Editorial

The Blog As Your Voice

L
LIKE THE POLAR bear that hibernates for extended
periods of time, one of India’s best-written blogs was
in hiding for a year. It re-emerged mid-January, and
Indian media professionals are secretly celebrating.
Sadly, though, for all our intellectual and tech-
nical superiority, there are few Indian blogs worth
a mention. Rajesh Jain’s views on emerging tech-
nologies—emergic.org—is probably India’s best blog
across all categories; and Pradyuman Maheshwari’s
aforementioned brutal take on the Indian media—
mediaah.com—comes quite close.
Both Jain and Maheshwari are just two of a breed
of what is now a sunrise sector on the Web. At last
count, LiveJournal, one of the Web’s most popular
blogging tool, had nearly 6 million registrations, of
which 2.5 million are active. Various studies on the
Net mention a disputable, but believable figure: a Sachin Kalbag Executive Editor
new blog is created every 7.4 seconds. In the recently
concluded US presidential elections, several blog-
gers were given media status by the government,
and some blogs were as keenly followed by the
“With blogs, the Web
voting public as were CNN.com or Fox TV network.
Here is the bitter truth about blogs, though:
has finally delivered on
They just do not have the reach of a top-notch tele-
vision channel, nor do they have the clout of a high-
its promise—an alternate
selling newspaper. Yet, like the independent
aspirant in the elections who is sure not to win, but
social structure”
is an irritant to big-party candidates, blogs will
make life a bit uneasy for existing media players. multi-core media behemoth. What holds bigger
Because, more than anything else, the blog is a promise is that traditional media, despite the fact
release. Against urban angst; to propagate knowl- that they use technology in every possible way to
edge; to say the things you always wanted to say, but shore up their core competence areas, are averse to
did not know where to publish, or worse, did not investing monies in new avenues, either out of igno-
have anyone who would agree to publish. rance or out of apathy.
Columnist Om Malik writes in Business 2.0, a This is the baggage bloggers do not carry.
respected US-based business and tech magazine: It is this that will make the blog Your Voice.
“We are seeing the rise of a new news network,
thanks in large part to technology. Average Joes and
Janes are now armed to the teeth with technology
that can capture and distribute news almost
anywhere.”
He could not have out it more succinctly.
With blogs, the Web has finally delivered on its
promise—to create an alternate social structure; one
where an individual makes as much an impact as a [email protected]
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6 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Enter Digital Passion 32 The Magic Bus
Are you ready to board the PCI-Express
bus? Here’s your ticket!

36 Beyond Music
Accessories and more to dress up your
all-in-one Apple iPod
16
Amar Singh
says he’s not 38 The Face Behind The Mirror
too tech
savvy Identity theft is no longer a problem
only for the western world. It is a real
16 and present danger for India too
‘.in’ domain
names up for
grabs 25 The Codebreakers 43 30 Days...
Hacking is not always about defacing A month without the Internet...can’t
17 or destroying. It also has a constructive be done? Find out
Guard side to it. Meet the ethical hackers who
yourself from
e-mail hoaxes keep an eye on their enemy—the
45 Hindi Hain
destructive hackers
24
Hum!
The lowdown Translating
30 Take a Crack software to local
on Intel’s
Create a bootable Windows XP
Sonoma languages and
installation CD with SP2 to win!
spreading the reach

Contents Magazine
Digital Tools 94 Upgrade Your Skill Set
Soft skills are essential tools for your
63 Your Learning Your Medium career growth. Here are resources you
New-age classrooms go virtual using popular could look up for honing them
multimedia tools to facilitate learning

60 Future
Perfect
We test
motherboards and
processors from
Intel and AMD,
with a view to
offering you the
best solution for
your budget PC. A
comprehensive 96 Home Is Where The Money Is
guide Have a computer at home? It could be
your money-making machine...

88 New & Notable 105 Agent 001

The latest and most desirable products including Agent 001 goes on his most powerful
the Nokia 6670, Microsoft Fingerprint Reader, hunt till date
Logitech MX-1000 Laser mouse and more

8 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

Digital Business 118 Tech-furnishing
Your Office
107 The Other Side Make the most of your
Is StarOffice the better, cost-effective alternative office using the latest
to MS Office? technolgy to
increase efficiency

120 When Will You

Upgrade?
When will you upgrade
122 Online Advertising v/s
your software? What are
Offline Advertising
Would you rather your ads be
the reasons that will make
seen online or through tradi-
you upgrade?
tional media? Here’s weighing
the pros and cons of both
112 Inventory Management
Customised Inventory Management software
can make your job easier. Take a look...

114 The Money Managers

Value Added Tax is set to change the way
businesses compute tax. Is your Financial
Accounting software ready for VAT?

February 2005
Digital Leisure Icon of Trust Escape
150
141 The Ocean Rises Apple Sues Teen
Amateur technology scored over Over Web Site
spohisticated and complex
systems as it survived the
Tsunami and aided relief efforts

146 Prince Of Persia

The Prince is back and this time, he’s 151
Gates Witnesses
up against nastier adversaries. Can he Windows Crash
beat them? Should you help him win
his princess?

144 Floor Your Valentine 48 We find out who are the best IT
Presenting five simple yet products companies in India when it
effective ways of impressing your comes to customer service,
beloved using digital photography reliability and satisfaction

Incredibly Useful Sites ....................16 Old Way Tech Way: Creating A Mediawise/Adwise ........................148
REGULARS

Gender Benders ..............................22 Digital Playlist ................................89 Bluff Your Way Through ................150
Geek Dreams: Sony Vaio X505..........37 Q&A ................................................90 Blogwatch ......................................151
Net Gain: DPReview.com ..................87 Tech Quiz ......................................144 Inbox ..............................................158
Tips & Tricks ....................................79 TechCritique ..................................145 Tabloid Tech ..................................160

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 9

 Note 1: Grey areas show the content also available on the CD. The DVD contains all that is on the CD
Note 2: If you do not want to boot from the CD, remove it from the drive at startup

Contents Interactive
DVD

DIGITAL PASSION DIGITAL TOOLS DIGITAL BUSINESS DIGITAL LEISURE

GAMERS SYSTEM GALLERY
Act Of War: Direct Action ■ WindowBlinds 4.4 Linux ■ 25 WindowBlinds Themes
Spanning one large mission, this real- ■ Iconpackager 2.5 ■ Mandrake 10.1 ■ 19 Style XP Themes
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squarely in control of counterterrorist The all-in-one updater for Windows XP made Mandrake more stable, more
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already was. Check it out!

Flatout
MUSIC
The Punisher MULTIMEDIA WHITE PAPERS ■ Prince of Persia: Sands of Time
An action-packed game based on the ■ PCI Express white paper
popular comic character AVI Maker
AVI Maker is a simple, but useful video
creator. Using AVI Maker you can create
custom-designed AVI Files.
■ FrameShow
■ ImageForge PRO
■ AutoImager
■ Virtual CD 6.0
■ All Audio Recorder ■ Disney's Robin Hood
■ Grandmommys Finger Painter

■ The Inevitability of Failure: The

VIDEO REVIEWS Flawed Assumption of Security in
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■ Electric Communities: Commerce and
Society in Cyberspace
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INTERNET ECTI is a software to create ■ Pixelus Deluxe
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■ Blog Express ■ Seven Seas
■ Feed Demon ■ Zuma Deluxe
■ FeedReader ■ Astropop
■ Free Launchbar ■ Bookworm Deluxe
■ Sony Vaio U70p ■ GMail (mail notifier) ■ Rocket Mania! Deluxe
■ Sony Vaio X505 ■ MyWeb Browser ■ Insaniquarium! Deluxe

DEV TOOLS ESSENTIALS E-BOOKS

CD (Bootable)

■ Adobe Acrobat Reader 6.0 ■ Down and Out in

■ Ad-Aware SE 1.05 the Magic
■ Ad-Aware SE1R24 29.12.2004 Kingdom
definiton file Simulations, Help, Support, Learning ■ Eastern
■ avast! Home Edition 4.5.549 and its ■ Altova Enterprise XML Suite 2004r4 Standard Tribe
latest update ■ BackupAssist 2.3.2 ■ ZopeBook
■ .NET redistributable ■ Secure Pack 3.0 ■ Long Tail
■ Eclipse 3.0.1 SDK ■ Flashplayer 7 Secure Pack is the ideal solution for ■ 330 Java tips
The Eclipse SDK includes the Eclipse ■ Quicktime Alternative distributing PowerPoint presentations. ■ The Cathedral
Platform, Java development tools, and ■ Real Alternative ■ Search Engine Commando 3.1 and the Bazaar
Plug-in Development Environment, ■ CBN Selector 2.1 ■ Parma Endorion: Essays on Middle-
including source and both user and SYSTEM ■ SmartDraw earth
programmer documentation ■ SafetyBar for Outlook Express 2.5.1 SmartDraw is an easy to use drawing ■ How To Be Creative
■ C/C++ Plugin for Eclipse (CDT 2.1) ■ SafetyBar for Outlook 4.0.1 software that allows you to create ■ Art Of The Start
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■ Dev-C++ 4.9.9.1 ■ Acronis Power Utilities flowcharts, Cryptography
■ Python 2.4 ■ Spam Alarm organisational ■ How To Create Bootable CDs
■ Zope 2.7.3 ■ Google Deskbar charts, timelines, ■ UpsetChap's Doom3 Guide -
■ Apache 2.0.52 ■ Onfolio (BETA) network Framzerate and Visual Tweaks
■ DOSbox 0.63 ■ Surfpack startpage diagrams, ■ Web Design in 7 days
■ D-Fend 2.0.62.42 ■ X1 Search (BETA) business process ■ Free Culture
■ Plone 2.0.5 ■ MSN Toolbar (BETA) management A book detailing why IPR and
A user friendly and powerful open ■ Desktop Sidebar diagrams, floor associated patents are not always a
source Content Management System ■ Microsoft Virtual PC plans, and more good thing

10 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Online Digit Patrons
By Demand It really does
January 2005

You get to choose what goes on Digit pay to be loyal!

Interactive. This month, you chose: Find out more
Mandrake 10.1 on www.
Flatout thinkdigit. com

Digit Reader Poll Subscribe

No more snail-mail! No need to visit post
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www.thinkdigit.com/subscribe and
Has anyone ever use your Credit Card to make sure you never
attempted to clone your miss another issue of your favourite magazine!
mobile phone?
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mobile cloning?

Log onto www.thinkdigit.com

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taste technology at
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There’s something for everyone on the Digit Forum www.thinkdigit.com/forum

Software Discussion Bazaar

Discuss software—from the best Have money, will buy! Buy
tools to the greatest games or exchange hardware or
software

Digit Discussion QnA

Your feedback on the Magazine, the Thousands of answers to every
DVD, the CD and the Web site hardware or software query you have
Hardware Discussion General Discussion
The hangout haven for From Linkin’ Park to Doom III,
hardware geeks it’s all here

12 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Twin Menace Pentop Computing
‘Evil twins’ are the latest menace to the security of LeapFrog Enterprises’ new FLY ‘pentop computer’ is
WiFi Internet users, warn experts in the UK. An ‘evil a talking pen that can translate words and help
twin’ is a bogus base station. Victims may transmit with maths and spelling. A user can draw a calcu-
valuable personal information, not suspecting that lator, touch the handwritten digits to perform an
these are being intercepted by cybercriminals. operation, and hear the answers announced.

Enter
GET .IN
Amar Singh
Politician
igh-flying Rajya Sabha
‘.in’ Domain Names Up
H MP Amar Singh is
known for his close
association with the who’s
For Grabs
who of corporate India and
Bollywood. Technology,
though, is not one of his
strengths. He admits he is
T he Government of India country or a dependent
recently inaugurated the territory) and ensure its
registration process for ‘.in’ operational stability,
Policy using which,
companies can attempt
to claim their name back
still adapting to domain names. A special reliability and security. if they feel someone is
technology, and is ‘Sunrise’ period, from INRegistry will also using one that they have a
candid enough to January 1, 2005, was implement new initiatives right to.”
admit his overall allotted to trademark undertaken by the Ministry Most of the top
tech ignorance. holders to register their .in of Communications and corporate organisations in
domain names. India have registered their
What does Corporates as well main brand and/or
technology mean as individuals company names already for
to you? holding registered the trademarks they hold.
Technology amazes me trademarks could “Net4India alone would be
since I grew up in harder register their .in registering more than
times. Today, when I see a domain name till 10,000 names/extensions by
paperless office or a tiny January 21. Post February 16. This is more
chip storing huge chunks of January 21, than the total ever
data, I realise the power of registration was registered in the seven to
technology. thrown open to eight years that the manual
What gadgets do you use? the public. process has been in place,”
My Nokia cell phone is Applicants who says Sawhney.
indispensable. My office did not register
handles most of my their domain SECURE YOUR WINDOWS
correspondence on e-mail. I names ran the
also have a home theatre
system.
risk of losing
their domains to
More
How tech savvy are
politicians?
cybersquatters. Illustrations Harsho Mohan chottoraj
At present, there are five Information Technology
Security
Most politicians cannot
take decisions on
lakh trade names registered that falls under the aegis of
in India. the Department of
Updates For
technology.
Do you surf the Net?
INRegistry
(www.registry.in/), the
Information Technology.
Accredited registrars
Windows
Yes. There are Web sites in official .in registry, such as Net4India
my name and I like to
check those. We also have a
basic party website.
appointed by the
Government of India,
operates under the aegis of
(www.net4india.co.in),
OnlineNIC (www.onlinenic.
com), DirectI (www.
M icrosoft Corp is
warning users that
they need three security
Is e-Governance possible the National Internet directi.com) and Good updates, including one that
for Uttar Pradesh (UP)? eXchange of India (NIXI). Luck Domains (www. applies even to computers
I believe it is. I met Infosys NIXI is a not-for-profit goodluckdomain. com) that have downloaded the
CEO Nandan Nilekani, who organisation that seeks to will facilitate the company’s massive fix for
plans to frame an IT policy facilitate improved Internet registration process. Windows XP. Two of the
for UP. We are trying to services in the country. Says Jasjit Sawhney, flaws which carry the
computerise land records INRegistry functions as an CEO, Net4India, “The company’s most severe
and build Internet kiosks, autonomous body within ‘Sunrise’ period has been threat rating affect versions
and Nandan has promised the NIXI fold to maintain designed to avoid problems of its dominant OS going
to turn UP into the new the .in ccTLD (country code of trademark infringement back to Windows 98.
Silicon Valley. top-level domain, which is and cybersquatting. There One even affects users
used and reserved for a is also a Dispute Resolution who have downloaded

16 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Security Watch
Service Pack 2 (SP2), a major received that removal tool.
E-mail Hoax security upgrade for Last week, the company Broadband
Windows XP released last also began offering a free BSNL's new
summer, after a series of program to remove broadband
crippling attacks. spyware. Spyware can service
However, SP2 was never monitor computer users’ offering
expected to solve all of activities, send annoying speeds
between 256 Kbps and 2
Microsoft’s security pop-up ads and slow Mbps, accessible in 198
problems, according to computer performance. cities across India. Plans
Stephen Toulouse, a Microsoft has also start as low as Rs 500 and
security program manager confirmed plans to sell its go up to Rs 9,000.
The problem at the Washington-based own anti-virus software,
Phishers are stooping to new company. “We knew we which would compete
lows, exploiting would-be were going to be providing against programs from Data
humanitarians. Web security updates for SP2. The goal McAfee, Symantec Transfer
firm Sophos said on January was always around and others. Limits
17 that there is a mass e- Under the
reducing the number of Home 500 plan,
mail floating around that critical updates,” he said. MS RESEARCH IN INDIA consumers are
poses as a plea for aid to The third flaw, with a restricted to 1
help the victims of last
month’s Tsunami disaster.
lesser threat rating of
‘Important’, affects
Microsoft GB of data transfer per
month. Under other plans,
The e-mail is a vehicle for
spreading a virus.
machines running
Windows XP and Windows
Research the usage limitation will
range from 2 GB to 10 GB.
The worm appears with
the subject line, “Tsunami
Server 2003. All three, in a
variety of ways, could allow
Facility Microsoft Research
donation! Please help!”
Recipients are asked to open
an attacker to take control
of another computer.
Inaugurated India (MSRI), the third
such facility outside the US
an attachment titled The flaw that affects and only the sixth of its
‘tsunami.exe’. If the
attachment is opened, the
virus gets forwarded to other
SP2 takes advantage of a
problem with Internet
Explorer that could allow
M icrosoft, the global
software, services and
solutions giant, has
kind in the world, was
inaugurated by Minister of
State for Science and
users in the address book. an attacker to gain control launched its research facil- Technology and Ocean
of a computer if the user ity in Bangalore. Development, Kapil Sibal.
Damages were persuaded to visit a The state-of-the-art
Sophos said that, so far, it malicious Web site. facility will initially focus
had received only a small The other severe flaw in areas of Geographic
number of reports of the could be exploited if a user Information Systems (GIS),
worm affecting users. employs a specially technologies for emerging
The e-mail appears to be formulated cursor or icon markets, multilingual
primarily a vehicle for that secretly allows the systems and sensor
spreading the virus. It could attacker to gain control of networks. On the occa-
also initiate a denial-of- another person’s computer. sion, MSRI and the
service (DoS) attack against a The new security fixes, Ministry of Science and
German hacking Web site, in released as part of Technology signed
which that site’s server would Microsoft’s regular Memorandum of
be bombarded with messages monthly security updates, Understanding (MoU) to
and thereby put out of action. come a week after partner in science and
Microsoft said it would technology projects.
Precautions begin offering a free The first collaborative
It’s easy to protect yourself program to remove the project will be in GIS to
against this one. Just do not most dangerous infections bring in a variety of satel-
open the attachment and from computers. Many lite imagery, remote sens-
delete the mail. users have already ing and other geographic

One Silly Question Which software would you like to do away with?

Is Lotus Note
on the ything
s boring or wh
erfectly e of an
many compl
ications…nev
at? Too
work p OS? Ads and spyware! act opposit ndly!
er liked it! After installing Norton AntiVirus, thing DAP made the ex r-frie
Abhishek Ja
in,Rajasthan
y
Does an Windows XP my PC run at snail’s
pace! Tally— asy and use
there were more viruses than before! ft e r, Goa
Microso a, Mum
bai Sonam Talwar, Gujara
t that is argalka
Manish Patwardhan, Mumbai Sharm sh Dh
Sunny Durge

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 17

 Pulse
The Digital World A Round-up of Technology News from Across the Globe
CANADA RUSSIA
SWITZERLAND
January 17, police arrested eight men and seized President Putin recently convened a
computers and thousands of pictures when they One of the country’s two makers of meeting focusing on the creation of
smashed a child pornography ring of Swiss Army knives is going the tech technology parks. The Russian IT and
unprecedented scale in Ottawa. The Ottawa Police way. Victorinox is promoting its communications minister said Russia
High Tech Crime Unit said officers swooped against ‘SwissMemory’ series, comprising 512 would invest some $650 million (Rs 280
an operation to buy child porn over the Internet. MB ‘USB’ knives. crore) in the IT sector in five years.

GERMANY
Metro Group, the world's third-largest
retailer, said on January 20 that it had
completed the implementation of RFID SPAIN
readers and tags at its largest distribution Police have arrested a man suspected of
centre in Germany. writing a virus capable of spying on users
through their Webcams. The programmer CHINA
from Madrid allegedly distributed the virus China is fast becoming a nation of
EQUATORIAL GUINEA over a file sharing network. prolific Internet users. A recent
A device is being developed that will allow report says two-thirds of Chinese
the recording of sophisticated wildlife data Internet users will purchase
on a palmtop. Connected to GPS satellites, something online this year and
it will record the precise location and time young people favour getting their
of animal sightings. Such data collection news on the Internet instead of TV.
could help save endangered species.

data in a geographically $250,000 (Rs 1.09 crore)

indexed database. in total funding for Three Incredibly Useful Sites
“MSRI will make much these projects,” added
of the government’s non- Venkatesan. Tech Support Sites
sensitive geographic data Some of the institutions
available to the public in a where the projects will be www.experts- Experts Exchange
format that is easy to undertaken are Birla exchange.com A free lunch does not exist. Take this
browse and comprehend, Institute of Technology and site: it lets you search for free, but
with intuitive visualisation Science, Pilani; Indian when you are about to get an answer
of data. Eventually, such a Institute of Information to your question, you realise you need
system could enable people Technology and Indian to register ($9.95 or Rs 433 per month)
to exchange information, Institute of Science, for the complete answer. A definitive
much like the Internet, but Bangalore; and the Indian tech support site, you can search for
indexed by region and Institutes of Technology solutions, question tech experts or as
geography,” said MSRI man- (IITs) in Mumbai, Delhi, registered users, browse whitepapers
aging director P Anandan. Kanpur and Chennai. and request webcasts. Not bad.
Research for this proj- Incidentally, China and Error Messages
www.generation.net
ect will involve work India are the only two Add this site in the favourites of your
from relevant fields of countries outside the US browser! Just what you need, when you
computer science, includ- where Microsoft has the get an error message on Windows and
ing GIS, graphics, user entire scale of operations, you are stuck. Did IE say something like
interfaces, spatial databas- including software develop- ‘Mprexe Caused an Invalid Page Fault
es, image processing and ment centres, sales and in Module Kernel32?’ On this site, you
computer vision. marketing offices. will find a link to MS Knowledge Base
MSRI plans to employ article with details about the error and
about 24 scientists, interns ROBO-COLLEGE! how to resolve it.
and support staff in the
first year.
MSRI is also initiating
Rocking www.answersthat-
work.com
Answers That Work
It’s a pity that all good things online are
several projects in the ICT
space by funding university
Robotix no longer free. The Ultimate
Troubleshooter at ‘Answers That Work’ is
priced at $25 (Rs 1088) for a single
research projects.
license. You can search ‘Libraries of
“We have selected spe-
cific projects through the
request for proposal (RFP)
T he National Robotics
competition of IIT
Kharagpur, ‘.:Robotix:.’,
Answers That Work’, ‘The Task List’ that
help you figure out what a certain
running process does and more. The
process from various insti- held with Kshitij, the
libraries contain answers to numerous
tutions across the country annual techno-
problems. Worth a dekko but once again,
and awarded them management festival of
be ready to pay.
18 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005
DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005
 Pulse

Digit Caption
“Carttops for Sale”
Last Month’s Winner!
Nishant A. Patil, Mumbai is the
winner for his caption: “No
honey...this is not how they
send junk mail...!”

Send your captions to

[email protected] and
win a book!
Webster’s New World
Computer
Dictionary By
Bryan
Pfaffenberger,
with published by
for a photo. Come up
will carry a caption Pearson Education
Every month, Digit t the Digit team at their own game!
and bea
Photograph Jiten Gandhi something funnier,

the IIT, will be held from The robots to be featured on card paper. PLAY AND FAIL
February 4 to 6, 2005 at the include: An analogue line tracer:
IIT Kharagpur campus.
The event covers various
EPIA-based multi
purpose test-bed robot: This
This can make decisions
at junctions.
Kids Playing
fields in Robotics including
mechanical design, image
robot will demonstrate the
tele-operation and
A robot that can be
controlled wirelessly: The
Computer
processing based computer-
controlled robotics,
exploration of unknown
space; sensorial features are
objective is to give
intelligence to the
Games Fail
microcontroller-based self-
contained robots and
IR sensors, Sonar, Flame
Detector, Human Detector
computer and make this
robot perform a variety of
In Studies
artificial intelligence (AI). and a camera to top it off. tasks without any changes
This year, PowerBoats,
Cannon Balls, Lodestones,
and Mission Mars /
An all-terrain vehicle:
This is based on a variant of
the rocker boogie echanism.
in hardware.
More details of the
event and activities
A new study being
conducted by leading
scientist Prof Robert
Conquerors are what the Mister-X: A robot that planned are available at the Winston suggests that
categories have been named. will be programmed to Web site, www.kshitij. children who spend hours
Started in 2001 as an draw a picture of Gandhiji iitkgp.ernet.in. playing computer games
Intra-IIT technical event, and watching television are
Robotix today enjoys failing to develop skills
worldwide participation. needed to succeed at school.
This year’s event has According to the Daily
already received 350 Mail, he added that
registrations, and more are youngsters are not
coming in. The ‘Mission acquiring long-term powers
Mars’ event this year has of study and application
teams from Georgia Tech, they need in class. This is
Arizona State University, mainly because the games
SUNY Buffalo and they play and the TV
University of Texas programmes they watch
participating. A team from require only short-term
Pakistan has also bursts of concentration.
confirmed participation. The programme
Another highlight surveyed a group of
of this year’s edition will primary school pupils and
be an exhibition by KRAIG found one in five had
(Kharagpur Robotics and played ‘Grand Theft Auto’—
Artificial Intelligence a notorious 18-certificate
Guild—a student club). One of the robots from last year’s edition of Robotix game where players steal

20 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Pulse
up to 2 Mbps in
Aniket Shingote v/s Amruta Sawant two packages,
GENDER Boot A PC From A (bootable) CD namely, the ‘Home
Plan’ for single
terminals and the
‘Business Plan’ that
allows multiple terminals
to access the Net on a
single connection.
BENDERS Based on Asymmetric
Digital Subscriber Line
(ADSL) technology,
DataOne allows copper
telephone pairs to be
used to provide a
2 min broadband connection.
13 sec
DataOne starts at Rs
Raring to go, Aniket sets out like an expert. Rebooting the 500 per month and goes up
PC, he presses the ‘Delete’ key that leads to the BIOS setup
utility. But hey, the screen looks different and the advanced to Rs 9,000 per month
BIOS features option is nowhere to be seen! Fortunately, (Business Plan). Other
Aniket notices the ‘Boot’ tab. He alters the order of the boot the behaviour at home and players in the market, such
devices and sits back relaxed. Not bad at all. some of this is due to as Airtel Broadband and
games,” he added. Reliance Broadband, are
“Digital media may well still offering speeds of 64
have some dangers as well Kbps, and they are calling
as some advantages for that ‘broadband’!
children. Modern children While Airtel offers the
are spending three to four 64 Kbps package at Rs 249
hours a day in front of a PC per month, DataOne offers
or TV screen of some kind, 256 Kbps at Rs 500. Reliance
often unsupervised,” also offers bandwidth
lamented Winston. speeds between 64 Kbps and
1 min 100 Kbps, but nothing
34 sec IS THIS THE REAL THING? compared to the 1 Mbps
being offered by BSNL.
Edgy to start with, Amruta lightens up once she hears the
task. Calmly, she reboots the PC and waits. Before we can A New As the largest telecom
service provider in India,
even bat an eyelid, she suddenly presses F8, which directly
takes her to the ‘Select Boot Device’ table. Presto! She
carries out the changes effortlessly, all the time chuckling to
‘Broadband’ BSNL has an edge over
private players.
herself. Piece of cake!
On The Block N Chenjaya, general
manager, BSNL, says, “We
think broadband will be a
cars, kill people and pick
up commercial sex workers!
“Many children who
those who spend long
periods playing quick-fire,
adrenaline-pumping games
B SNL launched the first
ever ‘Broadband’ service
in the country on January
success because our
network is our strength. We
have a good reach across
love computer games find it often lack a long- term 14, 2005. Prior to this, the the country and can reach
hard to concentrate on the attention span. Children Department of out to the masses faster.”
sort of tasks that require who have PCs and TVs in Telecommunication (DoT) The private players
slow application and are their bedroom tend to sit in officially recognised would agree. With plans to
necessary for school front of the screen into the ‘broadband’ as ‘Internet use the power of the
success,” said Prof Winston. early hours instead of with connection speed at a Internet for e-governance
To reach his getting enough sleep. minimum of 256 Kbps’. and to put into place a
conclusions, Prof Winston “Children are sleeping With the launch of its centralised State Wide Area
studied the impact of between two and five hours ‘DataOne’ services, BSNL Network (SWAN) across
computer games on less than their parents did has become the first various states in India,
children’s ability to tackle at the same age. This affects Internet Service Provider BSNL will now be in both
various tasks. He found that performance at school and (ISP) to promise bandwidth voice and data spaces

DART—Deep-ocean Assessment and Reporting of Tsunamis

D esigned to detect Tsunamis as small as one
centimetre, DART systems consist of a
seafloor Bottom Pressure Recording (BPR) sys-
An acoustic modem transmits data—on an
hourly basis—from the BPR to the buoy, which is
then relayed through a Geostationary
tem and a moored surface buoy. The BPR runs an Operational Environmental Satellites (GOES)
algorithm that generates predicted water height satellite link to ground stations. Ground stations
values and compares new samples with the pre- demodulate the signals and broadcast the
dicted values. readings to Tsunami Warning Centres worldwide.

22 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Pulse
GADGET GLUTTONY also grew to more than PVR-recorded television to a
23,028, up from 18,000 at wireless computer and
CES 2005: the 2004 edition.
Featuring a broad array
Samsung's 80-inch plasma
flat TV that earned them
Setting The of exciting product and
technology introductions
the bragging rights at
the show!
Stage For and announcements, many
of which provide
Media Devices: Belkin
TuneStage that enables
What is Sonoma? New Ideas consumers with
unprecedented control over
iPods to wirelessly stream
music to home stereos
Sonoma is the code name for
the second generation of the when, where and how they and simultaneously serve
mobile Centrino notebook
platform. The platform
includes a Pentium M
W ith over 140,000
attendees from 115
countries witnessing the
watch movies, listen to
music, view their digital
photos and access other
as a remote control,
Archos Portable Media
Assistant PMA 430 that has
processor, the chipset and introduction of thousands information, education and a 30 GB hard drive and can
the Wi-Fi card. of new products and entertainment content. screen movies from TV,
How does Sonoma improve technologies from more Showing the strength of DVD and VCR and
over the original Centrino than 2,500 exhibitors, the the transition to High Olympus’ M:robe 500 and
platform? Consumer Electronics Show Definition Television 100 MP3 players with
The Pentium M processor (CES) that ended in Las (HDTV), the show featured touch-screen, camera and
now has a front-side bus Vegas on January 9, lived the latest developments in 20 GB (5 GB in the M:robe
increase from 400 MHz to up to its billing, and display technologies and a 100) hard drives.
533 MHz. There is now
support for dual-channel proved to be the biggest variety of products and Gaming: Gizmondo
DDR2 memory and graphics stage for new products innovations that build unveiled an eponymous
support for the PCI-Express on earth! upon HDTV. portable gaming device
bus architecture. The chipset The four-day event In addition to being a that's a Swiss Army Knife
is new and has been code- saw executives from product showplace, the among handheld consoles
named Alviso. The Centrino’s consumer technology, 2005 edition included a being an on-the-go gaming
integrated graphics has been broadcasting, cable, star-studded array of platform delivering
upgraded by including the motion picture and industry luminaries wireless text messaging and
Intel Graphics Media numerous other industries delivering speeches and e-mail, GPS capabilities, a
Accelerator 900—-the first
DirectX 9.0 integrated converge in Las Vegas to participating in over 350 digital camera, and a
graphics solution for hear from technology conference sessions. portable video player.
notebooks. There will also be industry visionaries and Speakers included Telephony: Samsung,
the newly-released Intel view a showcase of hot new Microsoft chairman and LG and BenQ launched new
PRO/Wireless 2915ABG products and trends in chief software architect Bill smart phones (some with
network connection. audio, accessories, home Gates, Craig Barrett, CEO, a 2-megapixel camera),
Who released Sonoma? networking, mobile Intel Corporation, Ron Netgear Pre-N launched
As a successor to the Centrino electronics, video and Garriques, executive VP, their Wireless Router
platform, Sonoma was, wireless equipment. Motorola, Carly Fiorina, while Corinex's Internet
naturally, released by Intel. The 2005 edition also chairperson, HP and Rich Video Phone.
Why do we need Sonoma? set several major show Templeton, president and Notebook: Toshiba
The answer is performance.
records including number CEO, Texas Instruments. R15-S822, the first Sonoma-
Support for PCI-Express had of attendees (1,42,585, Some of the most enabled notebook.
to be brought in to Intel’s subject to audit), noteworthy launches at the Software: Meedio, a
mobile platform at some exhibitors (2,550) and show were: company that's been
stage. Intel is touting exhibit space (1.531 million TV and Video: Sling working diligently on a
Sonoma and the net square feet). Media's Slingbox that lets software alternative to
accompanying Alviso chipset International attendance you actually redirect live or Windows Media Centre,
as key breakthroughs in released a digital video
mobile performance and recorder (DVR) package
functionality, especially in
areas such as digital media
called Meedio TV.
processing. Photography: Kodak's
EasyShare One, their first
When Sonoma released?
Wi-Fi enabled camera,
Sonoma was released on 19 Pentax's Optio WP, a
January 2005. waterproof digital camera,
Where can I find a Minolta Magiolor, a
notebook that has support PictBridge 1.0 compliant
for Sonoma? photo-friendly laser (yes,
Intel expects system builders
and OEMs to offer as many as laser) printer.
150 notebook models based Home Theatres: Philips
on the Sonoma release. For launched its Pronto-
example, Toshiba unveiled its branded touch-screen
latest tablet PC at the 2005 controllers.
CES. The new Toshiba R15-
S822 that launches in Compiled by Meera Vankipuram,
February includes support Preethi Chamikutty, Ahmed Shaikh,
for Sonoma. Lexar’s new digital music player that was launched at CES 2005 Ram Mohan Rao and Aditya Kuber

24 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Passion l Lead Feature

Digital

32 The Magic Bus 38 The Face Behind

The Mirror 48 Most Trusted
Brands
Passion
Fuelling the pursuit of technology knowledge

Lead Feature

The Codebreakers
Fear and hatred are the emotions that hackers normally evoke. But there are two kinds of
this breed as well. Meet the ethical kind
ties, evaluate systems’ security practices and
Meera Vankipuram report loopholes as well as remedial measures to
the owners.
he word ‘hacker’ conjures up an image: an They can perform security audits for compa-
T evil person keen on disrupting systems for
fun’s sake—and so that he (a hacker is usu-
nies—testing a system for vulnerabilities and sub-
mitting a report. This kind of work may not even
ally a ‘he’) can boast to his friends about the sys- require the services of an ethical hacker per se.
tems he’s breached. The term ‘ethical hacker’, Alternatively, they could actually attack a security
may, therefore sound like an oxymoron. system, seek out the vulnerabilities that a mali-
However, ‘ethical hackers’ do exist, and these cious hacker could easily exploit and, of course,
masters of their craft are the mirror image of report or fix them.
what people think of hackers. They possess pretty India’s ‘underground overlords’ of the IT
much the same skill set, but use them for the realm are nestled in small—mostly, home—offices
exact opposite reason—to identify vulnerabilities in the quiet suburbs of Mumbai, Delhi and sev-
in systems so that corrective action may be taken. eral other cities across the country. These code-
The term ‘hacker’ originally referred to those breakers and security experts are busy scouring
involved in creating a new program or making networks to seek and destroy vulnerabilities.
changes to existing, complex software. Ethical hacker Shomiron Das Gupta, a Certi-
Ethical hackers employ the same tools and fied Information System Security Professional
techniques as malicious hackers, or ‘crackers’, but (CISSP) and GIAC Certified Intrusion Analyst
they do not damage the target systems, nor steal (SANS Certified), was formerly employed with
information. They test networks for vulnerabili- ICICI InfoTech as a security consultant, before

Imaging Atul Deshmukh Photgraph Jiten Gandhi

In the business of security (L

to R): Shomiron Das Gupta
(CISSP), Jagdish Mahapatra
(BDM, Cisco Systems), KK
Mookhey (CISA)
 Digital Passion l Lead Feature
Das Gupta and KK represent the growing
Ethical Hacking 101 - Resources You Can Use breed of young security professionals in India. In
Tools, discussion groups & virtual Honeypot Project (Online honeypot the recent past, India has seen a host of teenage
systems deployment): prodigies emerge in the security space. Sixteen-
Insecure.org: http://www.honeynet.org/ year-old Namit Merchant, for example, is the
http://www.insecure.org/ Crackmes.de (Challenges for youngest ever CISSP—a widely-recognised certifi-
Pull The Plug: reversers, newbies, white hats and cation, which requires a minimum of three years
www.pulltheplug.org black hats): of full-time professional computer security expe-
Whoppix Penetration Testing http://www.crackmes.de/ rience, prior to taking the test.
Toolkit: Eric S Raymond’s homepage: Ankit Fadia, a teen prodigy, was just 16 when
http://www.whoppix.net/ http://www.catb.org/~esr he authored The Unofficial Guide to Ethical Hacking.
The PacketStorm IP Network Carnegie Mellon Software A Computer Security and Digital Intelligence Con-
Emulators: Engineering Institute: sultant, he is now one of the best-known ethical
http://www.packetstorm.com/ http://www.cert.org hackers in India.
K-OTik Security (French): The SANS (SysAdmin, Audit,
http://www.k-otik.com/ Network, Security) Institute: The S-Word
Phrack (Hacker E-zine): http://www.sans.org Security threats for companies (SMBs and
http://www.phrack.org/ Ethical Hacker's Association (India): enterprises) have gained prominence in the
Hacker's Lab: http://www.netmonastery.com/eha last few decades. With more and more govern-
http://www.hackerslab.org/ /eah.htm ments and companies jumping onto the ‘world
wide web’ bandwagon, seamless connectivity
Conferences (through Virtual Private Networks, for exam-
DEFCON: ple) across branches is crucial for efficient
http://www.defcon.org/ functioning of a business network.
Black Hat conference: Today, viruses and worms proliferate on the
http://www.blackhat.com Web within a matter of minutes. Not only do
COMDEX: networks and security systems need to react
http://www.comdex.com/ instantaneously, security companies also need
to develop more complex and stable solutions.
SMBs usually employ a team comprising a Sys-
moving out to start his own security firm, Net tems Administrator and security experts to
Monastery. He also founded the EHA (Ethical monitor networks, 24x7.
Hackers’ Association) “to increase awareness Some of the best-known names in the secu-
about security in the tech community and to edu- rity industry include MIEL e-Security, Mahindra
cate programmers on measures to avoid mistakes SSG, SecureSynergy, HCL Comnet, IT Secure,
that attract bugs or cause vulnerabilities.” and Cisco Systems. Security firms offer services
Says Das Gupta, “Hacking is more about such as penetration testing, vulnerability
instinct than hardcore programming skills. You assessments, security audits, consulting
have to understand network architecture and be and education. Many security companies
adept with hacking tools. But to be an ethical also develop security assessment and
hacker, one has to build trust… which takes time intrusion-detection tools, and engage in secu-
to establish but can be lost easily.” rity-related research.
KK Mookhey, a Certified Information Systems
Auditor (CISA) with over four years of security Careers In Hacking
experience, agrees. Says Jagdish Mahapatra, business development
Anatomy of an Attack “The gains are low in manager, Cisco Systems, India and SAARC,
malicious hacking, “Organisations are beginning to realise that secu-
and really, it makes rity has to be top priority on their IT investment
stupid business budget. It’s the level of protection that causes the
sense to cross that dilemma. Most SMBs have a security policy in
Stage 1: Scanning, sniffing the line,” he says. place, but these have to be updated on a regular
network to discover vulnerabilities Both swear by basis based on the company’s needs, the current
the Code of Vulnera- environment and threats.”
Stage 2: Exploiting bility Disclosure— Security firms employ ‘certified ethical
vulnerabiilites to gain access inform the vendor hackers’ to perform audits as well as develop
first on discovering a security tools. But are they wary of hackers?
Stage 3: Causing damage, cov- vulnerability, ask for “Anyone who can wreak havoc is a useful
ering tracks (replacing system bina- a time period and tool for a security company. Especially
ries with custom-made commands, assurance that the while building a security system for a
manipulating intrusion detection sys- flaw will be fixed. network, hackers come in handy—they come up
tems/logs/audit data) “Else, you threaten with different ways of penetrating the net-
to go public,” says work,” says Mahapatra.
Stage 4: Using mail server to gen- KK, whose team has Security engineer Kartikeya Puri of MIEL
Infographic Jayan K Narayanan

erate spam/ running an IRC server, discovered vulnera- eSecurity, says, “Though security companies
scanning other PCs on network) bilities in soft- develop exploits, some organisations prefer just
ware from vendors random audits—by running tools like Nessus, a
like Microsoft, vulnerability scanner—to generate reports. You
Oracle, Nortel and don’t really need to be a hacker for that! Even
Macromedia. my ten-year old brother can run that tool! Secu-

26 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Passion l Lead Feature

Hackerspeak: Jargon Explained

I ntrusion Detection: The processes

involved in detecting inappropriate,
incorrect or anomalous activity
critical network services or
applications.
data on a computer system, often on the
Internet. In other words, exploiting the
weakest link—more often than not, users
happening in a network. Challenge: A virtual system designed by
Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS) are programmers with various hacking- Vulnerability scanner: A tool that scans
employed to determine if a computer related goals/problems to be solved computers on a network for known
network or server has fallen prey to an weaknesses. Port scanners look for “open
unauthorised intrusion. Exploit: An application designed to ports” to gain entry into the network.
penetrate known vulnerabilities in a
Honeypots: Closely monitored network network or software Man in the middle attack (MTM): Here, an
decoys that help distract intruders from attacker reads and modifies messages
attacking more valuable machines on a Sniffer: A tool that that captures between two parties without letting either
network and causing damage. passwords and other data while in transit party know that their link has been
Honeypots ring the early warning within the computer or over a network compromised.
bells about an attack and help study The attacker normally observes
exploitation trends. Deployment of Social engineering: The practice of and intercepts messages that travel to
honeypots usually does not affect conning people into revealing sensitive and from the victims’ PCs.

rity engineers normally protect the critical the servers and compromises the information
resources of a company—server side applica- Ethical hacking is flow; attacks on the border routers/ switches;
tions and Web sites.” subjective; its overflows (buffer/heap/stack-based) in server soft-
interpretation ware; and social engineering attacks.
Hierarchies In Cyberia varies—I could Once a network has been compromised, the
At the bottom of the hacker hierarchy is a ‘script enter a network intruder gains ‘Administrator’ privileges, and
kiddie’—a malicious hacker with little or no and snoop around using certin tools (‘root kits’) disables security
skill. These guys can cause a lot of damage with without causing auditing. At the end of their stay, using the same
their shoot-in-the-dark methods. A ‘white hat’ or any significant tools, the intruders simply turn on auditing again.
‘sneaker’, who also breaks into networks or harm Says Prakash (name changed), a cracker-
seeks vulnerabilities, does so for ‘altruistic’ rea- turned-security engineer from Bangalore, “Most
Kartikeya Puri,
sons. ‘White hats’ usually report bugs or vulner- MIEL eSecurity
networks cannot guarantee 100 per cent security.
abilities to the vendors. Online banking systems in India, for example, are
‘Black hats’ or ‘Crackers’, on the other hand, vulnerable to attacks. But it involves a lot of
are on the lookout for vulnerabilities in net- work—traffic to the site has to be sniffed, data has
works and software, and enjoy destroying vul- to be encrypted, the network scanned for vulner-
nerable networks. abilities, firewalls disabled, and so on. But a break-
Top-notch hackers—usually referred to as in is certainly possible.”
‘Wizards’ or ‘Gurus’—have been associated with
some of the biggest names in the software busi- Dancing With The Devil
ness. The best-known amongst these are Richard For every successful ethical hacker or systems
Stallman, founder of the Free Software Move- administrator, there is a hotshot cracker waiting
ment and GNU projects, which nurtured the to get the better of him. Although there is big
development of the GNU/Linux operating system money involved, the cat-and-mouse game
(OS), and Linus Torvalds, who developed the between security experts and malicious hackers
Linux kernel in 1991. is also a battle of extremely creative minds.
Hackers get to match wits at events such as Hackers are constantly upgrading their knowl-
DEFCON (www.defcon.org) dubbed the “largest edge, while virus writers continue to unleash
underground hacking event in the world”, the their creativity on the Web.
Black Hat conference (www.blackhat.com)—a Genuine hackers “seek to create, nurture and
melting pot of hackers, security experts, govern- contribute to the evolution of more efficient com-
ment officials and network administrators, and puter networks”.
COMDEX (Communications and Data Processing “Ethical hacking is subjective; its interpreta-
Exposition)—a hardware and software tradeshow. tion varies—I could enter a network and snoop
around without causing any significant harm.
Enemy At The Gate Does that make me any less ethical?”, asks Puri.
Vulnerabilities abound in networks. Security Yet, he confesses it is hard to stay ‘ethical’
professionals are privy to this knowledge, espe- when one has knowledge and access to sensitive
cially during audits. They have no reason not to and potentially lucrative information.
distribute this knowledge for profit or even Thomas Anderson or Neo, from The Matrix, a
exploit the vulnerability. “program writer for a respectable software com-
According to Puri, some of the most potent pany... and a hacker guilty of virtually every com-
hacking attacks include distributed denial of puter crime we have a law for...”, is merely a
service; idle scanning—exploiting the bugs on a stereotype. Not all hackers are malicious and not
server running on the network and then taking all ethical hackers are saints. But which hat would
control of the rest of the infrastructure; sniffer you rather wear?
attacks—where a sniffer is installed on one of [email protected]

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 27

 THIS MONTH’S CHALLENGE

So you downloaded
Creating a
Service Pack 2 for
Windows XP? How do
you go about creating
bootable
a bootable Windows
XP installation CD
with SP2 integrated
Windows XP
but using your
existing CD?
Send your solutions
installation CD
to takeacrack@
thinkdigit.com with SP2

How To Safely Overclock Your CPU

Last month, we asked you jumper settings or BIOS overclocking at the rated
LAST MONTH’S CHALLENGE how you could safely tweaks. Only when you are settings and work your way
overclock your CPU. sure that you can change the up in small increments
Unfortunately, none of CPU’s core voltage, clock Save your settings and
the entries we received were multiplier or bus speed, reboot the machine. The PC
good enough to deserve the should you go about should boot normally. Check
prize. So here’s the soution: pushing your system harder. for any signs of instability.

Win!
Most processors allow To overclock: Run a CPU-intensive program
overclocking only to a Enter the BIOS by or game like Half-Life 2 to
certain extent. Others, by rebooting your computer and stress the CPU and make
virtue of their design, allow hitting the [DEL] or the [F2] sure it is working fine.
it a little more. Most key. The exact steps will vary Reboot and enter the BIOS
processors today have their according to your BIOS type again. Increase the CPU
Take a Crack clock multipliers locked and and version. Refer to the voltage, again in small
and Win this prevents them from motherboard manual to help increments. Restart and
Webster’s New World being tweaked through that locate the FSB frequency and repeat the previous step.
Computer Dictionary component. In such cases, the CPU voltage settings. Continue till you feel the
By Bryan Pfaffenberger the bus speed needs to be Increase the CPU FSB machine has been pushed to
Published by Pearson Education used, but you need to take frequency in small its limits.
care when you do this so increments of, say, 2 MHz. Reboot and enter the BIOS
Rules and Regulations
Readers are requested to send that the rest of the system is Change the CPU Speed/ again. Increase the CPU
in their answers by the 15th of the not adversely affected. Voltage Settings to ‘Manual’ voltage, again in small
month of publication. Keep in mind that your to let you change them. increments. Restart and
warranties will not cover any Note: Throughout this repeat the step 4. Continue
Employees of Jasubhai Digital
Media and their relatives are not damage cause by over- exercise, monitor your the process till you feel the
permitted to participate in this clocking; so be very sure of system temperatures and
contest. the extent to which you can voltages very closely. It is
push your system safely. critical that they remain
Readers are encouraged to
send their replies by e-mail. The first by-product of a within limits for your system
Jasubhai Digital Media will not tweaking experiment will be to run reliably. Failing to do
entertain any unsolicited the generation of heat in so will result in shortening
communication. your critical components. So the life of your processor or
Jasubhai Digital Media is not before you embark on this even failure. It is important
responsible for any damage to task, ensure you have to start out your Changing the CPU Voltage
your system that may be caused adequate cooling for
while you are solving the components like the machine has been pushed to
problem.
processor, RAM and its limits. A stable over-
motherboard chipset. clocked system is one that
has the right balance
Steps To Overlock between CPU FSB, voltage
Your CPU and bus speed settings.
Consult the manual to Overclocking is achieved by
make sure that your trial and error and we
motherboard supports cannot overemphasise the
overclocking through Changing the CPU FSB frequency importance of safety.

30 DIGIT FEBRUARY2005
 Photograph Mexy Xavier Imaging Atul Deshmukh
The Magic Bus It is interesting to note that the PCI bus is the
Varun Dubey oldest, slowest bus (or piece of technology, if you
Is PCI express will) on your motherboard. Considering that it
the bus you have
M
an’s need for speed is perhaps the connects everything else—the latest video cards
been waiting strongest driving force behind his inno- to the processors to the latest memory—it’s a bit
vations; blazingly fast Ferraris and scary. In the infographic (on page 33), note how
for? Time to get supersonic jet planes bear testament to this. underserved devices connected to your USB or
on it… Computing, of course, has not been left Firewire port or even your SATA-based hard disks
untouched. In fact, the advances in technology are. This is the crux of the problem—the band-
in terms of processing power have been so rapid width requirement of a device is not satisfied by
over the past 10 years that had they been repli- the PCI bus; the bus itself becomes the bottle-
cated elsewhere, we would have already visited neck that needs to be rectified for the solution.
the most distant galaxies! For the second problem, consider a hard disk.
One aspect of computing—the PCI bus—has, Under the aegis of PCI, if this disk needs to
however, remained untouched for almost a communicate with the CPU, it will have to go via
decade! We demystify the latest buzzword in the the Southbridge, stop at the Northbridge for
tech world—PCI express. refreshments and finally arrive at its destina-
tion, fighting latencies all along the way. “Laten-
Everyone On The PCI Bus! cies”, you ask? Well, yes, notice how the USB, the
We need to first understand how PCIe works, and FireWire and the Gigabit LAN ports are all shar-
why it is needed, let’s first understand the basic ing the same 133 MBps bus. Fighting for
working of a ‘bus’. A bus is a bunch of conduc- resources means system slowdown. This is prob-
tors, and is primarily a means of transferring lem number two in PCI-land.
data from one system component to another. For The third problem with the PCI architecture
example, a bus is used to transfer data from your is that it is a one-way lane. That is, when the CPU
hard disk to the printer, or from the processor to is talking to the Northbridge, no other device
the memory, apart from other functions. PCI can access the CPU. This leads to a scramble for
uses the shared bus architecture, where the bandwidth and adds to system slowdown.
devices attached to the bus share the bus’ band- A slow bus fighting with fellow devices for
width when working. resources, and clogging at the Northbridge, are

32 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Passion l In Sight
a few of the problems your system faces every PCIe would be Another aspect that has changed in PCIe is
day. Let’s find out how PCI Express will save us. the legacy concept of PCI bus mastering. PCIe
the interconnect features a switch system that sits in the centre,
On The PCI Expressway between various and all the system devices connect to it via a
The most interesting thing to note is the legacy devices and dedicated link similar to the bus connecting the
PCI bus hanging at the bottom right of the info- bridges as CPU to the Northbridge. This is called a ‘Point-to-
graphic (below). PCI becomes a subset of PCIe. To well as the Point Interconnect System’.
understand how PCIe betters this, let’s first What this switch does is route all the
understand the basic structure of PCIe.
interconnect PCI/PCIe data through itself, allowing two
Unlike PCI, PCIe is a two-lane transfer system. between the devices to talk to each other—if the communica-
This lets data come and go simultaneously. In bridges tion does not involve any cache-specific data or
PCIe, each of the dedicated connections/paths themselves instructions, this switch will simply offer the two
between the switch and the device is called a devices a dedicated and direct link to share with
link. A PCIe x1 link has one lane, which can each other. This obviously makes information
transfer data to and fro simultaneously, provid- exchange between devices extremely fast.
ing transfer speeds of 2.5 GB/s one way, such that
an x1 link has a total transfer capacity of 5 GB/s. What Does This Mean?
Now, if we add another lane to this, we get an The question now is, how well does all this trans-
x2 link, wherein each lane can transfer 5 GB/s, late to real-world usage. Will your games finally
making the total available bandwidth 10 GB/s. run enormously faster and better?
We can theoretically have x32 PCIe connections Well, not really. The performance difference
with transfer speeds of 20 GB/s. between AGP 4x (1 GB/s) and AGP 8x (2 GB/s) is
To put things into perspective, if you could negligible. So, PCIe x16 cards will not make
manage a x32 PCIe connection between, say, Doom 3 run any faster because there simply isn’t
your 80 GB HDD to another 80 GB HDD, you that much data to transfer.
could transfer the entire 80 GB of data in about Immediate beneficiaries would be people
four seconds! But how does all this bandwidth into video-editing; the performance of their
help us? machines would see a huge boost due to the
Remember how in PCI, if the processor was dual-channel capability. This is because periph-
talking to the Northbridge, it was inaccessible to eral devices such as hard disks or external
other elements of a system due to the single- FireWire devices will be able to reap the bene-
channel nature of PCI? The dual-channel feature fits that additional bandwidth and reduced
of PCIe overcomes this and allows multiple latencies offer.
devices to communicate with each other. Our recommendation is that you should
PCIe will replace the entire bus architecture not upgrade to PCIe unless you work heavily
on a motherboard and would be the interconnect on video editing. If, however, you are about
between various devices and bridges as well as to upgrade anyway, go ahead and get a PCIe-
the interconnect between the bridges. based motherboard—PCIe as a standard is
PCIe is incredibly scalable and allows addi- an inevitability.
tional links to be provided as and when band- A word of caution, though: a motherboard
width requirements increase. For example, for a can only support either AGP or PCIe. So if you buy
Gigabit LAN card, an x1 lane is sufficient, but for a PCIe motherboard, you will have to buy a PCIe
replacing your 8X AGP card, a motherboard graphics card as well. On the upside, PCIe is back-
burning an x16 link is necessary and possible. ward-compatible with older PCI components.

The PCI Versus PCIe Architecture

Infographic Sivalal. S
The PCI-Express Architecture
The PCI Architecture

The numbers in red express the transfer speeds supported by the devices. Those in black are the transfer speeds allowed by the bus they are
connected to, in this case, PCI.

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 33

 Digital Passion l In Sight
What’s On Offer? RAID, and they also allow you to change the
Along with the obvious advantage of the PCIe If you go out to RAID configuration on the fly.
bus, these boards offer a gamut of features previ- buy a PCIe Another cool piece of technology that has
ously unheard of: if you go out to buy a PCIe motherboard, made its way to today’s motherboards is CQ, or
motherboard, expect to be bombarded with expect to be Native Command Queuing. This technology
feature-rich boards. We take you through the bombarded with enables a hard disk to decide the order of read-
best of what you can expect from these boards. ing data to minimise data throughput time—so
feature-rich you can watch a movie even when some encod-
Video boards ing is going on in the background, without
The latest PCIe chipsets from Intel, the 915, 925 stressing out your hard disk.
and their variants, come with an on-board Intel The nForce4 and Intel chipsets support this
Graphics Media Accelerator, which has Direct-X 9 technology; however, neither the ATi Xpress200
support, and is stipulated to match the perform- nor the VIA or SiS chipsets support this feature.
ance of the GeForce FX5200. The 915G and 915GV It should be noted here that not all these
chipsets also have native support for HDTV and boards support DDR2. For example, the VIA
widescreen LCDs, with support for multiple K8T890 series supports only DDR memory. The
monitors. The AMD solutions from nVidia do lit- Intel 915GV and 915G support both DDR and
tle to better this, what with the nForce4 chipset DDR2. Note that the 915GV Express chipsets
shipping without any onboard video at all! support only the latest LGA775 socket Pentium 4s.

PCI: The Evolution Path Network Support And Other

Connections
Version Technology All these chipsets provide a variety of connectiv-
PCI Intel developed the 32-bit PCI bus, which runs at 33 MHz
with a transfer speed of 133 MB/s
ity options. Each of these PCIe chipsets provides at
PCI-X The 64-bit version of the PCI bus, running at 33 MHz least eight USB ports and one FireWire, with the
with a transfer speed of 133 MB/s nForce4 providing 10 USB and two FireWire ports.
PCI-X 64-bit version running at 66MHz with speeds up to 512 MB/s Apart from this, it also supports Gigabit LAN.
PCI-X 64-bit version running at 133MHz with speeds up to 1 GB/s Interestingly, the Gigabyte K8NXP-9 offers
PCI-X 2.0 4.3 GB/s two on-board GigabitLAN ports. One is an nForce
The reason PCI-X is not implemented in desktops is the extremely high cost
of manufacture of PCI-X boards 4, and the other, added by Gigabyte, utilises a
PCIe x1 link. This apart, the motherboard ships
ATi Radeon Xpress200/200P chipsets do with an additional PCI Wireless LAN card as well!
much better, with their on-board video solution The card is a Gigabyte addition and is not on-
having 128 MB of memory, matching the board. The ASUS A8V-E Deluxe does feature an
performance of a Radeon X300. It also has built- on-board wireless LAN conforming to the
in dual-display support (Analogue and DVI) along 802.11g standard.
with SURROUNDVIEW, which is essentially For gamers who will be upgrading anyway,
support for three or more monitors. ATi and nVidia have released their versions of
Both Via K8T890 and K8T890PRO as well as SiS the PCIe x16 graphics cards, which are available
756 and 965 chipsets do not feature any onboard without having to pay a premium!
video. So on this front, ATi leads the pack. Unlike ATi, though, which launched native
PCIe cards, nVIDIA’s solutions use a PCIe-to-AGP
Audio bridge and have merely offered bridged versions
This is where the Intel chipsets emerge as clear of their current AGP 8X cards. However, the
winners. With on-board support for eight-chan- performance difference due to the bridge is
nel Hi-Definition audio with a 192 kHz sampling negligible and you can enjoy playing your
rate, which can play everything from High Defi- favourite games on high-end cards such as the
nition Dolby DTS to vanilla CDs without prob- 6800 GT and the Radeon X850.
lems. It even supports up to 15 simultaneous
audio streams. In The Future
The various AMD-based PCIe chipsets support The sheer convenience of the serial connections
eight-channel audio, but this is not High Defin- offered by PCIe and the bandwidth available could
ition. In fact, the Via K8T890 only has integrated change the motherboard manufacturing process
AC-97 six-channel audio, though it does come entirely by giving greater flexibility in terms of
with an eight-channel audio PCI controller. component placements. We might see modular
The much-touted Soundstorm integration into PCs where the I/O system is removable from the
nForce4 did not materialise, and we get the simple processor and could connect to it via PCIe sockets.
eight-channel integrated audio, which again, is This does not signal the death of USB and
not high-definition. Likewise with ATi and SiS. The FireWire, though, because by the time the above
Gigabyte K8NXP-9, though, improves on the scenario is realised, they would be so integrated
nForce4 chipset and provides six programmable with our lives that even the modular PCs would
audio jacks. No High-Definition audio, though. need to provide legacy support for them; just as
PCIe boards provide support for the older gener-
Storage And Memory ation PCI cards.
Every PCIe chipset comes with at least four SATA Despite some glitches like non-compatibility
connections, with the Gigabyte K8NXP-9 offering with AGP, PCIe technology is remarkable. It has
eight. All offer ATA connections and most of tremendous industry support, and not without
them also have the capability to be configured in reason. The bus is well on its way.
various RAID flavours: nForce4, suppors0, 1, 0+1 [email protected]

34 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Beyond Music
The Apple iPod is much more than just a music player. An audio recorder, portable stereo system,
digital library, organizer, portable hard drive …the list is endless. What's more, your favourite
‘digital companion’ has an ocean of accessories to choose from. Here are a few samples: (For a
complete list of accessories, head to: http://www.apple.com/ipod/)

Socks NaviPod IR Remote

A set of knit socks to dress A five-button infrared
up as well as protect your remote and receiver, the
iPod. Chose from six naviPod places the iPod's
colours. audio controls at your
Price: $29 (Rs. 1276) fingertips
Price: $50 (Rs. 2200)

iSkin Charger
Offers all-round surface A car power adapter,
protection. Beveled top which connects directly to
surface enables direct plug- a stereo input jack, to play
in of accessories. the iPod while on the road.
Available in a variety of Price: $40 (Rs. 1760)
colors.
Price: $25 (Rs. 1100)

Battery Pack
A reliable backup battery option, the
Battery Pack provides an alternate power
source for your iPod, when it’s internal
battery runs out of charge. The Pack uses
four standard "AA" alkaline batteries,
and has a useful charge-level indicator.
Price: $59 (Rs. 2596)

112 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Visual Explanation

Leather Organizer
Apart from ensuring a snug fit for the
iPod, the leather case can hold your
business and credit cards, cash and the
iPod’s earphones. Offers easy access to
the display and wheel.
Price: $25 (Rs. 1100)

iTrip FM Transmitter
Use the iTrip FM Transmitter to
play music through your car's
FM radio. Custom-made for the
iPod, the iTrip lets you select
radio stations directly from the
iPod. This plug and play device
doesn't require batteries.
Price: $35 (Rs. 1540)

Car Holder
Supports your iPod in the
car. The Air-Grip suction
cup keeps the iPod secure
and stable, lets you adjust
height and reposition the
iPod easily. A cable-
management clip helps do
away with tangled cords.
Price: $30 (Rs. 1320)

Media Reader
Infographic Binesh Sreedharan

Use the iPod as a temporary backup

device. Transfer photographs from
Text: Meera Vankipuram

digicam memory cards to your iPod (when

your card is full) while on the move or on
vacation. Supports CompactFlash (Type 1
and 2), SmartMedia, Secure Digital (SD),
Memory Stick, or MultiMediaCard (MMC)

Price: $100 (Rs. 4400)

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 113

 Imaging Binesh Sreedharan

The Face Behind

The Mirror When data thus defines your wealth, shapes
The fastest- Ram Mohan Rao your standing in society, becomes your ego and
growing crime in ID, it gains value. If you happen to have a desir-

W
ho are you? In the ages past, you were able identity—a bank account number with a
the US, ID theft, what people knew you as; what your sizeable balance, for example—that identity
is a real threat in friends knew you to be; what your invariably attracts thieves.
customers expected from you. In this digital age, What if you were to wake up tomorrow and
India too with you are merely data. find out that you have been leading a double
the growing Your e-mail ID is more relevant to this life; that someone out there has been your
reach of connected world than your birth name. Today, virtual Mr Hyde misappropriating your money,
your Web site’s URL brings you more business using your credit card number to commit
technology and recognition than any other avenue. How fraud, abusing your online portfolio? How
many friends do you have online—virtual person- would you feel to learn that your hard-earned
alities you haven’t even met—as against those cash and reputation has been virtually sold and
offline? Social interactions too, are fast taking a abused? Unlikely to happen, you say? Identity
digital role. That we are living in a connected theft is scary because it is easy. Even you can do
world is such a truism that the statement holds it... with a little patience and the right bent
no value and will soon be as useful as stating of mind. It is a low-risk, high-gain and low-
that the world is round. penalty crime.

38 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Passion l Tomorrow
Identities are most often stolen for finan- access passwords and other personal informa-
cial gains. There happen to be other forms of
For as little as tion. In fact, several virus attacks are intended
identity theft, such as offering someone else’s Rs 2,200, some just to track personal information.
name as one’s own when arrested—this is companies sell A common phishing scheme involves e-
called criminal identity theft. But the vast Social Security mails that appear to be sent by your bank,
majority of ID theft involves the transfer of an numbers, requesting that you log in to your online
unfortunate person’s money into the hands of account to confirm some details. You are meant
a happy thief.
mother’s maiden to follow the links in the e-mail, to a fake page
names, home that appears to be a genuine online banking
What, Me Worry? and employment site. Some estimates say that phishers are able
It can happen to anyone. In fact, it happens to addresses, credit to convince up to five per cent of recipients to
a staggering number of people; according to an history and more respond to their e-mails and take the intended
estimate, one in twenty people in the US have action. In fact, computer-savvy people, too, get
had their identity stolen. One of the reasons fooled by such e-mails.
for the proliferation of this crime is a large The Internet, while providing resources for
number of electronic transactions conducted people to avoid ID theft, has also helped in its
on trust. spread: the most frightening—and thorough—
Say, you receive a cheque in the mail from a way of stealing an identity is by purchasing it at
friend. You note down the bank routing number one of the many identity-search companies that
and the cheque number and make a call to your have come up on the Internet. For as little as Rs
credit card company saying you want to pay your 2,200, these companies sell people’s Social Secu-
bill by cheque. rity numbers, mother’s maiden names, home
You can do this over the phone. You are and employment addresses, previous addresses,
simply required to state the routing number on credit history and more.
the cheque you received from your friend, the
next cheque number, and the amount the credit The Ways Of The World
card company requires from you and of course, Phishing, viruses and paid information apart,
you say the chequebook is yours. Your payment consider some of the multifarious ways of steal-
will go through. ing identities:
You have just paid for your bills using your In a recent case in California, a hospital
friend’s account, unknown to him. That’s how executive died. In the obituary was a lot of
simple it is! Of course, the person who sent you personal information like the mother’s maiden
the cheque can easily track down where his or name. An identity thief got the Social Security
her money went, but this example just goes to number of the deceased and used it to steal
show how very trust-based most bank transac- thousands of dollars from his widow.
tions are-at least in the US. Ford Motor’s customer credit reports,
For identity theft to occur, personal infor- containing more than 13,000 records of
mation must be obtained. In the US, the two identifying information such as Social Security,
prime pieces of personal information are the bank account and credit card numbers, had
social security number and the mother’s been lodged in a supposedly secure database at
maiden name. This information can be uncov- Experian, one of the three major credit bureaus
ered—and usually is, when ID theft occurs—by in the US. Hackers bypassed security by posing
going through someone’s mail or trash, looking as employees of Ford and got access to all the
for bank and credit card statements, pre- personal information.
approved credit offers and tax information. Even fingerprints can be reproduced and
Other more direct ways include stealing infor- used. “If I steal your password, a credit card
mation from a wallet or purse such as identifi- company can issue you a new password,” says
cation, credit or bank cards, completing Chris Hoofnagle, legislative counsel for the
change-of-address forms to redirect mail, and Electronic Privacy Information Centre in
obtaining credit reports by posing as a landlord Washington, DC. “But if people are able to lift a
or someone who has a right to the information.
But it is not only data like lost Social Security Online Versus Offline ID Theft
numbers and credit cards that attract ID thieves.
Sources of personal information that are
publicly available include property records,
court records and marriage and divorce certifi-
Trevor Healy, vice-president, Payments at VeriSign, a California-based
online certification agency that secures transactions, says: “Online fraud
is very different from offline fraud. Online fraud is committed in three
cates. ID thieves can not only rob your mailbox categories: online theft, which is virtual shoplifting; identity theft, stealing
and hack into your computer, but also do things identities, so you can either sell those identities or actually use those
like monitoring your cordless phone and identities for shoplifting; and cash theft.
rummaging through low-key stuff like product- “In the online world, what we are witnessing is that the level of scale is
warranty cards. drastically different. In the offline world, if you steal an identity from a
The Internet opens up whole new avenues merchant’s trash can if the merchant is silly enough to put credit card slips
for identity theft—phishing included. A recent in there. You may get five or six cards and use those to create a fraud.
example involved the setup of a copy of part of “But in the online world, if you break into a merchant’s system, you
the PayPal Web site to acquire members’ could steal literally hundreds of thousands of identities. So the level of
personal details (See box: “How phishing works” on scale in the online world, if a fraud occurs, is much bigger. Everybody,
page 41). Trojans—viruses that remain resident though, is focused on product theft—the virtual shoplifting—first and
on one’s computer and can submit information forefront, and not on the other possibilities.”
to someone else—can monitor keystrokes to

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 39

 Digital Passion l Tomorrow
latent fingerprint of yours and reproduce it in a unscrupulous sites will authenticate your
mould—and this can be done—you can’t be credit card without verifying your billing
issued a new fingerprint. So how do you prove address and the CVV number (the three-digit
you are you?” authentication number on the back of your
Even children are not safe from this identity credit card). Fortunately, such authentications
theft. In April 2003, the story of Lisa Barraza’s are on the decline, and more and more finan-
son was uncovered. Barraza’s seven-year-old son cial institutions now require you to provide the
is a typical youngster, except for the fact that CVV number and verify the billing address. If
since the age of one, he has piled up over you’re still paranoid, you can think of using
$100,000 in credit card debt. How can a child so services like HDFC Bank’s NetSafe system
apply for credit cards and spend that kind of wherein you are assigned a credit card number
cash? He Obviously can’t, says his mother. for single use, with a limit that you choose,
Barraza first learned of her son’s debt The reason based on your real credit card details.
problems when she found a credit card in his identity theft is so
name. “My son’s social security number was powerful is that You Could Be Your Own Enemy
hijacked,” says Barraza. much of our RFID chips are particularly interesting. These
Bruce Schneier, founder and CTO of security today is chips are used in a variety of situations. For
Counterpane Internet Security of Cupertino, based on your example, in healthcare, they are implanted
California, and a recognised authority on identity under the skin. The intended use is to give
security, says, “The reason identity theft is so medical practitioners access to the medical
powerful is that much of our security today is Bruce Schneier, details of the person when he or she is unable to
Founder and CTO, communicate. But how easy would it then be to
based on your identity.” Counterpane Internet
steal such a person’s identity?
Security
New Avenues Some argue that all one would need to do is
When data becomes increasingly centralised, to purchase an RFID scanner, scan the victim as
things become easier for ID thieves—they can he or she passes by, clone a new chip with the
increasingly do one-stop data shopping. The cell same number and implant it under their own
phone is becoming a repository of the most skin. This issue—that of the stealing of informa-
sensitive personal data, and thus finds itself a tion via RFID tags—may become easier as RFID
lucrative target for attackers. Single-sign on serv- readers find their way into cell phones.
ices, such as Microsoft’s Passport service, open In early 2004, Nokia created a reader for RFID
another easy avenue for ID thieves. If a thief gets tags for its 5140 phone. This is based on NFC
hold of one Passport ID, he or she has pretty (Near Field Communication) technology—which
much everything to take on the victim’s identity. means that the phone needs to be put within an
Similarly, if a thief gets hold of your bank inch of a tag to be able to read it. A recent report
account number and online banking PIN, there’s from ABI Research says the first NFC smartphone
no limit to what havoc he can wreak with your will be out this year and goes on to predict that
finances, routing money to other accounts, send- by 2009, more than half of all handsets will have
ing out e-cheques, and the like. it inbuilt.
However, many people argue along the lines Wireless LANs, or WLANs, are another poten-
that you are “more likely to be struck by light- tial area of attack. Merwyn Andrade, a contribu-
ning than becoming a victim of fraud or iden- tor to the 802.11i security specification and chief
tity theft when they use electronic bill payment technical officer at Aruba Wireless Networks,
and account services”. The essential thing here is warns that ID theft could become a problem for
to keep your password or PIN safe. companies using WLANs. For example, users
The same goes for the online use of credit with 802.11i wireless phones might save their
cards. Although many people argue that using passwords and PINs on the phone. “This would
your credit card online is safer than using it be like keeping your keys to your house in your
offline because fewer people see your card wallet and then losing the wallet,” he says. “Once
number physically, the fact is that several 802.11i is pervasive, people might miss that they
have to worry about authentication.”
The Future Of Phishing Solutions
ID theft is the fastest growing crime in the US
D r Jonathan Tuliani, in an article floating on the Internet titled “The
Future of Phishing”, believes that the next few years “will see the
emergence of Internet man-in-the-middle attacks”. In such an attack, the
and is rising fast in India as well. As credit cards
and online transactions, amongst other things,
user is tricked as in a usual phishing scenario, except that instead of just the become more commonplace in India—banks in
user communicating with the attacker, the attacker is also communicating in India are fast catching on to credit history report-
real-time with the bank. “Two (or even 10) factor authentication is of no ing and the PAN card number may soon become
help, since the attacker does not interfere with the login process. Both the what the Social Security number is in the US—it
user and the bank are unaware of the presence of the attacker and believe is only natural that identity thieves here will
they have a secure connection directly from one to the other. take up the same techniques.
Once established, the man-in-the-middle has complete control. He can Thinking of it as a worldwide problem, what
modify instructions, even transfer funds to a different account or simply cut is the answer? It probably lies in the further
the user off and submit whatever instructions he desires to the bank. centralisation of data and the padlocking of that
“To combat this threat, it is necessary to move away from session-based data using a mix of several techniques, includ-
security (based on a secure log-in), to message-based security (based on ing, possibly, biometrics and secure tokens.
explicit authentication of individual transactions).” Biometrics refers to identifying one by some-
thing one is, rather than something one has or

40 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Passion l Tomorrow
Be Very Afraid...
How Phishing Works Cases of ID theft abound; some more mentionable
than others. In one notorious case in the early ’90s
O n November 17, 2003, many eBay customers received an e-mail notification
that their accounts had been compromised and were being restricted.
Included in the message was a link to what appeared to be an eBay Web page
in the US, the thief was a convicted felon. He not
only incurred more than Rs 43.5 lakh in credit
card debt, he obtained a home loan, and bought
for re-registration. homes, motorcycles, and handguns in the victim’s
The top of the page looked just like eBay’s home page and incorporated all name. The icing on the cake was that he called his
the internal links. To re-register, customers were asked to provide credit card victim to taunt him, saying he could continue to
data, ATM personal identification numbers, Social Security numbers, dates of pose as him for as long as he wanted. ID theft was
birth and mother’s maiden names. not a crime.
Fact is, eBay hadn’t sent the original e-mail and the Web page didn’t belong While the victim and his wife spent more than
to them either. Many who received the e-mail carried out the recommended four years and over Rs 6.5 lakh to restore their
actions, in the process, giving away vital ID secrets. credit and reputation, the criminal served only a
brief sentence for making false statements to
knows. Examples of machine readable biometrics procure a firearm.
are fingerprints, retinal or iris patterns, hand This case prompted the US Congress in 1998 to
geometries and facial features. A secure token is a create a new Federal offence of identity theft.
physical device: an example is USB secure tokens, Creating an offence of it is one thing, but ID theft
which are designed to store a person’s digital iden- is a low-risk and high-payoff crime.
tity. When someone attempts to log in to applica- There are several pieces of information
tions via a PC, virtual private network, or wireless that make up an identity; we need to
network, he or she is prompted to enter a unique realise that each of these pieces is potentially
PIN. If the number matches that on the USB token, valuable information, and we need to overhaul
access is granted. The number stored on the token the way we communicate and exchange
is encrypted for additional security. this information.
The most secure method of identification is In the long run, technology could come to
“two-factor authentication”. This would be some- the rescue. Before that, the problem will loom
thing like a PIN plus something you have (a key on us until every last one of us keeps every bit of
or an access card). Biometrics adds levels of secu- personal information under lock and key, and
rity by combining something you know with shreds it before throwing it away—physically and
something you are (for example, a fingerprint). virtually. Paranoia is the need of the times. You
Additional levels of security can be implemented have to pretend like someone’s looking over your
by added factors such as a username and pass- shoulder all the time.
word plus a biometric and a token. [email protected]

1/2 P H AD

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 41

Digital Passion | Geek Dreams
ake your pick from a jet fighter, an F1 car or wireless card (802.11b/g), an 87 key QWERTY
780 gm, a pencil thin
side-profile, a
space-age exterior,
T a space ship. Now remove the shell
protecting any of these machines. Carbon
keyboard along with a pointing stick; and a
battery life of up to four hours, the X505 is any
a 1.1 GHz heart. fibre—stronger, more rigid and able to dissipate geek’s dream come true!
The X505 is the real heat better than anything else now rests in your
pocket monster hand. Mould this space-age shell and give it a Watch the video review of this Notebook on the
laptop shape: 256 mm x 208 mm, 9.7 mm thick digit DVD!
at its front and 21.9 mm thick at the back. Next,
create a motherboard about the size of a
minidisk (2.5-inch diameter) and place an Intel
Pentium M 1.1 GHz processor with 1 MB of L2
cache on it. Place a 20 GB hard disk to the left of
the motherboard, a PCMCIA slot to its right.
Add two integrated USB 2.0 ports and a Firewire
port. Don’t forget the 512 MB of RAM, shared by
the onboard video card. Adorn the creation
with a bright, 10.4-inch LCD display with a
native resolution of 1024 x 768.
Now step back and lift it, with a finger. At
780 gm, the Sony Vaio X505/CP is an incredibly
small, light, and sexy laptop. With an external

Sony Vaio X505/CP

Imaging Sivalal. S

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 42

Digital Passion l 30 days... Digital Passion l 30 days with...

Without The Internet

Bhaskar Banik Day 10
I can’t take this anymore… so I draw up a list of things I can
T he Internet has become an integral part of our lives so
much so that we cannot even stay without it when we
are away from work.
do on the computer without having to use the Internet. Games
in single-player mode, e-books from Digit CDs, clean up the
[email protected] hard drive, listen to music, watch DVDs… not bad, huh?
Day 0
It’s been a while since I took a vacation and I’m really Day 12
looking forward to my upcoming month-long break. I must Finally… I leave town today hoping I won’t miss the Internet.
admit, though, that I have this uncanny habit of getting
myself into strange situations. My last day before I took off, Day 20
saw me get into one such ‘situation’! Deepak, our Test Centre I’m back from the trip and I am a bit tired. My younger broth-
head asked me if I was really going to be away from work for er has a go at me for disconnecting the Internet, but I stick to
a whole month. I replied with an emphatic “Yes!” Little did I my guns… well, almost. I give him some money to go to a net
know that this would also keep me away from the Internet café and save myself from being talked into reinstating the
and not just work for a month. In true military style severed connection.
volunteering, I had volunteered to spend a month without the
Internet. God save me! Day 22
I’ve caught up a fair bit on what’s been happening on TV.
Day 1 And I agree ‘Jassi Jaisi Koi Nahin’. Who else
The start of a long lazy month… I am really looking forward can run Windows on an
to a hot cup of coffee and my morning dose at iMac? But newspapers
www.extremetech.com. With a steaming cup of coffee, I head suck as far as TV sched-
for the computer and am aghast to discover that the Internet ules are concerned. My
is down. How could this be? Without further a do, I call up trusty Internet lets me go
the ISP and let the operator have it! After checking up on to website, download the
some details, I am reminded that I had asked for the months schedule, export it
connection to be discontinued for a month. Me? And then, to Excel and mark my
realisation sets in that I am working on an article and have favourite programmes.
to spend a month without the Internet. A bit like being in the Eight long days to go.
wilderness without any means of communication, if you ask
me… I mutter some apologies and wonder what one can do Day 25
to spend time without the Internet. I can already feel the I met an old friend today
withdrawal symptoms setting in. and he asked me to go with
him. Where? For an encounter
Day 3 with the other kind! He was
To make my month in the wilderness easier, I had a week- just going to a library! It was
long trip planned with a friend, but that has been postponed nice to experience the unmis-
by a few days. takeable scent of books once
again. I picked up a couple of
Day 5 books myself… Believe it!
A panicked friend calls up to find out if I’m okay… of course I
am, I tell him. “You haven’t been online for the last five days,” Day 30
he reminds me. This actually made me wonder how little we It’s over… I shall be free of
speak to our friends… it’s almost taken for granted that your my misery! World Wide
‘friends’ will be online and a smiley can replace the laughter Web… here I come! But
and smiles you used to share. was the experience any
good? In a way, yes.
Day 7 The Internet is a tool
I am still at my computer but it just doesn’t feel this same. and is only good as
No e-mails, no forums… can’t read up on anything or can’t long as you keep in
even download stuff… I could go to a net café, but that would control. Too much of
defeat the purpose of the exercise. Hmmm. It’s 11 pm and I any good thing can
have nothing better to do than sleep. Well, good night! be bad!
43
Graphic Atul Deshmukh
 FEBRUARY 2005 2005 DIGIT 101 FEBRUARY 2005 2005 DIGIT 103 FEBRUARY 2005 2005 DIGIT 105

Wide
T
he New Year started with a whimper. For If you already have a working old hard disk
Angle me, twice over. My Christmas bonus at
office was a new PC, with a brisk new
you installed into your new and upgraded
CPU/Motherboard, you may want to spare your
processor, plenty of RAM and a shiny new hard hard disk the additional strain that might push
disk. A couple of days spent migrating my data it into never-never land. To burn-in just the CPU
safely over to the PC was a small price to pay for and cooling, you should either eliminate the
the snappy responsiveness of Firefox. Yes, it is other modules from your test configuration in
quite a CPU hungry beast, and if you don’t plan PassMark BurnInTest or use a dedicated CPU
to upgrade your computer you might want to testing program such as Hot CPU Tester Pro
look at the Moox optimised builds (c6iv*) for the (c6iy). Do it in the summer with the case closed
best you can get on your current hardware. to stress your system to the max, but don’t
Sumod Hajela Anyway, come New Year and the hard disk flame me if the PC suffers a meltdown.
went all whiny. No boot screen, no detection by Once your computer is working fine, go and
BIOS, and of course no way to access my data. A download a S.M.A.R.T. monitoring tool such as
call to tech support and a stand-by hard disk ActiveSMART (c6j0) to keep an eye on your
installation later, I found myself looking at HDD’s reliability. While S.M.A.R.T. monitoring
Windows XP re-installing the second time in a might give you some warning about impending
week. The plan was to get back up to speed on failure, nothing substitutes for a good backup
this HDD, and when the original was replaced, plan. Lesson One is you should always backup.
the partition would be copied over with a disk All power-users have their computer envi-
image tool like Norton Ghost so I get back to ronment set-up just-so, with all the myriad util-
work in no time. Good thing I hadn’t turned in ities and shortcuts correctly configured and the
my old hard disk yet, so I had all the data back UI tweaked. But going through three installs of
minus the days I spent un-backed up on the the OS amidst work deadlines does an amazing
new PC that I hadn’t expected to fail. job of distilling what you do with a new PC to
just the absolute essentials. Here is briefly what

Crash & Learn

I ended up with on my “new” PC version 3.0.
First things first, put up the Windows
Firewall and block all network services before
plugging in the network cable. Yes, sad to
admit, but even our local network is infested
Lesson One: You with malware and an unprotected PC (like the
One needs to fall over and over should always back up temporary laptop for example) is certain to
before he can learn to walk—a your important data. catch nasty stuff like Sasser or Nimda. If you are
Disk failure is always a going on the Internet unprotected, this
lesson is perhaps never learned surprise. The best free research report (c6j2) should set you straight.
the first time around tool for backup is Next come the hours of Windows Update
SyncBack (c6ix). Set up patches—painful but necessary. I use the free
multiple jobs for your Avast! Antivirus and keep Spybot and AdAware
important data and rest easy. handy just in case my Internet Explorer picks
To cut a short story shorter, a few days after up something nasty. If you don’t install Service
I was all settled in nicely with patches up to Pack 2, BHODemon (c6j5) will help keep your IE
date and all my programs and UI tweaks just cruft-free. Of course, I mostly use Firefox with a
the way I like them, Windows stopped booting. dozen extensions, so IE is not much trouble.
The replacement hard disk too was making that You could choose to install a free third-party
ominous clicking noise. I should have paid firewall like ZoneAlarm or Kerio Personal
attention to the Icon of Trust numbers. My Firewall for complete protection, but since I am
Whimper Two was because I had failed to learn behind a corporate firewall run by an admin
Lesson One. Yet another data loss later, I was who knows what he is doing, I don’t. You
ready to try some data recovery software. R- should also try to not run as an Administrator-
Studio didn’t quite manage to read complete level user and RunAsAdmin (c6j6) helps there.
files, but Easy Recovery Pro did the job with Customising the Windows UI is managed
some careful guidance. It helps to remember with a combination of MS TweakUI and Kelly’s
your partition sizes as accurately as possible. awesome registry tweaks (c6j8). SlickRun (c6jd)
I tided over the next week on a lovely wide- handles my command-line needs perfectly, and
screen Compaq laptop that evoked the right Folder Pilot (c6jc) turns Explorer into a useful
kind of responses everywhere it went. But not tool. PopFile (c6jf) keeps my mail spam free and
from me, though. I was in mourning for my well categorised, but you could also try
two lost weeks, and didn’t appreciate it as SpamBayes (c6jj).
much as I should have. NewsPipe (c6jk) gets me my RSS feeds right
When my “new” hard disk arrived a week in my Outlook and is quite the run-and-forget
later, I was twice burnt, third time shy. It was program. If you aren’t comfortable running a
Sumod Hajela, Associate time for some serious agni-pariksha, and command-line Python script, you could give the
Editor (Technology) is Digit’s
Alpha Geek. His pastimes PassMark BurnInTest (c6jr) was my flame throw- free SharpReader (c6jl) a shot.
include creating new software er. The free version of this burn-in software But if there was only one thing I could talk
during lunch hours, and runs for only 15 minutes at a time, but it puts about this month, it would be Lesson One:
mastering just about every all the sub-systems—hard disk included— backup regularly!
computer-related technology
that there is. Write to him at through the wringer whenever you install a The text in brackets should be used like so:
[email protected] new component, or buy a new PC. http://snipurl.com/text to get the website

44 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

100 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 102 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 104 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005
 Digital Passion l First Hand
Imaging Binesh Shreedharan

Hindi hain Hunn !

Thanks to the
Preethi Chamikutty
has to be localised. For Linux to be accepted
among the masses, it is necessary that we
localise the common applications and inter-
efforts of a or long, computers in India have been faces. Translations are key foundations of the
dedicated few,
and the rise of
F restricted to those who understand
English, cutting off a large potential
localisation effort, and so we decided to trans-
late common applications such as KDE, GAIM
user base. A movement has been taking shape and GNOME,” says Advani.
open source since 1997 that could finally brought the power
software, of computing to the masses. How It All Started
The Bharatbhasha initiative was launched IndLinux started working primarily on Hindi
applications with the aim of providing free software to the and helped set up localisation teams for other
such as KDE, masses. With the advent and growth of open regional languages. The main goal of IndLinux
source programs, this has become reality. is to create a fully Indian language-enabled
GAIM and A volunteer project, IndLinux, focusing on distribution system.
GNOME are now widening the reach of computing to an esti- The project started around the year 2000
available in mated 1.3 billion people who understand Hindi, with Advani and Hariharan joining forces. In
the fourth largest language group in the world, the first two years of operations, the main
Hindi has been at the forefront of this movement. bottleneck was fonts.
Founded by Prakash Advani and Venkatesh Says Guntapalli Karunakar, coordinator at
“Venky” Hariharan, IndLinux initially received IndLinux, “Our major problem was that we did
support from FreeOS.com and is currently not have good quality fonts, so the display
aided by Netcore Solutions. wasn’t very good. We have developed our own
Prakash Advani, who is also the Linux fonts—our design team and other artists helped
Practice Head, Onward Novell Software (I) Pvt design fonts, while the technical aspect was
Ltd, says, “For any technology to be adopted, it handled by myself and a few others.” When the

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 45

 Digital Passion l First Hand
Bharatbasha initiative was launched, ‘Susha’ When I heard about this initiative of translat-
was the only free Devnagri available. ing software into Hindi, I wanted to contribute
Venky, co-founder, IndLinux, explains, whole-heartedly. Around the same time, the
“Back then, software vendors were selling fonts Voluntary Retirement Scheme (VRS) was
for nearly Rs 10,000—exorbitant by Indian stan- offered at work and I immediately opted for it.
dards. It was essential to make things afford- Initially, I could put in only one or two hours of
able. Even if half of of India’s Hindi-speaking work daily, but now, I am able to dedicate eight
population is illiterate, it still leaves us with to nine hours.”
200 million who speak, read and write Hindi. Shrivastava has been involved with this
We wanted to create a platform where anybody project for four years and finds it more satisfy-
could use applications and software was not ing that his Rs 25,000 per month job.
restricted to a chosen few.”
With this aim in mind, IndLinux sta rted Even if half of of Setting Standards
looking for volunteers who would translate for India’s Hindi- Although translation may sound like an easy
free. Posting messages on forums, word-of- speaking job, there are a set of rules the volunteers have
mouth, mailing lists and other such initiatives population is to follow. For instance, after someone sends in
helped bring in the volunteers. The main appli- illiterate, it still his part of the translation, it is reviewed and
cations that the team started working on were leaves us with 200 checked to see if the necessary standards have
KDE 3.2, GNOME 2.8 and GAIM. Today, KDE and million who been met.
GAIM have been completely translated into speak, read and As a matter of fact, the team has developed
Hindi, and GNOME is nearing completion. write Hindi a glossary of words that have already been
Venkatesh Hariharan translated into Hindi, and volunteers need to
Gaining Momentum Co-founder IndLinux
ensure that they do not use a new term for a
When the IndLinux team decided to widen word already in the glossary.
their scope of work, they held a workshop at Hariharan says, “Hindi is spoken in so many
the Homi Bhabha centre in Bangalore. In fact, dialects that we had to check if the translation
invites were sent to only 17 people, but more was Sanskrit or Urdu-based. For instance, we
than 40 turned up for the workshop, including argued over which word should replace ‘image’
a Myanmar national. What started as a small or ‘photo’. Some had used ‘Chitr’ (of Sanskrit
group is now a full-fledged movement. origin) in their translations, others had used
Besides Hindi, the free software is being ‘Tasvir’ (of Urdu origin). We eventually accepted
translated into other regional Indian ‘Chitr’, as everyone would understand it.”
languages including Bengali, Gujarati,
Kannada, Marathi, Oriya, Punjabi and Telugu. Mozilla Bhi Hindi Mein!
Says Karunakar: “Just like our group works on Apart from Linux, Mozilla, too, is being trans-
Hindi, there are other groups for different lated into Hindi. The Mozilla team is not as
languages. Translations in Hindi, Bengali, large as the Linux team. It has five members—
Punjabi, Gujarati and Tamil are at a usable Pankaj Tamrakar, the team leader, along with
stage while Malayalam, Kannada, Marathi, Yash Tamrakar, Namita Chandrakar, Asif Iqbal
Telugu and Oriya are progressing steadily. We and Anthony Sebastian make up the team.
now have Linux bootable CDs that boot into the The team is currently working on Hindi
language chosen.” alone, and the translation is almost done
Volunteers sign up for translation in their except for error messages and working on
spare time. Hariharan says, “For open source, it translating all Unicode-based software such as
is very critical to have volunteers. But, before Skype and Phpbb.
allocating them any work, we look at their What was the reason for translating
enthusiasm, commitment and available spare Mozilla into Hindi? Pankaj says, “In order to
time. We also have collegians volunteering increase the utility of the Internet it is impor-
with us.” Localisation is a global movement tant to make it easy. We wanted a safe and
and Indians are getting involved in translating standard Web browser. We had used Mozilla
software into regional languages. earlier; our search for the ultimate Web
browser ended with it. Today, some cybercafés
The Main Man are successfully using the Hindi version
A team spread across the country is difficult to of Mozilla.”
manage. Nevertheless, the work on the Linux
front has been well coordinated and is nearing The Market
completion. Ravishankar Shrivastava, one of Indians normally converse with each other in
the main volunteers, has been instrumental in their local languages. A reduction in the prices
the Hindi translation of KDE 3.2, GNOME 2.8 of computers has made them more accessible
and GAIM. to the masses. Hariharan concurs, “One-tenth
Shrivastava was technocrat with the of the world’s technological development
Madhya Pradesh State Electricity Board (MPSEB) Write In occurs in India and yet most Indians do not
who voluntarily retired in order to dedicate take advantage of that. It is ironical that we
more time to the translation effort, Shrivastav Done something just develop a lot of software for export purposes
has translated more than 80 per cent of as geeky? and our own people are left with nothing.”
GNOME 2.8, 90 per cent of KDE 3.2 and all of Tell us about it. True as this is, the exercise is far from over. As
GAIM—by himself! Write to editor@ Robert Frost would say, “…and miles to go before
“I was very fascinated by computers and thinkdigit.com I sleep…” is the status of this endeavour.
have also been writing for the past ten years. preethi_ [email protected]

46 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Passion l Icons of Trust

48 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Passion l Icons of Trust

In its second year, the Digit ‘Icons of Trust’

attempts to quantify and rate customer service in
India from IT product companies and the results are
a revelation, to say the least

Team Digit

T
here is this real-life story about customer care in Rhonda
Abrams’ groundbreaking management case study book
Wear Clean Underwear: Business Wisdom From Mom. The story
is about a woman who was using a set of car tyres, and
later found them to be faulty. She took the set of tyres,
and stormed into Nordstrom, a fashion retail chain in the US,
demanding a refund. The clerk at Nordstrom could have refused her
the refund, saying she never bought the tyres there. Instead, he
spoke to the higher-ups, got an approval, and refunded the customer
the entire money spent on the tyres.
This may be a small event in the history of a multi-billion dollar
company that has over 400 stores. But, it is not about the money
they lost that day. It is about a lifelong customer they acquired
thanks to their customer-friendly outlook.
Not surprisingly, Nordstrom has been consistently rated as a
world leader in customer satisfaction, an aspect of business most
often ignored in companies in India and across the world.
Customer satisfaction is a feeling tough to judge. How do you put
a figure to a smile on your face? How do you rate an emotion that
makes you share your acquisition with others? How do you retain a
customer for life, and if he does come back to you again and again,
what makes him do so?
With its groundbreaking survey ‘Icons of Trust’, which it insti-
tuted last year, Digit has been trying to understand just that. It is a
survey of perceptions; perceptions that are based upon experience
once the product is bought.
This year, Digit polled more than 3,000 users of technology across
the country in 14 product categories. In an exercise that went on for
more than 45 days, rigorous online as well as telephone polling by
Team Digit gathered more than 11,000 records.
While some of the results were expected, there were some
surprises in store.
The multimedia team managed the online data and Digit’s call
centre undertook the task of calling up hundreds of readers from
its database. What followed was nothing short of a revelation.
Digit’s brand head Prashant Narekuli then crunched the data
into understandable formulas, and then easy-to-refer-to results. As
the complete picture began to emerge, there was an understanding
nod whenever an expected company won. And when a dark horse
breasted the tape first though there was anothers reaction. This
time it was: “Wow, but I never imagined buyers trusted this
company.” Guess what—we had to humbly bow to the reality of the
market. It is only real experience that defines perception.
More than anything else, the Digit ‘Icons of Trust’ results have
been enlightening. From the survey, IT product organisations in
India will figure what makes them good and what makes them
mediocre in the customer’s mind. And buyers will know what prod-
ucts they can bet their money on.

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 49

 Digital Tools l Icons of Trust

CRT Monitors Samsung

Service staffs are rated as
Samsung The Top Three
W arding off the threat posed
by LCD monitors, CRT moni-
tors scored the second-best in
does very
being decent, and unresolved
problems are a low fraction of the
complaints. However, in line with
Samsung 8.18
well on HP 8.12
terms of reliability and service most other categories, the aver-
among all desktop PC compo-
reliability age repair turnaround time LG 8.11
nents. Owned for an average of perception remains at a high two weeks.
about 2.7 years, these workhorses but fails to Samsung does very well on Repurchase Index (%)
are the least likely to spring match that reliability perception, but fails to LG 76
unpleasant surprises out of the with service match that with service, where
box; are the least likely to require HP walks away with top honours.
Samsung 75
major servicing or repair, and in Philips 72
general, are hardly any trouble to
their owners.
Tushar Dhruv from Kolkata is
a typical happy owner. He says, “I
have been using a Samsung CRT
monitor for the last four years. It Satisfaction Index Reliability Index Overall
offers good clarity as well as
stability. I will buy from Samsung
again depending on price and
whether I can get a better deal
elsewhere.”
That only five per cent owners
need the services of repairmen in
two years reflects the technologi-
cal maturity of CRT Monitors.

Assembled & HP
Desktop PCs
The Top Three
Assembled
Others
7.72
7.44
O ne in 20 new PCs developed
problems within the first
week of purchase, and if you have
Every tenth
PC owner
in our survey also scores the
lowest on perceived reliability.
Of course, there are exceptions:
owned a computer for two or
had Ashish Choksi says, “My HP desktop
HP 7.34 unresolved
more years, you are almost PC is still with me after seven years.
certain to have had it repaired at problems I have not faced any problems as
Repurchase Index (%)
least once. With survey-leading while under yet. I am totally satisfied.”
Assembled 70 average ownership duration of Even more amazing are testa-
warranty
Others 70 2.75 years, it means a lot of people ments from assembled PC owners
fall in this unfortunate bracket. like Rajendra Prasad, whose five-
HP 70
Unfortunately, Indian brands year-old PC has served him well:
lead on the unpleasant first-week “The performance is pretty good
experience with one in six HCL PCs except that it hangs occasionally.”
and one in 10 Zenith PCs failing It is unfortunate that for this
within the first week. No surprise critical and complex device, the
then that the most complex device service levels are the poorest in the
survey. Every tenth PC owner had
Satisfaction Index Reliability Index Overall unresolved problems while under
warranty, and HCL owners seem to
be the unluckiest with as many as
one in five not being fixed.
PC assemblers do a little better
on this than the industry average,
but not by much. Combine this
with unhelpful support staff and
you have all the reasons why
desktop PCs tie for the bottom
place in service satisfaction too.

50 DIGIT JANUARY 2005

 Digital Passion l Icons of Trust

Our Methodology
T he ‘Icons of Trust’ survey inter-
views were conducted online
(through thinkdigit.com) and tele-
means: by replying to an insert in
Digit magazine, or by responding
to an e-mail request to take the
Category-wise Weightages
Reliability Index Satisfaction Index
phonically. The research sample survey. Both methods were Desktop PC 50 50
was taken from the existing reader tagged with a unique numerical Laptop 60 40
base of Digit, where 2,123 respon- identifier. A respondent would Inkjet Printer 50 50
dents were interviewed. Respon- log on to the survey page using
Laser Printer 50 50
dents shared gave their this number, and once logged off,
experiences with about 5.4 prod- the identifier would expire. This Scanner 50 50
ucts on an average. To maintain a ensured that there was no dupli- CRT Monitor 55 45
homogenous mix of respondents, cation in responses. HDD 70 30
people from over 100 cities were All respondents were asked Optical Disk Drives 50 50
chosen to get experiences over the specific questions to gauge their
Cell Phone 60 40
entire geography of India. experiences on Reliability and
Readers were invited to offer Service satisfaction with a Home theatre 50 50
their feedback through two specific product. PC Speakers 50 50
UPS 60 40
Reliability Satisfaction Digicam 50 50
Portable MP3 Player 50 50

How Was Service

18% Satisfaction Measured?
30% 23%
35% The total response sample was
2,123, based on which a statisti-
cal analysis was conducted to
8% determine, amongst other
30%
things, the Reliability and
15% 8%
20% Service indices. To understand
13% the importance given to each
question, refer the accompany-
ing pie-charts.
From the Reliability Index
Unit developed problems within a Unresolved problems during warranty and Service Index, an Overall
week of purchase Satisfaction Grade (OSG) was
Satisfied with the service
Satisfaction with the unit's reliability
generated for the categories. The
Average time taken to solve the grade was meant to indicate
Unit needed major repairs/ problem quickly how a particular company fared
replacement from the time it was overall, taking reliability and
Knowledge of tech support provider
purchased service into consideration,
Assistance provided by tech support within a sub-category.
Product needed to be repaired or
replaced in the last two years Assistance provided by non-tech To do so, the indices in ques-
support tion were averaged with a weigh-
tage in mind: both the Reliability

Cut Out The Middleman

regional volume partner, who will then send the

T he minimum average time to fix a problem is 6.5 days!

Most companies we spoke to claimed service turnaround
times of 48 to 72 hours, even in cases where our readers
replacement back down the same route.
Zenith’s (average turnaround time: 22 days) Devita Saraf
says that customers across the country send in computers to
reported an average of three weeks for the same. The the retailer for servicing, who must then ship it to the
common story we heard across companies with good service central service station in Navi Mumbai. While the actual
or bad, is that while they have complete control over the servicing takes 48 hours, depending on the choice of
turnaround time within their service network, it’s the transit delivery method, the transit time could be anything from 48
time that turns their speedy service to the time consuming hours to a week. They claim to do much better on Enterprise
affair it seems to be. services, though, where they handle the service directly
Liteon (average turnaround time: 17 days), for example, rather than through retailers.
claim to offer replacement of their drives for any genuine The lesson is simple. If you could take a manufacturer’s
problem, within two hours. The catch is that you must take word, you should forget your assembler/retailer and go
the damaged drive to one of their 23 volume partners across direct. Call them on their customer support or sales
India. If you take it to your local retailer, it must be passed numbers and learn about your service options. Do let us
up the chain to the distributor who then forwards it to the know next year whether that works.

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 59

 Digital Passion l Icons of Trust

Service That Works 100 cities were chosen to get

experiences over the entire geog-

W e spoke with manufacturers about their service networks in an

attempt to correlate their service scores with what they do on
the ground. Companies with well-trained call centre personnel were
raphy of India.
Readers were invited to offer
their feedback through two
appreciated by consumers, and Samsung even managed an upset in means: by replying to an insert
the service score for hard disk drives solely on the basis of their in Digit magazine, or by
customer support staff being liked better. responding to an e-mail request
Common sense would say that the closer the service centre is to to take the survey. Both meth-
the customer, the better the service would be. That is generally true. ods were tagged with a unique
All vendors have a central clearing house for service that, at the numerical identifier. A respon-
minimum, handles the database and has a major repair centre. For dent would log on to the survey
companies such as Zenith, no hardware repair is done anywhere page using this number, and
else. Retailers may only attempt to fix software issues. So whether once logged off, the identifier
the problem has a 15-minute resolution time or requires chip-level would expire. This ensured that
repair, it must be shipped to Navi Mumbai. Most retailers choose to
use cheaper, slower methods resulting in long wait times for the The Repurchase Index

T
owner—on an average, 22 days. hroughout this survey,
Rashi Peripherals, on the other hand, leverages their 28 service an important factor, the
centres in India to better effect, resolving simpler problems in their Repurchase Index, has
regional centres closest to the customer. This results in Sony optical been put forth for all manu-
disk drives being serviced in 11 days on the average. facturers in all categories.
This Index tells us how
many existing users of a
particular brand would buy

T he ‘Icons of Trust’ survey

interviews were conducted
online (through thinkdigit.com)
2,123 respondents were inter-
viewed. Respondents shared gave
their experiences with about 5.4
from the vendor again. This
is a percentage of the users
we polled for the survey.
and telephonically. The research products on an average. To main-
sample was taken from the exist- tain a homogenous mix of
ing reader base of Digit, where respondents, people from over

60 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Passion l Icons of Trust

Digital Cameras Canon

The Top Three
P hotography on the whole is a
small industry in India, and
digital photography is an even
Kodak,
Nikon,
Such minor niggles, though,
can put off users for good…The
traditionally strong Nikon,
Canon 8.55
Olympus and Sony 8.31
smaller one. While most manu- though, still has its loyalists and
facturers never had extensive Canon are these guys wouldn’t give up their Olympus 8.22
service networks in the conven- found to be Nikon for anything else. Nikon
tional photography era (yes, it’s in traditional rated the highest on the Repur- Repurchase Index (%)
the past), the need for such a favourites chase Index with almost 88 per Nikon 88
network is a must today. cent of its polled users wishing to
Canon 80
Kodak, Nikon, Olympus and buy another Nikon camera. If
Canon have been the traditional only Nikon could spruce up their Olympus 79
favourites as far as cameras go. service network now.
When it came to satisfaction,
Canon was way ahead of the
competition. Canon has made big
efforts in setting up a service
network and is also churning out Satisfaction Index Reliability Index Overall
cameras ‘Made for India’. No
wonder then, with all its efforts,
that Canon wins in the category.
Canon user Dr Tejinder Singh,
Ludhiana, says, “I have been using
it for a year-and-a-half and find it
pretty good. The only hitch is that
the battery drains fast. I would
buy from Canon again only if they
rectify the battery problem.”

Samsung
Hard Disk Drives
The Top Three
The Hard
Samsung
Others
8.28
8.27
“I bought a Maxtor HDD a
month ago as they claim
good after-sales support. But, I do
Disk Drive is
replacement over a two-year
period. This is the highest failure
rate of any single component
the most
Seagate 8.21 hope I am never in need of it!” critical and category in the survey, matching
Tejas Walke puts words to the that of the much more complex
hopes of every computer owner. irreplaceable desktop PC. Please back up your
Repurchase Index (%) component
The Hard Disk Drive is the data right away!
Samsung 77 most critical and irreplaceable of your Seagate and Samsung are by
Seagate 74 component of your computer. computer far the dominant manufacturers
Every other component can be in this segment, sewing up 90 per
Others 57
safely replaced, but the data lost cent of the responses between
to a hard disk crash can be crip- them. Both of them also have
pling. This makes the high failure higher rates of failure than the
rate of HDDs doubly disturbing. average of the other brands,
On an average, one in eight making them both a riskier
HDDs requires major repair or choice than most other brands.
Samsung drives have a
Satisfaction Index Reliability Index Overall slightly higher chance of crash-
ing, but have fewer repeat prob-
lems than Seagate drives, giving
them better perceived reliability.
Seagate takes seven days to repair
your drive and Samsung takes
twice as long—but gets top
honours in service with more
helpful support personnel.

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 51

 Digital Passion l Icons of Trust

Home Theatres Sony

The Top Three
T his was perhaps never a doubt.
Sony with its Wega line has
already established a benchmark
Sony has set
a benchmark
resolve product reliability issues
quickly if they want to seriously
compete with Sony and Philips.
Sony 8.42
for the Philips 8.15
for the industry to catch up with. India also has a large percentage
Philips is possibly the only other industry of users who assemble their own Others 8.13
real competitor thanks to the new with its home theatre systems, and this
products that are customised for Wega line of group seems fairly satisfied with Repurchase Index (%)
the Indian viewer and his pocket. products their achievements! They also Sony 82
Sony, though, is in a league by plan on staying loyal to their
Others 75
itself, with a strong after-sales unbranded or local compilations.
network, and way ahead of the Sony users we polled, seemed Philips 73
rest in terms of reliability and to have received exemplary serv-
satisfaction. In fact, a very large ice; no one had any issues that
number of existing users would were yet to be resolved during the
prefer to buy another Sony home warranty period.
theatre product and not migrate.
Parimal Patel from Gujarat Satisfaction Index Reliability Index Overall
has a Philips home theatre system
but is not sure if she will buy
from the company again. “I have
been using it for almost three
months. Though I am satisfied
with the product and there have
been no problems till date, I am
not sure whether I would buy
from them again.”
Samsung and Akai need to

Canon
Inkjet Printers
Canon, HP
The Top Three
Canon 7.93 A lmost every home computer
today connects to an inkjet
printer. Over the last few years,
and Epson
segment. Canon has once again
played the ‘catch up’ game to
perfection, chasing down HP and
are the
HP 7.92 inkjet printers have been posi- in fact, going ahead in some cases.
tioned (by all manufacturers) as
undisputed While Canon printers were
Epson 7.62 top three in
the solution to home printing, be found to be more reliable, HP
it for documents or photographs. this segment users were more satisfied with
Repurchase Value
The result of this has been a their printers. In the end, HP’s
HP 75 massive rise in sales and a subse- track record and longer presence
Canon 67 quent fall in prices of inkjet print- in the Indian market was not
Epson 65 ers. The battle for market share enough to keep them ahead.
and desk space from then on was However, HP’s Repurchase
going to be based on availability, Index was much better than
prices of peripherals, and quality Canon’s, despite the higher cost of
of service offered by the peripherals and service.
manufacturer. “I have been using both HP
Canon, HP and Epson are the and Canon printers for almost a
undisputed top three in this year. Though the performance of
both is satisfactory, HP’s service is
Satisfaction Index Reliability Index Overall better. I will not opt for an inkjet
printer in the future because my
work demands that I have a laser
printer, which I do not mind
buying from either company,” says
Jasrir Luthra from New Delhi,
aptly summing up the category.

52 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Passion l Icons of Trust

Laptops HP
The Top Three
F or long an aspiration product
limited to top execs, laptops
are now—rightfully, we may add—
HP builds
on its
seen favourable response from
users. Jeet Sharma, a network
administrator from New Delhi
HP 8.28
reputation Dell 8.07
everyone’s choice for a computer. and a Dell user, says, “I started
With prices falling steadily, it is and emerges using the Dell laptop just six Acer 8.03
just a matter of time before they the clear months back and it seems reli-
cost only as much as a desktop. winner able. I am satisfied with its Repurchase Value
India, though, poses unique performance so far.” Dell 92
challenges for manufacturers, A whopping 92 per cent of
and as is the case with any other Dell users said they would buy
Acer 78
product, a formula for success in another laptop from Dell, HP 77
another country may not neces- whereas this number was 77 and
sarily work here. 76 per cent respectively for HP
HP builds on its reputation and IBM. That itself speaks
earned in other segments and volumes about the service and
emerges the clear winner. reliability of these products.
Although more users of Dell
laptops said they would stick to
their brand, HP had no competi-
tion on the reliability and satis- Satisfaction Index Reliability Index Overall
faction fronts. Emerging the
winner on almost all counts, HP
replaces Toshiba at the top.
Toshiba, in fact, takes a major
fall this year, since users seem
displeased with the service, and
are the most dissatisfied lot
amongst laptop users.
Dell and IBM seem to have
put their act together and have

HP
Laser Printers
The Top Three
HP
Samsung
7.87
7.80
L aser printers have a long way
to go for the retail individual
and small business market, both
When it
comes to
reliable results, and HP clearly
dominates with a huge lead. HP
printers are also more reliable
in terms of quality as well as
fixing than those from Samsung,
Others 7.02
usage. This category turned in the problems, coming up with half of
Repurchase Index (%) highest rate of first-week prob- Samsung Samsung’s reported failure rate
lems across the survey, matching and HP have on all counts. Strangely, this is
HP 85 those of the desktop PC. The combined with a higher
similar
SAMSUNG 70 number of respondents owning perceived reliability score from
laser printers is less than a fifth
turnaround Samsung owners.
OTHERS 50 times
of the number that own inkjets. When it comes to fixing prob-
HP and Samsung are the only lems, Samsung and HP have simi-
manufacturers who show up in lar turnaround times. As in the
sufficient numbers to produce HDD category, Samsung’s slightly
higher unresolved problem rate
Satisfaction Index Reliability Index Overall is eclipsed by its better trained
support personnel, giving them
the lead in service. However, this
time the difference is not enough
to displace HP from the throne.

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 53

 Digital Passion l Icons of Trust

Mobile Phones Nokia

The Top Three
S ince the advent of mobile
telephony in India, cell phones
have been equated with Nokia.
The fact that
Sony
ment. I will buy from a company
that offers a profitable package for
me,” says Krishna Rath, a program-
Nokia 8.26
Ericsson has Sony Ericsson 8.24
Often referred to as the ideal mer from Trivandrum.
phone for India, they arguably come so Nokia maintains most of its Samsung 8.13
have the most user-friendly inter- close to followers, though. “I have been
face and rugged build quality to Nokia in using a Nokia for two months, and Repurchase Index (%)
suit Indian needs. I can confidently say that the prod- Nokia 78
such a short
Sony Ericsson, a close second, ucts and the company are
is perhaps still lacking in this time is extremely reliable,” says Girish Sony Ericsson 67
respect, but has taken a huge step testament Rupchandani, a student from Samsung 65
forward in reliability, almost to its Mumbai.
matching Nokia’s rating. On the commitment With over three quarters of
satisfaction front, Nokia was a polled respondents for Nokia
to the Indian
clear winner, and it is no surprise saying they would buy Nokia
that it continues to be Numero Uno market again, competition will have to
in India. play hard to garner market share!
The fact that Sony Ericsson has
come so close to Nokia in such a Satisfaction Index Reliability Index Overall
short time is testament to its
commitment to the Indian market
and the resources it has pumped
into this market.
“I have been using a Sony Eric-
sson model for six months now. I
had a Nokia earlier, but moved to
Sony Ericsson as there were more
features with a lower price tag, and
also because I wanted to experi-

Sony MP3 Players

The Top Three
Sony
Philips
8.19
7.96
S ony, Creative, Philips and Pana-
sonic are among the most
popular MP3 players. With the
Sony lords
over the
them as they slip from the top
spot they enjoyed last year.
Beating Philips in MP3 players
iPod just starting to catch up, this competition is one thing, but keeping Apple
Panasonic 7.78
comes as no surprise. As with and has the and their iPod at bay will be quite
Repurchase Index (%) home theatres, Sony lords over most reliable another. While ratings for Sony
the competition and has the most products were very impressive—especially
Philips 92 reliable products. Creative, on the in the Reliability Index—it will
Creative 90 other hand, does not enjoy such need to spruce up service if they
Sony 77 a favourable response. are to truly ward off the iPod
This category also sees Philips threat. With Apple on the verge
as a close second behind Sony, of taking off in the Indian
and with the most satisfactory market, next year’s results might
service, improving its loyalty base. well paint a different picture
This, however, is a poor result for altogether. Service and reliabilty
can help Sony and Philips retain
Satisfaction Index Reliability Index Overall their customer base.
Hybrid devices like cell
phones with extended capabili-
ties are the new threat to MP3
players. Says Ajay Mahajan from
Jammu & Kashmir, “I am using a
Compaq MP3 player for two years
without problems. It is definitely
reliable. But recently, I also got a
Sony Ericsson P910, which has an
inbuilt MP3 player.”

54 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Passion l Icons of Trust

Optical Disk Drives Sony

Sony tops in The Top Three
T he laser of your PC, the light of
your data, Optical Disk Drives
are often also the noise of your
reliability as
repair, Samsung saw a whopping
14 per cent of their drives go back
for servicing. They also scored the
Sony 8.06
well as Liteon 8.01
cabinet, the ‘drive not ready’ of poorest in every other reliability
your Explorer. ODD standards are service, parameter, coming in at the Asus 8.01
going through a transition the followed bottom of the qualifying brands.
world over, and in India, last year closely by Asus and Sony excelled at serv- Repurchase Index (%)
was clearly when CD-Writers Liteon ice, with the lowest rate of unre- LG 74
replaced the read-only drives of solved problems, and they also
yesteryear. Unfortunately, vari- had the quickest turnaround Liteon 73
able CD-Writer quality, plus the times, indicating a solid support Sony 73
delicate sensitivity of the media, network. Samsung, on the other
ensure that reading CDs is often a hand, with the largest rate of
hit-and-miss affair. unresolved problems and a two-
Kartik Vithalani, who uses and-a-half-week turnaround time,
Samsung products, says, “I have was the poorest at service.
been using the DVD-R for six
months and the CD-RW for two
years. No problems so far.” Satisfaction Index Reliability Index Overall
Sony tops in reliability,
followed closely by Liteon.
Samsung drives have the highest
number of responses this year,
accounting for over 40 per cent of
the overall. They were also the
worst of the lot.
While four per cent of Sony
and five per cent of Liteon drives
required replacement or major

Creative PC Speakers
The Top Three
Creative
Intex
8.24
8.11
W hile they may not be as
important as your monitor
for ‘real’ computer tasks, they are
Brand
loyalty is not
seven years. Though there have
been no problems, I feel Samsung
has better sound quality than
quite the indispensable add-on very high, Intex. In the future, I will not buy
Philips 8.08
these days. Despite the enormous with a multi- from either company and go for
Repurchase Index (%)
range of variation in sound qual- tude of Creative as I have heard it offers
ity, affordable speakers are now affordable quality sound.”
Creative 87 good enough to serve adequately Being the relatively simple
speaker
Intex 71 for occasional MP3 playback. devices that they are, it is hardly
Brand loyalty is not very high vendors a surprise to see that PC speakers
Altec Lansing 71 vying for
though, with a multitude of have the lowest chances of early
affordable speaker vendors vying your money failure with an industry average
for your money. of just one per cent, and the
Anurag Nagpal from Haryana lowest rate of failure with fewer
says, “I have been using Intex for than two per cent needing servic-
ing in two years.
Satisfaction Index Reliability Index Overall Creative and Mercury have
the lowest failure rates at two per
cent. Intex and Altec Lansing
share the highest rates of failure
at over 11 per cent, but curiously,
complement this by doing very
well on service, posting the high-
est scores in this category.

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 55

 Digital Passion l Icons of Trust

Scanners Canon
A third of HP The Top Three
T here was a time when a scan-
ner had to be from Umax. But
the widespread networks—sales
users said
improves its products with
advanced technology, I might buy
from them again.”
Canon 8.02
they would HP 7.95
and service—of manufacturers On the other hand, Nitin
such as Canon and HP seem to buy another Baria from Jammu & Kashmir Others 7.93
have had a swaying effect on HP scanner says, “Even after a year, my HP
buyers. While users of HP scan- scanner has no problems and is Repurchase Index (%)
ners had fewer problems and saw dependable.” HP 74
their problems being resolved The difference here is that
sooner, users of Canon scanners Swapnil uses an MFD while Nitin
Others 73
were more satisfied with the has a standalone scanner. HPs BenQ 71
quality of service. A third of HP loss, it would seem, is Canon’s
users said they would buy gain!
another HP scanner; this number
was about 66 per cent in the case
of Canon.
Increasingly, scanners are Satisfaction Index Reliability Index Overall
being built into multifunction
devices, and this seems to be the
root of any displeasure. Says
Swapnil Hoderkar from Pune, “I
am not pleased with the HP scan-
ner that I bought six months ago.
I expected its performance to be
much better—it is slow and the
quality of the work at the end is
not impressive. However, if HP

APC UPS
The Top Three
Overall, the
APC
Others
8.17
7.398
M ost of you do not use an Unin-
terruptible Power Supply
(UPS) at all. Either our State Elec-
reliability of
install-and-forget manner, but it
demands more attention.
Rajwinder Singh, a disap-
UPSes is,
Microtek 7.93 tricity Boards are doing great at
surprisingly,
pointed owner of a Shark UPS,
inspiring such confidence, or UPS says, “I have had it with me for
Repurchase Index (%) providers are not doing enough to only a little three years but had to replace it
APC 77 explain why a UPS is essential. better than twice in that period. Though the
This is the most fragmented that of company’s service is good, I do not
Microtek 70 market of all the categories here. find it reliable.”
desktop PCs
Others 65 Only two brands, APC and Every eighth APC device, for
Microtek, garnered enough votes example, needs to be sent for
to generate useful numbers. significant repair in a two-year
Overall, the reliability of UPSes span, but they fail the least often
is, surprisingly, only a little better and have the shortest response
than that of desktop PCs. You time of 10 days, a week less than
might expect a relatively simple the industry average.
device such as this to work in an For a critical power condition-
ing function to be unavailable for
Satisfaction Index Reliability Index Overall a period of 10 days to a month is
quite a risk for your computer.
With such low service levels and a
wide choice, it is not surprising
that over 30 per cent of owners
want to sample other brands. But,
given the abysmal industry-wide
performance, it may be a futile
search.

58 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Jumpstart

Digital

66OfandMotherboards Home is where

Processors 94 your skill set 96 the money is
Upgrade
Tools
Technology For Personal And SoHo Productivity

Jumpstart

Your Learning
Your Medium
Forget blackboards, chalk and textbooks... CD-ROMs are now de rigeur at Agamaa Virtual Classes

learning at her local coaching Welcome to a whole new teach-

Preethi Chamikutty class. What made this happen? ing paradigm!
Mumbai’s Agamaa Coaching Agamaa Virtual Classes is an
he last time Snehal Gaik- Classes, better known as Agamaa offspring of Chetana Publica-
T wad was interested in the
past was when she
Virtual Classes, uses interactive
CD-ROMs as a teaching tool, a
tions, a Mumbai-based publish-
ing house that specialises in
watched a historical at the local move that has made students as textbooks, and teaching guides.
cinema or on satellite television. excited as the teachers who teach At the classes, however, students
Her latest screen, however, is the various subjects. learn not by rote, but by associ-
something she will never Snehal says, “I like history ating images and sounds to the
forget—the white board at her lectures the best because we see words they read in their text-
coaching class. movie clips about various events. books and teaching guides.
This 15-year-old Standard X This helps me understand the Chetana’s already-existing data-
student of Mumbai’s St Columbia event better and is easier to revise base of computer books and
High School actually is excited at during exams.” related tools allows Agamaa to

Imaging: Shyam Shriram

 Digital Tools l Jumpstart
in helping students perform
better in examinations.”

It’s Got The Look!

Every Agamaa classroom has a
uniform look. Projectors, a Pro
Dolby sound system, collar micro-
phones and other necessary tools
comprise a classroom. Currently,
courses are conducted for classes
(Left) Learning Hindi the
IX and X.
cool way—at Agamaa
(Top) One of the tools
being used to impart We The Students
Photograph Mexy Xavier

training—a projector Purav Gindra of Mumbai’s St

Sebastian Goan High School was
introduced to Agamaa by his
cousin, a former student. Gindra,
a Standard X student, is part of
the vacation-cum-regular batch of
make use of film clips, anima- made available to be taken home. Agamaa, has opted for all the
tion, sound effects and 3D graph- However, this way, students could subjects they offer. “The audio-
ics to explain and narrate course not interact with teachers. visual interface is a great idea,” he
material. There are, of course, Agamaa devised virtual classes to says. “We see images and movie
textbooks and teachers, but bridge this gap. clips of our learning material, and
instead of just talk, there are this leaves a lasting impression on
interactive sessions supported by The Medium our minds. It is easier to recall
audio-visual representations of In an education system rife with during exams.”
textbook content. teachers, students and parents Snehal agrees. “The CD-ROMs
who believe in learning by rote, help me learn better. It is easier to
First Off The Block Agamaa has created a new niche. revise during exams,” she says.
Says Rakesh Rambhia, director, Fifty of its more than 1,600 All this, though, comes at a
Chetana Publications: “Initially, students spread across various cost. The fee for the class IX
we only had CDs containing branches in Maharashtra have course is Rs 12,000, while the
courseware, which were made now shifted over to the the CD- class X course costs Rs 18,000 for
available to students who wanted ROM way of learning. all subjects.
to avoid going to coaching classes. Says Rambhia, “Audio-visual
However, after interacting with communication is a powerful Business Prospects
students and getting feedback tool to influence the attitude, Rambhia feels this new way of
from parents and students alike, behaviour, approach, personality learning makes for good busi-
we decided to start this venture.” and thinking of an individual. ness sense. “At present, we only
Agamaa then took its CDs to Experts believe that this have classes IX and X, but from
schools and demonstrated the medium, if used to impart educa- next year we plan to expand it to
courseware. Initially, CDs were tion, could prove quite effective Standard VIII and XI as well,”
he says.
K-Yan—The Community Learning Tool For infrastructure, Agamaa
invested close to Rs 10 lakh at each

K -Yan was developed by financial

corporation Infrastructure Leasing and
Financial Services’ (IL&FS)
Some schools that currently deploy K-Yan
include Garden City College, Bangalore;
Tagore International EOK, New
of its centres and the software
development cost approximately
Rs two crore.
Education and Technology Delhi; Oakridge International
Services (ETS) at its ‘Compact School, Hyderabad; St The Competition Hots Up
Media Centre’. Built in Xavier’s College, Kolkata; Even if Agamaa made it first,
collaboration with IIT Cathedral Junior School, Navneet, another giant in the
Mumbai, K-Yan is a low-cost Mumbai; and private education sector, has
new-media product for J N Petit School, Mumbai. introduced Top Scorer Digest
community learning. Plus—a self-learning preparatory
K-Yan combines a K-Yan provides tool in CD-ROM format.
multimedia PC, a large format TV, a A Pentium 4 processor Retaining children’s atten-
DVD player, a CD writer, an LCD projector, DVD/VCD/ACD/MP3 facility tion span has always been a chal-
Internet surfing, video conferencing, and an A CD-Writer lenge. No matter how good the
AV studio system, in a single, compact unit An audio amplifier and inbuilt speakers teacher is, he or she can never
that can be operated from a single remote Large data storage facility (120 GB) and enact a historic event, or show
control-cum-mouse unit for changing from 512 MB of RAM the movement of a spirogyra on
TV to DVD, or operating the PC. It can also Internet connectivity a blackboard!
be loaded with teaching aids that help TV cable connectivity The teacher’s role may never
enhance classroom teaching, facilitate the An 1,800-lumen LCD projection system go out of fashion, but teaching
learning process and help students which can project images up to 25” x 12” tools could soon witness a
understand better. Plug-and-play capability sea-change.
[email protected]

64 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Imaging Jayan K Narayanan Photograph Mexy Xavier

66 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Test Centre

FUTURE
PERFECT
The complete guide to choosing the best platform that is easy on the
wallet, and will last you for years

Sanket Naik and Jayesh Limaye nVidia and ATi were the first to launch prod-
ucts for the new bus, and the rest of the

E
volution on Earth is a lethargic industry will follow soon.
process. Events in the PC market AMD, after the introduction of their
follow a similar timeline, with Athlon 64 processors, are riding the waves
innovations moving the industry of success. Not only are their CPUs currently
at a leisurely pace. It is thus quite at the top of the speed chart, but they have
a sight to witness the barren lands of the managed to rein in the heating issues that
PC—wrecked by bandwidth limitations and plagued them.
littered with GHz myths—sprouting next- While Intel’s product portfolio is
generation technologies that promise to focused and simple to understand, AMD’s is
turn the desert into thriving wetlands. Sleek a complete mess. The Athlon 64 processors
and efficient dual-core processors replacing are currently available in two different
fire-breathing, single-core GHz monsters is socket versions: Socket 939 and Socket 754.
a good thing. Bottlenecks are, similarly, The Athlon XP range of processors recently
being eradicated by the replacing of parallel got a replacement in the form of Sempron.
connectors with serial ones—witness the While that was on the processor side,
PCI-Express bus and SATA hard disks. the number of chipsets available for an AMD
Graphics cards now sport CPU-like proces- processor is numerous, and deciding upon
sors which will soon be better utilised by one is not an easy task. This will be handled
operating systems across the board, later on in this article when we look at
bringing performance and usability to an motherboards from different manufac-
ageing GUI. turers sporting various chipsets.
The PC industry is shifting gears, and We often receive letters asking what
not a moment too soon. This change in pace kind of machine will be decent enough to
brings along new jargon to sift through. play most of today’s games, will offer a fair
New chipsets, new processor roadmaps, new amount of upgradeability, and most impor-
memory technologies and the like take on tantly, will be easy enough on the wallet.
greater significance. Change brings along Since processors and motherboards are the
confusion; our first task here will be to shed two most crucial components that decide
light on the scene. the overall performance of a system, while
Our goal here is not to choose the best dictating the headroom for future expan-
processor and the best motherboard. Rather, sion, we decided to do a CPU and mother-
it is to pick the best combination. We will board comparison test. This article will help
help you arrive at a system-wide solution—a you decide the right platform to upgrade to,
solution that will last you through a few or settle for, when buying a new PC.
years and that will not strain your pocket: Due to the aforementioned changes in
the conclusion to this test will thus choose technology, choices are many, and at this
a combination processor/motherboard that juncture choosing the right solution mat-
strikes the perfect balance between per- ters: one wrong turn and your upgrade
formance, features and price. options could hit a dead-end. So, as we com-
With that in mind, let us first take a pare the different processors and mother-
look at where things stand in the rival boards, we will also discuss the pros and
camps of industry movers Intel and AMD. cons of the respective chipsets and
Last year, Intel introduced its 915 and processor families.
925 chipsets alongside the new LGA 775 This article is broadly classified into
socket processors, which were meant to be two parts: processors and motherboards.
paired with these chipsets. The highlight of First, we take a look at the available
these chipsets was PCI-Express, offering sig- processors, and then benchmark them to
nificantly higher bandwidth than the cur- arrive at a winner. Similar treatment will
rent PCI bus (For a complete low-down on then be applied to motherboards. We will
PCI-Express, read our In Sight story on page 32). then pick the best combination of processor

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 67

 Digital Tools l Test Centre
and motherboard, offering you a of L3 cache and are manufactured (Land Grid Array) type of socket
complete solution. using the older 130nm process. is found on motherboards sup-
The new line of Pentium 4 proces- porting Intel’s new chipsets, i.e.,
A LOOK AT PROCESSORS sors based on the LGA 775 package the 915 and 925.
Before we get to the action, let us is denoted by a new nomenclature. On the Celeron front, too,
refresh our knowledge on the Instead of using the core speed as there are two versions; the older
types of processors available. the name, Intel calls this series the ones that run on a 400 MHz bus
5XX series, where the ‘XX’ ranges have 128 KB of L2 cache, and are
Intel Processors from 20 to 60. Processors that have manufactured using the 130nm
As of today, Intel has two lines of the ‘Execute disable bit’ capability process. The newer 90nm-manu-
processors, namely the Pentium have the letter ‘J’ following the 5XX factured Celeron processors are
4 series for performance seekers, number, an example being 560J. called Celeron D, and are denoted
and Celeron D for the value-end The older Pentium 4 proces- by 3XX series where the ‘XX’
of the market. The original Pen- sors required a Socket 478 moth- ranges from 15 to 40. The new
tium 4 processors were based on erboard, e.g. 845, 865, 875, Celeron D runs on a 533 MHz bus
the 130nm manufacturing chipset-based boards, whereas and features 256 KB of L2 cache.
process, featured 512 KB of L2 the newer ones will be produced Some models of the Celeron D are
cache and ran on a 533 MHz FSB. for the LGA 775 package. The LGA available for the LGA 775 sockets;
But today’s Pentium 4 is a dif- the rest use the older Socket 478.
ferent beast; it features 1 MB of
L2 cache, runs on an 800 MHz AMD Processors
FSB and is manufactured using AMD has the Athlon 64 and Sem-
the 90nm process. A still newer pron ranges of processors.
version expected soon will run Depending on the processor inter-
on a 1066 MHz bus. face, or the socket, the Athlon 64
There are also special-edition can be divided into two distinct
Pentium 4 processors called categories—one that uses Socket
‘Extreme Edition’, and denoted by The older FC-PGA 478 The new LGA 775 754 and the other that plugs into a
‘EE’. The EE processors have 2 MB interface interface Socket 939. 754-pin processors

How We Tested Processors

WinRAR 3.3
T his year, we revived our ‘Processor Test’ process with newer and
better benchmarks and testing procedures. All the new
benchmarks are highly processor-dependent, and the peripheral
WinRAR 3.3 offers an inbuilt benchmark, operating on random data,
which is processed in the memory. Since the data is operated on in
sub-system has a low level of involvement, which results in scores the memory, the results are free from any influence that a disk
that reflect the true potential of the processor’s computational system may impart.
power.
For Intel’s LGA 775 processors, we used Intel’s D952XCV CINEBENCH 2003
motherboard with 1 GB of DDR-II 533 MHZ memory, whereas for the CINEBENCH 2003 is the free benchmarking tool for Windows and
Socket 478 processors, we used Gigabyte’s 8TRS350MT Mac OS based on the 3D software CINEMA 4D R8. CINEBENCH 2003
motherboard with 1 GB of DDR 400 MHz Corsair memory. delivers accurate results by testing a processor’s raw processing
AMD’s Socket 939 processors were plugged onto an Asus A8V- speed which affects system performance such as OpenGL,
Deluxe, while Socket 754 processors went with MSI’s K8N Neo 2. multithreading and multiprocessing. Also, this benchmark gives a
Socket ‘A’ processors were tied with the ASUS A7N8X-Deluxe. clear view of Intel’s HT technology in operations, as it supports HT.
Windows XP with SP1 was freshly loaded on a Maxtor Diamond
Max 120 GB SATA drive. On the graphics front, we used Gigabyte’s SiSoft Sandra 2005
AGP card based on the nVidia GeForce 5700 chipset and MSI’s PCIe This is the same good old benchmarking tool with newer features
card based on nVidia’s GeForce 5750 chipset. and tests added to it. Nothing seems to have changed except for the
new user interface and the extra benchmarking tool for USB drives,
ScienceMark 2.0 cache memory and other parts. We logged scores particularly
ScienceMark 2.0, as the name suggests, is a benchmark based on related to the CPU, memory and disk drive.
scientific calculations. This benchmark constitutes multiple
benchmarks that test various aspects of a processor. We used the Doom 3
following benchmarking modules: Doom 3 is a graphically intensive game capable of making any
MolDyn (Molecular Dynamics): Molecular Dynamics simulates the machine crawl. This OpenGL game paints a good picture of what a
thermodynamic behaviour of materials using their forces, velocities, decent machine should consist of to run games of the future.
and positions, where force is the most important parameter.
Primordia (atoms): This code calculates the Quantum Mechanical Half-Life 2
Hartree-Fock orbitals for each electron in any element of the periodic This DirectX 9.0 game scales very well with processor speed.
table. The number crunching involved in the calculation is complex Moreover, any hardware which runs this game well will be
and stresses the FPU (Floating-Point Unit) of a processor. The final comfortable with upcoming game titles.
score is given as the time taken to complete the calculations.
Cipher Test: The ‘Cipher Test’ tests four different forms of encryption Ziff-Davis Multimedia Content Creation
algorithms, AES 128/256 bit and RSA 512/1024 bit. The calculations This benchmark suite runs applications related to processor-
involved are mathematically inclined, resulting in the stressing of the intensive multimedia applications such as Adobe Photoshop, Adobe
ALU (Arithmetic and Logic Unit) of the processor. Premier and WaveLab.

68 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Test Centre
have a single-channel, 64-bit 915P Neo 2 did well on the
memory controller, whereas the PCMark CPU score, it came as no
Socket 939 has a 128-bit, dual- surprise when the board offered
channel controller. The Hyper- thhhe board offert system hangs
Transport link—a serial bus linking and crashes are experienced.
components on an AMD mother-
board—on a 754-pin processor is Who’s The King?
capped at 1600 MHz, which is oth- Let’s get into the real compar-
erwise 2000 MHz for the 939-pin ison of the processors and see who
processor. The total processor-to- comes out tops. This comparison
system bandwidth on a 754-pin is included six processors from Intel,
limited to 9.6 GB/s, whereas it is ranging from clock speeds of 2.53
14.4 GB/s for 939s. In short, the 939- GHz to 3.6 GHz.
pin processors are geared for AMD provided us with 10
better performance than the 754s. processors, including the top-of-
The L2 cache size on the the-line FX-55, along with the
Athlon 64 processor varies entire Sempron range. We also
between 512 KB and 1 MB. Similar included the Athlon XP 3200+. It
to Intel’s ‘EE’ processors, AMD has should be noted that high-end
the Athlon 64 FX range, available processors such as the P4 3.4 GHz
only on a 939-pin package. EE, Athlon FX-55, Athlon FX-53,
Sempron processors are and the Athlon XP 3200+ are
meant to replace the older Athlon either too costly or are phased
XP range of processors. They are out, and hence are not part of this
available in two versions—one for comparison. We included them to
the 754 Socket and the other for bring better clarity to the results
the soon-to-retire Socket ‘A’. Why of the mid-range processors.
two versions? Let us take each benchmark and
dissect it to see which processor
fares well and why.

Content Creation 2004

This is a system benchmark,
and so, apart from raw processing
power, it also relies on other crit-
A 754-pin Sempron 3100+ and a Socket ical parameters such as I/O band-
‘A’ Sempron 2800+ width and memory bandwidth.
The Athlon64 3000+ was right on
Initially, AMD wanted to retire top, scoring 31.4, despite the 1.2
the Athlon XP range, but since the GHz advantage the Pentium 4 3.2
Socket ‘A’ platform provides the GHz Intel processor has.
most value, they thought it wise to The Athlon64 3000+ processor
postpone its death. Hence the has an on-die, dual-memory con-
release of Sempron for Socket ‘A’ troller, and hence, memory band-
motherboards. Moreover, to bring width is not an issue and stands at
some stability to their platforms, 8 GB/s. Intel’s 3.6 GHz also sup-
AMD identifies the Socket 754 as ports dual-channel, but its
the ideal platform for the near memory controller is part of the
future, and hence the release of Northbridge and provides a band-
the 754 package Sempron. width of 6.4 GB/s.
AMD processors of yesteryear When you look at the results,
were infamous for their heating the difference in performance,
problems, but this is no longer the though not significant at first
case. The
Athlon 64
hardly gets past
50 degrees Cel-
sius; in et, sug-
gesting a
CPU-memor y
link inferior to
t h e
Gigabyte board.
Half-Life 2
Half-Life 2
scales well
with processor
performance.
Since MSI’s

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 69

 Digital Tools l Test Centre
glance, becomes important despite their lower clock speeds,
when you factor in the 1.2 GHz were able to beat the Pentium 4 3
advantage the P4 enjoys. The GHz and 2.8 GHz quite easily. Both
reason for the Athlon 64 3000+ Intel processors are based on the
winning is the excellent band- Prescott core and feature
width and low latency offered by longer pipelines.
the HyperTransport bus used by
AMD processors. MolDyn
This analysis is further con- Here the results were pretty simi-
firmed when you compare the lar to the Primordia test, confirm-
older Athlon XP 3200+ and Sem- ing AMD’s superb data-crunching
pron 3100+. The Sempron 3100+ is strength relative to Intel’s new
a 754-pin processor running at 1.8 Prescott core. The higher-clocked
GHz and uses HyperTransport, Sempron processors beat the
whereas the XP 3200+ is a Socket Sempron 3100+ and Athlon 2800+.
‘A’ processor running at 2.2 GHz, The Celeron D trailed the
but the memory controller is part pipelines on the Prescott core are Sempron 3000+ by a hefty 55-sec-
of the Northbridge, a setup similar the reason for the performance ond margin.
to the one used by Intel. Thanks to hit: if your job involves number-
this, the Sempron 3100+ leads the crunching varied datasets, such as Cipher Test
Athlon XP 3200+. Note how the in the scientific calculations made This test is based on the AES block
2.53 GHz Celeron D was thrashed in this benchmark, processors cipher, formerly known as
by the Sempron 2400+ running at with shorter pipelines score over Rijndael. In this test, the results
1.63 GHz, underlining the ageing processors with high core speeds kept the status quo: the Athlon64
nature of the Celeron line-up. with long pipelines. (We have not 3000+ occupied the first position,
factored the Athlon XP 3200+ here while the 3.2 GHz Prescott came
ScienceMark 2.0 because this processor will no in at a respectable second. The
This benchmark suite consists of longer be available.) rest of the story was very similar,
numerous tests that involve data One interesting thing to note with the Semprons giving their
calculations such as the mathe- was the difference between the Intel counterparts a hard time.
matically-intense molecular Athlon XP 3200+ and the Sempron At the low end of the range,
dynamics of the MolDyn test. 3100+. While in the Content Cre- the Sempron 2400+ was still
Through this benchmark, a ation test above, we noted that the beating the Celeron 2.53 GHz con-
processor’s number-crunching Sempron was way ahead of the XP vincingly. In this test, core clock
ability comes to the fore. We will 3200+, the tide reverses drastically speed and work done per clock
now take you through the tests we when it comes to number matters—hence we observe a
used within this suite. crunching. This clarifies two scaling of performance.
things: if your work involves a lot of
Primordia high-bandwidth work—using WinRAR 3.3
This test relies mainly on the CPU image manipulation applications, The Athlon 64 family made their
and, to some extent, on the CPU- 3D rendering, or sound editing—a mark here with the Athlon 64
memory link. The disk system processor with better CPU-to- 3000+ taking a convincing lead
does not figure in the equation at memory bandwidth will do well. over Intel’s P4 3.2 GHz Prescott. It
all. AMD’s Athlon 64 3000+ comes But if your work pertains to pure was interesting to see the Sempron
out as the best number cruncher number crunching, processors 3100+ beating most of the Pentium
in this lot of processors. with shorter pipelines and higher 4 series by a considerable margin.
Here too, the Athlon 64 3000+ clock speeds are better suited to This was the first time the Celeron
betters the faster-clocked Pen- your needs. D processor actually beat a
tium4 3.2 GHz Prescott. The longer The Sempron 3100+ and 2800+, Sempron—the Sempron 2500+.

How We Tested Motherboards

T he motherboards were segregated first on platform and then

on chipsets.
For boards based on Socket 478, we used Intel’s Pentium 4 3.2
installed for all motherboards and the hard drive was
defragmented before testing.

GHz processor and 1 GB of DDR 400 MHz memory. For the LGA 775 PC Mark 2004: The test mainly comprises applications that are
socket, we used a 3.4 GHz EE Processor and 1 GB of DDR 400 or used in day-to-day functioning, and generates a score depending
DDR II 533 memory, depending on the motherboard support. on the performance of the system in each individual test.
For Socket 939-based AMD motherboards, we used an FX-55 3D Mark 03: We used the 2003 version since most of the tests in
processor; for Socket 754-based boards, we used an Athlon 64 the new version would be skipped due to lack of hardware support
3000+ processor; and for socket ‘A’, we used an Athlon XP 3200+. in the GeForce 5700-based cards. However, 3D Mark 2003 scales
For both these rigs, we used a Gigabyte GeForce 5700 card for fairly well and was therefore used for gauging the graphics sub-
AGP-based boards and an MSI 5750-based card for PCIe boards. system of the motherboards.
We used a SATA 120 GB Maxtor Diamond Max drive on both CineBench 2003: This tool is set to deliver accurate benchmarks
test rigs. Windows XP with SP1 was our choice of operating system by testing the computer’s raw processing speed, and other areas
for the test. All other required drivers and patches were loaded that affect system performance such as OpenGL, multithreading,
before continuing with the tests. The operating system was freshly- multiprocessing, and Intel’s new HT Technology.

70 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Test Centre
CINEBENCH 2003 an application makes use of
The results from this benchmark these streaming instructions.
are quite interesting: CINEBENCH The DivX codec has been opti-
2003 makes perfect use of Intel’s mised for Intel processors, and so
HyperThreading technology, and you see the boost when you use
hence we see Intel’s 3.2 GHz Pentium 4 processors.
processors taking the steam out of The lower-clocked Sempron
AMD’s processors and coming out 2400+ and 2500+ paid the penalty,
on top. Except for the Celeron D, taking the last slots, falling behind
nearly all Intel processors per- the slightly higher-clocked
formed extremely well here. Celeron D processor.
To clarify, HyperThreading
does not involve two physical DOOM 3
processors. It is accomplished by In the gaming test too, AMD’s
having a virtual processor along processors took the crown; inter-
with the physical one. The results estingly, it was the Athlon 64
of this test are important for the 2800+. The Athlon64 3000+ was
future: both Intel and AMD are due behind the 2800+ by 3 fps. Close
to release dual-core CPUs-proces- on its heels were its cost-effective
sors with two physical cores on a siblings, the Sempron 3000+
and 3100+.
The Intel proces-
sors were completely
overshadowed by the
startling perform-
ance of the Athlon 64
range. In fact, the
new Sempron 3100+,
3000+ and 2800+,
which cost no more
than Rs 6,000, per-
formed better than
Intel’s expensive Pen-
tium 4 series. The
scores returned by
the Celeron D 2.53
GHz processor were
single die—in the latter half of this pathetic—just about half of what
year. If the current breed of HT- the Athlon 64 2800+ returned.
enabled processors derive a good Another point to remember is
performance benefit, it would that DOOM 3 is more graphically
be interesting to see the perform- intensive than Half-Life2—future-
ance of dual-cores on this games using this engine will rely
benchmark and similar multi- more on your graphics card than
threaded applications. on the CPU.

dBpowerAMP Half-Life 2
The Athlon 64 3000+ was the The results obtained from this
fastest at ripping songs from a CD, test are interesting because the
getting the job done in just 77 sec- scores scale with rated processor
onds. Surprisingly, the Sempron performance. Intel’s 3.2 GHz
2800+ took second position, dis- Pentium 4 managed to steal the
placing the Athlon64 2800+ to limelight thanks to its higher
third position. Intel’s P4 3.2 GHz clock speed and larger cache.
was outgunned even by the However, the Athlon 64 3000+ was
Sempron 3100+. The Celeron a hair’s breadth away from the
processor was nearly 31 per cent leader, which is commendable,
slower than the Athlon64 3000+. taking into account the 1.2 GHz
speed advantage the P4 enjoys
DVD to DivX over the 3000+.
In DivX encoding, the tides The competition really heated
favour Intel. Both the Pentium up for third place between the
4s—the 3.2 and 3 GHz—beat the Athlon 64 2800+ and the Pentium
Athlon 64 3000+ by a consider- 4 3 GHz. Eventually, the AMD top-
able margin. The results clearly pled the Intel processor by a small
indicate that DivX encoding margin. With the help of faster
relies heavily on core clock clock speeds, the Pentium 4s—the
speeds, streaming instructions 3 and 2.8 GHz—beat the lower-
(SSE, SSE2, SSE3), and how well clocked Semprons. From the

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 Digital Tools l Test Centre

Scoreboard
Processors Basic Specifications Score (100) Price *
Speed L2 Cache FSB
AMD Athlon64 3000+ 2.01 GHz 512 KB NA 65.23 6716
AMD Athlon64 2800+ 2 GHz 513 KB NA 61.99 6624
AMD Sempron 3100+ 1.8 GHz 256KB NA 60.95 5704
AMD Sempron 3000+ 2 GHz 256KB 333 MHz 58.19 5566
AMD Sempron 2800+ 2 GHz 256KB 333 MHz 58.90 4922
AMD Sempron 2500+ 1.75 GHz 256KB 333 MHz 60.21 3404
AMD Sempron 2400+ 1.67 GHz 256KB 333 MHz 63.30 2806
Intel Pentium4 540 3.2 GHz 1 MB 800 MHz 57.73 13900
Intel Pentium 4 530 3 GHz 1 MB 800 MHz 56.72 10900
Intel Pentium4 520 2.8 GHz 1 MB 800 MHz 55.29 9900
Intel Celeron D 325 2.53 GHz 256KB 533 MHz 50.91 4900
For the entire scoreboard, please visit www.thinkdigit.com

scores, we can infer that Half-life manufactured only to prolong clocked Athlon 64 will paint a
2 scales well with your processor— the life of that platform. There- completely different picture.
the faster the CPU, the better the fore, consider buying them only
performance the game delivers. if you are upgrading your older MOTHERBOARDS
Athlon XP-based machine. If you Two-and-half years ago, Intel, VIA
And The Winner Is… are buying a new Sempron and SiS were the only companies
The Athlon64 3000+ makes it to machine, we would recommend involved in the manufacturing of
the top thanks to its excellent per- the new 3100+, based on the 754 chipsets—the group of logic cir-
formance and attractive pricing. socket, so you have the option of cuits that controls the functioning
Competing Intel processors lack upgrading to Athlon 64 later. of a motherboard. Intel developed
that extra juice to take on the While that was Sempron, the chipsets for their own processors,
AMD Athlon64 3000+. value processor from AMD, the and their portfolio was perfectly
The Sempron range of proces- Celeron D processors from Intel tailored to suit the needs of their
sors provides the best value for are a hopeless piece of silicon that processors. On the other hand,
money; at least in certain tests you should not bet you hard- solutions from VIA and SiS
such as the DOOM 3 test, it gives earned money on. included chipsets for Intel as well
even the high-end Intel processors as AMD processors, like the KM400,
a run for their money. Choosing The Right KT400A, SIS760 and others. nVidia
However, before you jump Processor and ATi have since joined this elite
out to buy one of these, there are As with any other element of club of chipset manufacturers and
certain things to consider: the your computer, define the typi- now, with five companies offering
Socket ‘A’ versions of this cal usage that your processor chipsets, choosing the right moth-
processor, available as 2400+, will see before you choose one. If erboard is a challenge.
2500+, 2800+ and 3000+, are you are in academia, where your Amidst the transition the PC
work involves scientific calcula- industry is going through, buying
tions, an AMD Athlon 64 proces- a motherboard based on older
Price versus Performance sor would be ideal simply technology should be avoided at
because of its raw number- all costs. This section will shed
crunching performance. light on how to tackle this transi-
Similarly, people whose work tion. Here we help you choose the
involves 3D applications, image or right motherboard that not only
video manipulation, that is, mul- gives you the best performance but
timedia, should also go for an also provides enough headroom
AMD processor. The high band- for upgrades.
width between the CPU and The motherboards have first
memory gives them a good boost been divided on the basis of plat-
in these applications. form, namely Intel and AMD, and
For media encoding or further classified according to
decoding tasks such as ripping chipset. Let us first uncover some
movies to DivX, MP3 conversions, facts about Intel chipsets.
and the like, the Pentium 4 line,
with its long pipelines, SSE 3 Intel Motherboards
instructions and higher clock Motherboards based on Intel’s
In this graph, we have plotted a processor’s performance against the speeds are ideal. platform have always been known
price at which it is offered. Price is along the X-axis, and processor per- If you are a gamer, we recom- for their stability, performance
formance on the Y-axis. The green dots represent AMD processors, and
the blue dots indicate Intel processors. mend the fastest AMD Athlon 64 and reliability. This is to be attrib-
As you can see from the graph, as the price increases, so does perform- processor available. Though the uted to the fact that Intel’s
ance; however, the increase in performance is not linear.
AMD’s Athlon64 3000+ has the highest performance and it is offered at Pentium 4 3.2 GHz beats the chipsets are perfectly tailored to
roughly Rs 7,000. Intel’s 3.2 GHz comes in at second place, but is steeply Athlon 64 3000+ in the Half-Life 2 their processors. While some years
priced at Rs 14,000. The difference in these prices is significant; however,
there is a mere five per cent difference in performance. In other words, at test, it does so simply because of ago, it was only Intel who manu-
50 per cent of the price, the Athlon 64 3000+ offers better performance the 1.2 GHz speed advantage the factured chipsets for their own
by a margin of five per cent over Intel’s 3.2 GHz. Similar inferences can be Pentium has over the Athlon 64 processors, VIA, SiS, and now
drawn by comparing other pairs of processors.
3000+. Moving to a slightly higher- nVidia have joined in to give con-

72 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Test Centre
sumers a variety to choose from. obsolete too soon. The difference
In fact, VIA was the first to between the two chipsets is that
realise the performance gain of the i865 is aimed at the value-con-
DDR RAM and brought it to the scious buyer looking for an
Intel platform before Intel could onboard graphics solution,
do so with their chipsets. whereas the i875P chipset offers
Intel, with their 810 and 815 better performance.
chipsets for the Pentium 3 One point to remember is that
processor, made on-board motherboards based on these
graphics popular, especially in chipsets use the older Socket 478
India where the majority of the processors. In fact, ATi’s RS350 is
PCs sold have on-board graphics. also built around the Socket 478
The 845 chipset further improved processor, and hence the new LGA
graphics performance. VIA and processors won’t fit on these
SiS did bring good competing motherboards.
products, but lost ground to
Chipzilla’s marketing muscle. i915 and i925
Greater demand for on-board This brand-new chipset family
graphics spurred Intel to intro- from Intel is loaded with fea-
duce the i865 and i875 chipsets, tures—some new, some logical
the former targeted towards price- and some revised to meet current
sensitive users, the latter meant as standards. But the highlight is
the performance chipset. the introduction of the PCI-
By this time, graphics card Express bus for discrete graphics
leaders nVidia and ATi realised the cards and other peripherals.
potential market Intel had tapped Nearly all motherboards based on
into by including a graphics chip these two chipsets will have an
on board their chipsets. This her- x16 PCIe slot for a graphics card
alded the birth of the ATi RS350 and two or more x1 PCIe lanes in
PRO chipset with better onboard addition.
graphics than Intel’s chipset. These chipsets also support
Last year, Intel introduced the the new DDR II standard, the
i915 and 925X chipsets, which memory runs at 533MHz—133
were completely new platforms MHz faster than the fastest DDR
designed from the ground up, memory. On the integrated
offering new features and revising graphics front, the 915 chipset
some specifications to handle boasts of DirectX 9.0 compliance,
today’s media-savvy world. and is capable of hooking up to
an HDTV or to widescreen LCD
What’s On Offer monitors.
If you want to buy an Intel-based Most importantly, improved
system, the market offers mother- onboard graphics have been intro-
boards based on the i845, i865, duced so that a platform based on
i875, i915, i925 and RS350 chipsets. this chipset complies with
Asus, MSI, Gigabyte, Mercury, HIS, Microsoft’s upcoming Longhorn
Krypton are the brands you will OS’ minimum requirements.
come across. Let’s understand the On the storage side, the new
pros and cons of each chipset. chipsets have legacy support for
four SATA drives and one ATA
i845 drive. If the motherboard uses the
The 845 chipset is the oldest avail- ICH6R Southbridge, it supports
able chipset in the market. It is Intel’s Matrix RAID technology
generally used in motherboards too. Eight USB2.0 ports and a ded-
that do not cost more than Rs icated Gigabit network bus is an
4,000, and hence, we will treat it integral part of all motherboards,
as out of the scope of this article, unless the motherboard manu-
since we are primarily looking at facturer decides to cut down on
mid-range motherboards. cost.
Systems based on this chipset The introduction of High-Def-
are good for Internet browsing inition Audio (Azalia) will be
and Word processing—nothing too music to your ears! The new stan-
computationally intensive. dard improves upon the older
AC’97 and takes it further: you
i865 and i875 can connect 7.1 speakers directly
Both these chipsets are relatively to your motherboard; there’s no
new and have enough juice to hold need for an additional 7.1-
their own against newer Intel channel soundcard. Most moth-
chipsets. However, since they lack erboards also have ‘jack sensing’
PCI-Express, they may become enabled, which ensures that

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 73

 Digital Tools l Test Centre
incorrect wiring of speakers is a Southbridge still supports one IDE its heels is its sibling, the 915P
thing of the past. drive, and hence, connecting your Neo 2. Third place is taken by
old CD-ROM is not a problem—yet. Asus’ P5GD1-VM. Gigabyte’s GA-
Let The Tests Begin! The ASUS P5GD1-VM and Gigabyte 8I915G0MF scored 17 per cent less
For the Intel platform, the moth- GA-8I915G-MF have just one IDE than MSI’s top board. All this
erboards fell within the Rs 5,000 to connector, whereas MSI’s Platinum shows that MSI’s 915G Neo 2 has
Rs 10,000 range. Asus, MSI, Giga- boards and Gigabyte’s GA-8I915G a well-oiled sub-system.
byte and AOpen managed to send Duo have three—one via the
us boards, most of them based on Southbridge, and the other two, PCMark 2004
the 915G chipset. We did receive RAID-capable, via a third-party con- This test suite is also a system-level
boards based on the RS350 and 865 troller, namely the VIA VT-6410. benchmark, testing both the
chipsets, but we deferred to test Since MSI’s 915P Neo 2 Plat- processor and I/O performance.
them since they are based on the inum is based on the ‘P’ version of
older socket 478 processors and the 915 chipset, it lacks an The CPU Sub-system
would be obsolete soon. Of the onboard video controller, while MSI’s 915G Neo 2 was way ahead
seven boards based on 915G, MSI the other boards have an inte- of the other boards when it came
sent us three, Gigabyte two, while grated GMA 900 video chip. Every to the CPU sub-system, and the
Asus managed to send one. Unfor- board in this mini round-up fea- CPU sub-system was the reason
tunately, the AOpen was ruled out tures the x16 PCI-Express lane for for this board’s good performance
due to a malfunction. plugging a discrete video card, if in the Content Creation test.
you need to play high-end games.
Features Except for the Asus P5GD1-VM
All these motherboards support with just one x1 PCI-Express slot,
the latest Pentium 4 800 MHz LGA all the other boards featured a
775 processors, clocked up to 3.8 minimum of two x1 lanes.
GHz. Care must be taken while On the peripherals side, all
installing the processor, as the motherboards now come with
pins are on the motherboard sock- eight USB2.0 ports and Gigabit net-
et. The heatsink/fan unit does not work adapters for faster data
have a plastic retention mecha- transfer. FireWire ports still evade
nism like the one on older Socket the motherboards in general, with
478 boards. So check the heatsink only the Platinum series mother-
for proper contact with the boards from MSI featuring them. Overall, the results are pretty
processor after installation. As for the sound system, all similar with second place once
Gigabyte’s GA-8I915G-MF and boards had onboard support for again going to the MSI 915P Neo
MSI 915G Neo 2 score high for their Intel’s High Definition 7.1- channel 2, third place being secured by
clean and unhindered layout—no audio. Almost all boards feature Asus’ P5GD1-VM. Both the Giga-
capacitors near the processor area. PCI slots for those older sound byte boards are in the last spot.
MSI provides a unique CPU instal- cards and network cards. A point to observe is that the per-
lation clip so as to avoid damage to What we can conclude from formance of the GA-8I915G-MF
the motherboard socket. this is that no motherboard comes board is nearly 12 per cent
MSI’s 915G combo and Giga- close to the MSI 915G and 915P Neo poorer than MSI’s 915G Neo 2 in
byte’s GA-8I915G Duo support the 2 Platinum in terms of features the CPU sub-system test,
DDR and DDR II standards. Both offered. Gigabyte’s GA-8I915G Duo resulting in the low Content Cre-
these boards have four slots—two and MSI’s 915G Combo combine ation score.
each for DDR and DDR II—to assorted features so as to keep the
ensure dual-channel memory sup- cost down. Asus’ P5GD1-VM and The I/O Sub-system
port. The Platinum series boards the Gigabyte’s GA-8I915G-MF have In the I/O sub-system, Gigabyte’s
from MSI only support the DDR II all the essential features. GA-8I915G Duo gains over MSI’s
standard, whereas the Asus P5GD1- Platinum boards by a small mar-
VM and Gigabyte GA-8I915G-MF Performance gin. MSI’s 915G Combo, without
support DDR 400 MHz as well. Let’s take one benchmark at a time a doubt, has a poor I/O subsys-
Since most 915 boards use the to see how each motherboard fared. tem, a fact reflected in its
ICH6 Southbridge, almost all Content Creation score. Asus’
boards support SATA drives. How- Content Creation 2004 P5GD1-VM also scores less on the
ever, MSI’s Platinum boards use MSI’s 915G Neo 2 does a great job, I/O. These are not the boards to
the ICH6R Southbridge, thus returning a score of 33. Close on look at if your work involves
adding RAID 0, 1, 0+1 and Intel’s image or video manipulation.
Matrix RAID capability to the
storage sub-system. If you plan to Memory Test
use the system for I/O intensive Gigabyte’s GA-8I915G Duo again
work, requiring faster data trans- scored over the MSI Platinum
fers and reliability, you might motherboards—by a small
want to look at these boards; oth- margin of 0.22 per cent. Asus’
erwise the above are just extra fea- P5GD1-VM and MSI 915G Combos
tures that you won’t use. were right at the bottom of the
While SATA is increasing in score sheet, suggesting a CPU-
presence, support for older IDE memory link inferior to the
connectors is still in place. The Gigabyte board.

74 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Test Centre
Half-Life 2 mented on the basis of its inter-
Half-Life 2 scales well with face socket: AMD has different
processor performance. Since chipsets supporting the 754-pin
MSI’s 915P Neo 2 did well on the Athlon 64 and the 939-pin Athlon
PCMark CPU score, it came as no XP. A point to remember is that a
surprise when the board offered system based on the 939-pin
the best performance for this Athlon processor is relatively
game. This is further confirmed expensive compared to a 754-pin
when you consider the Gigabyte system. Since we are here focusing
GA-8I915G-MF right at the bottom on a mid-range system, we will
of the graph—it fared rather concentrate only on the 754
poorly in its CPU tests. Second chipsets, and not the ones sup-
place was taken by MSI’s other porting 939-pin processors.
Platinum offering, while third The majority of motherboards
place went to Gigabyte’s GA- available for the Socket 754 Athlon
8I915G Duo. 64 processors are either based on
VIA’s K8T800 or nVidia’s nForce3
DOOM 3 250 GB chipset. Both these
Except for the MSI 915G Neo 2 that chipsets are almost at par with
scored 27 fps, all other boards respect to the features they offer.
were stuck at 26.9. The results do Remember that the socket 754
not imply that the MSI 915G Neo is processors have a single-channel
significantly better than the rest. memory controller; dual-channel
It does show that the game was is found only in 939-processors.
GPU-bound, and hence the scaling These two chipsets are generally
did not occur as expected. used in the higher spectrum of the
mid-range boards.
In Conclusion Motherboards based on these
MSI’s 915G Neo 2 and 915P Neo 2 usually cost upwards of Rs 6,000.
Platinum boards were the best of The SiS 760GX chipset also sup-
the lot. Both boards performed ports 754-pin Athlons, and it pro-
equally well on all counts, and vides integrated video, which the
have good sub-systems that don’t former two chipsets lack.
bog down when stressed. More-
over, their feature lists are endless, Looking To The Future
and a very generous package As mentioned earlier, PCI-Express
makes them excellent buys. has yet to make a prominent
When you bring price to the appearance on the AMD circuit.
equation, the GA-8I915G Duo That day, though, is not far away.
comes out on top. At Rs 6,000, the nVidia and ATi have already
Duo is priced at Rs 6,000, which is launched chipsets supporting
Rs 4,000 less than the MSI Plat- PCI-Express, and ATi has already
inum boards. Despite its relatively made it to the Indian market, ATi
poor performance, the GA-8I915G- launched their Radeon Xpress
MF scores higher than the other 200 chipset featuring PCI-Express
boards simply because of its price. technology for the AMD platform.
At Rs 5,300, the GA-8I915G-MF is Currently, only MSI has products
priced nearly 50 per cent less than based on this chipset—the others
MSI’s Platinum boards. are expected to follow soon. Note
This, however, cannot take that this chipset only supports
away the accolades that the MSI 939-pin Athlon processors, which
platinum series boards deserve. If are expensive.
you want the best motherboard Since they don’t come under
for the Intel platform and don’t the purview of this article, we
mind the extra price, go for one of shall discuss them in a
the MSI boards. forthcoming article.
nVidia has launched their
THE AMD PLATFORM nForce4 chipset with SLI tech-
VIA, SiS and nVidia are the only nology, but it will take a while for
vendors that manufacture that technology to show up.
chipsets for the AMD platform.
While PCI-Express has made it to The Comparison
mainstream boards on Intel plat- So which is the best motherboard
forms, it hasn’t quite made to go with an AMD 754-pin
inroads into the AMD platform processor? To decide this, we test-
yet. A majority of the chipsets ed the five AMD, three Asus, one
supporting AMDs still use AGP MSI and one Gigabyte boards that
and PCI. arrived in our lab. Of these five
The AMD Athlon line is seg- boards, three were based on

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 75

 Digital Tools l Test Centre
nVidia’s nForce 3 250 GB chipset, On the Intel side, we have move on to the benchmarks and
and one each on VIA’s K8T800 and seen that the Gigabit network see how the chipsets performed.
the SiS 760GX. Let’s begin with adapter is present on all 915-
features first, and then turn our chipset-based motherboards; Multimedia Content
attention to performance. however, on the AMD platform, Creation 2004
only the Deluxe or Platinum MSI’s K8N Neo Platinum topped in
Features series boards have them, while this system-level benchmark, indi-
All these boards support AMD the rest use the older 10/100 stan- cating that this board has what it
754-pin processors up to the dard. If you transfer huge files takes to be the best and does not
maximum speed available. On over the network, or if you are a bog down when all sub-systems
the memory front, since the movie-editing house or an E- are stressed. Gigabyte’s GA-K8NS is
memory controller is integrated learning developer, ensure that off-target by a very small margin
into the processor core, it deter- Gigabit Ethernet is supported by from the leader, MSI. The remain-
mines the speed of the memory; your motherboard. ing Asus boards put up a relative-
in this case, it is DDR 400 MHz. Six-channel audio is present ly decent showing, with the dif-
In other words, all these on almost all motherboards, and
boards support DDR 400 MHz these were no exception. We did
memory in single-channel mode not compare the fidelity offered
only. Here, the HyperTransport by either these boards or by the
bus is capped at 800 MHz, which Intel boards that support High-
otherwise runs at 1000 MHz for Definition Audio, and hence
939-pin processors. Except for the cannot comment on the sound
SiS chipset, all boards support 3 quality.
GB of memory; the Asus K8S-MX Five PCI slots are common on
can support a maximum of 2 GB. these boards, but the Asus K8S-
All the boards have two IDE MX had only two since it is based
connectors that can connect four on a micro-ATX form factor.
IDE devices. Asus’ K8V-SE Deluxe MSI’s K8N Neo Platinum
has gone one step further, sported the best component ference between the Asus K8V-SE
offering one extra IDE connector layout. In fact, the layout was and the MSI K8N Neo not being
for RAID. MSI’s K8N Neo Platinum completely different from the more than 10 per cent.
and Asus’ K8V-SE have four SATA norm. The processor area was free
ports, whereas the K8N-E Deluxe of all intruding capacitors, and PCMark 2004 CPU
can support up to six SATA drives the storage ports were placed per- Sub-system
in RAID 0, 1, 0+1 and JBOD func- fectly for hindrance-free opera- In the CPU test, the ASUS K8N-E
tionalities. Gigabyte’s GA-K8NS tion. The component layout Deluxe emerged on top, dis-
and the Asus K8S-MX support two on the Asus K8V-SE Deluxe is placing the MSI K8N Neo Plat-
SATA drives, and are limited to also nice—a similar approach is inum to the second
RAID 0 and 1 capabilities. visible on Gigabyte’s GA-K8NS. position—albeit only by a small
Except for the ASUS K8S-MX, Due to its small form factor, the margin of 0.5 per cent. The race
which has an integrated video layout on the Asus K8S-MX was a for third place was close: Giga-
chip based on the SiS 760GX little cramped. byte’s GA-K8NS managed to edge
chipset, no other board has an The Deluxe and Platinum tags ahead of the Asus K8S-MX by an
onboard video controller. ought to tell you that the package extremely small margin.
The Asus K8N-E and K8V-SE, is packed with features. And this In the last slot was the Asus
and MSI’s K8N Neo Platinum was true, as Asus’ K8N-E Deluxe, K8V-SE deluxe. The point to note
motherboards have FireWire MSI’s K8N Neo Platinum and Asus’ here is that the top three were
ports. Eight USB 2.0 ports are sup- K8V-SE Deluxe were generous on based on the nForce 3 250 GB,
ported by almost all the mother- their packaging and features. and it seems that this nVidia
boards; however, only four to six chipset has a good CPU sub-
are on the back panel, and the Performance system. Between the VIA and SiS
rest are available via headers on Having taken a look at the feature chipsets, it’s hard to give a clear
the board. set these motherboards offer, let’s verdict since we had only one
board per chipset.
Scoreboard
PCMark 2004 Memory
Motherboard Basic Specifications Score ( 100) Price * Sub-system
AMD Platform (Socket 754 Motherboards) The results were pretty much the
Asus K8N-E Deluxe nForce3, 6 SATA W/T RAID, Gigabit, 7.1 Audio 77.97 8736
same again: Asus’ K8N-E Deluxe
Asus K8V-SE Deluxe VIA K8T800, 4 SATA W/T RAID, Gigabit, 5.1 Audio 76.42 8320
77.56 4992
took the top slot, to be closely fol-
Asus K8S-MX SiS 760GX, 2 SATA W/T RAID, 10/100, 5.1 Audio, Onboard Video
Gigabyte GA-K8NS nForce3, 2 SATA W/T RAID, 10/100, 5.1 Audio 77.65 5800 lowed by MSI’s K8N Neo
MSI K8N Neo Platinum nForce3, 4 SATA W/T RAID, Gigabit, 7.1 Audio 78.67 8000 Platinum. The VIA chipset-pow-
Intel Platform (i915 Motherboards) ered Asus K8V-SE beat Gigabyte’s
Asus P5GD1-VM DDR 400, Onboard Video, 4 SATA, X16 PCI-E Lane, 7.1 Audio 68.98 7904 GA-K8NS by a convincing margin,
Gigabyte GA-8I915G Duo DDR and DDR-II 533/400, onboard video, 4 SATA, X16 PCI-E, 7.1 Audio 78.77 6000 whereas the SiS-based Asus K8S-
Gigabyte GA-8I915G-MF DDR 400, Onboard Video, 4 SATA, X16 PCI-E Lane, 7.1 Audio 76.61 5300 MX came in last.
MSI 915G Neo 2 Platinum DDR-II 533/400, onboard video, 4 SATA W/T RAID, X16 PCI-E, 7.1 Audio 74.71 9700 For the memory sub-system, a
MSI 915G Combo DDR and DDR-II 533/400, onboard video, 4 SATA, X16 PCI-E, 7.1 Audio 76.19 6500
lot depends up on the actual
MSI 915P Neo 2 Platinum DDR-II 533/400, 4 SATA W/T RAID, X16 PCI-E, 7.1 Audio 73.31 9600
layout of the memory bus on the
For the entire scoreboard, please visit www.thinkdigit.com

76 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Test Centre
on par with Gigabyte’s While it might seem logical to
board, whereas Asus’ invest in an Intel solution for the
SiS connection once sake of PCI-Express, it is important
again fails to fire. to note that devices for this new
Overall, all mother- bus will take time to be widely
boards put up a good available. Currently only graphics
show here. cards are available for the PCI-
Express bus. Since AGP is preva-
Conclusion lent in current systems, it will
Going by pure per- take the better part of two years, if
formance, the com- not more, for the technology to
petition between make a complete shift to PCI-
the ASUS K8N-E Express. Hence, even after two
motherboard. Since the memory Deluxe and MSI’s K8N Neo is close. years, the AMD system you buy
controllers for some of the However, the Asus surges ahead, today will be
Athlons are on the processors, the by a small margin. On the fea- FEBRUARY 2005
difference that is seen is due to the tures front, both boards are on
physical routing of the memory par, and that leaves us with
bus rather than anything else. price to decide
who takes the
Performance Of The crown. The MSI AMD Athlon ASUS K8N-E Deluxe
I/O Sub-systems K8N Neo is 64 3000+
Asus’ K8N-E Deluxe maintains its about Rs 800
lead by a significant margin. cheaper
Gigabyte’s GA-K8NS takes the sec- than the upgradeable-to certain
ond position, while the ASUS K8S- Asus K8N-E extent.
MX is right on its tail. The Asus Deluxe. However, So what is the ideal mother-
K8V-SE Deluxe loses out to these we think they both board-processor combination? We
boards. Interestingly, the better- deserve accolades and are are of the opinion that the AMD
performing K8N Neo Platinum equally good solutions for platform, once again, offers the
from MSI slips to last spot, thus AMD’s socket 754 pin processor. MSI K8N NEO most value for money. The per-
that it is not the motherboard to Platinum formance of an AMD system is
be considered if your work Summing It All Up way ahead of Intel’s competing
involves lots of data processing. In our processor test, we wit- products, is on equal footing as
Overall, we can conclude that nessed AMD’s Athlon64 processor per features, and costs less.
the nForce 3 250 GB chipset is take the steam out of the Pentium We award the Athlon64 3000+
superior to the VIA and SiS solu- 4 series of processors. If you want and ASUS K8N-E Deluxe or MSI
tions by a long shot. the best performance, nothing K8N Neo Platinum as the best
beats the Athlon 64 line. buy Gold solution. This combo in
3DMark 2003 In the motherboard test, we conjunction with appropriate
In this benchmark, MSI’s K8N Neo saw the successful inception of components will work great for
takes first place, displacing the PCI-Express on the Intel platform, gamers, for professional artists
ASUS K8N-E Deluxe. However, the which was not the case with AMD- using resource-intensive applica-
difference is no more than 0.5 per the platform still relies on tions such as Photoshop, 3D Max,
cent, which can effectively be the AGP and PCI standards. Maya, etc, and will cost no more
ignored. Gigabyte’s GA-K8NS takes than Rs 15,000.
third position, and is closely fol- If you are on a shoestring
lowed by Asus’ K8V-SE, while its budget and Rs 15,000 is too much
cost-effective sibling, the K8S-MX, FEBRUARY 2005 to spend, go for the AMD
is put down where it belongs. This Sempron 3100+ and ASUS K8S-
test once again proves the superi- AMD Sempron MX. This combo will cost around
ority of the nForce 3 chipset over 3100+ Rs 11,000. Since the board has
its close competitor from VIA. integrated video and an AGP
slot, you can opt to save on cost,
DOOM 3 and at the same time, have the
With DOOM 3, Asus’ K8N-E deluxe option of upgrading later. This
comes first. Asus’ K8V-SE out- combination wins our best buy
shines Gigabyte’s GA-K8NS to take Silver award.
the second slot. MSI’s K8N Neo is ASUS K8S-MX For the ‘Intel Inside’ devotees,
the Pentium 4 530 (3 GHz) com-
Contact Sheet bined with Gigabyte’s 8I915G Duo
makes the ideal motherboard-
Brand Company Telephone E-mail Web site
processor combo at Rs 17,000.
Motherboard ASUSTeK Computer Inc. 022-56290785 / 87 [email protected] www.asus.com
ASUS Digi Giga System Ltd. 022-26526696 [email protected] www.gigabyte.com.tw Overall, on a performance-and-fea-
GIGABYTE Cyberstar 0-9323809599 [email protected] www.msi.com.tw tures scale, this combination lies
MSI Tirupati Enterprises 0-98310022600 [email protected] www.msi.com.tw somewhat between our Gold and
Processors Silver awardees, but costs more.
Intel SES Tech Limited 022-26824141 [email protected] www.intel.com
[email protected]
AMD AMD FAR EAST LTD 080-52372400 [email protected] www.amd.com
[email protected]

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 77

 choose ‘Properties’. In the
Macromedia Flash ‘Bitmap Properties’ dialog
box, deselect ‘Use document
Compacting .fla Files? default quality’ and change
Suppose you have to the number in the ‘Quality’
post an 11.8 MB Flash field. A higher number yields
document (the .FLA) to a Web higher-quality images
server. Although you have a with a larger file size, and
high-speed connection, there vice-versa.
still has to be a better way. Once you hae set the
And there is: number, click ‘Test’. The
Open any Flash file in dialog box reports the
Flash MX 2004, and choose File starting file size and the
> Save and Compact. This new file size for the image.
feature can compact the 11.8 Typically, setting the quality
MB monster FLA file to about to 50 can make a 700 KB
2.3 MB. Especially useful for image publish at less
those with slower connections. than 20 KB.
You can also use the
Find And Replace SECRETS THAT KEEP YOU AHEAD IN THE RACE mouse to drag the image
If you’ve ever been in around in the preview pane
the situation where you GENERAL TIPS 30 MINUTES EXPERT of the dialog box to see how it
have to find every instance of Macromedia Flash 79 GMail Storage 81 would look. If it’s grainy,
something in Flash and Dreamweaver MX 80 The Windows swap file 84 increase the number in the
replace it with another, you Microsoft Word 83 ‘Quality’ field.
know what a nightmare it Microsoft Excel 85
can be. If you have not Flash Text And Search
experienced this yet, trust us, Engines
you don’t want to. There is a To erase everything on Lower File Sizes When you create text
simple way to find and the Stage, double-click the When you are using a in Flash MX 2004, you
replace. Go to Edit > Find and ‘Eraser’ tool in the toolbar. lot of bitmap images need to remember that
Replace, to open the Find and Problem solved! Note, in a Flash movie, file size unlike HTML, Flash MX 2004
Replace dialog box. From however, that this works can add up fast. You can use text will not be picked up by
here, you can locate and only one frame at a time. the ‘Publish’ settings to search engine bots. So, you
replace text, fonts, symbols, When the playhead is at set the JPEG quality for need to add Meta Tags to the
sounds, video clips, bitmaps, frame 10, you can erase the entire movie, but that HTML document that the
and even colour. Yes, even everything on the Stage at can lead to inconsistency. SWF file will reside in.
colour can be replaced. frame 10, but nothing else. One image may look great,
Here’s an example: Draw To erase other frames, while another, grainy Static Text And Device
a circle and a box on the you have to move the and smudgy. Fonts
‘Stage’, and convert them to playhead to those frames To customise the Static text is display text
symbols called ‘circle’ and manually before you can go ‘Publish’ settings for that doesn’t change
‘box’. Leave them both there. ahead with erasing. individual bitmap images, onscreen, such as the
Go to Edit>Find and right-click on the image’s information displayed in an
Replace. name in the Library and interface, or for button labels,
In the dialog box, choose forms, and navigation.
‘Current Scene’ from the When you add static text
‘Search In’ menu. to your movie, by default,
Choose ‘Symbol’ from the Flash MX 2004 will embed
‘For’ menu. the font outlines in the SWF
Choose ‘Box’ from the file for the font you are
‘Name’ menu. This command using. Depending on the
will locate all instances of the font you choose, and how
box symbol. much text you use, this can
Choose ‘circle’ from the add considerably to the
‘Replace With’ menu. overall file size.
Click Replace All. If you want smaller file
sizes, use a device font. A
Erase Your Mistakes device font is a font that
You have filled up your won’t be embedded in the
stage with what you SWF file. Instead, you choose
thought was creative. a device font for the end
Unfortunately, the layout is users’ machines to display-
all wrong, the custom _serif, _sans, or _typewriter-
scrollbar is the worst ever, and the end users’ machines
and the text seems to will display that device font
have been written by a for the Static text.
three-year-old. It’s clean This will help keep your
Illustrations Harsho Mohan Chottoraj
up time! file size small.

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 79

 Digital Tools l Tips & Tricks
Small Type And Alias Text command, select the desired
When working with action, right-click on the
small type (10 points or action and choose ‘Save As
smaller), the text might Command’. You can also
become difficult to read name the new command and
because of the anti-aliasing view it in the Commands
that is automatically applied menu. These new commands
to vector shapes in Flash MX can be repeated, as and when
2004. Anti-aliasing is a required. Commands can
blurring, or ‘smoothening’, of directly be accessed from the
the edges of vector shapes Command menu as well.
and text. Often, anti-aliasing
adds to the quality of the Dreamweaver MX
shape, but small text may
become unreadable. Indent Text Without
In Flash MX 2004, Using Blockquotes
Macromedia has added a new Thus far, there have been
‘Alias Text’ button that allows two methods used to
you to alias blocks of type, indent text-using the
thereby increasing readability. <BLOCKQUOTE> tag or by
The alias text feature can placing text in the second cell
be applied to Static, of a two-column table. Using
Dynamic, and Input text cascading-style sheets, you now
fields. However, if a visitor to have a better alternative:
your Web site does not have Cascading style sheets
version 7 (or higher) of the Use lossless compression button in the ‘Properties’ allow you to specify the exact
Flash plug-in, they will only for the bitmap. In the panel, say, “digit”. Left-click indentation for your text. For
see aliased Static text. If you ‘Library’ window, right-click on the button to select it, and example, to indent all text
are using any Dynamic or on the bitmap and select open the Actions panel ([F9]) using the <P> tag, choose Text>
Input text fields with the ‘Properties’. Choose ‘Lossless’ Enter this ActionScript: Custom Style>Edit Style Sheet.
Alias text feature, viewers from the ‘Compression’ pop- on (release) { In the dialog box that pops up,
with older versions of the up menu and click ‘OK’. This digit.enabled = false; choose ‘New’. Now, select
Flash plug-in will still see will cause Flash to render the } ‘Redefine HTML Tag’, choose
that text as anti-aliased. image at the original If you want to enable the ‘P’ from the list and click ‘OK’.
imported quality, but will button later, change “false” to In the ‘Style Definition’
Improve Bitmap Quality probably cause the .SWF file “true”. dialog box, choose ‘Box’ and
To improve the image size to increase considerably. enter the desired indent span
quality of bitmaps Here Comes The Easter (in pixels) in the left text field
before and after importing _root.goto! Bunny! of the ‘Margin’ section. Finally,
them to Flash: Here’s the code for a Here’s how you can see click ‘OK’ and then ‘Done’ to
Don’t scale imported button placed inside a an Easter Egg in Flash return to your HTML
bitmaps within Flash. This movie clip, which will give MX 2004: document. As you will see, any
greatly reduces image quality. the instruction ‘Go to and Go to “Help/About Flash text wrapped in the paragraph
Instead, use an external image play’ a certain frame in the Professional...”, and click on tag (<p>) is set to an indent.
editor such as Macromedia root movie, and not the clip the tiny “TM” symbol near The definition of the new
Fireworks to scale the image to the button resides in. the number 2004. Enjoy! Paragraph style will look like:
the desired pixel dimensions _root.gotoAndPlay(frame); <STYLE TYPE=”TEXT/CSS”>
before import. eg: Matching The Size Of <!--
After importing an image on (release) { The Object p { margin-left: 25px}
into Flash, break it apart and _root.gotoAndStop(10); To fit the -->
convert it to a graphic symbol. } background/stage to the </STYLE>
To do this, first, select the selected object, place the
image and go to Modify>Break Disable The Hand Cursor object on the top left hand Clean Up Word HTML
Apart. Now, with the image Create your button as corner of the stage. Now, go Documents
still selected, go to you normally would. to Modify>Document Microsoft Word can save
Insert>Convert to Symbol, and Give your button an Properties>Match>Contents. documents in HTML
select the ‘Graphic’ option for instance name like “digit” in Remember, this will work format. However, the HTML,
the behaviour. the ‘Properties’ panel. only if the object is placed on XML, and CSS (Cascading Style
In the HTML tab of the In the timeline, click on the top left hand corner of Sheets) code that Word
Publish Settings (File>Publish the first frame your button is the stage. generates is geared more to
Settings>HTML) set the placed on and open the format and display documents
‘Quality’ to ‘Best’. Disable the Actions panel ([F9]) Customising commands in Word than in a Web
‘Allow Smoothing’ option for Enter this ActionScript: Flash 2004 Professional browser. Because of its
the bitmap. In the ‘Library’ digit.useHandCursor = has a History panel complexity, it’s a good idea to
window, right-click on the false; (Window>Other clean up Word-generated
bitmap and select ‘Properties’. panels>History), which HTML code.
Uncheck ‘Allow Smoothing’ in Disable A Button documents the history of Fortunately, Dreamweaver
the ‘Properties’ dialog and Create a button your previous actions. To save can instantly remove the
click ‘OK’. normally. Name the particular actions as a new unnecessary Word-generated

80 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Tips & Tricks

It’s A Mailbox, It’s A Back-Up Drive, It’s GMail!

GMail gives you 1000 MB of storage space. Here’s how to make the most of it

Windows Explorer. You can access

Jayesh Limaye this with your GMail login and
password. You can also tick the

U ntil about a few months ago,

backing up your data and
carrying it around was a breeze
‘Auto Login’ box so that you are not
prompted for your password each
time. Once this is done, you can
thanks to the availability of sites access the drive like any other on
like X-drive and SwapDrive. your computer.
Unfortunately, they went the Ticking the ‘Auto Login’ box is
commercial way leaving many a useful if you plan to perform
user in the lurch. Enter GMail, with automated backups on your GMail
its 1000 MB storage in every Drive. The drive can be operated like
mailbox. Apart from being a any other, and you can also perform
mailbox, this also re-opened doors all the functions you perform with
for those interested in storing and other drives, including copying,
backing up their data online. pasting and deleting files, as well as
As changes abound in the searching. You can also use ‘Send To’
service, several new tools are also in the context menu to send these
being launched to work with the files to this drive.
service. GMail Drive is one such tool
that allows you to easily backup and How It Works
store data in your GMail account. What actually takes place when you
copy and paste files to the GMail Create a filter in GMail to avoid your Inbox
Downloading And Drive is, they are e-mailed to your getting cluttered due to GMail Drive
Installing GMail Drive GMail account as attachments.
GMail Drive is a Shell GMail Drive periodically checks your apply filters to your account and
Namespace Extension that creates a account for new files and rebuilds ensure that all backed-up files are
virtual file system around your the directory structure. If you log on automatically moved to a particular
GMail account so that you can use to your GMail account after pasting folder. To start with, you could
it as a storage medium. To files in to your GMail Drive, you will move them all to the ‘Archived Mail’
download it, go to www. viskoe.dk. see some mails sent from your folder. To set up filters in your e-
In the description on the GMail ID with the subject starting mail account, you need to log in
homepage, find the ‘projects’ link. with ‘GMAILFS’. These are the files and click on the ‘Create a filter’
This will open a list of the projects you copied to your GMail Drive option. On the ensuing page, there
including ‘GMail Drive’. Download being sent as attachments. will be various options and choices
the utility (approx. 120 KB), extract of filtering your mails. Choose the
the contents from the .zip file, and Creating Filters In GMail ‘Have the words’ option and type
run setup.exe to install the As you back up more and ‘GMAILFS’ in the box next to it.
program. more files, it can get tough On the next page, tick the ‘Skip
to find the right file in a long list of the Inbox (Archive it)’ checkbox and
Setting Up GMail Drive e-mails. To make it easier, you could finally on ‘Create a Filter’.
After installing the
program, a new drive,
‘GMail Drive’, will appear in Automating Backups

G Mail Drive can also be scheduled to

perform auto-backups using
software such as ‘SyncBack’. This is a
free backup utility. When using
SyncBack, you are prompted to create a
profile, click on ‘Yes’, select ‘Backup’
and enter a name for the profile.
To schedule the backup of a Use a backup utility such as SyncBack to
particular folder, provide the path in take automated backups to your GMail drive
the ‘Source’ dialog box and your GMail
Drive address in the ‘Destination’ dialog this page, you can schedule the backup
box. Now just click on the ‘Expert’ to run at a specified time or at regular
Enter your GMail ID and password to access button and click on the ‘Misc’ tab. On intervals based on your requirements.
GMail Drive

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 81

 Digital Tools l Tips & Tricks
HTML code. To do so, launch Reload Additional
Dreamweaver and choose Extensions Without
File>Import>Import Word Rebooting Dreamweaver
HTML. In the dialog box that Myth: When you install a
pops up, select the Word- new ‘Object Extension’,
generated file and click ‘OK’. you need to restart
Now, you can customise Dreamweaver.
the clean-up process by Fact: You can reload object
selecting options from a series extensions while Dreamweaver
of checkboxes that is open. This simple trick can
Dreamweaver displays in the save a lot of time, especially if
‘Clean Up Word HTML’ dialog you develop your own
box. After you have selected extensions. With the ‘Objects
the parameters to cleanse, Panel’ open, click on the arrow
click ‘OK’. in the upper right of the
Dreamweaver will clean panel. The contextual menu
the document of excess code. will appear with a new option
It also generates an ‘HTML called ‘Reload Extensions’.
Corrections’ log of its clean-up Clicking on ‘Reload
actions. The preferences you Extensions’ will usually bring
entered are automatically up a timer icon. Once the
saved as the default ‘Clean Up timer disappears, your new
Word HTML’ settings. object is ready for use.

Using The Tag Inspector Rounding Corners Using

As you work in Simple CSS
Dreamweaver MX, you attributes in the Tag Inspector parent tag of the <td> tag You can shave off those
will notice that a list of tags panel (Window>Tag Inspector) where the cursor is. If you have sharp table edges with a
appear at the bottom of the as shown in the screenshot. a complex table and are little bit of CSS. However, the
window. These tags represent In the screenshot, you can having trouble figuring out code is proprietary for Mozilla
the tree location of where your see from the tag that the what the structure of the table and Netscape 6.x and higher-IE
cursor is in the document. For cursor is in a <tr> tag set is, this tool is indispensable. will still display normal, sharp
instance, the ‘Tag’ inspector within a <table> tag set within tables. You can use
might display: <body><p>. This a <td> tag set nested within Set Multiple Panels In Dreamweaver’s ‘CSS Editor’ for
shows you where you are, and another <tr> tag set within Dreamweaver MX2004 everything but the snippet of
what code is being generated another <table> tag set in the Many developers find it code that does the rounding.
behind the scenes. document <body> tag set. easier to set up a Create a new style using
You can select each tag by From there you can select any workspace with all the the ‘Redefine HTML Tag’
clicking on it. By right-clicking of the parents of the tag set. panels in one specific option, and select ‘Table’ from
on the tag you can edit it in By right-clicking the <tr> location. Some of us just the list of tags. Proceed as
the ‘Quick Tag Editor’, apply tag, you can add can’t get used to this. usual to the ‘CSS Style
styles to that specific tag a CSS style Sometimes the ‘Floating Definition’ dialog.
instance, or remove it to the Panels’ can be in the way of Here, you can choose a
altogether. You can also what you are trying to view. background colour, a border
modify tag By setting your preferences size, and a colour for the table.
according to your needs and When satisfied, click ‘OK’.
learning a handy keyboard Here’s the line of code you
shortcut, you can improve you need to enter manually at the
workflow tremendously. end of the table style rule you
You can toggle Panels on just defined: -moz-border-
and off by pressing [F4] or radius: 12px;
Edit>View Panels to view Don’t forget to add that
hidden panels, and Edit>Hide starting dash, or the code
Panels to hide currently won’t work! In design view,
displayed panels. you won’t see anything
You can also set ‘Panel unusual. It’s not until you look
Viewing Preferences’. This is at the page in a supporting
where you determine how the browser that you’ll see the
Panel and Property Inspector rounded corners.
will be displayed.
Panels which are checked Convert Layers
off will always appear in Into Tables
front of the ‘Document and The positioning of
Site’ windows. If a panel is elements on a page is
not checked off, it may be easier using layers than tables.
obscurred. In the lower half But it is better to use tables to
of the dialog box, you can allow older browsers to view
choose which panels appear these pages correctly. You
in the ‘Launcher’ option. don’t need to start working

82 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Tips & Tricks
with tables from scratch. You Making Pictures In Word
can create your page normally, Behave Properly
by using layers and then When you insert a
convert them to tables later. picture into Word, you
Create your page and click get a picture that flows in
on Modify>Layout Mode> line with the text. Word
Convert Layers to Table. Select treats in-line pictures the
the appropriate layout options same way it treats big
and click ‘OK’. characters.
You could also click on If you type in front of an
File>Convert>3.0 Browser in-line picture, it will get
Compatible to achieve the pushed out on the same line,
same result. as if it were text. If you centre
the line that includes an in-
Switch To External line picture, the image will
Image Editor? appear centred on that line.
If your images are nested If you don’t want your
deep within your site, picture to act like a character,
finding and editing them can and want text to flow around
be quite frustrating. the image, the simplest way to
Instead, open the image in tell Word to flow text around a
Dreamweaver. Click on picture is to make it float.
Edit>Preferences>External When a picture floats,
Editors. Select the file Word removes it from the text
extension you need to edit and on the page and places it in an
add the editor for it by clicking document, Word can generate Customising Bullets imaginary plane, commonly
on the ‘+’ button. The next a useful Document Map. If you are tired of the called the ‘drawing layer’,
time you edit an image of that same, boring bullets in above or below the text.
file extension, it is Using The Document Map your bulleted lists, it’s simple To make a picture float,
automatically opened within The document map to customise the bullets you right-click it and choose
the specified editor and is makes documents act use in Word. After creating ‘Format Picture’. On the
updated within Dreamweaver like Web sites formatted with your list of items, select ‘Layout’ tab, select either
once all the changes are made. frames. The left side of your Format>Bullets and ‘Square’ or ‘Tight’ under
screen turns into a navigation Numbering. Click the ‘Bullet’ ‘Wrapping Style’ and click
Microsoft Word tool you can use to quickly tab in the dialog. The dialog ‘OK’. Word will stick the
jump to something in the box contains several bullets to picture in the drawing layer
Assigning Heading Styles right side of the screen. choose from. Click the bullet and wrap text around it.
To Subheads To display the Document you want to use, then click OK Now when you move the
The ‘Document Map’ is a Map, choose View>Document to lock in your change. If none picture in the drawing layer,
useful tool for navigating Map. Word will open a new of these selections appeal to Word will reflow the text,
within large documents. To window on the left side of you, you can change the making way for the picture.
create the Map, Word needs to the screen. character that makes up any You may also want to
recognise which the headings This window displays your bullet set. experiment with the
in your document are; the document’s headings (or other Select any of the bullet ‘horizontal alignment’ and
Document Map is, therefore, text that Word interprets to be choices, then click see what works best for you.
more helpful if you use subject headings, if you haven’t ‘Customise’. In the ‘Customise
headings to organise your assigned styles). Click any of Bulleted List’ dialog, you can Turning Off Automatic
long document. those headings, and Word pick a character from any Hyperlinking
If you assign a heading takes you to that location in font on your system. Click the When there’s a URL or e-
style to your subheads, Word your document. To expand or ‘Bullet’ button, select a new mail address in your
can recognise that text as contract subheads, click the character to use as a bullet document, Word turns it into
headings and create a logical plus or minus boxes in the using the ‘Character’ button, a hyperlink. To turn off the
Document Map. For instance, document map. then click ‘OK’ to make automatic hyperlinking,
you might assign the ‘Heading the change. choose ‘AutoCorrect Options’
1’ style to your document’s The default font (or ‘AutoCorrect’) from the
headline or chapter titles, the from where the ‘Tools’ menu, then click on
‘Heading 2’ to first-level sub- characters is either the ‘AutoFormat As You Type’
heads, ‘Heading 3’ to second- Symbol or tab. Under ‘Replace As You
level subheads and so on. Wingdings. Type’, clear the ‘Internet and
To assign a style, click To pick network paths with
anywhere inside your heading characters from hyperlink’ checkbox.
and choose Format>Styles and another font set, If you didn’t turn off
Formatting. Word will display click the ‘Font’ AutoCorrect before you started
the ‘Styles and Formatting’ button. After typing, and now you have a
task pane. Now, just click one selecting the source, document full of hyperlinks
of the heading styles in the click ‘Character’ that you don’t want, you can
‘Pick Formatting To Apply’ again, make your turn them all off. Choose
window. Once you’ve applied Use the ‘Document Map’ to navigate within selection, and just Select All from the Edit menu
styles to the subheads in your large documents click ‘OK’. or press [Ctrl]+[A], and press

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 83

 Digital Tools l Tips & Tricks

Managing The Swap File In Windows XP

Boost system performance by choosing the optimal settings for the swap file

system cache if you are using your Accessing Virtual Memory

Jayesh Limaye machine as a workstation, and vice- Settings
versa if you are using your machine Open the Control Panel by

W
hen an application finds as a server. clicking Start>Control Panel. Double
that the amount of physical Usually, the page file size is set click on the ‘System’ icon if your
RAM on a computer is not to give you the best performance, control panel has the classic view. If
enough for it to run, it uses hard but you may improve performance it has the category view, click on
disk space to compensate for the by altering some of its settings. Set ‘Performance and Maintenance’ and
deficit in the amount of RAM the page file to reside on a drive then on the
needed by it. Windows XP allocates other than the one where Windows ‘System’ icon.
some amount of space for this by is installed, and to a drive where Now click on
creating a page file named files are least accessed. the ‘Advanced’
pagefile.sys, which is a hidden and Before doing this, though, it is tab. Click on
system file on the system drive (the advisable to defragment that drive. ‘Settings’
drive where Windows is installed). Also, if possible, this drive should be in the
The page file is set by default to a on another hard drive, preferably on ‘Performance’
minimum of 1.5 times and a a different controller. Keep in mind section.
maximum of twice the amount of that this drive should not be on Next,
physical RAM. This way, even on a fault-tolerant systems like a RAID-7 choose the
machine with 128 MB of physical configuration or on a mirrored ‘Advanced’ tab.
RAM, an application may utilise 4 drive, as this will reduce The ‘Advanced’ tab in Select the drive
GB of memory using the page file. performance (also, the page file ‘System Properties’ where the page
Since the page file does not require fault tolerance). file is currently
is present on the hard disk, it is, You may set both the minimum and present, select ‘No Paging File’ and
of course, much slower than the maximum size of the page file click on ‘Set’.
physical RAM. to twice the amount of RAM that Now select the drive where you
you have installed. Keeping the page wish to place your page file, and
Optimising Sysytem file size fixed will greatly improve select ‘Custom
Performance system performance because the size’. Enter a
Virtual memory has to cater page file size will not have to be number that is
to programs as well as the system dynamically adjusted and hence it twice the size
cache. Hence, system performance will not get fragmented. We shall of your
can be improved by setting the see how this is implemented in installed RAM
virtual memory to allocate more detail in the following steps: in the initial as
memory for programs and less to well as maxi-
Placing The Page File mum size dia-
Efficiently log boxes and
click on ‘Set’.
Defragmenting The Drive ‘Advanced’ settings in the Now click OK
As data is written to and read from ‘Performance’ menu thrice and
a drive, it gets scattered over the restart the
drive over a period of time. A drive computer for the settings to
in this state is said to be take effect.
fragmented and becomes slower to
access. The ‘Disk Defragmenter’ is a Final Words
utility which defragments or Since no two computers
compacts all the scattered data to behave the same, you need to
the beginning of the drive so that it experiment
becomes faster to access. After you with the virtual
Use the Disk Defragmenter to compact scat-
tered data to the beginning of the hard disk choose the drive on which you wish memory
to place your page file, you need settings to try
to defragment it. and find what
Virtual Memory Click Start>All works best
Programs>Accessories>System for you. Your PC
s against a page file, virtual memory Tools>Disk Defragmenter to launch will be the
A is the sum of physical RAM and the
size of the page file. Hence, while you can
the utility. In the list shown, click on
the selected drive. Click on ‘Action’
fastest in the
neighbour-
disable the swap file, you can never and then ‘Defragment’. hood in no time.
completely disable virtual memory. This will start the In ‘Virtual Memory’, set jayesh_limaye@
defragmentation process. the page file size thinkdigit.com

84 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Tips & Tricks
[Ctrl]+[6] to remove all the Save and change the entry in
existing hyperlinks the password boxes. In Word
XP or 2003, click Tools>
Creating Your Own Options>Security to access
Toolbars your password settings.
To create your own
toolbar, choose Microsoft Excel
‘Toolbars’ from the ‘View’
menu, and select ‘Customise’. Hiding And Unhiding
Click on the ‘Toolbars’ tab, Rows And Columns
then on the ‘New’ button. To hide a row(s), select a
Give the toolbar a name. cell(s) and press [Ctrl] +
Here, you also need to [9]. To unhide a row(s), select
select whether this toolbar the cells containing the range
will be available to all of the hidden row(s) and press
documents (the ‘Normal’ [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [(].
template), or only to the To hide a column(s), select
current document. Now, a a cell(s) and press [Ctrl] + [0].
small toolbar palette will To unhide a column(s), select
appear on the screen. Click the cells containing the range
on the ‘Commands’ tab, of the hidden column(s) and
select a category, then drag press [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [)].
the commands you want onto To unhide rows and
your new toolbar. columns in a sheet, click
‘Select All’ at the top-left
Comparing Documents intersection of the rows and
Word 2003 makes To review an earlier saved Password Protection columns. Then press [Ctrl] +
comparing two version, open the document Using Templates [Shift] + [(] and then [Ctrl] +
documents easier with its file, click File> Versions, Protect documents by [Shift] + [)].
‘Compare Side by Side’ select the version you want in password-protecting the
feature. Open the two the ‘Versions’ window, and Word and Excel templates you Adding A Menu Item To
document versions you want click ‘Open’. use to create them. That way, The Excel Menu Bar
to compare and select every new document or Right-click one of the
Window> Compare Side by ‘Permanentise’ A spreadsheet you open that’s toolbars, and then select
Side. Word makes each Frequently-used File based on these templates ‘Customise’ from the shortcut
document fit in one half of Office displays the most will also be protected by menu. In the ‘Commands’
the screen. When you scroll recently accessed files the password. tab, select ‘File’ from the
through one document, the under the ‘File’ menu for To create a password- ‘Category’. From the
other scrolls with it, making quick access. But did you protected template in Word ‘Commands’, drag the ‘Page
it possible to browse through know that you can assign or Excel, open a new Setup’ icon (or any other icon
the two documents files to be permanently document, click File>Save As, you want) onto the menu bar.
simultaneously. accessed directly from the and choose ‘Document To remove the icon at any
menu? Select Template’ (just Template in time, repeat the above steps
Tracking With Versions Tools>Customise, and click Excel) in the ‘Save As Type’ and drag the icon back.
To keep track of a the ‘Commands’ tab in the dialog box near the bottom
document as you work Customise dialog box. Scroll (‘Files of Type’ in Word 97 Increasing The Recently
on it, next time you save a through the ‘Categories’ list, or 2000). Accessed Files List
document, don’t just use select the ‘Built-in Menus’ Type a name for your new For this simple addition,
File>Save. Instead, select item, then scroll down to the template, and click ‘OK’. To go to Tools>Options, and
File>Versions. In the bottom of the ‘Commands’ set a password in the 97 and select the ‘General’ tab. In the
‘Versions’ dialog box, click window and select the ‘Work’ 2000 editions of Word and ‘Recently Used File List’ box,
the ‘Save Now’ button. In the item. Drag the ‘Work’ item Excel, click Tools>Options> change the number to the
dialog box that appears next, into the toolbar area. A new Save; in XP and 2003 versions, maximum, 9, and click ‘OK’.
enter any comments that ‘Work’ menu item will click Tools>Options>Security
help identify the document appear. Click ‘OK’ in the (see figure 4). Enter a password Grouping Sheets
in progress. Click ‘OK’, type in dialog box. Now add a file to to open the file (and if you Grouping sheets has the
the document name, and your new ‘Work’ menu. like, enter another password following advantages:
click ‘Save’. First go to File>Open to to modify it); then click ‘OK’. It allows setting the print
Now, the next time you open the file you want. Once The next time you want options for a number of
reach an important it is open, choose Work>Add to make a new password- sheets at once.
milestone, say, just before To Work Menu. The open protected document or Allows changing an item
sending the document out for file’s name now appears in spreadsheet, click File>Open from the View tab in the
review, click File>Versions, the drop-down list when you and choose your protected Options dialog box.
enter your comments and click ‘Work’. template. The new document Allows applying formats to
click ‘OK’. The next time you need to will inherit the template’s many sheets.
A new version will be work on or access this password. If you want to Allows unhiding of rows
stored inside the document particular file, just open the change the password of the and/or columns
file and listed in the Work menu and click on the document in Word 97 or simultaneously.
‘Versions’ dialog box. file name. 2000, click Tools>Options> Allows typing/inserting

57
FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 85
 Digital Tools l Tips & Tricks
text or formulas for the same In the resulting dialog box,
address in grouped sheets. make sure the ‘Condition 1’
To group all sheets in the drop-down list control is set
workbook, select the first to ‘Cell Value Is’. Then, set the
sheet in the workbook, hold second drop-down list box to
[Shift], and click the last ‘greater than or equal to’.
sheet tab in the workbook. Finally, enter the number
Alternatively, from a sheet 10000 in the box on the right.
tab shortcut menu, select Click the ‘Format’ button
‘Select All Sheets’. to open a dialog box where
To group continuous you can set the Font, Border
sheets, hold [Shift] and click a and Patterns. Click ‘OK’ twice.
different sheet tab.
To group non-continuous Repeating Column
sheets, hold [Ctrl], click a Headings In Printouts
different sheet tab and add it Excel users frequently
to the group. need to set up multi-
To ungroup sheets, hold page printouts that repeat
[Shift] and click the active the same column headings
sheet tab. on each page. If the headings
you want to print are also the
Reducing The Size Of A column headings in the first
Workbook few rows of your spreadsheet,
For sending a Workbook it’s easy to get them to show
by e-mail, you might up on each printed page.
want to reduce its size first. First, make sure that at
Press [Ctrl] + [End] to find the containing different types of ‘Custom’. In the ‘Type’ box, least one row in your
last cell in the used area data, which allows you to enter the following ‘Custom spreadsheet contains the
within the sheet. Find the delete, fill or lock cells by Formatting’ syntax exactly as headings you want to see on
last cell containing data in type. Press F5, or go to printed here: the printout. Then go to File>
the sheet. Delete all rows Edit>Go To. In the ‘Go To’ #,##0, ;[Red](#,##0,);- ; Page Setup>Sheet, and click
between the cells containing dialog box, click ‘Special’, and Now, If your cell contains the ‘Collapse Dialog’ icon on
data to the row of the last in the ‘Go To Special’ dialog the number 2345678 it will the right side of the box
cell in the used area. Delete box, select ‘Constants’ and be displayed as ‘2,346’. marked ‘Rows to repeat at
all columns to the right of click ‘OK’. top’. Back in your spread-
the column of the last cell Copying Styles From One sheet, you’ll see that your
containing data, up to the Counting The Number Of Workbook To Another pointer has become a right-
column of the last cell in the Words In A Cell To use your saved styles pointing arrow.
area used. Enter the following text in a different workbook, Click and drag that arrow
To quickly delete the in cell A1: “Digit is a you can use the ‘Merge’ over the rows containing the
rows, select the first row to great magazine”. option. First, open the new text that you want to appear
delete, press [Ctrl] + [Shift] + Now, in cell A2, enter the workbook. From the ‘Format’ as headings on the printout.
[Down Arrow]. To quickly following function: menu, select ‘Style’. Click After you make your
delete the columns, select =IF(LEN(A1)=0,0,LEN(TRIM(A1)) ‘Merge’. Now in the ‘Merge selection, click the ‘Expand
the first column to delete, -LEN(SUBSTITUTE(TRIM(A1),” Styles’ dialog box, select the Dialog’ icon located on the
and press [Ctrl] + [Shift] + “,””))+1) workbook where the styles to right of the collapsed dialog
[Right Arrow], press [Shift] + The result will be 5. be merge are saved and click box. Click ‘Print Preview’ to
[F10], and from the menu, ‘OK’. Finally, in the ‘Style’ make sure that your headings
press ‘Delete’. Repeat these Rounding Numbers To dialog box, click ‘OK’. look right. If everything
steps for each sheet in the Thousands appears to be in order, print!
workbook. Now save your file. Press [Ctrl] + [1] to open Conditional Formatting
the ‘Format Cells’ dialog It’s easy to overlook Prevent A Chart From
Replacing Zeroes With box. Select the ‘Number’ tab, important data in a very Being Printed
Dashes and from ‘Category’, select large spreadsheet. You can There are often times
Press [Ctrl] + [1] to open use the ‘Conditional when you do not want
the ‘Format Cells’ dialog Formatting’ feature to a chart to be printed. Select
box. Select the ‘Number’ tab, make critical data jump the chart, and right-click on
and from ‘Category’, select off the screen. it. From the menu, select
‘Custom’. In the ‘Type’ box, Let’s say you’re ‘Format Chart Area’. Select
enter the following Custom tracking household the ‘Properties’ tab, and
Formatting syntax exactly as expenses, and want to clear the checkbox beside
printed here: keep an eye out for ‘Print Object’. Click OK
#,##0 ;[Red](#,##0);- ; anything that cost more to finish.
than Rs 10,000. Select
Selecting Cells That the column in your The Current Date In A Cell
Contain Only Text spreadsheet with the To automatically
By selecting cells that currency amount, and insert the current date
only contain text, you Use a custom formula to round off select Format> into a cell, select the cell
can distinguish between cells numbers to thousands Conditional Formatting. and press [Ctrl] + [;].

86 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Net Gain

DPReview.com
For buying digital cameras, understanding digital photography or just keeping up with the
trends... DPReview.com is the place to go to
Aditya Kuber The site is also home to many
active forums where users can seek

D igital photography has evolved

enough to be present at our
beck and call. With digital
cameras (whether as standalone
information and tips from other
users. Forums can also be specific to
camera models and not just pertain-
ing to a manufacturer or technology.
devices or as part of another device)
are practically with everyone. While Learning The Ropes
this has given birth to some enthusi- An important facet of digital photog-
asts, most of those who are migrating raphy is that the technology changes
to digicams are amateur or hobby fast. While 3 megapixel was “in” last
photographers who are dumping the year, 5 megapixel seems to be the
film camera. norm this year. What does that mean
So naturally, this brings with to you? How does it affect you? Will
it plenty of questions such as “What you need to reconfigure your printer?
is a megapixel?,” “What is Will you need different media for
White Balance?”, “What type of card printing to ensure optimum quality?
works with my camera?” or even Will the consumption of ink be more?
“Which camera should I buy?” Will file sizes increase?
The DPR homepage has all the necessary links
Answers to these and many more
questions on digital cameras are
answered in painstaking detail at The timeline, in fact, is one of the most
www.dpreview.com. interesting sections on the site and
Started in 1998 in the early days lets you compare the changes in specs
of digital photography and still run and prices over the last 10 years—and
by London-based photo-enthusiast you realise that while prices have stag-
and Web designer Phil Askey, the site nated, features and capabilities have
has come a long way and has consis- improved dramatically.
tently been recognised for the qual- The site is not the only one
ity of its reviews. around to offer side-by-side compar-
isons of cameras, but is perhaps the
Welcome Home best of the lot. Unfortunately, you
One look at the site and you know can only compare two cameras at a
where everything is. It's like coming time. So if you were considering a
home! The site is a veritable ency- third camera as a potential buy, elim- The opening page of a camera review
clopaedia on digital cameras. Simply ination of candidates is the way to go!
find your way to the right links and you Keeping up with this can be tough
can read up on almost all the cameras Newsworthy if you don't know where to look for
to have ever hit the shelves. The site With new digital cameras becoming the information. DPReview.com also
also offers a timeline from 1995. available almost daily, it can be quite offers the “Learn” and “Glossary”
Although a hard claim to digest, a task to search for the best avail- sections, but are unfortunately the
they have about 90 per cent of the able. DPR opens with the news page weakest “links” on the site. Basic
cameras to have ever left the manu- and offers up-to-the-minute news technology information apart, there
facturing line listed on the site, that is continuously updated. isn't much to help the novice under-
complete with specs and even prices! Reviews of cameras “in-production” stand digital cameras or photography
are also a regular feature, and can be in general. So, only if you know your
handy to keep you abreast of devel- basics and want a second opinion
opments when considering a buy. on what camera to buy, this is the
A typical review on the site right place.
includes an introduction to a camera,
its design aspects, specifications, Under Exposure
features, tests and comparisons. It’s been almost 10 years that the site
Photo galleries created using older has been in existence. For as long as
cameras are also available, and can we can remember, it has been looking
be used as a benchmark when and feeling the same. Yes, it maintains
making a buying decision. Images its familiarity, but this is slightly
accompanying the reviews are not contradictory to what it caters to—
just good—they’re great! The sample constant change. The one thing that
photos and test images are accurate does remain consistently good,
and act as a good guide to the though, is that the site remains free.
The never-ending drop down menu! camera in question. [email protected]

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 87

 Compaq V2036AP Microsoft Fingerprint Reader
C ompaq’s V2036AP is a neat-looking 14-inch
widescreen laptop. This notebook sports a Forget Your Passwords
black-and-brushed metal finish and weighs just
2.36 kg. Powered by a Pentium M 1.7 GHz Dothan S omeone had to cash in on the growing paranoia about security, and
Microsoft is leading the pack—stepping in with the Fingerprint
Reader. This USB device eliminates the need to type in passwords, and
processor with 256 MB of DDR memory, it can
handle most office and multimedia applications ships with a software disk and manual with minimal information.
with ease. The build quality is great, Setup is simple, with a graphical representation of both hands
and the layout of the ports on either shown on screen. Simply click on the finger to register that finger's
side makes them easily accessible. print. You can register all your fingers if you like!
Goodies include a combo drive, Akin to an auto form completer, this thing allows you to register any
802.11b wireless LAN, a 6-in-1 card password field. Just put your registered finger on the scanner while the
reader, a FireWire port and JBL Pro password entry window is selected, and input your username and
speakers. The battery life at password. Useful for logging into Messengers, e-mail accounts and more!
150 minutes was average, Another neat feature is having shortcuts to Web sites on its one-
and less than similar touch menu. Just put your registered finger on the scanner, and a small
models we have tested. menu pops up from the system tray with links to your
Thankfully, though, it’s a registered Web sites. It works like a charm, but is
quiet operator and the battery expensively priced at Rs 4,514.
doesn’t heat up too much!
Company Microsoft Corporation India Pvt Ltd
Company Hewlett Packard India Ltd Price Rs 4,514
Price Rs 69,990 Phone 011-26294600
Phone 1600 11 4141 E-mail [email protected]
E-mail [email protected] Web site www.microsoft.com
Web site www.hp.com
Rating:
Rating 1 2 3 4 5
1 2 3 4 5

Logitech MX-1000 Cordless Mouse Nokia 6670

T he MX series of mice from Logitech are
revered by the gaming community as the best
piece of hardware a gamer can get his hands on.
Business As Usual
Until recently, the MX series boasted of an 800
dpi optical sensor that was precise to the last
I t is not often that Nokia releases a phone that resembles an
existing model, at least in terms of design if not on the
whole. At first glance, the Nokia 6670 can easily be mistaken
millimetre and resulted in accurate tracking of for a 7610. Nokia has sculpted the 6670 along the lines of
the mouse pointer on the screen. Now, the stylish 7610, though it restrained itself on the keypad
with the introduction of the MX-1000, design to advocate this model’s business goals.
Logitech is on the verge of triggering Based on the Series-60 platform, the 6670 has all the
a revolution. Instead of an LED light traits of the business series, including tri-band operation,
source though, the MX-1000 uses a Bluetooth, a 65K colour screen, a 1-megapixel camera, 8
laser for accuracy—as opposed to MB of internal memory—enough to store your business
ordinary light, a laser beam is more contacts—and a 64 MB MMC card. This time round,
coherent and results in minimum Nokia has provided the NetFront Web browser as the
scattering when it hits a surface. built-in option. NetFront supports all major Web
The MX-1000 has eight buttons that standards and is more accurate in the layout of pages,
can be programmed to one’s liking thanks to which pages look similar to what they look
using the simple-to-use ‘Set Point’ like on a desktop. However, considering the small screen size,
application. It uses RF for com- its usefulness is questionable.
munication and can be con- As far as its core competence—the phone—goes, the device is like any
trolled from as far as ten feet other Nokia phone—good signal reception and voice quality. However, on
away. Most interestingly, Logitech the usability front, the tacky keys do not help much. Being a business
has included a rechargeable Li-ion battery, akin phone, this should be of paramount importance since it is the only mode
to those in cell-phones. But eventually, at Rs of data input. We think the 6670 is a stopgap measure from Nokia to kill
5,500, the MX-1000 is a piece of luxury. time before it releases the much-awaited 6630.
Company Logitech Electronics India Pvt. Ltd Company Nokia India Ltd
Price Rs 5,500 Price Rs 25,639
Phone 022-26571160 Phone 011-26779000
E-mail [email protected] Web site www.nokia.co.in
Web site www.logitech.com
Rating Rating
1 2 3 4 5 1 2 3 4 5

88 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

O2 Xda II Mini
Mini Marvel with support for additional memory

O ne of the sleekest PDA phones in the market, the new

Xda II Mini from O2 runs Microsoft Windows Mobile
2003 PocketPC Phone Second Edition and is a tri-band
through the MMC/SDIO slot. A
256 MB SD card is bundled.
Voice clarity on the O2
GSM/GPRS device. It is sleek and is encased in a silver body Xda II Mini is excellent, even
with ribbed black sides and curved corners. with the speakerphone. The
The layout makes it easy to handle, with the camera screen is clear and vibrant,
button, volume slider and voice recorder keys on the left, but you may face issues in
the MMC/SDIO slot on top, the power button next to the direct sunlight. A neat feature is
stylus silo, the IR port on the right and the headphone the ability to change the orienta-
jack next to the USB port at the bottom. tion of the screen from portrait to
The front facia is neatly laid out as well, with minimal landscape with just a tap of the
controls. A square-shaped bank of keys under the screen is stylus—handy for spreadsheets
comprised of an enter/action key in the centre surrounded and documents.
by a four-way navigation key. This is flanked by symmetri- The 1,200 mAh Lithium Polymer bat-
cally designed ‘Send’ and ‘End’ keys on top and two applica- tery should see you through about three
tion buttons assigned to ‘Contacts’ and ‘Calendar’ at the days with standard phone and PDA use.
bottom. The camera, voice recorder, contacts and calendar Overall, good features and the sleek form factor are the
buttons can be re-assigned to other applications, depending highlights of the package. Poor image quality from the
on your preferences. The lens and a self-portrait mirror are camera and the high price tag are the potential deterrents.
at the back. Company Creative e-biz.com
With an Intel PXA 272 processor providing 416 MHz of Price Rs 34,888
horsepower, and 64MB of flash ROM and 64MB of RAM Phone 011-51619800
under the hood, the Mini boasts a 2.8-inch TFT LCD touch E-mail [email protected]
Web site www.myxda.com
screen that can display 64K colours at a resolution of 240 x
Rating
320. Connectivity options include Bluetooth and infrared, 1 2 3 4 5

Orite MV-3115 Krome Intellekt iQ700

Love’s Labour Lost I t’s a phone! It’s smart! It’s a smartphone!
The Intellekt iQ700 is one of the smallest
T his is probably love at first sight. You will fall for this beauty, which
incorporates a still camera, a video camera, a voice recorder, a Web
camera, a movie viewer and MP3 support, the moment you lay your eyes
devices running Windows Mobile 2003 Second
Edition. Encased in a metallic silver-grey
metal-and-plastic body, the device is a
on the packaging—with the glitzy model holding up the device in all its tad larger and heavier than a
shining glory! Your love will grow stronger when you hold it for the first standard candy-bar phone.
time. But alas, love is blind. No sooner than you’ve held the device and Looking inside, it is powered by
had a first close-up look, will you want to look away! Starting with the a TI OMAP 730 200 MHz processor
design, which is pretty compact for a device that packs in so much, the and has 64MB of ROM and 32MB
Orite will flatter to deceive. It has a small screen that has of RAM, topped off with a 2.2-
to be flipped open, and is roughly as big (or small) as that inch 176 x 220 pixel TFT screen.
of a Nokia 3310! So what can you do with
The device should come with 16 MB of on-board it? E-mail, MMS, Speed Dial
memory, but the unit we received had only 4MB on-board and Voice Tags are
and no flash cards, tying it down to the PC for good. supported, and you get all
To load MP3s onto it, you need to manually go to the the productivity software
device in ‘My Computer’ and create a directory called built into Windows Mobile
‘MP3’. Hereafter, it’s drag-and-drop. Photos taken with 2003. You can play back
the “3.2 mp” camera were grainy despite us using the WAV, WMA, AMR, AAC and MP3.
flash, and even worse with the 8x digital zoom! Video Voice clarity is decent, but the phone
at 640 x 480, though, was all right. does have a problem in areas with low signal
The package includes a carry case, a USB charger, strength. The speakerphone is good enough
cable, driver disk and Ulead PhotoStudio, and is priced at for a small conference room.
around Rs 9,000. Expensive considering the feature set... As for the operational controls, the five-
Company Mediatech India way rocket switch on the front panel looks
Price Rs 8,750 quite innovative in terms of design, but also
Phone 022-26361111 proves to be the phone’s nemesis.
E-mail [email protected]
Web site orite.com.tw Company Krome Mobile
Rating Price Rs 27,000
1 2 3 4 5 Phone 011-51539890
E-mail [email protected]
Looking for more information on any of the products featured in New & Notable? Web site www.krome.com.au
Please write to [email protected]. The DIgit Test Centre will be delighted to Rating
respond to your queries. 1 2 3 4 5

1 Poor: Has serious drawbacks and needs improvement before it can be used for its target application. 2 Mediocre: Does not live up to expectations, needs improvement
in many areas. 3 Average: Reasonably competent, but there is nothing spectacular about the product. 4 Good: A good buy, better than most products in its category.
5 Excellent: A brilliant combination of price, performance and features—far beyond expectations.

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 89

 Digital Tools l A-List
Intel Motherboards Portable Hard Drives Projectors Colour Laser Printers
Gigabyte GA-8I915G Duo WD-Media Centre 250GB Acer PD11 Lexmark C510
Excellent Performance at an Very low cost per MB High 1600 lumens bright- Blazingly fast at 24 pages
affordable price Memory card reader slots ness support per minute
None Big 330-Inch diagonal Colours come out dark
Contact Western Digital
Contact Digi Giga System Ltd. image size capability Contact Lexmark International
Phone 022-25851085 Picture in Picture mode (India) Pvt. Ltd
Phone 022-26526696 E-mail [email protected]
E-mail [email protected] Contact Acer India Pvt Ltd Phone 022-26057755/45/44
Price Rs 17,000 Phone 080 25219520 E-mail [email protected]
Price Rs 6,000
E-mail [email protected] Price Rs 34,499
Maxtor OneTouch 250GB Price www.acer.co.in Web site www.lexmark.com
Hotkey for launching
backup application Samsung CLP500
Heavy Good overall speeds
Contact eSys Distribution Printing quality not to
Phone 022-56910348 the mark
E-mail [email protected] Contact Samsung Electronics
Price Rs 15,500 Phone 011-515-11234
Gigabyte GA-8I915G-MF
E-mail farrukh_quazi@
Very affordable samsungindia.com
Average performer Price Rs 38,999
Contact Digi Giga System Ltd Sony VPL-ES2
Phone 022-26526696
E-mail [email protected]
Very easy to set up
Price Rs 5,300 Very low running cost of
lamp
Good performance
Contact Sony India Ltd
Phone 022-28313333
E-mail [email protected].
com.sg
Price Rs 79,990

The best products tested so far in different

Febru
ary 2
005
The A-List hardware and software categories

AMD Motherboards Portable Hard Drives Printers Monitors (17-inch)

ASUS K8N-E Deluxe Freecom FDH-2 Pro 80 GB Canon Pixma iP4000 BenQ V773
Excellent performance and Extremely compact and Good features, excellent Good screen geometry
great features bundled carry case performance Not a flat-screen monitor
Lacks PCI-Express Low cost None Contact BenQ India
Contact ASUSTeK Computer Inc Contact J S Equipments Contact Canon India Phone 022-25705230
Phone 022-56290785 Phone 022-23810713 Phone 011-26806572 E-mail SalesEnquiryIn@
E-mail [email protected] E-mail [email protected] E-mail [email protected] BenQ.com
Price Rs 8,736 Price Rs 19,500 Price Rs 11,000 Price Rs 5,900

Philips 107E5
Acceptable performance for
its cost
Not a flat-screen monitor
Contact Philips India
Phone 022-56912325
MSI K8N Neo Platinum (Gold) E-mail [email protected]
Transcend StoreJet TS0GJ25
Price Rs 8,500
Excellent performance and 60GB
good features Sturdy build quality
Lacks PCI-Express Slow access time
Contact Cyberstar Contact Mediaman Infotech HP Deskjet 1100D
Phone 0-9323809599 Phone 022-23828100 Rugged, can take heavy
E-mail [email protected] E-mail sales@mediaman loads
Price Rs 8,000 group.com Relatively slow
Price Rs 10,000 Contact Hewlett Packard India
Phone 1600-444-999
E-mail [email protected]
Price Rs 13,499

90 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l A-List
CRT Monitors (19-inch) Heavy-duty Multifunction Laptops
Philips 109P4 Devices MSI MegaBook M510C
Aperture grille for more Samsung SCX-5315F Terrific performance, typical
accurate geometry Offers good features and good feature set
Bad implementation of performance Slightly tacky keyboard
the on-screen display for Expensive Contact Maxtone Electronics
changing a setting Contact Samsung India Electronics Phone 022-23016468/23075393
Contact Philips India Phone 011-51511234 E-mail NA
Phone 022-56912325 E-mail vikram.negi@ Price Rs 65,000
E-mail PCP.India.Info@ samsungindia.com
philips.com Price Rs 64,995
Price Rs 16,000
CMV-CT-722A
Philips 109E5 Inexpensive
Maximum resolution of 1920 x Good pixel response time of
1440 16 ms
Inexpensive Contact Cee Vision Technologies
None Phone 022-26733353
Contact Philips India E-mail chemoplastmumbai@
Phone 022-56912325 vsnl.net
E-mail [email protected] Price Rs 25,600
Price Rs 17,500
Xerox SCX-M15i Wipro CPQ 15
Good performance at a Perfect balance of perform-
reasonable price ance, features and price
Bundled software not Mediocre inbuilt speakers
appealing Contact Wipro Limited
Contact Xerox Modicorp Phone 1600-333312
Phone 012-42561930 E-mail [email protected]
E-mail kuldeep.malhotra@ Price Rs 56,990
ind.xerox.com
Price Rs 56,599

LCD Monitors (15-inch) Laser Multifunction Devices Cell Phones LG LM50

CMV CT-522A Samsung SCX-4216F Sony-Ericsson K700i Stylish looks and good per-
High contrast ratio—500:1 Fast, feature-rich and priced Extensive feature set, formance
Mediocre inbuilt speakers sensibly includes camera, MP3, FM Lower battery life
Contact Cee Vision Technologies Slightly expensive radio etc. Contact LG Electronics India
Phone 022-26733353 Contact Samsung India Fast processor Phone 0120-2560921
E-mail [email protected] Phone 011-51511234 Contact Sony Ericsson E-mail [email protected]
Price Rs 17,500 E-mail vikram.negi@ Phone 0124-2560808 Price Rs 1,29,999
samsungindia.com E-mail dhiraj.soni@
Price Rs 34,999 sonyericsson.com
Price Rs 18,000
HP LJ-3380
Prints 20 pages per minute, Nokia 6600
fastest in its class Brilliant display screen,
None Bluetooth
Contact Hewlett Packard India No FM radio, slow processor
Phone 1600-444-9999 Contact Nokia India
E-mail [email protected] Phone 011-26779000
Price Rs 46,999 E-mail [email protected]
Price Rs 15,500

LCD Monitors (17-inch) Compaq X1237AP

Samsung SyncMaster 173P Future-proof features,
Great design, superb contrast executive looks
Expensive Battery life marginally lower
Contact Samsung India than average
Phone 011-51511234 Contact Hewlett Packard India
E-mail marketing@ Phone 1600-444-9999
samsungindia.com E-mail [email protected]
Price Rs 32,000 Price Rs 1,44,990

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 91

 Microsoft Outlook
Outlook has its share of annoyances. Here’s how you tackle the most common ones
Ram Mohan Rao Alerts, and here, find and click the
‘Options’ button. Here you will find the
1. Rich Text messages don’t ‘Export Rules’ button. Click it and then
show up properly export your rules to any safe location on
Reason: When you compose a message your hard disk. Repeat the process after
in the Rich Text Format—and the default re-installation and this time, select
setting on some versions of Outlook is ‘Import Rules’ and point it to where you
‘Rich Text’, what the recepient sees is not saved the rules before.
the mail you composed but a blank mail
with an attachment called ‘winmail.dat.’ 4. Outlook XP doesn’t open .exe
This happens with most receiving attachments
e-mail clients. Reason: At times, you may need to
download the kinds of attachments that
Solution: To fix this, go to Tools>Options Outlook XP blocks by default. There is no
and click the ‘Mail Format’ tab. Change the feature in Outlook XP itself that allows you
‘Compose in this message format’ setting to enable downloading these attachments.
to ‘HTML’ or to ‘Plain Text,’ whichever
you prefer. Solution: To enable Outlook XP to
download certain attachment types, you
Set the ‘AutoArchive’ option to ‘Archive Unused need to do the following: First, open the
Messages Every Few Days’ registry editor. Expand the branches to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\
choose how often you want AutoArchive to Microsoft\Office\10.0\Outlook\Security.
run, whether or not to delete old items Now, create a new string value by
permanently and so on. selecting ‘New’ and then ‘String Value’
from the Edit menu. Name the new value
3. Mail rules don’t get retained ‘Level1Remove’. Double-click the new
when you re-install Outlook ‘Level1Remove’ to edit it and enter the
Reason: When you migrate to or re- filename extensions you would like to
install Outlook, you can save all your stop Outlook from blocking. Extensions
mails by keeping the .pst files in a safe should be typed in lower case, without
location. After re-installation, you can the dots and separated by semicolons.
instruct Outlook to use that .pst file and For example, type in exe;mdb;vbs to
all your mails and settings will be safe allow .exe, .mdb and .vbs attachments
and secure. However, mail rules don’t get respectively. Click OK and close the
saved in the .pst file. So when you think registry editor. You may have to restart
you have got it right, you suddenly find Outlook for this change to take effect.
Change the default messaging format to HTML; that all your mail rules have vanished!
your default is probably Rich Text Format 5. Contacts don’t seem to work
Solution: Export your rules before you re- even though they are there
install. To do this, go to Tools>Rules and Reason: When you re-install or migrate
2. Inbox opens too slowly to Outlook, all your contacts are saved—
Reason: When you have a lot of mails in but when you try composing a mail to any
your Inbox, Outlook opens rather slowly. one contact or in any other way try to use
a contact from the list, Outlook seems to
Solution: Use Outlook’s AutoArchive ignore the contacts. It appears as though
option to archive old mails. There are the contact list isn’t working, even though
probably several mails in your inbox right you can see that the list is there.
now that don’t need your attention, but
are there just for reference. You can tell Solution: It’s simple. Right-click on the
Outlook to archive old messages contacts folder, then choose ‘Properties’.
automatically. What Outlook does is to put Click the ‘Outlook Address Book’ tab.
these mails in another folder, which it Here, tickmark the ‘Show this folder as
calls archive.pst by default. Go to an e-mail address book’ checkbox. You’re
Tools>Options and open the ‘Other’ tab. ready to go!
Here, click ‘AutoArchive’ and you will see Export your rules before you migrate your
all the options available to you. You can Outlook and re-import them after you are done [email protected]

92 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Illustration Harsho Mohan Chottoraj

Upgrade Your Skill Set

So you are high-flier at your workplace? Never mind your achievements; get set to acquire a whole
new range of soft skills with these Web sites
According to job portal Let’s look at some Web sites
Ram Mohan Rao monster.com, employers consis- that can help you and your
tently look for soft skills. You may employees develop these essential
f you are an employer, you not have several of these traits soft skills.
I need soft skills. If you are
an employee, you need
and skills, but you can easily and
actively pursue developing these Brownbag Training
soft skills too. In fact, whoever skills online. Of course, it’s prob- www.brownbagtraining.com
you are, at whatever level in your ably not possible to take a course Brown Bag Training is an e-learn-
organisation, it’s your soft skills on, say, ‘honesty’ but there are ing site that delivers classes online.
that consistently matter—an area several areas where you and Classes are presented live by an
of development you are most members of your organisation instructor. There are a variety of
likely to ignore. can actively improve. soft skill classes to choose from
At http://snipurl.com/digit_ From certmag.com, here’s an and a variety of “Class Packs” are
skills1 is a ‘Soft Skills Quiz’ that ‘Unofficial list of soft skills for available. A 20-pack costs $1,049
tests your soft skills quotient. The techies’— (Rs 49,000). But you could choose
page lists the 25 “Most frequently Team work a single class for $59 (Rs 2,700).
cited soft skills”. Some of these Communication skills They offer a satisfaction promise—
include oral / spoken communi- Presentation skills if you are not satisfied with the
cation skills, honesty, team work Selling class or classes you receive, you get
or collaboration skills, self-moti- Running meetings all your money back.
vation/initiative, leadership skills, Leadership Using the Brown Bag develop-
‘Working under pressure’, creativ- Problem solving ment process, they will custom-
ity, and time management skills. Customer service develop a class or series of classes

94 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Enhance

The Switchover
Site Delivery Method Pros Cons
Brown Bag Training Online Clean Interface, Live Instructor None
YouAchieve.com Online Huge number of courses available; articles and None
‘nuggets’ in addition to courses; affordable
Silicon Beach Training HTML Pages Free; large number of links No formal training option for non-UK customers;
you only get to use the free links
Get Ahead Direct CD-ROMs; eBooks Very affordable eBook option Limited number of titles
NAM Virtual University Online Reasonably Affordable Somewhat limited selection of soft skills
courses
CRM Learning VHS or DVD High-quality products Expensive

for your team or tailor their exist- Get Ahead Direct mation Technology. The soft skills
ing classes to address a specific www. getahead-direct.com part of the catalogue includes
market, skill or customer base. GetAhead offers CD-ROMs and courses relating to customer serv-
A typical class is completed in eBooks as training material. While ice, personal development and
about 45 minutes and all students an eBook is for $8.95 (Rs 403), a professional development.
receive an electronic certificate of multimedia CD-ROM costs $39.95 For instance under ‘Personal
completion. Visit http:// (Rs 1,798). There are ten titles avail- Development’, there are courses
snipurl.com/digit_skills2 for more able in all for $199 (Rs 8,955) for all in ‘Managing Stress’, ‘Recognising
details about the classes offered. the CD-ROMs. and Managing Anger’, ‘Recognis-
Some examples are “Customer Each GetAhead training course ing and Avoiding Burnout’, ‘Time
Service 101”, “Eight tips for writ- (eBook or CD-Rom) is a compre- Management’ and more. Each
ing quality e-mail”, “Dealing with hensive and self-contained course course is priced at $9.95 (Rs 448).
difficult customers” and so on. that will give you a ‘lifelong career Courses typically take an hour
skill’. Each course is designed by to complete. All courses are deliv-
You Achieve experts to include interactive exer- ered over the Internet. To use this,
www.youachieve.com cises, case studies and questions. you need to register and enrol for
At YouAchieve.com, you will find The 10 titles available are Busi- a course and it will be delivered
a variety of learning resources— to you when you want it.
workshops, clinics, articles, The flipside to such an
‘knowledge nuggets’, intensive arrangement is that the lessons
programs and ‘PowerBytes’ (small are pre-recorded and there is no
tidbits of key information you can live instructor.
access for free). All content is
delivered via the Internet. CRM Learning
Three types of full-access www.crmlearning.com
subscriptions ranging from a CRM Learning allows you to take
month, three months to one year an online preview of some of its
are available. Each gives you access courses before deciding if they
to the entire course catalogue for will be right for you. The method
the chosen duration. A one-month of delivery is either VHS or DVD.
subscription is only $46 (Rs 2,070). As with the other sites
The ‘Intensive Programmes’ mentioned so far, the soft skills
include material on leadership CRM Learning is expensive, but offers high-quality training offered there are communication
skills, personal career develop- skills, customer service, ethics,
ment and personal management ness Negotiations, Time Manage- leadership, and so on.
skills amongst others. The work- ment, Business Presentations, CRM Learning offers a ‘Purchase’
shops offered include interaction Winning at Interviews, Business option and it’s a good thing it let’s
skills, oral communication, Meetings, Organising Projects, you preview! Typically, the
corporate leadership, personal Planning Projects, Controlling purchase of the titles costs $795
development and other essential Projects, Business Analysis and (Rs 37,500) whereas ‘rental’ costs
skills. The clinics are short (20- Data Analysis. Some of these may $275 (Rs 13,000).
minute) ‘courses’. be classified as soft skills, some This means that you can order
not quite. the tapes or disks and present
Silicon Beach Training GetAhead also has an impres- them to your entire team at your
http://snipurl.com/digit_skills3 sive customer list, which includes convenience. However, the
This site has a compilation of the likes of Sun Microsystems, ‘rental’ option may not be avail-
many free e-learning resources Sony, IBM, AT&T, Kodak and able to Indian customers due to
that are available. Here, you will Compaq among others. shipping issues.
find links to books that you can Titles in the soft-skills depart-
purchase, links to forums, arti- NAM Virtual University ment include ‘The power of listen-
cles, tips and tricks and much www.namvu.com ing’, ‘Communicating non-
more. The topics are arranged The catalogue at NAM Virtual defensively’, ‘Attitude is Every-
alphabetically from ‘assertiveness University includes soft skills thing’, ‘Really Angry Customers’
skills’ to ‘communication skills’ training as well as training in and others.
to ‘time management’. other departments such as Infor- [email protected]

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 95

 Digital Tools l Smart SoHo Imaging Jayan Narayanan

Home Is Where
The Money Is
Telecommuting is not just a trend that will fade away... It is fast becoming a way of life more
and more professionals are choosing
comfort of their homes. And web- Sanjeev. With a rating of about
Meera Vankipuram based ventures that survived the 600, out of 93,000 programmers
dot-com crash are providing such listed on the site, Sanjeev is aiming
“Earn Rs 4,000-10,000 every month opportunities to people in India to head the top of the pile soon. A
by online surfing. Full/Part-Time and abroad. better ranking obviously means
from Home/Cyber café. Franchisees more lucrative offers. Who needs
required all over India. Contact: ...” Programmer For Hire placement services in such a
“Work 1-2 hours per day on A 29-year-old programmer with convenient setup?
home/office Internet. Earn extra five years of experience in IT is If you are a programmer, tired
income without leaving your resigning from a top firm to do of a structured corporate career,
present occupation. Training freelance assignments, working head to getafreelancer.com, renta-
provided. Contact: ...” from home. “I have been offered a coder.com, scriptlance.com and
freelance assignment from a US- elance.com—to code and earn,
ooks familiar? It’s based firm to develop Web-based without leaving home!
L splashed all over the clas-
sifieds in newspapers, in
applications using Flash and Flash
Communication Server,” says The Write Stuff
notices stuck on local trains and Sanjeev Menon. The project, Freelance journalism has been
buses and in dozens of handouts spread over a few months, will around for a while but thanks to
distributed at busy street corners. earn him as much as $1, 300 the Web, sourcing projects has
While the reliability of a signifi- (Rs 56,500) per month. never been easier. As an offshoot
cant portion of these notices is Sites such as www.renta- of the outsourcing boom, journal-
suspect, working from home is an coder.com help programmers like ists in India can now freelance for
option being explored not just by Sanjeev touch base with compa- foreign publications on a wide
homemakers but also by full- nies and individuals seeking free- variety of subjects.
fledged professionals tired of the lancers. These sites charge 15 per Chennai-based Power Quill
corporate rat race. cent of the programmer’s pay for (www.powerquill.com) is one such
The proliferation of the Inter- every project sourced through company that employs a network
net and cell phones has given their service. “The clients rate you of freelancers and is the brainchild
several users the choice of explor- based on your performance, which of former business journalists K
ing alternate careers within the is then displayed on the site,” says Nitya Kalyani and Arun Natarajan.

96 DIGIT JANUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Smart SoHo
Power Quill has worked on freelancers. Chillibreeze provides lation skills and make moolah
assignments for publications in people such as Nishi Roopa, a while they are at it. Prerna, a free-
the USA, India, south-east Asia and We mostly doctor who wanted to switch to a lance translator who has worked
the Middle East. Co-founder Arun employ career in writing, opportunities to on French-to-English projects,
states, “We mostly employ people people who work from home. Suma is an initially scoured the web for serv-
who work from home. We tap our work from instructional designer who free- ices that advertised freelance
pool of editorial staff depending home...most lances in order to spend more time assignments. “Google is your best
on our clients’ requirements. At of our with her five-year old. Arka and bet. Simply type ‘freelance trans-
times, we even fill in for temporary communica- Aniban are freelance scriptwriters, lation’ and follow the links. Most
tion happens working with Chillibreeze.
shortage of editorial staff. I think a sites are reliable and pay well,”
lot of women who have school- over Instant The requirements of interna- says Prerna.
going kids and the time to spare Messengers.” tional clients like Business Intelli- Sites like ProZ.com—a direc-
benefit from this kind of a setup. Arun Natarajan gence or even market research tory of freelance translators and
All you need is a good broadband reports are met by freelancers in translation agencies, Yahoo!
Co-founder,
connection at home—most of our Power Quill, relevant fields. Those interested in Groups and Elance Online have
communication happens over Chennai writing business-related white discussion groups on best prac-
instant messengers.” papers can contribute (on a royalty tices followed, payment and
A bulk of Power Quill projects basis) to www.outsource2india project details. “People normally
includes writing articles and news .com, another Stylus venture. bid for projects. The bids are
reports for domestic and foreign Anusha Subramanian, a free- placed by both agencies and indi-
publications, creating corporate lance journalist in Mumbai works viduals,” says Prerna. These sites
communications material for from home. She freelances for also offer ratings. The higher
small and medium businesses print publications and also edits. your rating, the better your
(SMBs) and Public Relations firms Anusha has been a freelance chances of obtaining a good
writer for over three project. Online forums also help
months now. She network with other translators,
coordinates with ‘The across the globe.
Word’, a company The ultimate repository for
based in Mumbai. “All freelance projects in any field, be
you need is a good it programming, editing, writ-
cable Internet connec- ing, graphic design, marketing,
tion at home and you content development or e-learn-
are your own boss!” ing is probably Elance Online
she claims. (http://snipurl.com/digit_elance).
Anusha is also a Elance lets companies ‘find the
member of several right professional’ for the right
online business job. This ‘global marketplace’ has a
networks including ranking system and also lets you
the popular Ryze.com, bid for projects that are up for sale
where she meets and consult sourcing experts.
prospective clients. As Other aspects such as payments
for the payments, are also handled through the
Journalists Supriya and Jigna, founders of a company that “Cheques are deliv- website itself.
ered home just like
employs freelancers other publications,” Uncharted Territory
she states. The Internet is flooded with gate-
and Web-based content. Set up by journalists Supriya ways that you can tap to earn
“Once our work is appreci- Madangarli and Jigna Kothari, The money without leaving home. A
ated, we receive more responses Word offers editing, marketing reliable Internet connection,
through word-of-mouth referrals. and content creation services to comfortable workspace, requisite
But Google is our best sales guy! companies and publications in software and inputs are all you
We browse the Web for potential India and overseas. need to get started.
projects and rely on it for adver- Says Supriya: “We make use of Exercise caution, though. You
tising our services,” adds Arun. the huge network of freelancers in must have the strength of mind
Apart from the Internet, Power India and contact them when a and the resources to deal with
Quill also makes use of VoIP, e- specific service is required.” delayed or erratic payments, long
mail and Skype. “We believe that The duo bags projects through periods without sufficient work
technology can drastically bring the Web and has enrolled in busi- and even lack of opportunities to
down the cost of publishing,” ness networks and also rely on match your skill sets.
Arun affirms. referrals. “Typically, magazines It pays to upgrade your skill sets
Another company that has pay around Rs 2 per word, news- from time-to-time, enrol in forums
capitalised on the outsourcing papers Re 1 or Rs 1.50 per word. For or business networks, and interact
boom is Bangalore-based Stylus other services, we charge accord- with people online and offline, to
System. Stylus develops Web appli- ing to the project.” stay marketable.
cations and manages BPO projects If you are willing to risk the
for clients in India and abroad. Click To Translate pitfalls and are confident of your
It recently inaugurated a divi- Linguaphiles with a flair for trans- talent and endurance, take the
sion called Chillibreeze (www.chill- lation can turn to the Web to plunge—the Web is your oyster.
ibreeze.com), which employs polish their linguistic and trans- [email protected]

98 DIGIT JANUARY 2005

 OLD
WAY
TECH Creating A Portable Song Compilation
WAY
Digit’s brand Prashant Narekuli ([email protected]) and Sachin Kalbag ([email protected])
head Prashant
Narekuli got fed
up with Exec Ed
Sachin Kalbag
showing off his
iPod at every
possible
opportunity.
Prashant was
determined to
show off what
he could do with
his age-old Aiwa
personal stereo
versus the iPod
Sachin was
flaunting

Listening to music the Old Way Listening to music the Tech Way

1 Items in hand: Aiwa Walkman, Philips 1200 W

stereo system. Needed 3.5-inch pin cable.

I bought the 3.5-inch pin cable from a local hard-

Items in hand: 15 GB iPod, FireWire cable. Needed
a USB cable.

Bought USB cable for Rs 2,200. Had to call up the

ware store for Rs 30. Apple distributor and then go to pick up the cable.

2 Time taken 30 minutes Time taken 95 minutes

Connected the Audio Out of my PC to the Aux In Connected the iPod to my PC. Loaded the iTunes

3 of my Philips stereo system using the 3.5-inch pin

cable. Popped in a blank 90-minute cassette that
cost Rs 25.

Time taken 2 minutes

software from the accompanying CD. After a few
hitches, it worked.

Time taken 28 minutes

Transferred over 3,000 songs from my PC to the

4 Played my favourite 20-song playlist as the stereo

did the recording. Had to turn the cassette once.

Time taken 91 minutes

iPod in just over a half-hour.Of course, this was
from a legit playlist gifted by a friend in the US.

Time taken 31 minutes

5
Played the recorded cassette on my old Aiwa Created a playlist from the 3,000 songs on the iPod
Walkman that I had bought for just Rs 1,000. and played them. Revelled in the digital, new-age
Enjoyed the age-old ways of analogue music! way of listening to music!

Total Time Taken: 133 minutes Total Time Taken: 154 minutes
Total Cost: Rs 1,055 for 20 songs Total Cost: Rs 15,000 plus for 3,000 songs

And could not decide what was most important—cost, stereo—or Walkman—gives you a simple, cheap and
The
Winner
I15,000
quality, or quantity. Sachin spent more than Rs
on his equipment. While you can show off
time-tested solution. Ultimately, I favoured
simplicity over the flashier iPod—it costs much less,
Is... the iPod to friends and colleagues, the personal and is almost hassle-free.

100 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Download a tool called PartitionMagic
(http://www.powerquest.com/partition-
magic/) that lets you convert from NTFS to
FAT32 without losing your data. If possible,
backup your data as a precaution.

Hey RAM!
The specs of my PC are as follows: Athlon XP
2400+, 256MB PC133 DDR RAM (Hynix) and
a Krypton C18G-400 motherboard with onboard
nVidia Geforce 4. Recently, my friend acciden-
Your Questions, Our Answers tally dropped my RAM module. But there were
no cracks or scratches. From then on, while
DVD Regions Conundrum launching some applications or games, it shows
an error—“(appname).exe has encountered an a
I have a Samsung DVD ROM attached to my problem and needs to close.” When I viewed the
P III that worked just fine. One day, I saw technical contents of this report, it displayed,
that it could not read the DVD disk, “The following files will be included:
however, it read CDs till now. From the D:\DOCUME~1\SIVASU~1\LOCALS~1\
‘DVD Region’ in the ‘Properties’ of the Temp\WER6.tmp.dir00\gta-vc.exe. mdmp.
DVD-ROM drive, I found that the current D:\DOCUME~1\SIVASU~1\LOCALS~1
region shows Region 1, but India belongs \Temp\WER6.tmp.dir00\appcompat. txt”
to Region 5. When I try to change the
region from 1 to 5, I receive an error For each application, only the number
message: “Unable to update region after “WER” and the application name
setting. Please make sure the drive itself changes. It happens mostly when
contains Region 5 media and you have launching GTA:Vice City, Colin McRae Rally
administration privileges.” How do I make 2, Adobe Live Motion and PDF-to-HTML
my DVD drive read a DVD? converter. Is it due to my Hynix RAM? Do I
Sadananda Singha need to get it replaced (it is within the
warranty period)? Are there any tools to
DVDs have nine region codes: detect damaged RAM modules?
Region 0 is region-free and such M Siva Subramanian
DVDs will play on all drives. Regions 7
is reserved and not set. Region 8 is for use on To test whether your RAM is damaged,
international planes, ships etc. These remove all RAM modules from their slots
settings can be changed four times at most, and insert only one of them into a slot. Now
after which they get locked to the last region run any the following utility: http://www.
used. It looks like you have changed the memtest86.com/
region more than four times, in which case Or get the Microsoft utility at: http://
you are out of luck. Remember, you do not oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp
have to change the region simply because you If you get an error, run the test again with
are in India. To play a DVD made in the your RAM chip in a different slot. If you do
US, for example, your player needs to be not get an error this time, then your RAM slot
in Region 1. is not faulty. Repeat the test for all the RAM
You can bypass the region lock that each chips you have.
DVD player comes with using various soft- It may turn out that both your RAM slots
ware. However, this is illegal and will render are faulty. To make sure that it is your RAM
your warranty void. chip at fault, test it on another machine
where the slots are working fine.
Get FAT! If you do not get any memory errors, then
your RAM chip is fine and you should try rein-
My OS is Win98. I stalling your games and software and updat-
installed Win2000 ing them with the latest patches.
Pro and it asked to
upgrade with NTFS Internal HDD, External Connection
which I did. Now, I
cannot format my C: I have a P III 1.0 GHz, a Vesta 810e Intel chipset
drive on which my OS board with 256 MB of SDRAM and an 80 GB
resides. When I try to Seagate HDD running Win98 and WinXP as the
format it, the D: drive OSes, a CD-ROM and an LG CD-RW. I also have a 40
gets formatted. My C: GB Seagate HDD not connected to the system. The
drive file system is 40 GB HDD is divided into three partitions running
NTFS and other drives, Win98. The 80 GB HDD is divided into six parti-
including the D: drive tions—four as FAT and two as NTFS. How can I
are FAT32. How can I connect my HDD to my system without opening the
change my C: drive cabinet? Do I need any special drivers?
from NTFS to FAT32? Managing drives in Partition Magic 8.0 Ravi Shah

100 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 It is possible to convert an internal HDD sor will give the same performance as an Intel
to an external HDD. You need to buy a processor running at a core speed of 1500
case which retails for Rs 1,500-2,000. Just put MHz. This is not the actual core speed at which
your drive in the case and connect it to your the processor runs. If your processor is an
PC with a USB cable. These cases do not Athlon XP 1500+, then your actual CPU core
support SATA drives—only regular IDE ATA speed is 1,333 MHz.
disk drives. There are four chipset manufacturers for
AMD boards—ATi, nVidia nForce, SiS and VIA.
PROcessor CON! There are manufacturers who make moth-
erboards based on these chipsets—ASUS,
I recently bought a PC with an AMD proces- Gigabyte, MSI and others.
sor 2800+, ASUS motherboard, an 80 GB You need a graphics card to play almost all
HDD, 256 MB of DDR RAM, a combo drive etc. I high-end games these days. For specifics, refer
have installed Windows XP. The PC configuration to Digit (January) for the graphics card
in the device manager displayed “AMD Processor shootout. Since you haven’t mentioned your
1500+”. When I asked the vendor about this, he motherboard or the chipset specification, we
replied about some switches on the mother- cannot give you a detailed answer. But you
board. On changing those, it would show the can check your motherboard and graphics
correct configuration. I am not so familiar card (if you have it) using the SiSoft util-
with AMD processors. I want to know what ity. Also, try installing DirectX9c and
the number 1500+ actually means, and is update your graphics driver. Try
my vendor right? running games now. It might work.
Earlier I worked on a P IV PC with a
VIA chipset motherboard. I had a bad The Infamous BSOD
experience with that PC. I came to know
that the VIA chipset doesn’t support high- I have a P IV 2.4 GHz PC with 512 MB of
end games. So I didn’t opt for any moth- DDR RAM, an Intel 865GBF
erboard having VIA chipsets. But my Motherboard, nVidia GeForce FX 5200
vendor says that there are no chipsets AGP, an 80 GB Seagate Barracuda 7,200
available other than VIA for AMD proces- RPM, a Samsung combo drive and a
sors. When I opened my CPU, I saw that he Realtek Rtl 8139 ethernet card. When I
had given us an ASUS motherboard with a logon to or logout from Windows XP, the
VIA chipset. Now my PC hangs every time blue screen of death appears often—in fact
I install a game, even a small one like 80 per cent of the time with either one of
Delta Force. Is it the motherboard, or these messages:
something else responsible? Aren’t there other 1. IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL Technical
motherboards available for AMD computers? Is Information: Stop (0x00000000,0x00000002,
a graphics card required to install games? 0x000000000, 0x804 D9716)
Sambit Mohapatra 2. PAGEFAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA
Technical Information: Stop 0x00000050
To check whether your vendor has given (0xFFFFFF60,0x00000000,0x804F4C32,0x00000000)
you the correct processor, go to your BIOS. The technical information varies each time.
Your processor’s core speed will be listed The errors occur mainly when I switch from one
there. Alternatively, download any of the user account to another (I have disabled faster
following utilities: Sisoft Sandra from user switching). I have no problems when I logon
http://www.sisoftware.net/ or Everest from immediately after system boot. I have installed
http://www.lavalys.com/. Click on the the latest BIOS drivers. There are no anti-virus or
Computer>Summary tab and your system background software installed. I have Windows
specs will get listed. This will tell you whether XP Professional, Windows 98 SE and SuSe Linux
you have been taken for a ride. with XOSL in a separate partition. Is there a fault
The term “1500+” is AMD’s way of indicat- in my RAM?
ing the processor’s performance—this proces- Amar Gupte

This error happens mainly due to

the hardware or software incompatibil-
ity. To avoid this, update the drivers of
all your devices and upgrade to SP2 in
Windows XP.
If that still does not solve the problem,
immediately after you get the error, reboot
your PC and see the CPU temperature in the
BIOS. In case, it is too high, then your system
is overheating and you must get a better heat
sink and fan. If the temperature is normal,
then go to Start>All Programs>Accessories>
System Tools> System Information. Click on
IRQ on the left side. View the status of your
IRQs in the right hand pane. If there is any
Viewing System Summary in Everest IRQ whose status is not OK, uninstall that

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 101

 Upgrade Without Losing Data And Settings
Method 2: Manually Transferring Files Outlook Express
F aster processor, bigger memory and better
computer… something we all want. We hunt
for the best deal and finally decide to go ahead
And Settings
This is for adventurous techies! Make a check-
To back-up the Address book, click ‘File’,
then ‘Export’ and then ‘Address Book’.
with that upgrade when we are struck by a list of the files you want to back-up—My Choose ‘Text File’ and select ‘Export.’
thought that could well be upgrade-altering! Documents, Outlook, E-Mail Settings etc. We Choose a filename to save the file in the e-
“How will I back-up and restore all the look at each one step by step. To start with, mail Backup Folder. Select the fields you
settings from my present OS version to the make a new folder on a drive where Windows would like to export. To restore the address
new installation or from this PC to another?” does not reside. All your settings and files book, import the text file you saved into
So many settings, so much data—e-mails, must be stored in this folder, henceforth to be Outlook Express.
Internet favourites, downloads...how? The called the ‘Backup Folder.’ To back-up your E-mail settings, click
mere thought can give you goosebumps! ‘Tools’ followed by ‘Accounts’. Now choose the
Fear not, for there are ways and means to My Documents account from the list and click on ‘Export’ to
archive critical data and retrieve it as easily. Click Start>Run. Enter ‘%USERPROFILE%’ save it to the e-mail Backup Folder. The e-mail
We tell you here how to migrate files and and click OK. Copy ‘My Documents’ in the settings can be restored to the new computer
settings between Windows XP PCs. Let’s Explorer window to the Backup Folder. in a similar manner.
consider a scenario in which you wish to re- To restore ‘My Documents’, click on Start, To backup your e-mails, you must find the
install Windows XP. run ‘%USERPROFILE%’ and copy ‘My e-mail store folder. Click on Tools>Options
Documents’ from the Backup Folder to the and then the ‘Maintenance’ tab. Click on the
Method 1: Using The ‘Files And location opened in Windows Explorer. This ‘Store Folder’ button, and note the location
Settings Transfer’ Wizard time, you will have to overwrite the folder. where your e-mail is stored.
Windows XP comes loaded with the ‘Files and Close Outlook Express, navigate to this
Settings Transfer Wizard’ utility, which helps Outlook folder in Windows Explorer and copy all the
transfer important files and settings from Outlook data comprises files with the .pst files in it to the E-mail Backup Folder. To
an old PC to a new one. The transferred extension for personal folders, .ost for offline restore your e-mails, click File>Import>
files and settings include ‘Appearance’, storage, .pab for the address book, .rwz for Messages. Select Microsoft Outlook Express 6
which contains wallpapers, colours, sounds, rules and .nick, .nk2 for nicknames for (OE6) and click Next. Select ‘Import mail from
fonts and location of the taskbar; AutoComplete. Additional files include .dat for an OE6 store directory’ and enter the e-mail
‘Accessibility Settings,’ ‘Internet Settings’ Toolbar and Menu settings, .fav for Favorites, backup folder path in the dialog box. Now
which includes your favourites, proxy and and so on. select the folder you wish to import to and
security settings, cookies, dial-up settings, To backup data from Outlook, create a click OK.
homepage, Outlook Express mail and folder in the Backup Folder and close Outlook.
settings and My Documents. Click on Start>Run. Enter ‘%APPDATA% Favorites And Cookies
\Microsoft\Outlook\’. Copy all files with the You need to create a folder for storing
Backing Up Files And Settings above extensions to the folder created earlier. Favorites and Cookies in the Backup Folder.
Click Start>All Programs>Accessories> Repeat the above steps for the path ‘%USER- Open IE, click File>Import and Export and
System Tools>Files and Settings Transfer PROFILE\Local Settings\Application click ‘Next’. Now select ‘Export Favorites’
Wizard. Click ‘Next’ in the first dialog box Data\Microsoft\ Outlook\’. It’s better to and select the backup folder you created.
that opens. Since you wish to first back up store the files from each of these folders The Favorites will be saved as a .htm file.
your files and settings, select ‘Old Computer’ separately in the folder created in the Favorites can be imported in a similar way,
and click Next. Now, select the method of Backup Folder. and so can Cookies.
transfer—which includes ‘Direct Cable,’
‘Home or Small Office Network,’ ‘Floppy Drive
or Removable Media’ and ‘Other.’ We shall Good Practices
select the ‘Other’ method. Enter a location on
a drive where you don’t have your data and
click Next. You can opt to export ‘Settings
Only,’ ‘Files Only’ or both or customise your
F ollowing some good practices makes life
easier. Organising folders in a convenient
way will help reduce the hassles of backing
selection. Clicking ‘Next’ one last time will up your data. Here are some methods.
transfer your settings and files to the Relocate the ‘My Documents’ folder to a
selected location. drive on which Windows is not installed.
Open Windows Explorer, right-click on ‘My
Restoring Files And Settings Documents’ and click on ‘Properties’. In the
After re-installing Windows XP, start the Files dialog box next to ‘Target,’ enter a path to
and Settings Transfer Wizard as before, but a folder on the drive of your choice.
this time select ‘New Computer.’ Select the From now on, this new folder is your ‘My
last option—“I don't need a Wizard Disk,” as Documents’ folder. Use sub-folders within
you have created a backup of the old this store all your data, be it e-mails or
Windows settings. On the next page, select documents. Changing the My Documents location
the option ‘Other’ and point to the location Similarly, the Outlook Express mail store
where the backup is placed. Wait for some folder can be relocated. In Outlook Express, click on Tools>Options>Maintenance. Click on
time for the files and settings to be restored. the ‘Store Folder’ button and select ‘Change’. Now point to a folder of your choice and click
Finish this operation and log off for all OK. All future mails will be saved to this folder.
settings to take effect.

102 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 WiFi Without Access Point clear all connections in preferred access points to
make sure that you connect only to your laptop.
I want to set up WiFi at work with a single desktop On the top right of your window, click the
and my WiFi-enabled laptop. Can I use a wireless PCI ‘Advanced’ tab and select ‘Computer to Computer (Ad
card and communicate directly with my laptop with Hoc) networks only.’ Un-tick the ‘Automatically
the RF waves from both terminals? Does technology connect to non-preferred networks’ box. Go back to the
tion support such configuration? Or is an AP a must? Can I wireless networking tab under the preferred
Quefsthe use only an AP connected to the desktop that will Networks window, click ‘Add’ and spec-
o nth
Mo communicate with the laptop? Which brand is ify a name (SSID)—any name. The
preferred for the hardware (AP, wireless PCI card)? connection type would already
[email protected] be specified as ‘Ad Hoc’. Now
you will see the name of
You do not need an your network in the
access point to setup preferred networks
a wireless network window marked
between your laptop with a red ‘X’,
and your desktop. You signifying that
need to set up an Ad that computer
Hoc access point. is not within
First, install the range.
wireless card on your Since your
desktop. If you are laptop is WiFi-
using Windows XP, enabled, go to
your card will be auto- the wireless
matically detected and Illustration Shyam Shriram networks tab
the drivers will install. If other networks are available, and you will
Windows will automatically open the window for wire- see the name you gave in the above step in the
less network connection. If not, click on the ‘Wireless “Available Networks” window. That’s all you need to do
Connections’ icon to open the window. If applicable, to share data between the two.

device from the device manager. Your Dirty PC !

computer should work fine now.
If all the IRQs have status ‘OK’, then I have a P IV 1.6 GHz CPU with an Intel
download the Windows memory-testing 845WN motherboard, 128 + 256 MB
program from http://snipurl.com/c3mh. SD RAM, 40 + 120 GB HDDs, a 24X CD-RW,
Run it, and if it gives any errors, then a 16X DVD-ROM and a 15-inch LG monitor.
assuming you have a single chip, remove I have three OSes—Win98, Win2000 and
your RAM chip and put it into another WinXP, loaded in the 40 GB HDD in three
slot. If it works fine then your RAM slot different partitions. The problem is that
is faulty and you will have to repair or my WinXP restarts abruptly without warn-
replace your motherboard. If, however, ing and this generally happens when I
your errors persist, then your RAM chip switch on my PC after several hours. After
is definitely faulty. this, when the PC restarts, the CHKDSK
If you have multiple RAM chips then operation is performed that results in
insert only one of them and test it in some errors and when finally XP restarts,
your RAM slots, then put in the other a warning indicates that the system has
and test as before. Identify the faulty slots recovered from a serious error.
and fix the problem accordingly. My DVD-ROM works perfectly but when I use
it for some time, the BIOS stops detecting it.
Over Drive! When I restart my PC three to four times, the
BIOS detects it perfectly. This problem occurs
I have a Celeron 600 MHz, a Procomp moth- at regular intervals and persists or does not
erboard and 128 MB of RAM. I have two occur at all.
Seagate hard disks—20 GB and 40 GB. I also have [email protected] Sanjeev Chharia
a Sony CD-ROM and an LG CD-RW. The two IDE E-mail us your
cables are all occupied. How do I attach a DVD- computing problems, Ensure that the motherboard is clean
ROM to my PC? and we may answer and dust free. You may want to contact
Tanmoy Das them here! Since we get a local technician to service it. Make sure
more mails per day than all wires and cables are plugged in properly
Install an IDE controller card to be able to we can handle, it may and that your RAM, video cards and all
add additional drives. An alternative is to take some time for your other peripherals are plugged in tightly
query to be answered.
remove your CD-ROM and attach the DVD- into their sockets. As for your DVD problem,
Rest assured, we are
ROM in its place, as a DVD ROM drive will listening! check your connection cables. They must
allow you to read CDs as well. probably be loose!

104 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Ask Agent 001
Agent 001

Power To The PC
Faulty power supply can spell doom for PCs. Agent 001 tracks down the better ones

A
month ago our editor SK, decommis- When confronted Efficiency in this case refers to the ability of
sioned his five-year-old glorified type- the PS to fulfil the demand from the machine
writer—his older Pentium pro system—
with the without significant internal loss. For example,
with the idea of getting a new 64-bit super fast efficiency if a PS is rated at 350W, under typical load con-
desktop PC. While he is not a geek you often question, most ditions, the total power consumed was 250W
come across in the Test Centre (TC) or Skoar!, his shopkeepers will whereas the power supplied to the system was
six-month stay amongst them has made him be at a loss to 175W. This amounts to 70 per cent efficiency
tech savvy enough to long for a 64-bit system. So implying that the remaining 30 per cent was
the TC drew up the best configuration and I
answer you, well, internal loss and dissipated in the form of
gave my inputs for the best market deals, all set efficiently! heat. And all this under typical load condi-
and done the final piece of paper was given to a tions. The consumption would vary depending
local assembler near SK’s house. He assembled on the work done by the processor.
the beauty, and boy, oh boy the smile on SK’s Why processors? Processors are the real
face was infectious when the monster of a power hungry monsters in the machine. At low
machine zoomed through most applications loads, when the system demands less power, the
like a Ferrari on an open road. amount of energy lost will be high presenting a
Everything was wow, cool and fast until that precarious situation for a poorly designed high-
fateful Sunday morning when a high pitch wattage PS since most of the power consumed
started emanating from the box and soon, will be flushed out as heat rather than used by
everything went cold. The TC was summoned, the machine. Therefore, although a good PS is
and they traced the fault to a fishy power sup- expensive, in the longer run, it will prove to be
ply (PS). But why wasn’t it a 400W supply with cost effective.
dual fans? Just the question to put a sleuth like So which one should you buy? Visit almost
me on the right track. any computer shop and a 300W PS costing Rs
This time around, though, the job was diffi- 500 will be the first one handed out to you.
cult since no one in the TC could come up with Brands are dime-a-dozen in this category and
quantitative proof as to which power supply you would be forgiven for thinking that just
brand is more reliable or efficient. However, about everybody in the world has a manufac-
from their testing experiences, they have reser- turing plant! Not all 300W PS, though, are bad.
vations about certain brands known to be bet- In fact, Mercury, Microtek, Frontech, Perx and
ter than others. According to them, a 350W PS HIS, to name a few, are the fastest moving ones
is a must if you own one of those deluxe, plat- and from my investigation, they don’t fare too
inum boards overflowing with additional fea- badly either. However, when confronted with
tures and demanding more power. the efficiency question, most shopkeepers will
But is putting a higher capacity PS the only be at a loss to answer you, well, efficiently!
solution? Debating on the issue, we arrived at Regular 400W PS are a different ballgame
the conclusion that a altogether. Everybody knows the ratings are
better (read effi- bogus and stickers are just that—stickers. Ask for
cient) 350W PS is as a 400W PS and be ready to spend up to Rs 1.5K
good as say, a for a bogus PS. Push a little harder and reluc-
poor 450W PS. tantly, you might hear the name VIP. The 400W
Illustration Shyam Shriram

PS from VIP is priced at Rs 1.9K and comes with

a three-year warranty and according to shop-
keepers is the best you can buy. Our TC swears by
Antec, a name not familiar to most in the mar-
ket. They are priced at a premium but are worth
the price.
In the marketplace, VIP attracts attention
as being the best amongst the brands. Antec is
definitely better and has a wide product port-
folio to choose from but is priced higher. With
no proper test in place, recommending a buy
is difficult but I will bet my money on an
Antec or a VIP.

Want more of Agent 001? Turn over to read his

Answers to your buying questions
 Ask Agent 001 Digital Tools l Ask Agent 001
TFT LCD monitors are expensive and
Pentium Or Athlon? The Athlon 64 will set you back by at least 23K for a
3200+ is ideally decent 17-inch model. LCD monitors with low
I am learning Maya and plan to buy a new PC to response time of 8 to 12 ms are rare in India
pursue a career in designing. What processor
priced at Rs 12K and even if they are available, would be priced
should I settle for? Should it be a Pentium or an and should prove high. For the moment, it is not advisable to go
Athlon 64 FX? Also, please mention the appropriate to be a great in for an LCD monitor given the fact that they
motherboard and the cost of the respective mother- performer when are expensive for the marginal advantages
board-processor combo. coupled with the they offer. My reasoning is also based on expe-
Jeet rience…I play lot of games and have come to
K8N Neo FSR the conclusion that even the worst CRT is a
Applications used for 3D modelling such motherboard better bet than a reasonable LCD since they
as Maya require colossal amount of pro- from MSI let you play without distortions. LCDs are
cessing power and tons of memory. As of today, also finicky about the resolution you run
AMD’s Athlon 64-bit processor is the numero them at.
uno and there should be no doubt about which On the positive side, LCDs consume less
processor to go for. The Athlon 64 family com- power, but that should not be an issue since
prises the Athlon 64 and Athlon 64 FX proces- home computers hardly run long enough to
sors, the latter being significantly costlier. In show up in the electricity bill.
case money is not a problem, consider the FX
series, the required RAM and motherboard, else First Hand Or Second Hand?
you can settle for the Athlon 64 processor.
The Athlon 64 3200+ is ideally priced at Rs I am interested in buying 256 MB SD RAM—
12K and should prove to be a great performer new or used. I have a P3 64 MB SDRAM,
when coupled with the K8N Neo FSR mother- 1 GHz processor. What is the market price for
board from MSI. This motherboard is priced at Rs both options?
7.5K, and a higher option, the fully loaded Dipen
Platinum priced at Rs 9.5K, is also available. Keep
in mind that for getting the maximum out of You should never compromise on a
this PC, you need to equip it with at least 1 GB of component like memory modules.
DDR 400 MHz RAM from Transcend or Kingston. Going in for used RAM has many pitfalls
although the deal might look good. Used RAM
Sound Decisions does not carry warranty and if you are going
to buy used RAM, buy it from a trusted source
My current PC configuration is P4 2.66GHz, only. New 256 SD RAM would cost you some-
Gigabyte 8S650GXM motherboard, 256 MB where around Rs 1,950. Before you buy,
Ram, 80 GB HDD, S3 Savage 2000 64 MB card. I though, make sure you point out to the deal-
want to upgrade and have already bought an Asus er that you are using a Pentium 3 and not a
P4C800 DLX motherboard, 1 GB DDR 400MHz RAM P4 processor.
and Antec PlusView 1000 AMG cabinet. Which is the
best CPU, graphic card, hard drive and sound card? Building A Gaming Rig
Money is not an issue.
Raj Anand I like playing games and would like to assemble
a reasonably good gaming rig. Can you to chart
The Asus P4C800-DLX supports socket a configuration that will play new games including
478 P 4 Processors with 800 MHz FSB. For Doom3, Half-Life2 and Commandos 3.
maximum performance, you can opt for a P 4, Anshul Thakur
3.2 GHz processor with 1 MB cache. For the
graphics, a GeForce 6800 GT card from I generally avoid such questions since
Gainward is a good investment. Western digital many variable parameters govern the
drives also perform admirably; however, are answer; least of all, the price restriction.
harder to obtain and service might become an However, since I have received a lot of similar
issue. You can safely bet on the Maxtor or queries, I am listing down a configuration that
Samsung SATA drives, though; they perform will cost around Rs 35K.
and help for them is not too far!
As for the sound card, I recommend you try Configuration For Gaming
the on-board sound first. If you are not satisfied
with the quality, then you could go in for any Product Price Range (Rs)
Creative Audigy card. Processor AMD Athlon 64 3000+
Motherboard MSI K8N Neo FSR
RAM Transcend 512 or 256 MB at least
CRTs Rule Still! Ask Away Graphic Card ATi 9600XT or GeForce 5700
Ultra-based cards
I want to buy a good 17” TFT monitor with fast Want some tech prod- HDD Maxtor or Samsung 120 GB
response time (8-12 ms), analogue and digital uct, but don’t know how Monitor Samsung 793S
inputs. My four-year-old CRT monitor has recently to go about buying it? Case Your choice
conked off and I would also like to know if this is the Send a mail to Power supply VIP 400 watts
[email protected], Keyboard Logitech New Touch
right time to upgrade to an LCD monitor considering and get your queries
the prices. Is a fall in prices expected any time soon? Mouse Logitech Optical
answered Optical drive Lite-on Combo drive
M K Mech

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 107

 Digital Business l Case Study

Digital

112 Inventory Accounting

Management 114 Software 118 Tech-furnishing
Your Office
Business
How Technology Can Help Your Organisation

Case Study

The Other Side

Can you imagine life without MS Office? Is there an alternative? StarOffice could just be the answer
you are looking for
the form of loans, insurance and credit cards,
Ram Mohan Rao to name a few. Amongst the four first-genera-
tion entrepreneurs who founded apnaloan.com
icrosoft is the undisputed leader in office is Parag Patankar, chief information officer and
M suites, and MS Office is the de facto stan-
dard when it comes to choosing an office
director, Insurance. An IIM Ahmedabad
alumnus and an engineer from IIT Kanpur, he
software package. For those who came in late, spent two years at the Project Finance Division
alternatives exist. And they are cheaper too! One of ICICI Ltd before moving to Corporate Banking
such alternative is StarOffice—Sun Microsystems’ in ICICI Bank where he spent three-and-a-half
offering for the office environment, priced much years in various capacities. We decided to find
lower than MS Office. out from him what it’s like to use StarOffice and
As the chief technology or information MS Office in tandem.
officer of your company, you might wonder
about using something like StarOffice instead of It’s All About The Money...
MS Office, given the ‘unknown’ aura sur- Apnaloan.com started in 2000 with the tradi-
Illustration Shyam Shriram

rounding it. So we decided to learn more about tional MS-based Office Productivity environ-
it, and investigated if any corporate setup was ment. It was not until 2003 that they started
implementing it. looking at alternatives, mainly from a cost per-
We came across Apnaloan.com. spective. The licensing cost for MS Office is
Apnaloan.com is a leading mediator for around Rs 8,000 per license for the Small Busi-
financial products in ness Edition, while the Professional Edition
retails at around Rs 12,000. In con-
trast, StarOffice 7 retails
 Digital Business l Case Study
for $60 (approximately Rs 2,700) per license Apnaloan.com now stores its information in
when purchased in a 25-user pack for SMEs. both formats. Moreover, since many of its cus-
Before implementing it on a large scale, tomers, vendors and business partners con-
Apnaloan.com evaluated both StarOffice and tinue to work with MS Office, the challenge was
Open Office—and decided to introduce StarOf- to internally work on a new environment,
fice in the organisation in late 2003. It’s been a but make it seamless with respect to external
year already, and Aplaloan.com now uses a com- communications. Naturally, this took some
bination of both. time to stabilise.
But the question is, why use MS Office at all
if you are migrating to StarOffice? Patankar Compatibility Issues
answers that even if Apnaloan.com uses StarOf- “When migrating from one environment to
fice, many of its customers, business partners There has been a another, compatibility issues are to be
and associates continue to use MS Office. There saving in licensing expected,” says Patankar. While StarOffice
are still some compatibility issues with opening costs that allows one to save files in MS formats, retrieval
and importing MS Office documents in StarOf- outweighs the of those files within the MS Office environment,
fice and vice-versa. Hence, there is a need to incremental cost at times, results in changes in templates, text
maintain MS Office for external communication. in training or and graphics. Also, when a file stored in MS
Also, when the transition from MS Office to re-training Office is opened in the StarOffice environment
StarOffice was done, Apnaloan.com already had through the ‘Import’ option, there were issues,
licenses for MS Office, and it made sense to con- Parag Patankar particularly with Excel Sheets containing Pivot
CIO and director,
tinue to use the existing licenses and only add Insurance,
Tables, Macros and Graphs and with PowerPoint
StarOffice incrementally. Apnaloan.com files containing embedded worksheets or
graphics. Some of these issues are as yet unre-
Resistance To Change solved, although there is a clearer under-
If one were to consider pure functionality, StarOf- standing of the problems.
fice is similar to MS Office, give or take a few fea- So how comfortable are users with StarOffice
tures. However, when looking at deployment, now? “Users who have started using StarOffice
Apnaloan.com had to consider several issues. from day one have no issues. However, people
First, a significant re-training effort was who have shifted from MS Office to StarOffice
required—even though the overall functionality sometimes feel that MS Office is easier for cer-
is similar, the user interfaces and the way menus tain functions, though, they have now adapted
and functions are used is different in StarOffice. to StarOffice,” says Patankar.
More than the re-training, overcoming user He adds, “Apart from productivity software,
resistance to change was a stumbling block. e-mail is a way of life in organisations and
People were used to working with MS Office and people are comfortable with the MS Outlook e-
it was difficult to make them abandon the com- mail client since some features in it are not yet
fort level they enjoyed. available with third-party mail clients. One can
“Almost all training was done on-site. We use Netscape or Mozilla with StarOffice but
subsequently set up a small StarOffice migra- there are limitations with these clients. For
tion-cum-support team in-house, whose mem- instance, options such as ‘Calendar’ or ‘Sched-
bers developed more expertise through uling’ are not available with Netscape and
self-study and by resolving user issues through those who are used to these have taken it
research. This was documented and used in sub- for granted and find it difficult to adjust
sequent training. The focus was on identifying without them.
the issues faced by users during the transition “Such issues need to be resolved before alter-
and providing solutions to these problems,” natives to MS Office can become really popular.
informs Patankar. I also expect organisations to start evaluating
Linux-based Office productivity applications as
The Switchover they become more mature,” Patankar states.

So Should You, Or Shouldn’t You?

Understanding the differences between StarOffice software and
Microsoft Office will help you anticipate the key challenges
involved and determine the best migration option for existing
So would Patankar recommend StarOffice to
other, similar organisations? “They should cer-
documents, templates and business applications. Depending on tainly use it for people who primarily need to
the complexity and value of existing files or custom solutions, the work on documents. However, for heavy users of
options range from archiving to converting to re-engineering source code. presentations and/or spreadsheets, there is a
The main steps of the process are: fair amount of re-training that will be required
MS Office documents and templates must be converted to the StarOffice and organisations should factor that cost into
software file format. the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) computa-
Existing scripting and custom solutions must be migrated. tion,” says Patankar.
Current business rules and processes may have to be adjusted to take full At the end of the day, though, Patankar feels
advantage of StarOffice 7 Office Suite features. that there has certainly been some cost saving.
In addition, key architectural differences between these two application “There has been a saving in licensing costs that
suites can affect the way they process and store information and data. outweighs the incremental cost in training or re-
However, because the suites also share many similarities, it is possible to training. Also, the benefits will further increase as
make the switchover nearly transparent to most users. the knowledge base has grown sufficiently, and
Extracted from the whitepaper entitled ‘Migrating to StarOffice Software from Microsoft Office’, the incremental training effort and cost would be
available at www.sun.com/software/whitepapers/staroffice/SO7Migration_wp.pdf lower as compared to the initial cost.”
[email protected]

110 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 How To Manage
Your Inventory
Every business needs to have a customised Inventory Management software in place.
A bold statement, but one backed by hard fact. As an example, we look at how a chemist can
benefit from it, in terms of both time saved and the hassle avoided

In order to switch over from manual inventory

management to software-based management, the first
step is to list and catalogue all supplies. From there
onwards, you only need to catalogue and sort when new
supplies arrive.

The cataloguing process is just a matter of entering data into a

computer. In this example—the chemist’s store—the fields to
be entered may be:
Name of medicine
Category of medicine (e.g. Cough Syrup)
Amount currently in stock
Cost per strip / bottle
Date of manufacture
Expiry date
Location of storage

All the details you entered for each item are encoded into a
unique bar code, which the computer will print out using a bar
code printer. All you have to do is stick these bar codes on each
medicine box / bottle.

112 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Tools l Visual Explanation

The computer informs you of the following:

Whether you have the medicine in stock
A customer hands you a doctor’s prescription. All you need to
How much you currently have in stock
do is punch in the medicine name into your computer.
When the medicine expires
Where in storage is it located

All you need to do is finalise a sale and

the computer prints out an itemised bill
with the name of the medicine, amount Once you have gathered
purchased, cost per strip / bottle, and the all the medicines that the
total cost customer was prescribed,
you just use a bar code
scanner to read the bar code and
finalise the sale. Totalling is done
automatically, and the software
automatically reduces the inventory
by the amount of goods sold

The inventory management software

helps you keep a track of what you have
sold and what you have bought. It will
give you an overview of your sales
figures in a snap.

You can also keep tabs on your

The software also helps you develop a balance suppliers, comparing cost versus
between supply and demand. It keeps a track of efficiency per supplier
what sells more and what doesn’t sell at all, in
order to ensure that you never have an excess
of one product or too little of another. It can
also warn you when a batch of goods is nearing
expiry, so you can order fresh supplies in time.

Infographic Shyam Shriram, Text Robert Sovereign-Smith

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 113

 Digital Business l Smart Business

ensures this while eliminating calculation mis-

Imaging Binesh Sreedharan

takes and reduces the probability of human

error as opposed to the manual accounting
system. Moreover, FA software reduces paper-
work even further, as reminder letters, invoices,
statements of accounts and other documents
can be e-mailed, thus saving time and postage.
Popular FA software has forsaken the outdated
MS DOS environment for a complete Windows-
based accounting system.

FA Software For SMBs

FA software is more comprehensive and differs
from software that can be used only for specific
purposes such as taxation or payroll.
Accounting software needs vary, from those of
individuals to those of large, corporate enter-
prises. We talk here about FA software intended
for small and medium businesses (SMBs).

Make Way For VAT

It’s an eventful time for SMBs, with the finan-
cial year-end looming, coupled with the imple-
mentation of the long overdue Value Added Tax
(VAT) from April 1, 2005. A form of sales tax paid
on products and services at each stage of dis-
tribution, based on the value added at that
stage, VAT will figure in the ultimate cost to the
consumer. An indirect tax, the VAT regime aims
to increase tax compliance and will spare no
one. What implications will the introduction
of VAT have on accounting procedures?

The Prakash Surte, a lawyer and a tax con-

sultant, offers, “As with the enactment of any
taxation act, VAT may lead to a disgruntled gen-
eral public. Nevertheless, it is a good move as all
the earlier sales tax acts will be repealed and

Money
VAT will take their place. Originally meant to be
a uniform rate, the VAT will vary as per com-
modity and state. Remember, VAT falls under
the purview of the State and not that of the
Central Government. Once VAT is implemented,
the maintenance of accounts will change to an

Managers
extent, since the sales tax-related provisions
and incidence of taxation will have to be cal-
culated differently.”
The majority of the FA software in the
Indian market is home-grown. Tally, EQA,
Accounts 21, Wings Accounting and S’Tax are
popular packages. Digit spoke to vendors of FA
As VAT looms large, small and medium business need software and to end users to get a snapshot of
to gear up for the new tax regime. Is your financial what’s in and what’s not for SMBs.

accounting software up to speed? EQA

Expert Quick Accounting, or
EQA (www.compubrain.net), is
Renuka Rane equipped to handle manufac-
turing, trading, excise, point of sales, sales tax
ourtesy the ubiquitous business and warehouse management, and VAT, too.
C accounting software, the thick, dusty
ledger is no longer a part of the modern
EQA was made VAT-compliant last year, taking
into account the reports, returns and forms
office. One need not be a geek to be able to that would have to be filed state-wise. Vikas
handle Financial Accounting (FA) software. Chitlangia, MD, Compubrain India Limited,
Numerous user-friendly versions sell like hot- developers and marketers of EQA, says, “EQA is
cakes while upgrades and enhancements act as customisable. The user can tweak it and set the
the proverbial icing. ‘master’ as per his requirements. The propri-
As per the universal rule of the double entry etary database is in .eqa form and is compatible
system of bookkeeping, each debit should have with other software. The ‘report designer’ fea-
an equal and corresponding credit. FA software ture enables preparation of invoice and

114 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Business l Smart Business
Various add-on features and upgrades can
Ask For These in FA software be downloaded from the Tally Web site. For the
Client information financial year 2005-06, Tally plans to upload
Receivables and payables VAT, e-TDS, TCS, service tax, payroll, mobile
TDSVAT (April 2005 onwards) device support, multi-lingual software, port-
Salary payouts folio management and e-banking.
Sales and purchases Tally ees 6.3 enables exchange of information
Order management with non-Tally systems using XML, the industry
Inventory management (for trading firms) standard for data interchange. It enables the user
Customisability report and invoice generation to share data across locations—with extended
Budgeting production enterprises (“ees” stands for Extended Enterprise
Incorporation of items subject to different tax System) including customers, bankers, business
rates in one bill In case changes partners and other associates. The protocol sup-
Technical support and after sales service occur in the port for Tally is customised to business-specific
format of the needs and integration with SAP, Oracle and other
returns, we external software is possible.
delivery challans, reminder services, monthly, provide free Vinod Nair, Navi Mumbai based chartered
quarterly and annual reports. If changes occur upgrades to accountant has been using Tally for the last six
in the format of the returns, we provide free existing users for years. “I experimented with other FA software
upgrades to existing users for one year.” one year. before I settled for Tally. Tally supports good
According to Akshay Kurwa, Partner, Kurwa Vikas Chitlangia, browsing speeds. The hundreds of reports that
Rubber and Valves, Mumbai, “The rigidity that MD, Compubrain India are generated daily can be easily exported to MS
is otherwise observed in other FA packages is Limited (for EQA) Excel. Unlike other custom-made accounting soft-
absent in EQA, which is very easy to operate. ware that could be easily tampered with, Tally has
However, some features that I needed are yet to rigid security control. Of course, for human
be incorporated. Since, we receive good after- errors such as mistakes made by accountants,
sales support and regular upgrades, I am sure only the audit trail can reveal discrepancies.”
this issue will also be resolved.” However,
Manish Purohit, operations manger, Creadent EX Personal
Solutions, Rajasthan, has not been so fortunate. Accountant
“Although EQA is a useful product and is A product from the Tata stable,
packed with features, after-sales service needs EX PA (www.myexonline.com)
to be improved. I am still waiting for the fea- was created specifically for growing businesses.
tures the vendor promised.” EX PA is enhanced by the latest technology and
an extremely easy-to-use user interface. It is
Tally equipped with readymade templates to suit
Tally (www.tallysolutions.com) specific business lines. The ‘Smart Folder’ con-
is hugely popular due to its cept allows tracking of items/customers/sup-
speed, simplicity, power and pliers and related information with a
flexibility. Incidentally, Tally was the first FA drill-down facility. EX PA has over 70 reports
software to introduce the no-codes concept i.e., specifically designed to meet statutory and MIS
it accepts alphanumeric characters for needs. It helps perform ad hoc queries on data
accounts and inventory masters. Satish T, that make it ideal for auditing. Mr Natraj, mar-
advisor, Tally Solutions, says, “The Tally Audit keting manager, TCS (Bangalore), says, “EX Per-
feature allows the finance manager to check sonal Accountant is a user-friendly FA package
the time, date and accuracy of entries. This way, and is compatible with SQL and Excel. Once the
malpractices can be detected and errors recti- VAT formats are ready, we will upgrade the
fied. Tally is VAT-compliant. It is running suc- current version.”
cessfully in Europe, the middle east and
south-east Asia, where VAT is the norm. Imple-
menting the same in India is not an issue.” Wings Accounting
Wings Accounting (www.wings.
be) was the winner in Digit’s
review of FA software in the
country in July 2004. Wings Accounting offers
several tools to help businesses automate their
finance and accounting functions comprehen-
sively; it can work in any world language and is
also VAT-ready. It helps account for VAT payable,

Price List
Accounting Software Price (Rs)
EQA 3,000
Wings 5,000 onward
S’Tax 10,000
Account 21 4,950 onward
Tally ees 6.3 4,500
Tally is popular for its speed, simplicity and flexibility

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 115

 Digital Business l Smart Business
(www.topsyssolutions.com), a Windows-based
application. Balagopal Karat of Topsys Solu-
Unlike other tions, developers and marketers for Account21,
custom-made says, “It handles billing and inventory control
accounting and users can define the format. Certain
software that reports can be e-mailed directly. Account21 has
could be easily an open interface and data can be imported or
tampered with, exported to and from Excel and CSV.” Users can
Tally has rigid purchase Account21 versions as per the func-
security control tions of each product—invoicing coupled with
Vinod Nair, multi-currency and/or inventory (for trading
Chartered Accountant, /manufacturing).
Navi Mumbai Vidhya Dhandapani, Accountant, Kropex
India Ltd, Bangalore, says, “Account21 is user-
friendly with diversification for inventory con-
trol. For instance, we deal in 6,000-odd items
subject to different rates of taxation. This
Wings Accounting provides total VAT compatibility
results in numerous calculations that are now
easy to handle thanks to Account 21. It is also
VAT-ready, we will just enable that feature
input credit and accounting. It generates all once VAT is implemented.”
information to help prepare and file returns for
VAT. Existing users can easily upgrade to Wings S’Tax
Accounting that is VAT inclusive. Wings S’Tax ( www.sinewave.co.in) is
Accounting will generate VAT returns directly an accounting software used
once the formats are finalised. Wings has spe- for filing Central Sales Tax
cial features for NGOs and the apparel and (CST) and Maharashtra Sales Tax (MST)
footwear industries. Multi-layered security, monthly, quarterly or annually, depending on
report writer, forms and invoice designer, multi- the assessee. Priced at Rs 10,000, it includes
locational accounting, confidential accounting the various forms required for sales tax pay-
etc. come with Wings Accounting. ment and offers a standard facility to import
Sutinder Singh, director, PCH Marketing, data from other software. S’Tax is a product of
Hyderabad, says, “We have been using Wings Sinewave Computer Services Pvt Ltd. Anil
Accounting for the last 20 years, starting with Moolani, Director, Sinewave, says, “In a
the DOS version. Reports can be printed in any month’s time, S’Tax will be equipped with the
format. Wings is web-enabled and can handle facility to calculate VAT. Present users
large quantities of data. When the Windows of S’Tax can get upgrades that contain VAT
version of Wings was introduced, we were modifications, either online or through the
apprehensive and switched to Tally for six CDs we dispatch.”
months. We had to revert to Wings, which is an K K Gada, a CA in Mumbai, has been using
excellent FA package for SMBs.” S’Tax for the last five years. Gada states, “S’Tax
efficiently calculates sales tax liability, files
Account21 returns in the prescribed format, prints challans
Anyone familiar with the basic for tax payment, and so on. S’Tax has made client
accounting system can work management easier. Once the modalities of VAT
comfortably with Account21 become clear, we will just have to incorporate VAT
in some aspects of the accounting procedures
(where the amount is to be set off). Other basic
accounting principles would remain unaffected.
We keep receiving upgrades from Sinewave for
S’Tax, Tax Base and even Service Tax. We will
simply have to get the upgrade for VAT.”

The Last Word

Download a fully-functional demo version of
the FA software from the vendor’s Web site, or
get it totally free on request. This allows you to
test the functionality before buying. Steer clear
of pirated versions that may contain viruses or
have inadequate documentation. Also, users of
pirated software are ineligible for technical
support and upgrades. While upgrades are not
an issue, after-sales service could be a sore point
in some cases. However, registered users can
obtain online technical help from the call
centre of the vendor. The verdict: SMB users of
FA software seem to be a contented lot, albeit
after some experimentation.
Account 21 is easy to use and has a diversification for inventory control [email protected]

116 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 place to suit today’s techno-
logical needs. This could, in
fact, even help save some
money in the bargain. Let’s
look at the various parts of
an office that could be truly
Imaging Atul Deshmukh

‘IT- enabled’.

The Cubicle
Cubicles today are typical—
they have a computer, a
telephone, sometimes a
printer, almost never a
scanner and a soft board.
Space for the person
working in the cubicle is
at a premium, and he or
she has to manage space
and devices efficiently.
While a printer is a
necessity, a scanner
might not be required
as frequently.
However, arming
every cubicle with a
printer could cost
the company much
more, apart from
cramping up the
cubicle.
The solution here is simple.
Space could be freed up in a cubicle by
strategically placing a multifunctional device
(MFD) so that four or more workers in a partic-
ular bay could use it. This would also reduce
hardware costs in terms of peripherals and
You want to tech-enable your office, and don’t maintenance.
Space in the cubicle could be further
want to waste money on unnecessary expenditure. enhanced by replacing the existing CRT mon-
Here’s a primer to get you going on the right track itor with an LCD one. These certainly take up
less space, and although they cost more that
would be recovered from the power savings
Aditya Kuber they offer.
Today’s executives are tech-savvy and would
he agricultural age was based on ploughs surely appreciate the extra space made avail-
T and the animals that pulled them; the
industrial age, on engines and the fuels
able to them. They have enough devices they
would want to either sync with the computer or
that fed them. The information age we are now simply have at hand at work.
creating will be based on computers and the Some devices that are now commonplace
networks that interconnect them. with today’s on-the-go executives include a
Folks at Sun Microsystems can now say, “We PDA, a cell phone, digital camera, pen drives
told you so”, and everyone would have to agree. and more. The computer in his or her cubicle
Their famous punch line “The network is the should have at least two USB slots to accom-
computer” is slowly coming true with the work- modate two of the above devices at a time.
place undergoing a major upheaval since the There are enough executives who would like
early days of the computer. But merely having to sync their PDA with their computer and cell
a computer and a printer connected on a net- phone, and add digital images in a presenta-
work are not enough to say that your office is tion saved on the pen drive!
IT-enabled. But is this a practical way of working?
With today’s technologies, the use of var- Sandeep Mehrotra, sales manager, Adobe Sys-
ious devices in tandem can help you get the tems India, says, “I think offices that incorpo-
most for your business. rate technology in a big way will not only reap
According to researchers at IBM, nearly 70 benefits in terms of saving costs but also see a
per cent of all work is collaborative in nature great deal of increase in productivity. Tech-
and only 30 per cent is done individually. Why, nology will be an enabler in making the office
then, are most offices still made up of indi- an enjoyable and comfortable environment.”
vidual desks? V Krishnan, general manager, consumer
Most offices would do well to optimise the sales, imaging and printing, HP India, agrees:
way employees work by refurbishing the work- “A tech-intensive office will definitely involve a

118 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Business l Smart Business
fair amount of initial investment and hence, of ensuring you never forget. At any given
the start-up operation will be more expensive point, at least one of the devices would be with
than the conventional non-tech office. But, a you. So even if your PDA is in your bag, the cell
well-designed and well-linked office will be phone would remind you of a meeting or a
able to pay for its investment within a short birthday. This job could also be carried out by
period,” he says. the secretary and you need not worry about
missing another appointment.
The Conference Room In fact, if your PDA is e-mail compliant and
What can easily be called the great coliseum in can support MS Word, Excel and PowerPoint
an organisation, the conference room is one of files, you need not worry about not having a
the most important areas. Given today’s pres- file during a meeting.
sures and tech-readiness most employees have, You could ask your secretary to e-mail it to
the room should not need to be “prepared” A tech intensive you. You could then download it using either
before each meeting. office will Bluetooth or Infrared, and you’re good to go!
Some of the most important aspects of a definitely involve a
conference room are the projector, projector fair amount of Tomorrow’s Office
screen, a computer for playing presentations, a initial investment... While these setups are possibly enough in
phone with conferencing facility and a video- But a well-linked today’s scenario, imagine having an office
conferencing facility. and well-designed where anyone could sit in any cubicle without
The layout of the conference room must be office will pay back having to worry about any kind of setup.
conference-friendly and the computer should the investment Given that all cubicles are identical in size
ideally possess the following: a DVD combo in a short span and have the same hardware, employees could
drive, USB ports, memory card slots and a lot of of time simply choose the cubicle closest to their team
RAM so that the presentations don’t drag V Krishnan with every change and their data, e-mail and
around. Remember, this is also the room where General Manager - extension would follow automatically. How?
you would possibly be making an impression Consumer Sales, Imaging Your identity card would be the most impor-
on the client. So let ’er rip! and Printing, HP India tant tool at work. With every cubicle being
A good projector is a long-term investment. identical, there would be a swipe facility out-
But having the right one to suit your needs and side the cubicle. Simply swiping your ID card
your conference room is a major task. While would mean that the computer in that cubicle
the range of projectors available is vast, you would open your e-mail account and personal
need to make sure you get just the right one settings and the Internet phone in the cubicle
for your office. (Refer the January 2005 issue of would simply assume your extension.
Digit for more on projectors) This process repeats every time you change
Videoconferencing is gaining in popularity, your cubicle. With all your data on the network
and if you could “meet” with the client and safely encrypted, the only thing you need
without having to leave your office, what a way to carry around is your coffee mug!
to save time and money! All this sounds good but isn’t it a little
Says Yugal Sharma, country manager, fancy? “A number of functions in today’s situ-
Polycom India, a video conferencing major: ations can only be performed using intelligent
“Video conferencing boosts productivity—there devices and hence, technology and gadgets can
are no two ways about it. Executives globally, only help augment the mental capability of an
and even in India, have reported benefits individual and help perform his/her tasks far
thanks to faster decision-making, improved more efficiently,” says Krishnan.
employee morale, improved access to the best [email protected]
talent, reduced time to market, better cus-
tomer responsiveness, more efficient work
practices, fewer concerns about travel prob-
lems, and a greater focus on results overall.
And, of course, measurable costs like travel and
accommodation are reduced.”

The Boss’ Room

Contrary to what you might think, bosses do
have a lot of work, and therefore, require all
the space and gadgets they normally have in
their rooms! An ideal room for a boss would be
a hi-tech, efficient place where things happen
at the touch of a button.
As boss, you probably carry a range of
gadgets, and with good reason. Your laptop,
cell phone, PDA, pen drive, and a whole lot of
data spread across these devices is your lifeline.
You also need to attend a lot of meetings
and keep track of a variety of other intra-office
activities and events including birthdays,
anniversaries, appraisals and more. How does
one person accomplish all this on time? Syn-
chronising data on various devices is one way

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 119

 Trends

“W
e work mainly on Windows NT
and 2000 operating systems. We
plan to shift to Windows 2000
completely, but not as of now. We have around
100 people in the organisation and only about
25 per cent of them use computers. We use MS
Outlook and MS Office, and most of our work
is done on word processors. We use McAfee
Antivirus that is updated daily. If we are to
upgrade the OS, it would be based on our
requirements. We will look at the best
Rajeev Tyagi

software for upgrading. If the business

demands it, it will be done, otherwise we
Virendra Vishnu simply cannot splurge, as upgradation
Manager, Corporate IT involves additional expenditure for training,
Operations, AVL India hardware and others—all incidental.”
Software Pvt Ltd

When Will
Businesses, more often than not, take a long time to switch over to newer versions of
software. Five industry experts tell us why they don’t upgrade fast

“W
e work on the Microsoft
platform. The OS comprise
Windows 95, 98 and XP. We use
Mcafee Antivirus that is periodically updated.
While it is not possible for all systems in the
office to be updated regularly, all are at par
within a month’s time. Our office work is
spread across 70 locations with nearly 300
machines on the network. Maintenance is
mostly done in-house and only maintenance
for hardware is outsourced. Our MS Office
usage is largely restricted to MS Word and MS
Bhagirath

Excel. Only if there is an absolute need for

our business, will we upgrade the software.
Amay Choudhary At present, the work doesn’t demand it.
Corporate IT Manager Besides, when we upgrade our software, we
will invariably have to upgrade 40 per cent of
our existing hardware as it will not support
the new software.
“We have introduced Citrix for remote
computing and management to save costs.
We may not upgrade every system in the
office, as some software that works best on
98 may not do so on XP. The decision to
upgrade will depend on various factors. More
importantly, will there be an increase in
productivity after upgradation? If the reports
Imaging Atul Deshmukh

promise an upswing in productivity then it

makes sense to upgrade. There must be logic
to support the change.”

120 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 “M
ost of our work is done in the Microsoft environment.
We are currently using Windows 98 and Windows XP.
Norton AntiVirus helps keep the systems safe and it is
updated weekly. Our network comprises 13 users, so it’s not very
complex. We have outsourced maintenance to a team of service
engineers who also help us make upgrade decisions. They know our
systems thoroughly and can recommend what is required. Majority
of our in-house designers use tools such as Corel and Photoshop.
Currently, we have deployed Outlook Express on all systems. We may
opt for an upgrade, provided it helps improve the speed and
efficiency of our employees, more so, when we are handling
Jiten Gandhi

multiple projects and have to cater to our customers’ demands. In

our line of work, the customer is very important and it is imperative
to meet deadlines. We will upgrade only if there is a requirement
Hemang Desai for the new software and it is cost effective. If the new software
Proprietor, IND Advertising helps us deliver better, will it make sense.”

You Upgrade?
“W
e use the Windows NT and 2003 Server in the hospital.
There are 100-plus machines on the network and their
maintenance is done in-house. I am aware that the
support for NT has been withdrawn by Microsoft. Nevertheless, I am
confident that my in-house team is well-equipped to handle any
problems. As far as I know, the systems on NT are not exposed to any
security risks. They are mainly on the Intranet and hence, not as
vulnerable. We use Norton AntiVirus and upgrade it as and when
new definitions are available. We use only licensed copies of
software and there are no pirated versions. We don’t mind getting
newer versions of software provided there is a demand for it.
Training the staff on new versions is not an issue. We will focus on
Jiten Gandhi

improvement in efficiency and productivity following the

introduction of anything new.”
Hari Vishwanathan
IT Head, Bhatia Hospital

“W
e have offices across six metros, mainly used by our
technical experts who provide technical support for HP,
IBM, and so on. At our office, we have a network of
nearly 125 computers. While we work on Microsoft and Linux
platforms, we use the former more than the latter. We use Windows
2000 and 2003 Server on our systems. We use Norton Symantec that is
updated on a weekly basis. MS Outlook is used for e-mails. Whenever
any upgradation has to be done, the first thing we will take into
account is user convenience. As far as possible, we would like to avoid
down time. Other factors that are equally important include costs of
training, support and hardware. All this has to be carefully planned.
At the same time, we allocate a budget every year for training and
Mexy Xavier

upgradation. We will upgrade only if it is followed by an increase in

productivity. An increase in productivity can be achieved only if there
is improvement in user efficiency and the end result of all this should
Gopal Patkar be increase in revenue.”
Sales Manager, Business
Link Automation India Ltd

E-mail: [email protected]

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 121

 Online Advertising v/s Offline Advertising
With online advertising emerging fast, we find out if it is better than offline

In online advertising, we can The advantages of offline advertising

clearly set our target audience lie in the placement of ads

S C
haadi.com is a matrimonial services provider, which reative has been in the Indian market for the past
started operations in 1997. The company created has 16 years. Initially, we produced only sound cards
succesfully created a new industry—online matchmak- but today, we have a wide range of products from
ing. Today, we have over two million members and record sound cards to multimedia kits, CD-ROMs, speakers and
over 200 million page views per month. We are present even MP3 players. Creative be credited for converting the
online and invest considerably in online advertising. PC from a calculating device to an entertainment unit.
“Online advertising is important to us since we are an “Strategically, we do not allocate any budget for online
online entity and the products and services that we offer or offline advertising. However, we advertise offline in a
are all available online. At present, we advertise offline in major way as we have been getting good results from it.
local trains, TV channels and other mediums. It is difficult We advertise in IT magazines and to a certain extent, in
to say how much we spend on each medium but it does lifestyle magazines. It wouldn’t be useful for us to
amount to a few crores. advertise in glamour magazines as their readers are not
“In online advertising, we can clearly set our target audi- our target audience.
ence as we know their interests, age and gender. This is not “I think combining offline and online advertising

All the four P’s of market- I feel innovation is required in

ing— product, price, place- offline advertising. It is very
ment and promotion—can essential to educate the reader
Photograph Mexy Xavier

be implemented online, about the product and the

which is not possible more ways you do that, the
offline better
Vibhas Mehta, Rajshekhar Bhatt
Group Partners Relation Sales and Marketing Manager
Manager, Shaadi.com (India), Creative Technologies

possible in offline advertising as we do not know who exact- would provide the desired results as we would be able to
ly we would be catering to. A mixture of online and offline reach out to a wider group. In India, people still use dial-
advertising is necessary, which is enabled by technology. up connections to access the Internet and more so for
“In online advertising, we can be sure that the user has a checking e-mails. If online advertisements are data-heavy,
need and there is the option of offering him exactly what he it may be a problem to view them.
wants. Online, we can customise what we offer to the shop- “The advantages of offline advertising lie in the
per. Just a few basic questions to understand his needs and we placement of the ads. If an ad is placed in an IT magazine,
can offer him a deal accordingly. Moreover, the online you can be sure that it will reach your desired audience. If
method is measurable. We can know where the customer you advertise in a particular magazine regularly and there
learnt about us. For online customers, more information is is a set pattern or way of presenting your ads, you can be
just a click away. They can go to a specific option, click on it sure that the customer would definitely notice the ad
and get additional data. Even when we offer something to the whenever he flips through the magazine.
customer online, we can ask him some details such as his “The drawback in offline advertising is that if the
interests and spending limit and then offer a product. customer have missed your ad in the newspaper t oday,
“We cannot afford to ignore offline advertising totally he has probably missed it forever. Besides, if he were to
though, because the older age group of the population who see an ad with some offer for a particular time period,
try and fix alliances still prefer to scan matrimonial ads in he would not be eligible for it at a later date. Hence, the
newspapers—and this is quite a large number. Besides, there impact of the ad is lost.
are a few drawbacks with online advertising, the major one “Also, once printed, the ad cannot be changed. If you
being inadequate penetration of the Internet. Internet usage want a different ad to appear, it means an additional
in villages is much lesser than in metros, which makes it dif- expenditure. On the other hand, if you have a 30-day
ficult to reach that segment. Bandwidth problems in India contract with a portal, you have an option of changing ads
make matters worse. We use Flash and interactive media in every 10 days at no extra cost.”
our online ads that are data-heavy and may not load proper-
ly if the bandwidth is not supportive.” As told to Preethi Chamikutty ([email protected])

122 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Leisure l Touched by Tech

Digital

143 Impress Your

Valentine 146 Prince
Persia
Of
164 Minister
Sharon Stone
Leisure
Technology Beyond Work

Touched By Tech

The Ocean Rises

How technology lent a helping hand to relief operations in mainland India, Sri Lanka,
Thailand, Indonesia and the Andamans
“The sea—this truth must be compared with the might of the first waves hit the Andaman
confessed—has no generosity. No catastrophe. Amidst all the chaos, Islands to send out warning signals
display of manly qualities—courage, even the marvel that is technology to coastal areas.
hardihood, endurance, faithfulness— could not come to the rescue. When disaster struck Indian
has ever been known to touch its irre- In hindsight, though, a signif- shores, conventional communica-
sponsible consciousness of power.” icant number of the causalties tion systems were the first casual-
—Joseph Conrad could have been avoided had ties. In the face of adversity of
India availed membership of the mammoth proportions, technol-
Meera Vankipuram Tsunami Warning System (TWS) ogy came to the rescue not only in
in the Pacific. The TWS monitors mainland India, but also in Sri

I
t was almost as if the ocean had seismological and tidal activity in Lanka, the Andaman and Nicobar
decided to make itself heard the Pacific Basin and dissemi- islands, Thailand and Indonesia.
against the incessant abuse it nates earthquake and tsunami
had been facing for centuries. In warning information to its 26 The Web Of Hope
one of the worst natural disasters member states within a matter of As the water rose, mobile and land-
ever, the tsunami that originated hours in case of an impending line networks capitulated. Phone
near Indonesia and went on to disaster. calls were not possible. Strangely,
ravage almost 10 countries in Reports now indicate that even though, SMS worked. Those who
south-east Asia, the ocean let us without the warning system, India were not washed away by the
know its might. Any or relief effort had at least 40 minutes after the waves were able to reach relatives
thereafter seemed only via SMSes. Bloggers
inadequate when
Photograph DigitalGlobe
Imaging Atul Deshmukh
 Digital Leisure l Touched By Tech

“The Blog Response Overwhelmed Us”

A tête-à-tête with Peter Griffin, a media consultant based in Mumbai who helped set up
the Tsunami relief blog
Asia, Rohit and I decided to set up a free search tool (Pico), which could
collaborative blog that would try to link search up to 250 posts;
people who wanted to help with those but later someone ‘donated’ us a paid
that needed help. Fortunately, we had search tool.
great media support right from the start.
Photograph Rajeev Tyagi

Popular sites like Boing Boing, Smart SEA EAT also seems to have inspired
Mobs, InstaPundit and Rediff wrote about ‘cyber-volunteerism’.
SEA-EAT. So far we have received nearly The blog had to be updated round-the-
400 e-mails from people offering or clock. When someone in India went to
seeking help. sleep, someone in New Jersey would take
over; when that person hit the sack,

B log buddies Peter Griffin, Rohit

Gupta, Dina Mehta (from India), Bala
Pitchandi, Megha Murthy (USA) and
Paola Di Saio (Thailand) set up the South-
How did you deal with the information
overload?
As the team grew, suddenly there was
way too much information on the blog.
someone in California or Thailand would
take over. People were blogging from
home and office; some offered to redesign
the blog in between hectic work schedules.
East Asia Earthquake And Tsunami (SEA- Since Blogger didn’t support ‘sub-blogs’, Blogger would have nearly shut us
EAT) Blog—www.tsunamihelp.blogspot. we installed a Wiki to sort the info and down if a chance contact in Google hadn’t
com. Digit spoke with Peter Griffin on how make the site easily navigable. provided us unlimited bandwidth!
the blog aided relief and rescue efforts. Our News Wiki team received a lot of People also offered us mirror sites. An
‘this is not journalism’ flak, though. IT company, ironically named Tsunami
How did the world get to know about Someone then purchased the URL Software (http://www.tsusoft.com/), even
SEA-EAT? (tsunamihelp.info), someone else posted a link to SEA-EAT on their site, at
A day after the tsunami struck south-east donated server space. We were using a the risk of losing valuable traffic.

worked overtime to broadcast the aidsites), Amazon.com, The Hindu assisting rescue efforts and trying
Photograph Mexy Xavier

situation in their countries. online (http://pay.hindu.com/thrf- to find missing persons in the

Thai local Paola di Maio, pay/thrfpay.jsp) and NDTV.com. islands and also coordinating
along with netizens in India and with counterparts worldwide.
the US, set up the South-East Asia Radio To The Rescue
Earthquake And Tsunami Blog— The unassuming transistor radio Rising To The Occasion
www.tsunamihelp.blogspot.com proved to be a life-saver for locals Mobile service providers in Sweden
(see box above), which was a reli- in the Andaman and Nicobar and Denmark waived incoming
able source of first-hand infor- A post about islands and Nagapattinam district and outgoing call charges from
mation on the devastation a group of in Tamil Nadu, two of the worst south-east Asia for 48 hours post-
wrecked by the tsunami. This orphaned hit places in India, to receive tsunami to help survivors reach
and other community blogs have children in warnings—and later, information their families. In Sri Lanka and
helped people search for their Thailand from the Government and NGOs. other nations, phone companies
loved ones. received A group of amateur radio oper- used call patterns to track users
Relief efforts that needed responses ators (‘ham’ radio) had embarked and send SMSes—the responses
massive coordination of from nearly on an expedition to the Andamans. helped trace stranded tourists.
resources and manpower 40 people Gopal Madhavan of the governing
received an impetus from online who wanted council of the Amateur Radio Soci- Rudimentary Databases
information hubs set up by to help ety of India, says, “When the earth- IT experts from Bangalore, Shriram
Google (www.google.com/ Dina Mehta quake and tidal waves hit the Raghavan and Sudhakar Chandra,
Tsunami_relief.html), the popu- Media Consultant island, the phone and electricity came to the tsunami-hit Cuddalore
lar Web directory BoingBoing went off and only the ham district, TN, to help relief work but
(www.boingboing.net) and photo- network stayed alive.” Powered by a soon realised the lack of a nodal
blogs and news feeds (www. 12-volt car battery, the group set up point for co-ordination.
2bangkok.com/quakes.shtml). their equipment in Port Blair in They used MS Excel and created
Voluntary sector and media about three hours. They had access a database of supplies and donors
organisations in India and abroad to nearly 35,000 hams globally. and generated reports. Ragha-
also put up several online notices Ham operators started an van states, “We had barely three
for donations. The task of search- emergency network and coordi- hours to create the database. We
ing for missing relatives and fund nated relief efforts with the then trained two volunteers and
raising is being coordinated by Indian Army and voluntary agen- handed the database to the local
BBC News online (http://news.bbc. cies. Makeshift radio stations District Rural Development
co.uk/1/hi/ talking_point), UNICEF were set up in tsunami-hit areas Agency (DRDA) officials.”
( www.unicefusa.org/Tsunami ), of Tamil Nadu with control Evidently, technology is helping
CNN.com (www.cnn.com/2004/ stations in Chennai, Bangalore, make amends.
WORLD/asiapcf/12/28/Tsunami. Kolkata and Delhi. They are now [email protected]

142 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Leisure l Valentine Surprise

Floor Your Valentine

With Digital Photography
Five simple, yet great ideas to impress your beloved

Mridu Khullar surprise your sweetheart with digital pictures

you captured on the sly. Whether on a T-shirt
t’s that time of the year again and as with a picture featuring you both or a Shrek-
I cupid aims for you and your beloved,
don’t get stuck in the rut of the same
and-princess portrait with your faces, these
ideas are sure to f loor him/her this
old card-and-f lowers routine. This year, Valentine’s Day!

ow
ebrity!ptured h ous
Cel er ca t fam ll,
n A-listnation ekv in thsahot? Wseoft-
rl, Avid imagould loo-the-air imagingeus or
i
G u
Mys your v riend w gown-inout the Morph your
i
Ha rlf nroe g ke ph h
r gi o brin ls li mor Wit
you ilyn M st and are too asily mage. e f iles
e i
Mar it a re softw can rity’s ockwav res. If
iv e s in g yo u l e b S h ctu dobe
g
e. U h, ce reate f pi A
war amorp n to a even c eries o sing s that
n t o n s u in
F a s c a a
abl e plu g- les
ure you ing , tit
pict pheus, lips us omfort riety of ptions
a
Mor ovie c eady c ad a va n add c
o r m a l r nl o ev e
’re dow e or
you oshop, he sam
t t
Pho ou do
.
let y quotes
and

Give A
Make Digita
lG
the tw our Valenti ift
y
o of y ne a r
night o o
out an u inside a mantic T-sh
bag or d show heart. irt wit
S
of you coffee mug it off! Even he can wea h a picture
ever y w b r o
How time s hich she c etter, do th it to a girl f
h a e
shirt, ? It’s simp e sips on h n keep at w same on h ’s
p le e ork an er
t-shirt referably w ! Get a ph r coffee. d thin
transf hite o oto pr k
or t h e r i
e prin rs from you light-colou nter and a
printe ter m r local red; a plain
d ls T
a hear the image anufacture computer s o buy iron-o -
t shap onto t r’s we tation n
Decor e and h e T-sh bsite. er y stor
a
it trul te with bead then you ca irt transfer, Af ter you’ e
y spec s, glitter n ea c u t ve
You ca ial. and ot sily iron it it out into
and ba n also p h er acc o n
ri essori the tee.
All th gs, calendar nt your pho es to m
ake
at lim
its you s, mugs and tographs on
is you any ot to mo
r crea u
tivity. her smooth se pads
surfac
e!
Illustrations Shyam Shriram

144 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digital Leisure l Valentine Surprise

Flick T
Remem hru Flip Bo
as a kid er those f lip b k
b o
? Why n ooks th
the sam ot go d at you m
e o a
you’ll n thing with y wn memor y la de and loved
eed are our dig ne and
much t a it
he sam dozen or so p al photograph make
aren’t e, with ictures s? All
a th
boyfrien ble to take only slight ch at are pretty
d a
sar y ch /girlfriend is such picture nges. If you
anges u n’t look s when
image-e sin in
diting s g Adobe Pho g, make the your
funny o t
faces o ftware. Make oshop or any a neces-
progres r crazy sure yo nother
s p u in
clip or ion. Print the hotos that h clude many
p se av
Flip th aste them toge images, cut e a gradual
rough t h er in orde t hem ou
move a the boo r alo t and
n k
use pict d even do craz and your sub ng one edge.
u y je
close fo res of you bot things. For V-D ct seems to
r a hug h
or kiss! and join them ay, you could
so they
come

Star In A Digital Mo vie

those early romances and
How about converting
vie? Yes, you read that
dating pictures into a mo
service allows you to
right. A newly-launched
gra ph s and have them
send in your photo
vies. A movie portray-
converted into life-like mo
you me t, fell in love and got
ing how the two of
t the thing!
together would be the jus
tur es tha t depict the various
For this, find pic
ip. Then, log on to Digi-
stages in your relationsh
slid es.com) where you can
Slides.com (www.digi-
Just fill it up and mail
download an order form.
es on a CD and your own
it with your pictur
starring you and your
movie (directed by and
sen t on a DVD right to your
valenrtine) will be
doorstep.

Change The Setti ngs t roadside bench is anyth

ing
two of you sitting on tha
That picture of the the osome! Changing
an tic . Bu t it can be made into a cosy tw feel and effect. You
bu t rom orm its
e can completely transf s
background of a pictur e re-un ion in which she think
ld als o tak e tha t pic ture of her colleg tur e. Or jus t sw ap the
cou pic
d replace it with a better to work
she looked dreadful an ph oto gra ph ! You need to know how
s of all the peo ple in the
he ad
e, though. Here’s how:
with ‘Layers’ for this on h Layer 1. Enlarge the
e in Photoshop, starting wit picture from where
Open your pictur the
face from it. Next, open ture,
picture and cut out the en t fac e. If you are using the same pic
be tak ing the rep lac em th the he lp of the
you ’ll cop y and use that. Wi
to sav e an ori gin al the ori gin al
make sure Paste this on
sso ’ too l, select the face and ‘feather’ it. eve n loo k. To cha ng e
‘La
res ize it. Ad jus t the colour to give it an r pro ces s, bu t
picture an d follow a simila
bac kg rou nd of you r picture, you need to e.
the fac
kground instead of the
this time, select the bac

FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 145

 Digital Leisure l Tech Critique

Imaging Jayan K Narayanan

Blade of Darkness meets Sands of Time

The story picks up from to really enjoy this game,

Avinash Rai where SOT left off. After play it with a joy pad). Right
defeating the evil Vazir, the from the tutorial, enemies
personally thought Prince rewinds time to make charge at you by the dozen.
I ‘Sands of Time’ (SOT)
was a very good game,
things right. He saves his
father, his kingdom and
Thankfully, disposing them
isn’t a problem, due to the
blending just the right Farah. Everyone’s happy… new ‘Free Form Fighting’
amount of ‘platforming’ with except Fate: it was the system. Dual wielding is now
action. The chemistry Prince’s destiny to die and by in the house, hacking is, thus,
between the two leads (the avoiding death, he really twice as fun.
proud Prince and the lovely messed Fate’s grand plans. Pick up any weapon
Farah) felt just right. Fate, a stickler for tidiness, dropped by your foe and use
+ MASTER OF SWORDS Surprisingly, people weren’t
satisfied with the game (us
sends a manifestation of
itself, called the Dahaka, to
it to your advantage (you can
even throw weapons at
Awesome combat
gamers like to whine!). Since clean things up. No man enemies and cut their heads
system
Ubisoft is one of the few wants to die, so you play a off. How cool is that?) Every
Stunning level design
companies that actually Prince on-the-run, devoid of action during combat leads
Good soundtrack (if
listen to their fans, they sleep or rest, which explains to various opportunities.
you like metal)
gladly obliged. ‘Warrior why he looks like someone Grapple an enemy and you
Fast loading times
Within’ (WW) is basically a killed his pet kitten. can (a) cut his head off, (b)
MASTER OF PAIN darker and an extremely cut him in half vertically, (c)
- violent (and frustrating) Now With 100 Per Cent cut him in half horizontally,
Repetitive at times
Too many monoto- version of Sands of Time. One More Gore! (d) strangle him, (e) throw
nous boss fights that practically bubbles with The game is tough, and no, him at other enemies, (f)
Bad camera angles sexual references (don’t even it’s not only because of the thrust your sword in his
get me started on the outfits). crappy controls (if you want back, remove it, take his

146 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT

 Digital Leisure l Tech Critique

He awaits me on pins and on needles

during sequences
Illustration Shyam Shriram

where the Prince

runs from the Dahaka.
Bosses and their minions are
well-detailed and move menacingly
sword while he writhes in pain and enough. So, few issues with the
cut his head off using both the visual department; it’s the sound
swords, à la Gladiator. department that’s off. Firstly, the Hero pose. Fear me!
The combat in this game is Prince sounds a bit cocky and some
sweet, and will definitely bring out of his dialogues are seemingly
the sadist in you (it did for me). ripped from a B-grade Van Damme
Mastering it may take you time as flick (I guess the Prince got a bit
there are loads of combos, but trust too Americanised!).
me, it’s worth the wait. Watching the Prince slice
The only grouse is that there are through his enemies is cool, but
too many monotonous boss fights hearing them shreik like cats is not.
in the game—there’s even one in Female assassins, for example,
the tutorial level! That apart, the sound like they’re experiencing
combat system in WW is one the sexual ecstasy when they’re being
best I’ve seen in any third-person slaughtered. It’s this kind of cheap
action game. commercialism that bugs you, but
The platforming isn’t that bad thankfully there isn’t enough pres- The swords are just a distraction
either. It’s more or less the same as ent to hamper a perfectly good
SOT with a few new moves thrown gaming experience.
in, such as the ability to slide down Godsmack provides the tunes
curtains using swords—slick stuff. for the entire game. I like listening
Puzzles aren’t that tough; they to metal while I’m decapitating
just take a little bit of thinking people as much as the next person,
(which is true for most POP games). but somehow the experience does
There is a fair amount of backtrack- not feel very Persia-ish (Not that I
ing present in the first half of the would prefer Cheb Mami screech-
game, which gets on your nerves ing, but still…)
because running from tower to WW certainly has some annoy-
tower, dodging the same traps over ing factors but then, which game
and over again just doesn’t cut it. doesn’t? I really liked the darker
tone, the metal tunes and the, er, A little pressure and you fall apart? Amateurs!
I Make This Look Good costumes this game had to offer. If
Visually, the game is excellent. Just you’re a die hard SOT fan who
like its predecessor, WW is bathed enjoyed the game for its charm you
in a light glow at all times; giving may feel let down initially, but trust
the game the same dreamy look me-give it a shot and you’ll be hack-
that was present in SOT. Level ing and slashing and begging for
design is mind-blowing, and levels more in no time.
load quickly. The Prince moves as [email protected]
fluid as ever, and watching him
kick a** is certainly a treat. Prince Of Persia: Warrior Within
Unfortunately, the same annoy- Distributed by Milestone Interactive Software
Limited
ing camera angles that plagued SOT Phone: 28381614
are back for the sequel as well; Web site: www.milestoneinteractive.com
these being especially painful Price: Rs 1,499 Oh yeah? YOUR mother wears army boots!

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 FEBRUARY 2005 DIGIT 147

 MediaWise
Wired, January 2005 PC World, February 2005

Groping In The Shadows Those Stupid Error messages!

JUST LIKE THE underground news networks worked NO MATTER HOW computing technology improves,
behind the scenes to throw out governments and those stupid PC error messages keep coming, and
colonial powers, an underground network of pirates is coming, and coming. Stephen Manes of PC World
threatening to bankrupt the entertainment business magazine is as frustrated as you are.
the world over. Jeff Howe of Wired magazine goes into
the hidden corridors of the Shadow Internet. Wonderful way to begin my day: A startup DOS-style
message appears; the PC’s screen explains that a crucial
Just over a year ago, a hacker penetrated the corporate system file is missing and that I should insert the restore CD-
servers at Valve, the game company behind the popular ROM. But in the chamber of horrible housekeeping that is my
first-person shooter Half- office, I have no idea where the disc is.
Life. He came away with Next step: Denial. I reboot, or try to, and get the same
a beta version of Half-Life message. That CD has to be around somewhere. It has to. I
2. “We heard about it,” spend a couple of hours overturning every shred of clutter in
says 23-year-old Frank, a the place. Nothing.
well-connected media Few days later, I try again. You know the thinking: Maybe it
pirate. “Everyone thought fixed itself somehow. And then I see something I missed before.
it would get bootlegged Down in the lower-right corner of the computer manufacturer's
in Europe.” Instead, the startup screen, I see the phrase ‘<F10=System Recovery>’.
hacker gave the source That’s when it hits me: There is no restore disc. This is one of
code to Frank—it turned those machines that comes
out that he was a friend with rollback data on the
of a friend—so that Frank could give Half-Life 2 to the world. hard drive alone.
“I was like, ‘Let’s do this thing, yo!’” he says. “I put it on Admittedly, having the
Anathema. After that, it was all over.” restorative option on the
Anathema is a so-called topsite, one of 30 or so hard drive is handy when
underground, highly secretive servers where nearly all of you can’t find the CD. But
the unlicensed music, movies, and videogames available on there’s no excuse for not
the Internet originate. Outside of a pirate elite and the Feds supplying a disc that
who track them, few know that topsites exist. Even fewer costs, what, 10 cents?
can log in. And even worse is the
Within minutes of appearing on Anathema, Half-Life 2 generic message that’s not
spread. One file became 30 files, became 3,000 files, only inappropriate but
became 300,000 files as Valve stood helplessly by watching simply wrong.
its big Christmas blockbuster turn into a lump of coal. The This kind of thing
damage was irreversible—the horse was out of the barn, the happens constantly. Error
county, and the state! The original Half-Life has sold more messages and what I’ve
than 10 million games and expansion packs since its late come to call “monologue
1998 release. Half-Life 2’s official release finally happened boxes” are supposed to
in November, after almost a year of reprogramming. help you solve problems.
When Frank (who, like all the pirates interviewed for In reality, they’re riddled
this article, is identified by a pseudonym) posted the Half- with errors themselves—when you can figure out what they
Life 2 code to Anathema, he tapped an international mean. Take my copy of Norton AntiVirus, which is supposed
network of people dedicated to propagating stolen files as to update itself automatically. I’ve repeatedly run into
widely and quickly as possible. situations when the updater tells me that it has aborted—and,
It’s all a big game and, to hear Frank and others talk afterward, that my virus definitions are up-to-date. Which is
about “the scene”, fantastic fun. Whoever transfers the correct? Who knows?
most files to the most sites in the least amount of time TurboTax still offers a classic in the annals of dialog-box
wins. There are elaborate rules, with prizes in the offing stupidity. When you exit, it asks, ‘Do you want to save this file?’
and reputations at stake. Topsites like Anathema are at But what it really means is, ‘Do you want to save the changes
the apex. Once a file is posted to a topsite, it starts a you made to this file?’ If you had simply been fooling around
rapid descent through wider and wider levels of an with some what-if scenarios, the right answer might be ‘No’.
invisible network, multiplying exponentially along the way. But if you were afraid you’d lose the file itself, you’d probably
At each step, more and more pirates pitch in to keep the pick ‘Yes’—and wipe out some of the original data. How hard is
avalanche tumbling downward. Finally, thousands, it to get a basic question like this right?
perhaps millions, of copies—all the progeny of that Crummy error messages have migrated from our PCs to the
original file—spill into the public peer-to-peer (P2P) Web. The archetypal example: A site wants data in a certain
networks: Kazaa, LimeWire, Morpheus. format—say, phone numbers without parentheses or hyphens—
Without this duplication and distribution structure but doesn’t say so. You enter information your way, then get a
providing content, the P2P networks would run dry. message that says something like ‘Incorrect Data’ with no clue
(BitTorrent, a faster and more efficient type of P2P file- as to what’s wrong. Bad enough that the site doesn’t dope out
sharing, is an exception. But at present, there are far fewer what you meant; often it will force you to reenter not just the
BitTorrent users.) phone number but everything else, too.
To read the entire piece, go to www.snipurl.com/digit_shadow
Read Stephen Manes’ entire rant at www.snipurl.com/digit_error

148 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 AdWise
PCmag.com, January 12, 2005

The Top Trends At CES 2005

THE CONSUMER ELECTRONICS Show (CES) is the place to be
every year for those yearning digital nirvana. PC Mag
columnist Jim Louderback was there to take a look at the
trends that will define 2005.

1. Digital TV Gets Cheaper And Cheaper: We’ve chronicled this

on ExtremeTech, but the trend is only going to accelerate. With
30” LCD TVs
approaching $1,500,
ultrathin tube-TVs
rivaling rear-projection
models, and amazingly
cheap three-LCD RPTVs
that may just rival DLP
and plasma, it will be
easier and cheaper to
replace that aging tube
TV with a digital-
capable set. And with
all the new factories
coming on line, expect
prices to continue their
inexorable slide.
2. Post-HDTV World
Is Coming: Here in the
US, HDTV means 720p
or 1080i. But the industry is already envisioning a world of When you gotta...
progressive scan 1080-double the resolution of the biggest This ad nicely gets across the message that you can,
current sets. The plasmas and DLP projectors on display indeed, build a truly portable desktop. The pun
supporting 1080p looked great. Alas, we may not have much complements the visual very nicely, too.
content to take advantage of these great-looking displays.
3. Not Now For High-Definition DVD: Both Blu-ray and HD-DVD
are ready to go, and vendors were showing off drives and players
for each. Alas, with two competing standards-and high-profile
announcements of support for each-neither will take off over the
next 18 months. Even though current DVDs look a bit pale on
today's modern HDTVs, don’t expect anything substantial until
late 2006. And if the warring factions can’t get their act together,
it could stretch out into 2008 or later. To quote Bugs Bunny,
“What a bunch of maroons!”
4. Home Media Networking Will Be Big: Yes, we all will be
moving our media around the house and to portable devices. But
the question is, “When will someone get it right?” I looked at
networking schemes from TiVo, DivX, DirecTV, and many others.
Someone will figure this one out, but none of the current solutions
are easy enough, or transparent enough, for most consumers.
Only startup Sonos seemed to understand the need for simplicity,
but its products are audio-only and expensive.
5. DVR Is A Feature, Not A Product: Back when TiVo and
ReplayTV launched, the digital video recorder seemed to be the
next big electronics product, after DVD. But over the last five
years, hard-drive and flash-based media recording have become
pervasive. DVR is rapidly becoming part of many consumer
devices, from satellite radio to set top boxes. DirecTV rolled out its
own homegrown versions, joining Motorola, Scientific Atlanta, and
more. Even TiVo realises that DVR alone is not enough, as it rolled
out additional services and connectivity designed to turn its box
into the hub of the digital home. Anyone planning on building a
standalone DVR ought to have their head examined.
Read the full piece at www.snipurl.com/digit_ces An extension of yourself
Based on a simple theme, this ad gets across the overt idea of
the smartphone being able to do many things at the same time,
and the subtle message that it can act as ‘an extension of you’.

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 149

 Computer Games For Schools Internet Resulting In Widespread Plagiarism
Recent research by the London Institute of Education The widespread use of the Internet as a research tool has
concluded that games have a valid place in the given rise to cheating among high-school students, say
classroom. Games, it was found, taught life skills such as educators. It is being realised that students, accustomed to
decision making and problem solving said Futurelab, an downloading copyrighted music and such, may not realise
organisation trying to use technology for learning that copying even a few sentences constitutes plagiarism

First
Escape
YOUNG AND RESTLESS

Apple Sues Teen Over Web Site

A t the age of 13, in 1998,
Nicholas Ciarelli, then a
schoolgoer at New Wood-
disclosure agreements.
Ciarelli established the
dePlume Organization LLC,
stock, New York, started a which is registered in New
Web site, publishing insider York. It lacks the money to
news and rumours about defend a case against a
Apple, using the nom de major corporation.
plume ‘Nick dePlume’. Some speculate that www.premkahani.
Three years later, his site Apple is after the source— com
ThinkSecret.com was the the real target is whoever
first to report that Apple
would debut a G4 version of
Nicholas Ciarelli—getting under
Apple’s skin
has been breaking non-
disclosure agreements. P remkahani.com says it
‘builds beautiful
relationships’. Sadly, though,
the PowerBook laptop
series. The product Now a 19-year-old ONLINE REVENGE there are no relationships
launched soon after, and so freshman at Harvard, being built here, beautiful or
did ThinkSecret.com’s
reputation amongst Apple’s
Ciarelli’s—and that of other
news gatherers like him—
Woman otherwise. A ‘lucky spin’
feature on the main page
fans—generating millions of
hits per month.
growing influence has
raised questions about
Deletes Ex’s shows up a random profile-
and if the pic on that profile
Apple sent a series of
warnings to ThinkSecret to
accountability and
journalistic standards. Web
Data happens to be large, it takes
up the entire screen, pushing
stop publishing proprietary sites run by product buffs all the text away. And oh,
searches by community or
information. When Ciarelli
predicted the arrival of two
new products in December
have generated valuable
buzz. They have also irked
companies by leaking
P olice in Fukushima,
Japan, said that a woman
in her 30s illegally used her
religion yield no results
whatsoever. Want to browse
2004, Apple filed a lawsuit product information. boyfriend’s username and profiles? You get one result
of illegally The suit alleges that password to access an per community, and the
misappropriating trade ThinkSecret.com induced Internet game and delete ‘next’ and ‘previous’ buttons
secrets against him. tipsters to break non- his game data. She now don’t work!

faces charges in accordance

My Desktop with a law banning illegal
access. The woman has
owned up that she did
T hink you have the most
beautiful, most innovative
desktop around? Send it to
delete her boyfriend’s
online game data: “I did it
[email protected], and as revenge for breaking up
Digit will publish the most with me.” The couple met
eye-catching of them each month. through the game in the
autumn of 2003, and started
a relationship after actually
The winner
will receive a
meeting each other, but
copy of they soon broke up.
Webster’s New The man, in his 20s, did
World Computer not suffer financially
Dictionary. because of her actions, but
By Bryan Pfaffenberger, she deleted items such as
published by Pearson weapons and clothes that
Education WE SURRENDER: Rohit Daya’s desktop makes us wonder at he had spent time in the
This month’s winner is planet Mars game collecting.
Rohit Daya Sent in by Rohit Daya Investigators said the
woman had accessed the

150 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 People Who
There’s [Ctrl] and [Alt]. Now,
Changed
if only I could reach [Del]...
Computing

This month’s winner is

Manju Jaiswall from
Making
Bangalore. She wins a Small Big
Mini Keypad worth Rs.995/-
by Travel Pac
The TravelPac mini Keypad is a
T wo people invented the
integrated circuit (IC) at
almost the same time.
19-Key pad that is
ergonomically designed with an Manufacturers wanted more
incline for convenient data out of the commonplace
entry. This USB device is a plug- transistors. But there was a
and-play and hot-swappable
device. It is a lightweight device
designed for a notebook.

WIN!
A Mini Keypad by Travel Pac just by sharing an amusing picture with
a tech angle to it. The picture should be shot by you, and should not Jack Kilby
have been published earlier.
Send your picture to [email protected]. limit on how small you could
The prize-winning picture will be published each month. make each transistor, since it
is connected to wires and
devices. So, scientists wanted
online role-playing game cinema tickets, text voting, launch but the keynote a miniature circuit with
Lineage using the man’s and news or sports text address by Microsoft’s transistors, wires, etc.
username and password in alerts are growing popular. chairman and chief In 1958, engineer Jack
about April last year. software architect, Bill Kilby was working for Texas
Lineage is an adventure THE BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH! Gates himself. Instruments (TI). A year
game in which players fight Returning to the earlier, research engineer
enemies with characters such
as knights and magicians.
Gates’ International CES for the
seventh consecutive year,
Robert Noyce, aka Mayor of

PROLIFIC TEXTERS
Windows Gates captivated the
capacity audience with yet
Crash another riveting pre-show
UK Text keynote address.
Before that, however, he
Message
Record T here was a buzz in the
air at the Consumer
lived through the horror of
witnessing his beloved
Electronics Show (CES) 2005. Windows display the BSOD
Robert Noyce

Only this time, the reason (Blue Screen Of Death) and Silicon Valley, co-founded
for excitement was not pop up a kernel error. Fairchild Semiconductor

U K mobile owners
continue to break
records with their text
another product Here’s to you, Bill!
When
he finally
Corporation where he
invented the integrated chip.
Noyce also founded Intel.
messaging. The latest got going, It occurred to Kilby, when
figures show that 26 billion Gates sitting at TI, that all parts of
texts were sent in the UK in returned to a circuit could be of silicon.
2004. The figures were one of his In 1959, both applied for
collected by the Mobile favourite patents. Kilby and TI received
Data Association (MDA). topics over the a US patent for miniaturised
They also showed that 2.4 past few years— electronic circuits while
billion were sent in Reali-sing A Noyce and Fairchild received
December alone, the Digital Lifestyle. a US patent for silicon-based
highest monthly total ever. The keynote integrated circuits. The two
Every day, 78 million covered virtually companies decided to cross-
messages are sent—which is all aspects of license technologies after
more than one message per digital living such years of legal battles, creating
person in the UK—and there as music, photos, a global market now worth
are no signs of a slowdown. TV, portability, $1 trillion a year.
One of the reasons for gaming and so on, Today, an IC can be small-
the growing number is that which can be er than a coin, and can hold
people are using it to do enjoyed on various 125 million transistors!
ottoraj
much more. Booking Mohan Ch devices and platforms.
ustration Harsho
Ill

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 151

 Escape
Nuptials Time!
T wo distinguished gentlemen of the
Digit team are no longer single; they
have been sacrificed at the altar of
Jayan, Digit’s lead designer, who had
kept his beau Shiny hidden from
everyone’s knowledge by cleverly
marriage. It is a sacrifice they have wooing her when he was in Kerala, did
invited upon themselves, having fallen no such thing. His facial hair, the pride
NLP head over heels in love with two lovely of his Malayalee clan, had been groomed
Natural Language Processing young women. with as much discipline as he puts
(NLP) is an Artificial Intelligence Copy Editor Robert Sovereign-Smith Photoshop streaks in his opening
(AI) undertaking. It aims to aka Raaabo married visuals. His beard
process sentences written in a Karen at a ceremony in represents his
language such as English so as which no one could personality, as it did for
to extract meaning from them
and represent this meaning in a recognise Robert. He Osho, G B Shaw and
manner that a computer can had worn formal clothes for the first other hirsute champions of history.
understand. If you want to time in his life since he’d peddled Both Robert and Jayan are back at
portray yourself as an AI goods as a salesman for a leading work now, with all the vim and vigour
practitioner, simply say that company. Heck, he’d even shaved for the of newlyweds. We are now waiting for
amongst all AI disciplines, you wedding reception. the seven-year itch!
like NLP best and then go on to
describe how you do it.
How do you make a transmission of smell. This Ishiguro and his team
computer understand English? XML SMELL will allow for the trans- are talking about the
To this, you reply, “That’s what
NLP is for. You break up the
A Language mission of fragrances by e-
mail, by SMS to a mobile
successors to a robot called
VisiON, which is just 38 cm
sentences into parts of speech,
and then parse it just as you
For Smell phone, or via a TV show.
Currently, the scientists
tall and weighs only 2.4 kg.
VisiON operates
would any other string, of are designing a device independently of human
course, ellipsis is one major which will sit close to a TV, input, makes its own
hurdle.” (‘Ellipsis’ means an
instance where the context is
not available.)
A researcher at Huelva
University in Spain
claims to have created a
a radio, a phone or a PC,
and which contains a
'smell palette'. The
decisions based on
information it perceives and
recognises the football,
What is ellipsis? Intimidate version of XML—often called components in the palette approaches it and delivers a
your audience here. “You don’t the successor to HTML—that get manifested according hefty kick.
know what ellipsis is? Say you can transmit fragrances. to instructions in the XML It can identify an
reply to a question about your The ability to transmit Smell language. opponent and shield the
name with ‘John Smith’. Here, smells could have ball. Atop its head is a 360-
you haven’t specified what John applications in several ROBO-CUP degree vision sensor, so it
Smith is and that’s ellipsis.” fields including tourism, does not have to turn its
Your audience will probably
ask you at this point, “So that’s
gaming, marketing,
medicine, and so on.
Robots Will head at all.
Robot World Cup
all there is to NLP? Parts of
speech and parsing?”
The university has
worked with researchers in
Win World tournaments have been with
us for quite some time
Since you don’t know too much both computing and
chemistry to come up with
Cup By now—the most recent being
held in Lisbon. RoboCup
yourself, you launch off into
unfamiliar words— “No, no, the concept of the XML
Smell language. It said the
2050! 2005 is scheduled for July
in Osaka, Japan.
there’s actually much more. You
have got to consider things like initial idea was to print Ishiguro is confident
failure of substitutivity, you
have to learn to use the FOPC
and HMMs, construct working
smells on paper using laser
and inkjet printers, but in
this approach, the
A Japanese consortium of
robotics experts has
that players of steel and
wire will one day lift the

grammars and much more.” fragrances degraded over a

What is FOPC and HMM? short period of time. The
Remember to learn the full scientists now claim to
form—First Order Predicate have developed a dual-pass
Calculus. It sounds nice and AI- printing system, using two
ish. Of course, you deliberately polymers which degrade by
use the abbreviations in the light and by touch, so that
first instance, so you can the smell only emerges
expand them later. HMM stands when a document is read.
for ‘Hidden Markov Model’. Not content with this,
Finish off with: “Like I said, researchers quickly realised
it’s basically the manipulation that smells could be
of the parse tree. You construct propagated over networks
the tree and do all sorts of and, of course, the Web.
things with it. I can direct you They therefore created XML claimed that their World Cup. “The important
to a tutorial if you like.” Smell, which they claim engineered humans will thing to remember is what
can define in a universal outplay real ones—in you see here is just the
and standardised way the football—within 45 years. beginning,” he says.

152 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Escape
whatweretheythinking.com ROAD RAGE DEVIOUS WORM

Report Breaking
T
ired of the big bad mate-
rial world and its fleeting
pleasures? Looking for Roadhogs News
something spiritual? We are
not talking of austere lifestyles. Online Spreads
In today’s instant world, even
spirituality is available on a CD! Worm
For $19.95 (Rs 870), you
can “Travel to the astral realm.
Leave your body behind and
T here is now an alternative
to venting anger while on
head for astral light. With this
CD and download, projection
the road—go online and
report the offensive driver.
Law enforcement officers in
T here’s a new, smart
worm out there. It uses
breaking news from the
has never been easier.” You Arizona and Washington are CNN.com Web site and a
are tempted to ask why people asking the public to report devious technique to keep
http://snipurl.com/c7oa leading such exciting astral reckless drivers online. itself up-to-date in order to
lives want $19.95 from you! For “It’s just another tool to dupe recipients into
only $49.95 (Rs 2,150), you get three titles on one CD including solicit the public’s help in opening attachments.
‘Instant Meditation’, ‘Astral Projection’, and ‘Remote Viewing’! fighting aggressive On January 21, UK-based
If you really want to know more, www.worldofalterna- driving,” said Trooper security vendor Sophos said
tives.com has the answer—“Accurately calibrated sine wave Johnny Alexander, a that the Crowt.a worm
frequency generators were used to generate different frequen- spokesman for the grabs its subject lines,
cies in each ear. Experimenting through the whole range of Washington State Patrol. message content, and
alpha and theta waves, it was found that a combination of Motorists in Washington attachment names from
frequencies consistently caused a complete shift in can go to the state patrol’s headlines—in real-time—
consciousness…” Yeah, right! Web site and report areas from CNN’s Web site.
If you thought this was a con job, read ‘Don’s’ testimonial: where aggressive driving is The worm’s subject and
“Can’t believe how easy this is. Projected first time. Cool!” Huh? consistently a problem. attachment filename change
There are folks like ‘Don’ with money to spare on a download They can note what to mirror the top headline
that promises nothing less than an out-of-body experience. they’ve witnessed, when on the site.
Experience is guaranteed and customer service is top-notch! If and how the incidents Compiled by Ram Mohan Rao,
nothing happens when you listen to the download, you get your occur, as well as license Meera Vankipuram and
money back. Seriously, what were they and ‘Don’ thinking? plate numbers. Aditya Kuber

Micro Persuasion reading the press release for Microsoft’s new Windows
http://snipurl.com/bx85 Anti-Spyware product. If Microsoft’s product is really
going to clean up spyware effectively, how will it do so
“Tap Into the Flickrgeist” without violating the licensing agreement of Claria’s
Consumers are replacing Consumer Reports. We are Gator and other spyware/adware?
increasingly turning to blogs and other forms of
consumer generated media to gather the information Duct Tape Marketing
Here’s taking a look we need to make informed purchasing decisions. http://snipurl.com/bx86
at some eye-catching Armed with these insights, we can easily separate
blogs. Will the new exceptionally great products from the average. “Referral Marketing Is Target Marketing At Its
Windows Anti- Consumers can do this today with more than blogs Best”
Spyware product by tapping into what I call the Flickrgeist. Thanks to Most small business owners miss the boat when it
violate the Gator RSS, as a marketer you can easily monitor your comes to getting a constant flow of referrals because
company/product’s Flickrgeist index against your they start looking in all the wrong places. If they seek
EULA? There’s a
competitors. referrals, most small business owners think only of
review on Flickrgeist In case you’re not familiar with the site, Flickr is a their clients. While existing clients can be a good
and one about a free free photo sharing site that anyone can use to post source of referrals, they don’t have much motivation.
photo sharing Web photographs and then “tag” them with certain labels. They might send a client or two, but won’t think of you
site. Check out how Flickr makes it a snap to find all photos across its vast day in and day out. And, that’s what your referral
referral marketing community that have posted photos under a common marketing effort really needs.
works—and finally, tag. Each tag has its own RSS feed.
Using Flickr tags, you can assess just how much Small Business Information
there’s a blog about consumers are evangelising brands by stacking them http://snipurl.com/bx87
blogging against their competitors. All you need to do is simply
replace the bracketed text below with the name of “What A Blog Can Do For Your Small Business”
your product and enter the URL into your browser... The blogging movement is picking up speed with the
launch of blogs on About.com network and the
The Gripe Line Weblog purchase of blog software company Pyra Labs to
http://snipurl.com/bx8a Google. More companies are experimenting with the
blog environment. Will blogging become the next
“Is Microsoft Violating The Gator EULA?” mainstream application like email? Will business blogs
A thought suddenly struck me yesterday when I was improve your business?

DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 153

 Santa, Spammers And Flaw Fighters
6 A Chinese security group has 10 Which country has advanced
1 China’s released sample code to its communications
largest PC exploit two new unpatched flaws infrastructure by launching
manufacturer has in Microsoft Windows. Where are Cernet2, a high-speed Internet
purchased IBM’s these two flaws found? backbone that connects 25
personal computer business for a. Windows Search program and universities in 20 cities? Cernet2
$1.75 billion. Name the group. Box Width function achieved speeds of up to 40
a. Lenovo b. Armonk b. Load Image function and gigabits per second during a trial
c. Beijing d. Zhang Windows Help program run conducted in December 2004,
c. User Rights function and a record for real-world
Command program applications, where the average
2 Which company has offered a d. Internet Explorer speeds are about 2 to 10 Gbps for
$5,00,000 (Rs 2.25 crore) universities.
reward for information leading to 7 Name the recently a. India b. Japan
writers of the computer viruses unleashed Internet worm c. China d. USA
Blaster worm and SoBig.F? that identified potential victims
a. Novell b. Apple by searching Google, AOL and Last Month’s Answers
c. Microsoft d. Symantec Yahoo and spread by targeting
pages that used vulnerable 1. Niklas Zennstrom co-founded Skype
3 Which search engine aims to versions of the PHP Bulletin Board 2. Red Hat sent out the fake security
make Internet surfing easier (phpBB) software. bulletin to Linux users
for the visually impaired by read- a. Santy b. Santa 3. JVC released Everio GZ-MC100 and
ing out the results? c. Elf d. Reindeer GZ-MC200, the tape-free camcorders
a. Scholar b. Yahoo 4. gdSuite is Google’s add-on for its
c. Speegle d. Google 8 Toshiba is the second major desktop search tool.
electrical appliance maker 5. Blueprint has teamed up with BT to
4 Microsoft announced the after Sony to announce its develop a service to host media files
launch of a stripped-down withdrawal from which product 6. “Mobile digital secretaries” will be
version of its Windows operating market? deployed on the Nokia 6600
system in January. What part of a. Plasma Display TVs b. LCDs 7. Nordstrom.com interprets customer
the OS is being removed? c. Handhelds d. Laptops enquiries by analysing search strings
a. Internet Explorer c. Games 8. The UK’s free Windows XP version is
b. Outlook Express d. Winamp 9 According to a recent study by Windows XP Counterfeit Project
AMR Research, what 9. Chaska city, in the US, plans Wi-Fi
Got an 5 Researchers at security percentage of IT jobs required by access for most of its 15 square miles
interesting software company Sophos American companies by 2010 will 10. Gaetano Borriello’s team at the
question? found that 42 per cent of all spam be performed by Indian firms, University of Washington team has
Send it in with sent this year came from this saving the US nearly $30 billion constructed a smartwatch that uses
the answer to single country. (approx Rs 130 billion) annually? RFID (Radio Frequency ID)
editor@thinkdigit. a. Tanzania b. Germany a. 5 per cent b. 2 per cent
com c. United States d. United Kingdom c. 10 per cent d. 15 per cent

Crossword
Solve the Win!
Across reverses heights
crossword
6. _____ Presario PCs from HP (6) (abbr) (4) and send your
8. _____ Visual representations stored 3. This icon answers to
in electronic form (6) resembles a sun dial [email protected].
9. Cut out to modify data (4) in a Web browser
10. Base-8 notation (5) toolbar (7)
If all answers are
11. Boot up upsets tarts (5) 4. Hot standby or correct, one lucky
13. Make available (7) Warm standby? (8) participant could win
16. An object-oriented Programming 5. Ctrl+Shift+Z in a copy of Webster’s New
in Logic (7) Corel (4)
World Computer Dictionary By Bryan
17. Direct Read After Write (abbr) (4) 7. Quick and Dirty
20. Data entered into a computer (5) Operating System Pfaffenberger, published by Pearson Education
21. Element of data storage scatters (abbr) (4)
life (4) 12. Locate and read
22. Waiter to host computer on a data from storage (8) Last Month’s Winner
network (6) 14. Discharge cargo Parveen Bansal, New Delhi
23. Programming language named to transfer computer
after French mathematician (6) data (8)
15. Pre-packaged art 1. a 6. b This
Down work (4,3) 2. c 7. a Month’ss
Answer
1. DTP package of the ’80s confused 18. Bit end to an asynchronous Specification (abbr) (4)
art words (8) transmission! (4) 21. High-speed computer (4) 3. c 8. a
2. Microsoft's new technology 19. Initial Graphics Exchange 4. d 9. d
5. c 10. c

154 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005

 Digit Forum
Broadband in India = End of
PC/Tech Mags in India?
klinux
Digitized!
Might not be in the immediate future as
broadband speeds are... lousy. But, in the
near future, when the tariff war is on and
consumers get cheaper, faster and more
efficient broadband services, would
consumers/techies still want to buy
PC/Tech mags, or rather download
A Taxing Regime English Only, Please!
I was in south-east Asia recently, and was I was simply blown away by Digit’s latest
whatever he wants and get more articles
shocked to know the price difference offer where you offered four DVD
from online mags?
between products available in India and movies—The Lord of the Rings, Terminator 2,
What should Indian mags change, if
there. I purchased a Sony digital camera Shakti, and Munna Bhai MBBS—free with
they have to compete with broadband?
(CyberShot P73), which costs Rs 18,990 in every subscription.
Just curious!
India, but Rs 12,500 in Singapore and Rs But guess what, I am disappointed!
**************************************** 10,000 in Malaysia. Sony even offered me Digit is read all over India, and not every
saROMan
a one-year international warranty for it. region appreciates Hindi movies. For
In-House Geek
Indians effectively pay Rs 9,000 in them, the two Hindi DVDs are a plain
Location: b4 my PIII
taxes for a product that costs Rs 10,000. I waste. May I request Digit to respect the
Depends... what r u buying the magz for...
don’t understand the reason for this. I cultural and lingual diversity our
for the software in it... or for the
also bought a Creative MuVO Slim 256 country by giving only English movies so
contents... like Game/Hardware
MB for Rs 6,000 which is available for Rs that every one benefits from the offer?
reviews... new emerging trends, etc.
8,000 in India. The good news is both the
**************************************** products I chose won the Digit ‘Zero1 M S Karthikeyan
ujjwal 2004 Award’ in the respective categories. Chennai
Digitized Spammer
Location: University .Area .Delhi
Saurabh Sahu, Dear Karthikeyan,
Yes, to a certain extent sales would be
Titilagarh (Orissa) At Digit, we believe creativity knows no language
affected, as there are many people who
barriers. The movies we chose are some of the
buy the magazine for the CD and software.
Hi Saurabh, greatest Hollywood and Bollywood hits; each one
However, if the magazine kept Indian
That’s just like the icing on the cake. First you of them is a masterpiece in its genre—whether
specific articles like current hardware
get these products at low prices, and then your fantasy or science fiction or drama or comedy. It
prices, reviews of Indian ISPs, etc. people
choices win the Digit ‘Zero1 Awards’. About the will not be possible for us to change the movies
would still buy them.
taxes: We wouldn't know whether the as they were chosen after careful consideration.
**************************************** government is planning to bring down tariffs For now, you use the sub-titles feature on DVDs
Nemesis
further on IT products this year, but prices of to enjoy the Hindi movies.
Digitized Spammer
IT products have fallen drastically in the last —Executive Editor
Location: New York
three years, and will continue to fall this year.
I agree with ujjwal... sales will b affected
It is only a sign of a mature market that prices
but not much... countries like the US have
good broadband penetration... but still ppl
fall as demand rises. You don't have to look Who’s Illiterate? Cops or
read mags... but like ujjwal said, the mags
further than the cell phone market—both Executive Editor?
handsets and call charges in India were the So, it is this balmy Thursday morning,
here will have 2 carry a lot of Indian stuff
most expensive in the world when the services and I am walking around in the market
like reviews, prices, availability, etc., of
began. Today, with almost five crore cellular when I see the January issue of Digit. I
tech products in India and from an Indian
subscribers, we have one of the lowest tariffs buy it first up, come home and read the
perspective...
in the world. editorial.
**************************************** —Executive Editor It was awesome! Mr Executive Editor
cheetah
Sir, you have said it all in just a few
Resident Techie
lines. It had just the right stuff I needed
Location: Jalandhar
to explain to everyone in defence of
I don’t agree with that guy.
Baazee.com CEO Avnish Bajaj. My friends
Nobody buys the mags for software
and relatives just did not seem to
only, we all buy because of new software
understand when I told them earlier.
they suggest, hardware reviews and cool
Delhi has seen it all—from teachers
site links.
and parents giving us embarrassing
For Example: I learnt about Skype
speeches to innocent people being taken
from Digit. I learnt of the Slogger Firefox
into custody to raiding cyber café’s. The
plug in from Digit Jan 2004, and it has
capital is going crazy and the reason?
changed my opinion about Firefox; now I
Technology illiteracy!
use Firefox only and quit using Opera.
Who can even think of arresting
This is the use of these mags, they
Avnish Bajaj, the head of one of the few
totally change the way u think.
dotcom success stories in India? Only
**************************************** pot-bellied Delhi policemen!
Indyan
About the so-called “tech-savvy”
Digitized!
media, the less said the better. They
Location: Asansol, W.B.
don’t even realise that the video that
As long as there r people like me who hate
caused all this cannot even be sent
reading on their pc screens, mags wud
through MMS, only via Bluetooth and
remain alive. Also, I like da dvd.
Infrared cell phones. I have now come to

162 To post your comments on Digit Forum,

99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106
visit www.thinkdigit.com/forum
 Write to the Editor Digit will publish the best letters on these pages.
Letters may be edited for clarity
E-mail: [email protected]
For subscription queries, call the Help Desk at
Snail Mail: The Editor, Digit, D-222/2, Om Sagar
022-27629191/9200 Fax 022-27629224, or
Building, MIDC, TTC Industrial Estate, Nerul,
send an e-mail to [email protected]
Navi Mumbai 400 706

Inbox
not know the implications of his
misguided writing. Environment-friendly Digit
I am one of those lakhs of readers
SVS Rama Rao Digit has. I must also admit, I am
Mumbai quite infrequent, even if I would like
to buy it every month.
Better Way To Excel! I still preserve the first copy of
In response to Ram Mohan Rao’s article Digit, which was published in June
on ‘Microsoft Excel Nightmares’ (January 2000. Since then, I have been buying
2005), I would like to point out a solution every now and then, whenever there
simpler than what the writer suggests. was a special issue (and there were
Rao’s solution to the first nightmare several). The result? I have a whole
“Excel Freezes Columns While Freezing rack at home reserved specially
Rows” is: Let’s assume you need to freeze for Digit copies. Letter
the top row, which contains, say, names. For me, the biggest of the
First, freeze the panes while at cell A1 by attraction for buying the Month
going to Window>Freeze Panes. Now, go magazine was the fully-loaded
to Window>Split. This will split the sheet CDs. They were, and now the
into four blocks. Go to the centre of the DVDs that are absolutely brilliant. I
split, so that the four-pronged cursor still preserve all my CDs along with
shows. Drag it up to the bottom of the their covers, lest I forget its contents.
row you want to freeze, and drag it also Even today, I refer to these CDs to get
the conclusion that my six-year-old to the left, all the way, beyond the first the software I require.
nephew is more tech savvy than the column. Now, freeze panes again by going A recent incident reaffirmed my
Delhi cops and the Indian media. to Window>Freeze Panes. You are done! faith in the contents of your CDs and
Anish Arora Here is an easier way: Let’s assume DVDs. I am currently pursuing my
New Delhi you want to freeze the top row, which graduation in information
contains, say, names. Select second row by technology. Since my library is a Digit
clicking on the row number (when the subscriber, I have no problems
Digit’s executive editor Sachin Kalbag curser changes to horizontal arrow). gobbling up all the information in
may be a highly technology-literate Now go to Window>Freeze Pane. You the magazine in text format. But our
person. All the same, I beg to differ with are through. college does not allow us to access
him on the profound opinions expressed Sushil Chauhan the CDs and DVDs, which become
by him in Digit’s January 2005 editorial Mumbai college property.
(“Out With Technology Illiteracy”). May I suggest that you start,
Scientists, from prehistoric times to the along with your current great
early 1960s, were simultaneously Ram Mohan Rao’s feature on MS Excel scheme of four movie DVDs, a CD-
philosophers with a deep-rooted sense of nightmares was interesting and useful. only subscription, without the
social responsibility. Tip 3, to get rid of the “Getting Started” magazine. I would be really happy if
Around the ’60s, a cataclysmic Pane, was especially useful. As regards you start one soon.
change overtook human civilisation Tip 1, we can use a simple formula for The primary reason for not
including, sadly, scientists and freezing panes: If you want to freeze the subscribing is because of the
technologists, with an all-pervasive top ‘n’ rows, then position the cursor in magazine pile-up, and they are not
social irresponsibility setting in across cell A (n+1), before freezing the panes. something I want to throw. Because
all strata. The new philosophy was And if you want to freeze the leftmost n of this reason, the read, re-read and
expounded by the digital brahmins, who columns, then position the cursor in cell re-re-read issues have just piled up
considered the rest as untouchables. (n+1)1 [i.e. the top cell in the (n+1)th over time.
Granted, our inventions can benefit column], before freezing the panes. As You could engage an organisation
mankind in hundreds of ways, but if regards Tip 2, it would be good to make to collect old magazines and recycle
misused, can harm in a million ways. all cells of the same height if you want them to make new magazines. The
Individuals define the use and misuse of to see the file on the screen only. If you idea may seem bizarre, but you
inventions, don’t they? want to print it, wouldn’t increasing the would be the first company ever to
We are irresponsible scoundrels with height throughout the file to suit the publish a truly environment-friendly
no social commitment. Our sole largest make the printout unwieldy? magazine.
commitment is to Mammon and Fullar Velker Also, it could add to your image,
multinational monsters that fund and Via e-mail giving rise to hugely positive public
enrich us. Avnish Bajaj belongs to this opinion of your company.
socially irresponsible breed, and from Dear Sushil and Fullar,
the strong defence put up by Sachin Your inputs are most appreciated. I am sure Mohammed Shaik Hussain Ali
Kalbag, it is evident that this breed has Digit’s readers would love your solutions. Via e-mail
an ardent fan following. Thank you very much indeed.
Alas, Digit’s executive editor does —Executive Editor

107 108 109 110 111 112 DIGIT FEBRUARY 2005 163
 The New-look Bill Gates
A
fter Bill Gates’ visit to
Las Vegas for the
Consumer Electronics
Show, rumours are rife that
the man is getting a PR
makeover. The Microsoft
chairman gave his first inter-
view to a blog—Gizmodo—at
the show. He also hung out
with a couple who won a
‘meet a celebrity’ contest
sponsored by Swatch. And
most of all, he agreed to be
People And Events That Grabbed Headlines—For Better Or For Worse photographed in bed with an
Apple laptop. Has he mellowed with age?
All this led CNET

Stone Becomes
News.com commentator Jeff whether the apparent soften-
Pelline to suggest that Mr ing-up of Bill Gates is perma-
Gates has aged and lightened nent, or whether it’s just a
up. Only time will tell Vegas thing.

Minister On Net You In The Mood, Baby?

A
team of scientists at along with “films of a non-
Rambam Hospital in sexy nature.”
Haifa, Israel, has Electrodes attached to
invented a machine that can their heads read the electrical
measure how randy one is responses to the images. A
feeling. The gadget has been computer then analyses the
dubbed, rather obviously, the data to measure the patient’s
‘hornometer’, and calculates libido levels.
whether a person is feeling Like we need a machine to
randy. British tabloid The Sun figure how sexed up we are
reported that patients are feeling. Or someone else, for
asked to watch erotic videos, that matter.

Self-Help Books, Anyone?

W
hy are you living? Life.” It began at just 99 cents.
This is, of course, What the seller was offering
Anything for friends: Sharon Stone the ultimate was what he (or she) desires
question. And since you can for his (or her) life. Of course,

T
he things people do on The 46-year-old actress buy just about anything at that may or may not be the
the Internet these days! married restaurant owner eBay, it turns out that you same as what you want.
It seems it is possible to Michael Bourseau and stylist can buy the answer to that “Do you feel aimless,
become a minister over the Brenda Swanson in a ceremo- question, too. Refer to this undirected, and unfulfilled?
Net. Hollywood star Sharon ny witnessed by actors Jack issue’s Escape for other weird Do you desire a reason, point
Stone did just that—getting Nicholson and Robert Wagner. eBay auctions. and a purpose in your life? If
ordained online—in order to The event was conducted The title of the auction so you have come to the
officiate at the wedding of two by Ms Stone at her luxury was “Purpose in life—do you RIGHT auction,” the item
of her friends. home in Coldwater Canyon. need it? Get a Purpose in description began. And then
the details: “the five-year plan
for your life,” “five of my best
Conceived On The Net life stories that have givin (sic)
me purpose,” and, most

N onu and Cornelia

Dragoman, from Medias,
Romania, recently had a baby
other and finally tying the
knot. Cornelia said, “We
named him Lucian Yahoo, one
important, “a certificate of
authenticity signed by me.”
Last time we checked, the
and named him Yahoo, after name after my father and the bidding had reached $5.50.
the Web portal. They’d had a other from the computer. The seller is apparently
virtual relationship for three These were the two elements not aware of the thousands of
months before seeing each which guided my life.” Wisdom @ $5.50 self-help books out there.

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