COMPUTERS, THE AGONY AND THE ECSTASY

[Stanley]

Yes, quite right! I didn't recognise the croaking Old Fart who rang me and as soon as I realised it was Steve and he was coming round I barred him! I told him that he ought to be in bed, not working and the last thing I want for Xmas is whatever he has got. Look after yourself Pluggy and give me a shout when you are fit again!

[Tizer]

Oh dear, if Pluggy's too unwell to work or has to be quarantined then the Barlick IT systems will be in disarray!

[Pluggy]

Stanley is pencilled in for Monday Morning. Feeling a bit better today, although I wasn't feeling that bad yesterday, the croak wore off by dinnertime. Its a bit of a sniffle/cough, what the quacks would call a respiratory virus. I'll live.

[Stanley]

Huh! He sounded terrible! Call me early Steve.....

[Tizer]

If he does come, make sure you use a disinfectant wipe on your mouse and keyboard afterwards...when he's gone so as not to offend the poor lad!

[Stanley]

Shortly after the war I remember going to the Savoy on Heaton Moor to see 'Gone with the Wind', a very long film. During the interval the usherettes came round and sprayed everyone with atomisers filled with weak disinfectant. They used to do it just before landing in Australia on the first flights I made....

[Tizer]

During the interval the usherettes came round and sprayed everyone with atomisers filled with weak disinfectant.

This is why you're so healthy and never catch anything Stanley, you were impregnated with disinfectant at an early age. If a polar bear ate your liver it would probably curl up and die!

[Pluggy]

I'm still coughing pretty bad, I'll cry off for tomorrow Stanley, its taking more shaking than I anticipated.....

[Stanley]

Don't know about that Tiz. Only one way to find out....
Plugs, very sensible, get better for Xmas! A lot of these viruses nowadays seem to be recurrent, they retreat and you think you're OK and then Wham! they hit you again. Drink plenty of fluids....

[chinatyke]

Feeling chuffed with myself. I spent yesterday afternoon upgrading my Mac to the latest Mavericks OSX operating system, a free upgrade from Apple for my old OS which was no longer supported. All data and program files were preserved, no need to reload them, although odd programs will not work with the new OSX without themselves being upgraded. It would be like Microsoft offering you free Windows 8 if you had Windows XP.

TIP: Anybody with a Mac with 10.6.8 or later OSX should upgrade now whilst it is being offered free, just go online to the App Store.

Last week I went to our local E-Plaza electronics mall with my friend. He wanted a Windows 7 OS in English to replace one he messed up.The price for a genuine package was 3500rmb, over £350. They had a cheaper version (perhaps Home Edition) at £280 and Windows 8 at the same prices. He bought a DVD at another stall for 15 rmb = £1.50, no doubt a fake. Bill Gates earns all this money and then gives it away to buy condoms for poor people in Woggawogga Land. Is he trying to send a message to the rich or just sticking up 2 fingers?

To have Windows 8 or Mac OSX installed by E-Plaza techies on a bare computer costs 50 renminbi (£5) here, Pluggy wouldn't make much!

[Pluggy]

If you pay me your prices for genuine English Windows I'll put genuine English Windows on a bare machine for zero labour charges. for a little bit more I'll chuck the computer in as well.

Did the fake come with a product key ?. Without it you can download Windows legally for nothing, it won't run for more than 3 days without the product key though, unless its a cracked version. Since most Windows in China is ripped off, it probably is cracked....

[chinatyke]

We were told a key wasn't required so I guess that means it was cracked. It wasn't the 30 days version offered by some vendors.

I agree with you, I was talking to a guy tonight who bought a lap top with pre-installed Windows for less than £200.

[PanBiker]

Way back in the days when I was system building and vending the OEM versions of various flavours of Windoze. Microsoft reckoned that the scale of the problem was the equivalent of every copy that was bought legally being copied 10 times. Some never, others thousands of times. This held good for Widows software and MS application suites.

[Pluggy]

I don't suppose you'd know if it was good enough to take Microsoft updates, the cracked ones usually have updates disabled so they don't download Microsoft's 'spyware' aka "Microsoft Genuine Advantage" . Well, its an advantage to M$, its debatable for everyone else.....

[chinatyke]

Way back in the days when I was system building and vending the OEM versions of various flavours of Windoze. Microsoft reckoned that the scale of the problem was the equivalent of every copy that was bought legally being copied 10 times. Some never, others thousands of times. This held good for Windows software and MS application suites.

Don't get me wrong Ian, I am not advocating the use of pirate software, it is theft even though it is hard to avoid fake stuff when you live here and it is tempting when it is openly on sale. But if Apple can provide an operating system for 20 USD (and Ubuntu for free) then why does Microsoft need to charge such exorbitant prices? Indeed, if there are 10 times as many Windows programs in existence than OEM sold, then Ms should produce uncrackable versions and sell at say 15% of the price. I'm sure the technology already exists to make future releases secure. Or is the genie already out of the bottle? I buy genuine OSX for my Mac and have done so before this latest free upgrade, I don't mind paying 20 dollars but I would object to paying 200 dollars. But the other side of the coin is that Apple hardware is expensive.

[Stanley]

I love the freedom of Ubuntu in that everything is free and legal.
Plus rang me yesterday but we agreed that he was better off staying at home and getting better, he still sounds bunged up. No rush for his services, it will do next year. Not a lot of point in me catching something and him spoiling Xmas! Get well Plugs.....
Just installed another 10mb of upgrades, I don't know what most of them are for but just download them anyway. Seems to work and I have an OS that is up to date.

[PanBiker]

I don't think MS would have lost money if they had sold Windows for a tenner, that gets the box going. Then add the Office suite for say £30 - £50 depending on options. I know all the argument for inflated prices but that approach would have still made money and made piracy less attractive. Never mind, MS has made do at 10% of the potential revenue.

[Pluggy]

The standard argument for Apple vs Microsoft is that Apple are primerily a hardware vendor, and they provide an operating system to make it work. They make their money selling you the box in the first place at maybe 2 or 3 times the price on a similar box from another vendor, so they can afford to give you (or sell at little money) the Operating system. Modern Macs are essentially standard Wintel boxes with a querky bios so that Apple's OS will only run on a real Mac. You can Install Windows or Linux on them exactly as if they were a PC. Microsoft on the other hand don't make so much hardware and they make money by selling you the Operating System and the Applications. You can install Windows on anybodies PC. Canonical (Ubuntu's company) take an open source operating system largely written by volunteers and hobbyists and apply a bit of polish. They don't develop it outright, they just refine it. They make their money from kickbacks from Google's advertising and donatations. They employ about 500 people around the world, its its absolutely nothing in comparison to the number that Apple and Microsoft Employ. To further muddy the waters, Apple actually use lumps of Linux in their own operating system, in return they contribute to Linux by writing bits for it. CUPS (Common Unix Printing System) which is what makes almost all flavours of Linux work with all manner of printers is managed by Apple. They have paid people developing for it, in return they use it in OSX. Such deals in Linux land aren't uncommon. HP and Sun do simialr things in their products.

[Tizer]

Very interesting Pluggy, thanks for that. Always good to know a bit more - lifelong learning and all that!

[Stanley]

I learned a lot from a book, 'The World is Flat' by Thomas Friedman who, in the course of a survey of globalisation related the history of the free software movement. Fascinating stuff and no matter what they say publicly, the software giants owe much to the basic idea behind this collaboration. It has certainly helped me and I am glad to acknowledge it.

[Steven Chorkley]

Hmm.... Rather interesting! I knew Apple used CUPS but didn't realise how heavily they depended on it. What's betting that's what AirPrint is based upon!

I'm currently in love with Microsoft. I always used to be an Apple fan but got rid of my mac sometime in July (don't get me started about Maverics or even iOS 7). I'm at Nelson & Colne and they have a dreamspark premium scheme. As you all know I pirated... Not proud, but again, who is going to pay £350 for a load of 0's and 1's! Now everything running on my computer is genuine. Including my server running Windows Server (£1000 software licence).

Unfourtunatly, we have also been given Visual Studio but this years exam (AS) covers Java so we are forced to use Netbeans

I'm determined to dive head first into Ubuntu... Just haven't had the time or energy!

chinatyke did your friend have a valid licence before he re-installed Windows? If so, you maybe able to find the product key as a sticker on the machine. If you want to activate Windows with the old key, try running Windows Genuine tool from Microsofts website. It will detect that it's fake and will ask you to enter a valid key, you should be fine just entering the old licence.

[chinatyke]

chinatyke did your friend have a valid licence before he re-installed Windows? If so, you maybe able to find the product key as a sticker on the machine. If you want to activate Windows with the old key, try running Windows Genuine tool from Microsofts website. It will detect that it's fake and will ask you to enter a valid key, you should be fine just entering the old licence.

Valid key? In China? You must be joking!

Actually I have genuine Vista Ultimate on my pc but I stick to Mac nowadays.

Thanks for the advice Steven.

[Stanley]

I don't have a key code for my OS. Should I be worried?

[Big Kev]

I don't have a key code for my OS. Should I be worried?

No, you use an open source OS.

[plaques]

Windows 8 on my laptop advises to make a back up of the OS in case of loss. PC World say that it will cost £X to buy a replacement. However, a pal in the trade says that at a push Microsoft will replace it free if you really press them. They don't give a product code on purchase.