You know what all those environmental regulations mean when it comes to the megacorporations that do the polluting?


Exempt. Exempt. Exempt.


Some burden.

But it's the same either way. How can you demonize one party for something that they ALL do?

It's been so many years since I've encountered anything I might have actually needed IE to use, I don't have the faintest clue what you're talking about anymore. Examples?

SSD reliability is garbage and it always has been. Even with the flashier new ones, it's all just more wear leveling and more tricks to make it seem like that's not the case.

I'm really curious about the actual reasoning behind all of this hating on NewEgg or any other retailer for the condition of open box and refurbished products. Like you just said, this thing worked fine out of the box for a few weeks, and the problems either didn't appear or weren't noticed for MONTHS. I have to ask, how do you expect NewEgg to test for that kind of failure? I must reiterate - IT WORKED FOR YOU FOR WEEKS. They may not have tested it but if they did, IT WOULD HAVE PASSED.

I'm currently using an open-box MSI motherboard from NewEgg. It's in my primary workstation and it's been working perfectly fine for almost a year now. If it had broken down at some point during that time, or if it breaks down sometime later, I really don't see how I can say it's NewEgg's testing policies that led to my equipment failing.

Please, can you explain it to me?

Who are edging closer and closer to being at real risk of being shut down on the basis of the content that passes through their pipes. They've only narrowly avoided the bullet by handing over their customers whenever they can. The ISPs trying to pull AOL redux are Big Media, and the rest of them are being screwed like all of us. What do we do?

Downloaded content is only flagged when you downloaded that content with a program that snuggles nicely into the Windows security framework. Any program that does downloading can just ignore that such facilities exist and not use them. Mainstream browsers, sure - but what about all those auto-updating programs and the filesharing network of the moment? That's really laughable as a layer of security.

downloaded files are flagged noexecute and there's a confirmation dialog before any downloaded file can be executed
Let's note that this only applies to methods of downloading which are playing nicely within the bolted-on security framework within Windows. If the user is downloading something in a method other than using a mainstream browser or windows file sharing, this doesn't kick in. Reminds me of all the crapware on KaZaA and similar services.

(unless the file has been cryptographically signed by a source the user trusts)

Given the rash of certificate security issues recently, it's pretty clear that signatures are not security. There are also lots of Windows drivers that aren't signed, so users who plug in hardware that isn't covered under an OS-built-in driver are quite familiar with the process of ignoring signature issues.

*This might also be present in Windows XP.
I do believe that SP2 or SP3 enabled this in XP, but it's been quite some time so I'm not sure.

Except that MySQL is the default solution for SQL databases. When you sign up for decent web hosting, you don't get access to an 'SQL Database', you get access to a 'MySQL database'. This has nothing to do with the quality of database versus database. It's the lowest cost solution. I've heard plenty of good about PostGreSQL, and have seen it gaining some apparently well-deserved recognition. Oracle, well, I've heard plenty about the guy you have to pay to make it work right, and the scale of those numbers. But MySQL is the default, it's what your average SQL database admin is going to know if they're not in a Microsoft shop. From a business perspective, you go for your top mindshare competitor, whether or not they're the most technically mature.

An 18 year old, a legal adult. Meh. There are lines being drawn that simply don't need to be. The fact that someone thinks it's appropriate to block communication between a student and a teacher simply because it happens outside of school, well, let's not get into it. We already know how bad the educational systems are, this is just another turd on the pile.

I was just given an old HP N5440 with the S3 Savage GPU. I was so happy, being able to revive it with Linux. Going to make a sweet little mobile workstation out of it... except now, what limited 3D support it has is being dropped? wahhhhhhhhhhhh.