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Maybe even that won't get rid of the adware.
It will, if you do it right. That means
1) Don't try to "repair" the installation, format C: and do it really from scratch.
2) Don't install from a "recovery CD" from the hardware vendor, it might have the adware pre-installed. Use an unmodified Microsoft CD. Install from that.

Now you have a clean installation. To make it stay clean (not only from adware), do the following:
3) Before you connect to the internet again, install the latest service pack AND the post-SP4 hotfixes. Here a utility that collects all the updates into an offline update CD is helpful. I use the offline updater from heise, a German IT publishing house.
You can download the current version from http://www.heise.de/ct/projekte/offlineupdate/download/ctupdate50.zip
The UK site of heise has an article in English that explains the system (for an older version, but I think the principle still applies): http://www.heise-online.co.uk/security/Do-it-yourself-Service-Pack--/features/80682
4) It is usually a good idea to use something else than Internet Explorer for surfing ;-)

If you can't read German yet, then maybe it's time to learn. This has always been one of the best computer magazines in print. It's in-depth and hands-on. I built one of their hardware projects once (an SBC). Possibly still have it. http://www.heise.de/ct/

1. GP does not sound psychotic at all

2. I see nothing irrational or excessive at all. The US has deliberately sent the Lucetania into a battle zone in order to enter WWI, disregarded intelligence that could have prevented Pearl Harbor, entered a virtual battle in Tonkin to enter Vietnam, and made up stories on WMD to enter Iraq. In that light an NSA backdoor does not seem more preposterous to me. And there have been news items on this, even from Bruce Schneier.

I think you owe GP an apology for your incorrect accusation.

K I was following with a skeptical eye till you mentioned WOMD. Give it up for once, guys. They've used gas on the Kurds before. They used it during the Persian Gulf war. All we asked was that they show they got rid of it. Not only would they not show they got rid of it, they run around claiming they've got it and their citizens screaming that they're the big bad new military power sent to bring down the evil West. And you have a problem with us doing something about that?

My tolerance for your type is fast waning.
Of all the dictatorial military powers ever to exist in the history of mankind, the US is the teddybear of them all. Yes I know it's a fallacy to say "look how much worse we could be". But I'm saying it anyways-- we could just be Rome or China and run in, kill all their leaders and men and loot their country for our own profit. As it is we're doing quite the opposite, installing power everywhere, spending billions to set up schools and all that, blah blah. Basically what the Europeans didn't do when they pulled out of the African colonies.

So I say to you-- "Boo hoo" Control your citizens and don't offer save haven to terrorists, and we won't do this to you.

1. GP does not sound psychotic at all
2. I see nothing irrational or excessive at all. The US has deliberately sent the Lucetania into a battle zone in order to enter WWI, disregarded intelligence that could have prevented Pearl Harbor, entered a virtual battle in Tonkin to enter Vietnam, and made up stories on WMD to enter Iraq. In that light an NSA backdoor does not seem more preposterous to me. And there have been news items on this, even from Bruce Schneier.

I think you owe GP an apology for your incorrect accusation.

It's the latter: a single API + kernel language for any GPU. Because both NVIDIA and AMD are represented in the contributor list, it actually has a chance of being adopted.

According to heise.de (in German), nVidia says that OpenCL applications will run seamlessly on any gpus with a CUDA-compliant driver. Does anyone know if that applies to the proprietary Linux drivers?

If this really takes off, how long until the hardworking people from the x.264 or VLC or ffmpeg or mplayer projects can write a H.264/AVC decoder that uses the GPU?

http://www.heise.de/ct/schlagseite/03/01/gross.jpg

The screen reads "New device found. Device:A310. Start Auto-Configuration?"

I'd much rather this remain a separately downloadable add-on.

It is designed so that every application has to get the agreement from the user first. He/She may choose to permit access to the accurate or approximate coordinates (or to deny access).

Source: heise.de (german)

Lee Graham Walker, a British citizen, and the German malware programmer Axel Gembe have appeared in a federal court in San Francisco...

I'm guessing yes.

This article also notes that Gembe may have been the HL2 thief, and that he's been on the hook for this DDoS attack since 2006: this was just their (first?) court appearance for it.

I have no particular premonition about how this will all turn out. On the one hand, German courts were taking it easy on him as long as he straightened his life out... on the other, the FBI with its "first successful investigation" into a DDoS may wish to make example of. We'll see.

As someone living in Germany's southern neighbor, I have to say that I haven't found the Germans to be about "freedoms" in our field at all. Have you followed the recent laws where even having a copy of Wireshark installed your laptop is a crime?

Erm... are you sure? http://www.heise.de/software/download/wireshark/35071

heise.de tested IE7, IE8 Beta2, FF3.0.1, FF3.01 with Java+Flash and 12 recommend addons, Opera9.52, Safari3.1.2, Safari4 Developer Preview

> Nope, it's an entirely different company and patent. I'm guessing all the MP3 players already have licenses for the Fraunhofer patent - they usually do.

AFAIK there are multiple beneficiaries of MP3 licensing fees: I highlighted the German Fraunhofer Institute as just one of them.
To which patent are you referring ? I can not see one in the article.

I also just checked http://www.heise-online.co.uk/news/German-Customs-cracks-down-at-IFA--/111434 (English) and http://www.heise.de/newsticker/Zoll-auf-Beschlagnahmetour-Update--/meldung/115126 (German) and they suggest it is MPEG audio/ DVB-T related.

http://www.heise.de/ct/projekte/offlineupdate/download_uk.shtml There's an English version of the site somewhere in there, but I don't have the time to find it at this moment. It's the same batch file though.

Isn't this the same hack which was described in detail in c't #8/2008? Mifare classic, uses Crypto1, a flawed pseudo random number generator and salts which only depend on the power on time, which is under the control of the attacker. Flaws were discovered by slicing the chip and inspecting the layers with a microscope.

All Nvidia G84 and G86s are bad

Does this affect the new 9xxx chips as well? Here is a table (translation) listing which mobile 9x chips are equivalent to which 8x chips. Are they really identical except for the name, or has the thermal problem been fixed?

Those wanting the latest versions of the Android SDK instead of a buggy load of old crap have to sign an NDA that prohibits talking about it, publishing screen shots, or sharing code fragments.

http://www.heise.de/english/newsticker/news/112945
http://osnews.com/thread?323230
http://www.newmobilecomputing.com/comments/20069

Google are a bunch of dollar-hungry corporate arseholes just like Apple and MS, but at least you know where you stand with the latter two, neither of whom are pretending their SDKs are FOSS while behaving in ways that are the antithesis of the openness that's a central tenet of the movement.

and what people are working on (about 5 programmers that I know of are doing VOIP apps -- and Apple already said there'd be no problem putting them up on the store).

So why does T-Mobile forbid free VoIP apps on IPhone?

German article at heise online.

Back in '04 the time to live was (claimed to be) around 20 minutes. I wonder what the time is for an unpatched Vista (the figures in the article are for XP). Heh - I bet '98SE survives forever (nobody would want to exploit that).

Andy

There's a good article about the topic in c't magazine (german) available (for $$$) at http://www.heise.de/kiosk/archiv/ct/03/01/186_Foto-Kopierer

the link is dead because TFA was a premature assumption, it's apparently replaced by this http://www.heise.de/newsticker/Bundesrat-will-heimliche-Online-Durchsuchungen-auf-Terrorabwehr-beschraenken--/meldung/110466 article, stating that it stranded in the Bundesrat of Germany, there's no such thing as a Parliament of Bavaria.

Bavaria's capital is big on using Linux - and what better target could the conservative Bavarian state government find than the liberal city council of the capital?

Try this: http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/110426

It's from yesterday. The story you link to is today's and is talking about the Bundesregierung as opposed to the Staatsregierung Bayern. Roughly speaking, it's the equivalent of Federal and State government in the US.

The article says that the law has no chance of survival - it's pretty clearly in violation of the German constitution, and most Germans take their constitution *very* seriously.

My take is that it's a typical "bargaining play": aim for the moon, and if you fall on the clouds, well, it's still better than the hilltop position that you really wanted. Compare the tactic with the *IAA's lobbying. They ask for outrageous new laws, everyone gets upset and writes to their reps, the law eventually gets watered down, and everyone goes home happy, failing to notice that the *IAA have achieved yet another step along the way to their goal of total control.

The original post has few problems

1. the link does not work - I suppose it was meant to be this:
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/Bundesrat-will-heimliche-Online-Durchsuchungen-auf-Terrorabwehr-beschraenken--/meldung/110466

2. this article says that Bavaria did NOT managed to extend existing proposal on searching, eavesdropping etc, existing proposal is maybe not that nice but it was apparently less harmful politically than the Bavaria's extension.

Besides similar laws (lows?) already exist although not really in such drastic form. OTOH secret services do what it wants anyway - Germans violated its own and other countries' law to get account data of tax criminals. I believe there are countries where even suspicion that evidence was produced illegally or on information received illegally would nullify the whole proceeding. In Germany it apparently is not that important how you get your data as long as you can prosecute whoever you want. I guess each country has its quirks when it comes to powers that the state has.

All shops are in Germany, international sales may be possible, but I'm not sure if the Neorunner will work in GSM 1900 networks (I guess not).

Trisoft: Freerunner,
Pulster,
OpenMoko Neo Freerunner GTA02 EU Version

All links found here (German only, sorry):

Linux-Smartphone Freerunner von Openmoko im Handel

I've been having a similar problem lately, trying to recover data from two old CDs that were stored in a closed case under my bed.

Here's a nice Windows tool helping with recovery of barely readable discs: H2cdimage (first link on the page). I fear it's only available in German, but what it does is read a disc as well as possible. Errors are skipped and not written to the image, but you can run the program again and it will re-try just the defective sectors. You can even move the image and program to another machine and try with a totally different optical drive. Each time h2cdimage will continue where it left off and try to read just the missing sectors.

Great program imho :)

There's really only one question, which date should be the date to run Ctupdate for the final time? Before fire walling off XP or isolating it from the web.

If 4/8/2014 is the end, then should we run ctupdate on 3/8/2014 everyday until 4/8/2014, just in case the servers bog down with others with like ideas?

I shudder to thing about obscure drivers that we don't know about yet. Sort of like breaking things that were not broken. Vista is a pain in the ass just like HD is, it's a painful death of freedom. (my opinion)

heise Security c't Projekte

http://www.vulnerabilityassessment.co.uk/ctupdate.htm

v4.80
http://www.heise.de/ct/projekte/offlineupdate/download/ctupdate480.zip

Maybe one more question, with the economy shot, the switch to HD (add $1000 to $1500 for each mucking device, tv, converter, blue-ray burner, 3CCD equivalent HD camera, etc.), the attack on net neutrality, the destruction of communications and privacy, the investment in adobe, sony, etc. WHY would I want a higher costing machine, running slower, with an OS that won't do what the current one does now?

Even if we didn't do production, if all we did was watch tv on the internet, and work with audio, WHY would we want this extra cost with a crippled and DRM'd OS?

(Okay, that was three questions)

Maybe Microsoft would like to explain that?

Everyone is calling Open Standards these days. the EU has its own competence team called OSOR (see: http://ec.europa.eu/idabc/en/document/6728).
but were is the action ? does anyone see a "bounty" something like that ? What are the products ?

M$ had to pay several $$ fine. Why is the money not supporting a Xorg (see: the State of X11 http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/06/11/0229209) a product that truly every user uses and that gets so little attention. Several other projects are waiting for a leadership.

There are projects that could save the EU Millions, Howto ? see the german foreigen office ( http://www.heise.de/newsticker/Auswaertiges-Amt-spart-im-IT-Bereich-kraeftig-dank-Open-Source--/meldung/85977 )
the EU could offer education for people that want to add linux to there business in Europe, help with simple things like translations for OS projects.

did anyone hear/read about it ? I did not.

According to heise.de (German only, sorry), Toshiba will release a DVD player equipped with a Cell processor that will upscale the DVD content. That article only talks of "DVD" all the time, there's no mention of a new format.

I didn't read TFA, but since heise.de just brought an anouncement that Toshiba is planning to kill Blu-Ray by introducing a normal DVD player with enhanced upscaling... Is this the same thing or are they betting on two horses?

The heise article is here: http://www.heise.de/newsticker/Toshiba-setzt-Kampf-gegen-Blu-ray-Disc-mit-einem-DVD-Player-fort--/meldung/108830

The most recent example of this was when the German Chaos Computer Club published the fingerprints of Wolfgang Schäuble, Germany's Innenminister (sort of like the UK home secretary or the USA's DHS head). They even distributed it as a film with their magazine, since there is no law against publishing fingerprints.

This English-language article at Heise Online gives all of the gory details...

Heise had an article about a new Atom based ITX Board yesterday. I'm quite sure that it is the same board linked here. There was one particulary interesting fact:

The Thermal Design Power (TDP) of the Atom 230 chip is sth. like 4 to 8 watts while the northbridge with the integrated GPU (945GC) uses 22(!) watts.

Heise.de: Mini-ITX-Board mit Intel-Atom-Prozessor aufgetaucht (Sorry, only available in German)

So I think we'll have to wait for a board that uses a mobile chipset ...

Ok, I found something about that issue:
the year 1900 bug has been "resolved" by declaring it non-mandatory...
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/101224
(german)

heise reported this almost 14 months ago
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/87080
(german)

I am too really really sick of what's happening with all this "think of the children" craze. I've been trying to buy some software from EA Store (some booster packs for Battlefield 2 not some hardcore p0rn) and they tell me I need to buy from 23:00 to 06:00 because of some "young protection regulations" (the pack has some logo with "Violence"). What's the danger here? I give them a valid CC, I am (well) over 14/18/21. Are they thinking I'm somehow watched by some teens and they don't want to take any chances?!

Also in Germany at least one ISP (Arcor) has been sued for providing access to porn without proper age verification (read proper GERMAN age verification). Oh and the nice tidbit is that those suing were the German porn "manufacturers".
As a result Arcor has blacklisted some IP ranges (you can imagine how well that went) and afterwards they put in place some "DNS blackhole" (they were returning 127.0.0.1 for youporn.com for example). It seems that currently access to google is under threat (as you guessed you can find porn with google!): http://www.heise.de/english/newsticker/news/100074

Further information published by the US Air Force identifies the US Naval Security Group Station at Sabana Seca, Puerto Rico as a COMSAT interception site. Its mission is "to become the premier satellite communications processing and analysis field station". These and further documents concerning Echelon and COMSAT interception stations at Yakima, Sabana Seco (Puerto Rico), Misawa (Japan) and Guam have been published on the web.[20]

KeeLoq has been cracked recently. The wireless access control system is used in vehicles built by Chrysler, Daewoo, Fiat, General Motors, Honda, Toyota (Lexus), Volvo, Volkswagen and Jaguar. All it takes to get access is to record two messages, which can be done from up to 300 feet away. http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/105772

13) Bill Gates insists for a reconsideration on ms-ooxml to the French standardization body
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/Endspurt-der-ISO-Abstimmung-ueber-Microsofts-OOXML--/meldung/105696

Heise reports that the vote process in Germany was manipulated, too, although on a more obvious level:

link (German only, sorry)

The members of the German institute for norms (DIN) were basically unable to vote "no", only "yes" and "abstain" were allowed.

As by now most spam probably originate from hijacked nodes or dedicated spamming networks, it is questionable whether blocking open relays is an effective tool against spam right now.

On the other hand, the blacklists of the IT magazine iX prove to be very effective: They have a nearly real-time IP blacklist of servers, that sent verified spam during the last 3 days (only), combined with fuzzy text signatures of spam mails, all available via DNS zone ix.dnsbl.manitu.net or downloadable lists (delayed by about 20mins).

Here, even their DNS based blacklist alone blocks most of incoming spam, with an extremely low rate of false positives and complains: They claim to have about one removal request in about 6000 new entries, where the blacklisting usually originated from infections.

Their fuzzy checksum techniques help avoid costly text analysis and is based on simple text manipulation, notably one of their strongest techniques is to fingerprint the distribution of whitespace as layed out in this optimized procmail script.

Spam infrastructure isn't unlimited - but blacklists have to be very large or really fast.

As by now most spam probably originate from hijacked nodes or dedicated spamming networks, it is questionable whether blocking open relays is an effective tool against spam right now.

On the other hand, the blacklists of the IT magazine iX prove to be very effective: They have a nearly real-time IP blacklist of servers, that sent verified spam during the last 3 days (only), combined with fuzzy text signatures of spam mails, all available via DNS zone ix.dnsbl.manitu.net or downloadable lists (delayed by about 20mins).

Here, even their DNS based blacklist alone blocks most of incoming spam, with an extremely low rate of false positives and complains: They claim to have about one removal request in about 6000 new entries, where the blacklisting usually originated from infections.

Their fuzzy checksum techniques help avoid costly text analysis and is based on simple text manipulation, notably one of their strongest techniques is to fingerprint the distribution of whitespace as layed out in this optimized procmail script.

Spam infrastructure isn't unlimited - but blacklists have to be very large or really fast.

As by now most spam probably originate from hijacked nodes or dedicated spamming networks, it is questionable whether blocking open relays is an effective tool against spam right now.

On the other hand, the blacklists of the IT magazine iX prove to be very effective: They have a nearly real-time IP blacklist of servers, that sent verified spam during the last 3 days (only), combined with fuzzy text signatures of spam mails, all available via DNS zone ix.dnsbl.manitu.net or downloadable lists (delayed by about 20mins).

Here, even their DNS based blacklist alone blocks most of incoming spam, with an extremely low rate of false positives and complains: They claim to have about one removal request in about 6000 new entries, where the blacklisting usually originated from infections.

Their fuzzy checksum techniques help avoid costly text analysis and is based on simple text manipulation, notably one of their strongest techniques is to fingerprint the distribution of whitespace as layed out in this optimized procmail script.

Spam infrastructure isn't unlimited - but blacklists have to be very large or really fast.

Once again: The iphone look-a-like was not confiscated, see http://www.heise.de/english/newsticker/news/104591
Law enforcement officials acknowledged that the raids were only for patent violations.

No, actually you got it wrong. It was acknowledged by law enforcement officials that the raid was about patents. From http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/104657:

Auslöser für die Aktion waren den Angaben der Staatsanwaltschaft zufolge Strafanzeigen der Rechteinhaber. Bei der Razzia sei es vorwiegend um Patente für Datenkompressionsverfahren, DVB-Standards und DVDs gegangen, sagte Kriminaloberrat Oliver Stock, der die Aktion koordiniert hatte und sich über einen "erfolgreichen Abschluss" freute.

Bad translation (by me):

According to the public prosecutors office complaints by holders of rights were reason for the action. Law enforcement senior councillor Oliver Stock who coordinated the action and was glad about the "successfull completion" said target of the raid where mainly patents for data compression, DVB standards and DVDs.

There were some initial (wrong) reports that reason for the raid was counterfeiting (iPhone look-a-likes) but these reports were later corrected, see for example http://www.heise.de/english/newsticker/news/104591 (in english).

No, actually you got it wrong. It was acknowledged by law enforcement officials that the raid was about patents. From http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/104657:

Auslöser für die Aktion waren den Angaben der Staatsanwaltschaft zufolge Strafanzeigen der Rechteinhaber. Bei der Razzia sei es vorwiegend um Patente für Datenkompressionsverfahren, DVB-Standards und DVDs gegangen, sagte Kriminaloberrat Oliver Stock, der die Aktion koordiniert hatte und sich über einen "erfolgreichen Abschluss" freute.

Bad translation (by me):

According to the public prosecutors office complaints by holders of rights were reason for the action. Law enforcement senior councillor Oliver Stock who coordinated the action and was glad about the "successfull completion" said target of the raid where mainly patents for data compression, DVB standards and DVDs.

There were some initial (wrong) reports that reason for the raid was counterfeiting (iPhone look-a-likes) but these reports were later corrected, see for example http://www.heise.de/english/newsticker/news/104591 (in english).

"Later today, a representative of Meizu told German press agency dpa that the police had not come by because of the mobile phone, but another of the company's products, a portable MP3 player. There had been "discussions" regarding licenses, she was quoted as saying. According to dpa, Meizu staff opened the stand again and again displayed the smartphone late this afternoon, with the MP3 player missing from display."

This would make iPhones a serios competetor to business phones like Blackberrys et al.