Belkin has been making defective routers for nearly 11 years now. I can't believe people still buy their products after the 2003 HTTP hijacking fiasco. Did everyone seriously believe them when they said "we won't do it again"?

At least, in the case of Windows, you can forcibly disable this "feature" with registry edits...or you can just block Microsoft IP's at your router. Routers have no way to disable stuff like this other than flashing custom firmware which is not always available depending on model.

I use a custom built mini-ITX Linux machine as a router, running Gentoo.

Star Trek communicators actually have a serious range limit. They do need a relay infrastructure to work beyond short distances, it's just that the ship itself acts as the relay.

Or better yet...turn off Windows Defender and disable the services it needs to run. Yes, Windows will complain at you. But you can forcibly turn off those warnings as well. And if the warnings do pop up and annoy you, you can disable the service that shows the warnings as well. It's my computer, I will do whatever I want to with it, and the OS will let me, or I will modify it until it does.

I have a device that produces ammonia from water and air already. It's called a "cat".

Keep in mind, barring some models like the Galaxy S4 that support both...CDMA phones will not work on GSM networks and vice versa.

That might sound funny today, but at one point before they went under, 3dfx made the Voodoo5 6000. That card did actually require an external power supply that plugged into a wall socket. There were a few of them made, but 3dfx went under before it could be released.

I'm not against the idea of cameras in my house. What I am against the idea of is cameras in my house that are not under my control. Cameras that I have full control of, that I can control access to (and limit to myself), preferably connected to my Linux server (which again only I have access to) - perfectly fine. Cameras that some random third party can access? nope.jpg

From a DS9 episode. [Bashir has suggested to Rom to form a bargaining association to prevent exploitation] Rom: You don't understand. Ferengi workers don't want to stop the exploitation, we want to find a way to become the exploiters.

I converted my entire apartment to CFL approximately 10 years ago. I have moved once since then...when I did the conversion I saved all of the incandescent bulbs the apartment complex put there, and just put them back when I left and took my CFL's with me. I have about 8 incandescent bulbs under my sink for when I move again (the apartment doesn't get to keep my CFL bulbs). I've had to replace...1 CFL bulb since then. I am thinking about converting to LED's, but I haven't seen the need to replace perfectly good CFL's. When they do eventually die I will probably replace them one at a time with LED's.

Yep. I actually don't have Comcast...I had Insight, which was then bought out by Time Warner (service has improved dramatically since TW took over by the way). The modem that was originally provided me was garbage and didn't support any of the higher speeds. Although, when it was Insight, it didn't matter, because they neglected the network for years until TW took over (the fastest speed available was 10mbit until the TW takeover, it took them a year but it's 50mbit now). I just went and bought a Motorola SB6141, not only do I save the $6/month, I have a much better device, so when the 50mbit service was made available all they had to do was upgrade my service.

This is why I don't use ISP provided equipment. I have my own cable modem (which is just a "basic" model without router functionality), and my "router" is a custom built Linux box (it handles the wifi as well with hostapd).

Indeed...Classic Shell removes all the suck from Windows 8 and makes it act like Windows 7, while keeping the "under the hood" improvements that Windows 8 has for CPU scheduling.

Luke (and Leia due to being his twin sister) were supposed to be 19 in ANH. Carrie Fisher was 20, Mark Hamill was 25.