Magic DVD Ripper is a very easy and powerful DVD ripping software, which can convert DVD to VCD, SVCD, AVI(DivX), WMV, MP3, iPod and PSP formats or backup DVD to hard drive without any loss of quality. You can then enjoy them anytime without DVD discs or burn them to blank DVD or CD discs using burning software.

Nice intro and credits. I still miss Patrick but Roger is improving a lot. Hated his "anemic" attitude when covering for Roger or Patrick, seems that is on the past.

Have you heard about Asus Eeepc? Looks promising for a portable solution for a lot of people.

Like Roger said, having the feature where the UPS can safely shutdown the PC is a plus. I p/u a CyberPower 1285AVR recently. It has a LCD display that tells me how much power the PC & monitor are using, the amount of time it can power my system in case of loss of power, etc. The UPS is connected to the PC via USB, there is an option to use serial cable. To test the unit, I unplugged it from the outlet, and the PC went to hibernate mode after 5 min (set by user).

Just wanted to say great episode, you are doing awesome Roger you've taken patrick's spot very well, and I thought the content of this show was just much better than usual...must be the once a week.

-Roger, you don't need to get so mad at yourself every time you pronounce something wrong, it doesn't bother anyone just fix your pronunciation and move on :)

-I keep waiting for an HD version or at least widescreen, please!

This episode seemed more lively than the last one. Great job!!!

I was hoping you guys would cover some beginning level Video Editing Apps for Linux sometime.

About 40 minutes into the show Roger said you can hook up a UPS Keyboard and Mouse to the UMPC's ... So were can I get a UPS Keyboard and Mouse? Are those considered the wireless mice and keyboards so if the computer turns off it still has power from its battery? LOLOLOL (whispers... USB)

Am I missing something here?

[QUOTE]
the passwords for both volumes are keys randomly generated using my password program "Personal Passworder". The passwords have the max number of 63 characters. This program is a password program that I have starting up when the laptop boots. It needs a password to be opened or even opened from the task bar. So, I open my password program. Then I copy and paste the passwords to mount the TrueCrypt volumes. This makes it very secure. On top of this I also have the BIOS password activated (although that is easy to hack). I do not save ANY data on the C: drive whatsoever so if my laptop gets stolen, nothing can be retrieved." [/QUOTE]

So what you're saying is your Truecrypt volumes are only as secure as your first password programs password and not your 63 character Truecrypt passwords? Once you get by the first password it's just copy and paste correct?

The ¨USB flash drives had a limited read/write lifespan¨ thing is not a big deal anymore. Because a single block of the flash memory can now withstand between 1 million to 5 million writes. When you added in the capacity of the drives and the max write speed of the drive. Itś almost impossible to hit the write limit unless something very odd happens.

[drive capacity * write life] / max write speed = lifespan

[32,768MB(32GB) x 1million ] / 80MB/sec =
32,768,000,000MB / 80MB/sec = 409,600,000/sec

409,600,000/sec
6,826,666.666666667/min
113,777.777777778/hour
4,740.740740741/days
12.988330797/years

So it would take about ten years or so before you would start hitting the problem. Lets try a different number for what could be seen for drives in the not so distant future.

[256,000MB(250GB) x 5million ] / 200MB/sec =
1,280,000,000,000MB / 200MB/sec = 6,400,000,000/sec

6,400,000,000/sec
106,666,667/min
1,777,778/hours
74,074/days
203/years

Did you guys release the new openings and endings early? The copyright notice at the end of the show says 2008 when I believe it is still 2007.

---Matthew Hicks

As a CS3 user that was very useful information. I came across this episode and now I learned a new feature for still pcitures in CS3 lol. Panorama pictures is always great, when it comes to those wide views. I'll be testing that out now. :) Oh and Yes soon I will be playing bioshock, when those patches come out though hehe.

Thanks for the link to pixel corps. I've been messing around with the stuff looks like the site will help push me in the right direction.

Ok, Ill admit that Roger annoys me less than before.
I either built up a tolerance to him or he's changed. I was sure I wasnt gonna last past this week and add another Tom Merritt podcast but I still have this raging man-crush on Robert, so I stuck around. For now.

The quality of the shows topics have been actually very good since the balding dude left. Did you hire some new staff? Hell, even the Dvorak gabfest seems to have better topics. Whoever is responsible for both shows topics deserves a hand.

So, is the Jackass/Break.com segment gonna be regular thing because I got a buttload of old computer gear as well as gunpowder left over.
Say the word and were gonna singe a few eyebrows.

Great episode, Roger's doing great, hang in there man.

UMPCs are pretty neat, a few of my friends have them and generally use them in their car as a gps platform and various other small tasks. I've seen a few in EMS and law enforcement but it seems they have the same ideas/feeling as you guys with vertical integration and issues with price so the trend is now towards the tablet pcs and the popular toughbooks.

Its great to see things progressing although when I fire up iTunes, its a total bummer not having dl.tv episode to watch on Tuesdays! But I say we wait and see for what you guys have instore for us!

I'm not sure why esbjorn thinks his single password for his 'passworder' program is any more secure than just using a password for truecrypt. About the only strange hypothetical is that since he isn't actually typing the truecrypt password, that remains safe from things like keyloggers. But his passworder password is still subject to such things and has the additional liability of putting the other passwords into the windows clipboard for all to see.

I personally remember Roger from TechTV and enjoy watching him progress on camera. Keep up the good work guys and I like the information y'all present.

I love my Sony VAIO VGN-UX71 ... when used in it's cradle, I have it hooked up to a standard monitor, mouse and keyboard. The best thing is it's portable. I can take a tiny bag around to a friend's house and have a full blown PC.

I bought it in Japan, so it was actually cheaper than buying a laptop in Australia.

Great show.
Roger was dandy.
I think he hit it on the head at the end "more great content".
I used to do a computer talk show years ago.
Somtimes I would prepare 3 hours of content for every 1 hour of show. These were the shows I was most pleased with.
The hosts can be a lot more confident if they know they have lots of interesting things to talk about.
USB flash drives die. I think it is most likely due to some sort of arcing or stress during a hot plug/unplug.
Lots of people on Newegg forums are complaining about USB flash drive slowness. I read somewhere that flash drives perform much better during sequential rather than random read/writes.
UPS': Steve Gibson says we "know" that a bad hard drive sector is created every time there is a power interuption during a write. I thought that was an interesting statement that deserves some elaboration and investigation.

Hi everyone, I'm being hammered here LOL. I've been on vaca so here's my 5 cents. Yes, I'm copying my password to mount the TC volumes for a brief second but the passworder program cleans the clipboard immediately after its been pasted. Also know that the password program runs on my USB key so anyone who steals the laptop needs to first get through the BIOS password (ok, that's easy), and my OS credentials (that's easy too). Also, I run an utility that ignores any signals from unapproved software and hardware peripherals until I'm done with the TC volume mounts. In addition to this I run Zone Alarm and Privacy Mantra amongst my many tweaks. This makes for a very safe mix.

I'm always interested in better ways of doing this so please suggest additional ideas. Thank you for the feedback.

Cheers