DEP (Data Execution Prevention) is a security feature in Windows that prevents a program from executing code in a memory block that is marked as no-execute. DEP helps stop buffer overflows, which are used by many computer viruses and other security threats to take over your computer. DEP is a good security feature to have, but there are a few times where DEP stops legitimate software from running (most likely due to poor programming or hacks). Windows allows you to create exceptions to DEP, but unfortunately Windows does not allow you to remove the exceptions if you have already uninstalled the program, which just so happened to be exactly what I had done. Fortunately, I have figured out how to remove them without having to reinstall the program.
Tag Archive for 'windows'
If you have Windows Vista, you may as well find some decent sidebar gadgets to replace the rather pathetic ones that Microsoft gave you. Here are a few I use to get you started. If you have any others that you think should have made this list, please add it in the comments.
I recently purchases a Acer Aspire 5100 laptop with Windows Vista Home Premium on it. I wasn’t too thrilled to get Vista because of all of the bad news I have heard about its development. I had actually sworn off of Windows entirely, having uninstalled Windows 2000 and installed Debian Linux on my desktop PC.
Safari, the web browser from Apple, is now available for download here for Windows. The interfaces is slick and it seems to load webpages quickly. It appears to use the KHTML engine for rendering webpages, which apparently has great web standards support. Nice, but unnecessary seeing as how I think it is not as good as Firefox. So the big question is “Why did Apple do it?”
Regnum Online is a free to play MMORPG that is developed in Argentina for Windows and also has an unofficial Linux client. It is somewhat similar to Guild Wars (which unfortunately does not work under Linux). Check it out, as it is one of the best free MMORPGs I have played.
The world is divided into three separate realms (kingdoms) that are at war with each other. The game has both PvE and PvP, many quests, and impressive 3D graphics that are on par with many other commercial MMORPGs. You can choose to be a Human, Elf, Dark Elf, Half-Elf, Morlock, or Utghar. You can be a Warrior, Mage, or Archer, and each one has two subclasses that become available in later levels - Knight, Barbarian, Warlock, Conjurer, Marksman, or Hunter. The game does have a slight commercial side to it as they sell premium content, such as renting horse health and mana regeneration potions, and an experience boosting scroll.
Recently, a friend of mine asked me to look at his karate instructor’s computer. I went over there and the computer was continuously rebooting. It was running Windows 2000 and MSN as their internet provider. He, like most other computer users, did not have a backup of his software or data. He runs his business off of this computer, which has irreplaceable information from the past 10 years and has a program that manages all of his students, training, schedules, and billing. He said he does not have the CD that the program came on anymore as the last person that worked on his computer destroyed it. Microsoft in their infinite wisdom decided to set the computer up to automatically reboot when it encounters a blue screen of death, rather than show the error message and just let the user reboot on their own. I guess even Microsoft hopes that problems will just fix themselves. “No problem,” I thought, “I will just reboot into safe mode, set it to not reboot on errors, fix the problem, and I will be done.” Yeah right…
Continue reading ‘Would You Trust Microsoft With Your Business?’
Is it possible for Linux to win in the fight for desktop users against Microsoft Windows? Is it possible for Microsoft to stay competitive against another operating system that is available for free when it has spent over $6 billion dollars to make Vista?
I recently read yet another article posing the question of what would happen if Microsoft makes Windows available for free (as in price, not open source). I personally think this is a ridiculous question to ask because users already pay for Windows. Price is not the issue. Users also pay for Mac OS X, which is built upon the BSD like Darwin. Linux can be much like OS X using nothing but free, open source software. So why do people pay for an operating system?
I have seen many, many discussions about how Linux is faster than MS Windows, or how Gentoo is faster than Arch is faster than Debian is faster than SUSE. Faster? Will I really notice a few milliseconds? Will my hardware have the same speed boosts as these other people are claiming? Will some things be faster while other things get slower?
The answer is yes/no/maybe. I can definitely say that Debian IS faster than Windows 2000 on the same hardware. I can also extrapolate that since Windows XP is just 2000 with some added features (bloat), that Debian is also faster than Windows XP.
My hard drive crashed and I was again left with the proposition of re-installing Windows. I have used Linux in the past and have dabbled with Debian in virtual machines. I read a great book about Debian called The Debian System written by Martin Krafft which convinced me that Debian was the right Linux distribution for me (where is Ubuntu’s Social Contract?). I highly recommend this book for anyone who is even slightly interested in Debian. After looking at what software I had that was Windows only, I finally decided that I don’t play Half-Life 2 that much and I could live without Dreamweaver. I made the switch.
