“Free antispy tool for Windows 10”
Version 1.6.1399 – released October 4, 2018
Download | Changelog
Cool Tools
Wednesday Random Stuff…
I’ve got Win10 1809 running on 3 machines. Although I have a few minor errors in the logs I’ve no issues yet.
Firefox 62.0.3
Download (all) | Download 32-bit EN-US | Download 64-bit EN-US
Release Notes
Thanks Scott!
Winaero Tweaker for Windows 10 version 1809
A few fixes and several new features
Download & Info
Intel Graphics Driver for Windows 10
Version: 25.20.100.6323 Date: 10/1/2018
Highlights
Windows 10 October 2018 Update Launch Driver
HDR for embedded laptop panels Launch Driver
Download
Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:
‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi’ Negative Buzz Amplified by Russian Trolls, Study Finds
“finds evidence of deliberate, organized political influence measures disguised as fan arguments…Overall, 50.9% of those tweeting negatively [about the movie] was likely politically motivated or not even human”
How Likely Are You To Have a Deer Collision?
“West Virginia continues to top the list of states where an individual driver is most likely to run into a deer. Some good news for West Virginian’s though, this year while West Virginia continues to be No. 1 on the top 10 list, the likelihood of having an insurance claim involving a deer was 1 in 46 — down three points from last year.
Montana (one in 57 chance of a crash), Pennsylvania (one in 63 chance of a crash), and Wisconsin also remain at the top of list. Rounding out the top 10 states where drivers are most likely to collide with large animals like deer, elk, moose or caribou are Iowa, South Dakota, Minnesota, Michigan, Wyoming, and Mississippi. The months drivers are most likely to collide with a large animal in the U.S. are (in order) November, October, and December.”
Interactive map there too.
1-in-3 pass ‘US Citizenship test,’ just 19% for Americans 45 and younger
“Among the embarrassing errors uncovered in the survey of questions taken from the U.S. Citizenship Test and conducted by Lincoln Park Stragtegies:
72 percent of respondents either incorrectly identified or were unsure of which states were part of the 13 original states.
24 percent could correctly identify one thing Benjamin Franklin was famous for, with 37 percent believing he invented the lightbulb.
12 percent incorrectly thought WWII General Dwight Eisenhower led troops in the Civil War.
2 percent said the Cold War was caused by climate change.”
Perhaps it is time to require you pass this test before being allowed to vote?
Try for yourself. Took me less than 2 minutes.
USCIS – Civics Practice Test
Washington Times – US Citizenship Test – Could You Pass?
CNN – Can YOU pass the U.S. citizenship test? Take this quiz
Wednesday Morning Random Stuff…
Chrome 69 Desktop & Android Released
“The Chrome team is delighted to announce the promotion of Chrome 69 to the stable channel for Windows, Mac and Linux”
Download | Download standalone(full) | Download standalone 64-bit Windows version(full)
“Chrome for Android 69 (69.0.3497.76) has been released and will be available on Google Play over the course of the next few weeks.”
Download
Firefox 62 Is Out
Download (all) | Download 32-bit EN-US | Download 64-bit EN-US
Release Notes
Other Software Updates
AS SSD Benchmark 2.0.6821.41776
HWiNFO 5.88 (I use portable version)
Wise Disk Cleaner 9.7.6 (I use portable version)
Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:
The military secret to falling asleep in two minutes
“The technique is said to work for 96 per cent of people after six weeks of practice.”
Hmmmm, I dunno…
Hero siblings lift overturned SUV from roadside ditch, save couple and baby
“I saw that water was seeping into the car, where it was turned upside down,” Allen said. “We tried to break the windows, but that didn’t work. So the only thing I could think of was to flip the car over. So I told my sister to help me so we could flip it over to its side. So what happened is after we flipped it over to the side, I took my shirt off and wrapped it around my fist and I used my fist to break the windshield off.”
Well done!
Thursday Random Stuff…
CCleaner 5.46
Download (I use the portable version) | Release Announcment
I keep getting questions so…
Yes, I still use CCleaner. Yes, I still recommend CCleaner. But, though many seem not to listen, I keep telling folks NOT TO INSTALL IT. It doesn’t need to be installed and all the issues that have come up have been from the installed versions.
Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:
Google makes it easier for veterans to find jobs, as well as businesses led by other service members
“The first new initiative, through Grow with Google, adds new features to a search for “jobs for veterans.” Enter your military code (MOS, AFSC, NEC, etc.) and Google will surface results for civilian job listings that require a similar skill set. Partnerships with other companies will also make this possible on services that use Google’s Cloud Talent Solution, such as FedEx Careers, Encompass Health Careers, Siemens Careers, and more.”
Yahoo and AOL scan your inbox for advertising purposes
Google and Microsoft claim they don’t.
Logged off: meet the teens who refuse to use social media
“It is widely believed that young people are hopelessly devoted to social media. Teenagers, according to this stereotype, tweet, gram, Snap and scroll. But for every young person hunched over a screen, there are others for whom social media no longer holds such an allure. These teens are turning their backs on the technology – and there are more of them than you might think.”
Outstanding!
Which Social Media Site Is Tops Among Teens? Not Facebook
“This group favors another social channel above all others — Snapchat.”
I’m a little confused by the term “social media”. I take it to mean sites like Facebook and Twitter. Sites like Instagram and Snapchat are listed as “social media” but I just don’t see the resemblance. Am I wrong?
Dairy and meat ‘beneficial for heart health and longevity’
This Man Had to Have His Arm Amputated After Eating Raw Seafood
Warning, nasty pic there. I rarely eat sushi but I love me some raw oysters. I try to stick to the “months with R” advice.
Days you’re most likely to get a ticket.
“According to our figures, ticket volume spiked significantly toward the end of the month: The 28th, 29th, 30th, and 31st were all among the top five days for tickets.”
If you ask you local and state police they swear up and down there are not any ticket quotas. This article shows that to be Bravo Sierra.
Master of Marketing
New web site, a watch line, and now Blackened American Whiskey.
Master of puppets, I’m pulling your strings
Twisting your mind and smashing your dreams
Blinded by me, you can’t see a thing
Just call my name ’cause I’ll hear you scream
Master, master!
Just call my name ’cause I’ll hear you scream
Master, master!
Viking Cruises bans children, says clients want kid-free vacations
Warner Bros’ Wile E. Coyote Movie Finds Its Scribes In The Silberman Brothers
“Road Runner’s nemesis, Wile E. Coyote a.k.a. ‘Super Genius’, is getting his own big screen feature and Deadline has learned that Jon and Josh Silberman, the supervising producers behind CBS’ Living Biblically have been hired to write Coyote Vs. Acme.”
I always wanted the coyote to catch and barbecue the road runner. When I was younger had this patch on my snowmobile suit and the sticker on my snowmobile:
Friday Random Stuff…
Battle Royal
Who ya got? Poll up in the right sidebar. Polls not working correctly.
Intel wants PCs to be more than just ‘personal computers’
vs
Eric wants PCs to be just ‘personal computers’
Wise Disk Cleaner Updated
Version 9.7.5.692 brings “improvements” and “fixes”.
Download ( I use the portable version. )
openSUSE 15
Forgot to mention this. Leap 15 was released last week. It use kernel 4.12 released last July. Current LTS in 4.14+. Current Stable is 4.16+.
I don’t get it. Fail.
Off Topic
“We live for the One, we die for the One”
Wikipedia | IMDB
Babylon 5 is one of my all time favorite Sci-Fi series. It is finally available for streaming. (I’ve got the DVD set)
Babylon 5 on Amazon Prime
Babylon 5 DVD Babylon 5: The Complete Collection Series
This poster is on my wall.
Stuff I Bookmarked:
A newspaper columnist’s rant against cheeseburgers gives hamburger loyalists the hero they deserve
Heroes don’t always wear capes.
Facebook, Amazon, and hundreds of companies post targeted job ads that screen out older workers
IMHO this practice is widespread and along with being illegal is short-sighted and disgusting.
Countries With the Widest Gaps Between Rich and Poor
The U.S. is #9 and that is sad.
Scientists race to find who is pumping an incredibly dangerous gas into the atmosphere
China. There, I solved it for you.
AI better than dermatologists at detecting skin cancer, study finds
“At first look, dermatologists correctly detected an average of 87 percent of melanomas, and accurately identified an average of 73 percent of lesions that were not malignant. Conversely, the CNN correctly detected 95 percent of melanomas.”
Interesting but isn’t that why they send it out for a biopsy?
Question Club: Where should Star Wars go after Solo’s box office disappointment?
Disappointment to who? Its opening weekend was a holiday weekend and most sane people hate the movie theater. PPV and DVD by this fall at a fraction of the price to take your family to the theater.
CCleaner…
This past 24 hours has seen a wave of fake news and hysteria over CCleaner supposed snooping.
As far as I can tell there is no new data collection. They have introduced a new privacy options section.
From a forum post:
Your privacy is very important to us and we commit to ensuring the continued confidentiality and security of all data we collect and process. We also require that any and all parties which have access to our data adhere to strict security standards and best industry practices. This protects your privacy, whether you are an EU resident or not.
As part of this commitment, we’ve updated our Privacy Policy and added a new ‘Privacy’ tab into our software. If you’re a CCleaner user, in this tab you can adjust your privacy settings. Privacy settings are unavailable for Free users as we do not collect any personal identifiable information, so Free users are essentially anonymous.
Tuesday Morning Random Stuff…
The Future Of Cortana?
Microsoft bought an AI company. The only bright side to this is maybe in the future we can get our robot overlords to BSOD.
Speccy 1.32
Hardware info tool. Freeware.
Detection
Improved SSD detection for newer SSD devices
Improved SSD detection for laptops
Settings & Preferences
Added new Privacy menu
Download (I use the portable version)
VMware Workstation Player Updated
VMware Workstation 14 Player Version 14.1.2 is a free upgrade for all VMware Workstation 14 Player users.
Windows 10 2018 Spring Creators Update (Version 1803) as host and guest
Ubuntu 18.04 support as host and guest
VMware Workstation 14 Player Version 14.1.2 also contains bug fixes, security updates and performance improvements.
Download
Off Topic
Banned From Amazon: The Shoppers Who Make Too Many Returns
Thursday Random Stuff…
Start10 Updated
Start10 is a Windows 10 start menu alternative. It is $5 and is my preferred start menu replacement.
Start10 v1.60
– Updated for Windows 1803 to fix searching in start menu
– Added new blur option for Windows 1803 (on by default)
– Links to the Games and Homegroup folders on Windows 1803 will not work(Microsoft deprecated those locations)
Download | Changelog
Off Topic
‘Solo’ is the worst ‘Star Wars’ movie since ‘Attack of the Clones,’ according to critics
“You will find only what you bring in.” – Yoda
Android Scan To PDF
I needed a way to scan contracts to my phone. Google search brought up several options, Adobe, Camscan, and others. They either wanted yet another account for decent options or wanted you to buy a premium version. Turns out the best option for me was right there all along.
Google Drive has scan to PDF built in. I didn’t know so I thought I would share.
Scan documents with Google Drive (Android)
Scan documents with Google Drive (iPhone) – “You can’t scan documents with Google Drive on iPhone and iPad.” ROTFL
Friday Random Stuff…
Pretty uneventful week IMHO.
Avast: The CCleaner Hack Was TeamViewer’s Fault
“To initiate the CCleaner attack, the threat actors first accessed Piriform’s network on March 11, 2017, four months before Avast acquired the company, using TeamViewer on a developer workstation to infiltrate. They successfully gained access with a single sign-in, which means they knew the login credentials.”
Ryzen Gen 2 Benchmarks
Anandtech did the right thing and applied all the Meltdown and Spectre patches before benchmarking. Keep that in mind when you read other reviews.
“In our benchmarks, we compared the new AMD chips to the more recent Intel chips, but with the Spectre and Meltdown patches applied. It is clear that the patches have had an effect on some of our Intel scores more than the AMD results: combine that with AMD’s generational improvements and for a lot of tests, especially gaming, there is either a neck-and-neck result or AMD pulls a lead in multi-threaded scenarios. For anything that is hard on a single-threaded, such as our FCAT test or Cinebench 1T, Intel wins hands down, and winning the 1T tests is no easy feat, however overall AMD is pushing that performance-per-watt metric ever closer, and offering a competitive product for users that multitask.”
Ya Don’t Say
“Increasingly, it feels like people in our industry, the tech industry, are losing touch with reality.”
Y’all. Everyone else already knows that.
Off Topic
Disgusting
Saw this:
Equilar 100: CEO Pay at the Largest Companies by Revenue
Looked up this:
Forbes: The World’s Highest-Paid Athletes List
Vogue: The Highest-Paid Models Of 2017
I don’t blame the people who get it. I blame the people who pay it and the culture that allows it to happen.
National Record Store Day
Saturday, April 21, 2018 is National Record Store Day.
“Record Store Day was conceived in 2007 at a gathering of independent record store owners and employees as a way to celebrate and spread the word about the unique culture surrounding nearly 1400 independently owned record stores in the US and thousands of similar stores internationally. The first Record Store Day took place on April 19, 2008. Today there are Record Store Day participating stores on every continent except Antarctica.”
Many music artists have special releases for this day. In the past I’ve gotten a few albums and even a Metallica cassette.
This year I am shooting for the Def Leppard – Live at Abbey Road LP. I’ve got emails out but no responses yet…
*edit (April 21, 2018, 11:40(EDT)) – No luck 🙁
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Have A Great Weekend!
Mine will involve one or more of the items below.
