actually working while its little icon is sitting in your system tray? Did you know you can test it?

EICAR, a European organization involved in virus research, provides a downloadable file which is harmless, but which all major anti-virus software recognizes as a virus for testing purposes.  If your anti-virus program is working, you should receive an alert as soon as the file is downloaded.   (Remember, it’s not a real virus!)

Visit the following link and scroll to the bottom of the page to download the test file, which is available in four versions.  The first and the third (a compressed ZIP file) should suffice.  If your anti-virus product doesn’t react to these files, then your real-time protection isn’t working.  As always, you should keep your software up to date to ensure protection against the latest threats.

Download the EICAR test file

Windows 7: Everything Vista Wasn’t Cracked Up to Be July 22, 2009

Posted by Kathy in Software.
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It’s the Windows that Vista should have been.

I wasn’t a Vista hater like a lot of people, although I hung onto XP for quite a while before I upgraded. Vista was all right, if a bit of a security nag with its User Account Control. Other than that I really didn’t object to it.

But now I’ve been using the Windows 7 Release Candidate for about a month, and there’s a big difference. As a Mac user, I run Windows in virtualization, and Windows 7 seems to run much faster than Vista ever did. Though very much like Vista in appearance, the 7 interface seems greatly simplified.

I particularly like the changes to the Taskbar. If there is any part of Windows that users have been clueless about, it’s this. In Windows 7 the Taskbar now represents running programs with an icon rather than a text button. If you have multiple windows open in one program, the icon has a “stacked” appearance, and clicking on it brings up a list of windows to choose from. By right-clicking you can “pin” an item permanently to the Taskbar, replacing the separate “Quick Launch” section. Thinking about it now, I believe the Taskbar overhaul is one of my favorite features.

Another subtle, but big improvement is the “Shut down” button. In Vista when you clicked the red power button from the Start Menu, you didn’t actually power down necessarily. Now there’s a button that reads simply and honestly, “Shut down.”

And I haven’t encountered any driver or software incompatibilities compared to Vista.

So far (it’s only the release candidate), Windows 7 has been a good experience.  When it’s officially released, I think it will be worth the upgrade from XP for those who were scared of Vista.  I just have one tiny gripe…

What the heck does seven have to do with anything??

Download the Windows 7 Release Candidate