WServerNews (formerly W2Knews)

Vol. 13, #13 - Mar 31, 2008 - Issue #667

How To Speed Up Windows Vista

Editor's Corner
- Vista Chat With Mark Minasi
- Quotes Of The Week
Admin Toolbox
- Admin Tools We Think You Shouldn't Be Without
Tech Briefing
- How To Speed Up Windows Vista
- Some Issues With XP SP3
- Microsoft Admits It Knew About, Didn't Patch, Bugs
- Planning To Move To Windows Vista Now That Service Pack 1 Is Out?
Windows Server News
- What Spooks Microsoft's Chief Security Advisor?
- Why Did Vista Stink? Developers, Developers ...
WServer Third Party News
- With BeyondTrust You Can Take Away User Rights
- Latest SNSI Update
WServerNews FAVE Links
- This Week's Links We Like. Tips, Hints And Fun Stuff.
WServerNews - Product of the Week
- Sunbelt Exchange Archiver Wins 'Most Valuable Product' Award

Sunbelt Exchange Archiver Wins 'Most Valuable Product' Award

The brand new in-depth review of SEA in Redmond Magazine said: "Sunbelt Exchange Archiver makes e-mail archiving and retrieval accessible to the rest of us. Overall, Sunbelt Exchange Archiver is a significant upgrade over the base archiving, retrieval and compliance capabilities in Exchange. In particular, the installation and user documentation are among the best I've seen, and help make the product very usable. If you have a good reason for ensuring your e-mail archives are accurate and easily accessible, Exchange Archiver may be the best way of achieving those goals." Read the full review:
http://www.wservernews.com/080331-SEA-Review

	Editor's Corner

Vista Chat With Mark Minasi Mark and I exchanged a few emails this week. He joked in his famous way: "Vista runs fine, ON THE RIGHT MODERN HARDWARE. Just as XP did in October of 2001, when it was shipped. I run Vista on a Lenovo T61P - the dreaded 64-bit version, for which I rarely have trouble finding drivers despite all the uninformed nay-saying - and it runs like a top. I can't wait until 2013 when Windows 7 ships, and all of the people who currently say that Vista's "a dog" will be saying, "oh, no, don't use Windows 7, it has no drivers and runs slowly - stay with that reliable old Vista!" Take care, keep up the excellent work!" I had a good chuckle and had to admit he was of course right. It's still true that the "software trashes the hardware" meaning that newer software versions unfortunately always take more resources than the old version, and so require a new machine. I guess they continue to code knowing that Moore's Law will get them more speed in the future so they can "afford bloat". So for this issue I'm featuring a story on boosting Vista's speed! Quotes Of The Week "Common sense is genius dressed in its working clothes." -- Ralph Waldo Emerson "The real danger is the gradual erosion of individual liberties through automation, integration, and interconnection of many small, separate record- keeping systems, each of which alone may seem innocuous, even benevolent, and wholly justifiable." -- U. S. Privacy Study Commission, in 1977 (!) Thank you for being a WServerNews subscriber. Please tell your friends about us. They can subscribe here: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Subscribe

Hope you enjoy this issue of WServerNews! Warm regards, Stu |

Email me: feedback@wservernews.com

Get Rid Of Your Old Second Generation Exchange AV

Yeah, it may work OK. But the yearly maintenance is scandalously high. You can spend your valuable IT budget on something better than that. Get Ninja for your Exchange AV. It is cheaper than Trend, McAfee or Symantec and true third generation, integrated, policy-based antispam, AV, disclaimers and more. It's very little money if you take advantage of the competitive upgrade program. Try Ninja for 30 days. You will be amazed how easy it is to set up and run: it takes 50% less admin time than the others!
http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Ninja-Email-Security

	Admin Toolbox

Admin Tools We Think You Shouldn't Be Without Get your Macs under control! Securely manage your Mac OS X Systems with Microsoft Active Directory. Free white paper: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Centrify On a tight budget? Free is Good. Download our Community Edition and get the best employee white/yellow page directory on the planet: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Namescape FREE eBook with evaluation: Admin's Shortcut Guide to AD Security http://www.wservernews.com/080331-ScriptLogic Sunbelt Exchange Archiver wins Redmond MVP Award. Read the review and get a product walk-through. This is an archiving solution you have to check out: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Sunbelt-Exchange-Archiver-Award

	Tech Briefing

How To Speed Up Windows Vista SP1 may not give your system much more oomph, but there are other ways to speed Vista up. Spending a few minutes (or a few dollars) optimizing your Vista PC can help it get its groove on. InfoWorld described how to use Flash drives to cache disk reads, how to make Vista's User Account Control work -for- you instead of against you, how to turn off gadgets and services you don't need (and chew up CPU), check that the graphics card is tuned and up-to-snuff, make sure the drive is optimized and boost performance by allowing Vista more power and more tweaks. Read the full article here: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Speed-up-Vista Some Issues With XP SP3 A WSN subscriber wrote: "Just a note, spurred by uncertainties with recent experience, but I think we'll see a few negatives come in on XP SP3 concerning 3rd party Apps. I'm finding some already in the area of printers (HP). One of the unidentified problems is printing with 3rd party print apps that didn't happen until the upgrade to SP3. I'm working on that... "Another is an issue when logging off. With the logon profile page missing the profiles, or not being able to type the password into the password field, (had this happen with three different desktops from three different customers running XP SP2. I do backups prior to SP updates, suggest that to all who do update!) "An interesting item is on a new XP SP2 build. If you immediately install SP3 w/o updating with MS Updates, you will find that when you go to the MS Update site manually for updates...Media Player 11 will not be listed as an optional download. You'll also find that the SP3 update left the fresh build with Media Player 9 intact. "The SP3 update will also not install IE 7 by default and leaves IE 6.0 intact and when going to the MS Update Site...IE 7 will not be listed as either a critical update or a optional update. "On the positive end...two units that I did install SP3 on and in which were pre-updated with every update available from MS Updates are running much faster than they were before the updates and no issues with them so far. The main hardware is different on those also though, ASUS Intel boards compared to strictly Intel boards. "Under SP3, certain hardware that needed drivers. Those drivers supplied on the Intel CD were not recognized as the proper drivers for the board, and under the SP2 build they were. I went to Intel to get driver updates and they weren't identified by SP3 as proper. As always...we all appreciate WServer News and the good work at Sunbelt...using CounterSpy is great, works great with XP SP2 and Vista. Blessings!" -- Dave Brooks. Microsoft Admits It Knew About, Didn't Patch, Bugs Microsoft's security team knew about bugs in its Jet Database Engine as far back as 2005, but it didn't patch the problems because it thought users were safe from attack. ComputerWorld has this story: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Jet-Database-Bugs Planning To Move To Windows Vista Now That Service Pack 1 Is Out? Several challenges can arise when you try to move your applications from an operating system like Windows XP to one like Windows Vista because the underlying code for Vista is so completely different from the one for XP. When you do begin to test your applications on Vista, you'll find these three major categories of compatibility concerns: Security Release-related issues User experience Read the full story at: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Vista-Application-Move

	Windows Server News

What Spooks Microsoft's Chief Security Advisor? Microsoft security honcho Bret Arsenault says application exploits, virtualization security and attacks coming from .edu domains are among the things that keep him up at night. NetworkWorld has the full story: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-MS-Chief-Security-Advisor Why Did Vista Stink? Developers, Developers ... InformationWeek had the scoop on another very interesting Vista story. Here is one paragraph about crashes that is particularly interesting: According to the Microsoft e-mails, Nvidia's drivers alone caused 28.8% of the crashes seen in Vista during the report period. (The report says only that it covers 2007, but it likely does not cover the entire year.) Microsoft drivers come in second at 17.9%, ATI is third with 9.3%, and Intel takes fourth place with 8.8%. Webroot Software, makers of an anti-spyware application, was next with 2.9%. All the other drivers, from hundreds of companies listed on the report, plus "Unknown", make up the other 32.3% of the crashes. Read the whole thing at: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Vista-Crashes

	WServer Third Party News

With BeyondTrust You Can Take Away User Rights BeyondTrust's software allows companies to minimize user rights in the name of security. When it comes to user rights, less is more, according to officials at BeyondTrust. With that in mind, the company has launched a piece of freeware to help organizations minimize user rights as part of an overall enterprise security strategy. Using BeyondTrust Application Rights Auditor, users can identify software that requires elevated privileges. Once those applications are identified, enterprises can develop plans to remove users' administrative rights without any application downtime and affecting business productivity. According to BeyondTrust officials, there were previously only two ways to determine what applications required users have administrative rights - to take the rights away from and see what applications broke, or examine every installed application one at a time. BeyondTrust Application Rights Auditor is available for free download and supports Windows 2000, XP and Vista, Windows Server 2003 and 2008, and 64-bit Windows platforms. eWEEK has more about this free code and where to find it: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-BeyondTrust Latest SNSI Update SNSI uses the latest Mitre Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) list of computer incidents. It also contains the latest SANS/FBI top 20 vulnerability list. SNSI also uses the latest CERT, CIAC Microsoft and FedCIRC (Department of Homeland Security) advisories. New Checks: W3258 CA BrightStor ARCServe Backup ListCtrl.ocx ActiveX Control Vulnerability M0139 Security Update 2008-002 - Mac OS X 10.4 L0528 DNSSEC-Tools libval APEX trust flaw - FC L0530 KVM disk block access range break-out error - FC L0531 Qemu disk block access range break-out error - FC L0532 Horde Turba2 IMP and Webmail validation errors - FC L0533 Turba2 Horde IMP and Webmail validation errors - FC L0534 IMP Turba2 Horde and Webmail validation errors - FC L0535 Dbus daemon security policy error - FC L0536 Xen Qemu disk block access range break-out error - FC L0537 PhpMyAdmin $_REQUEST access error - FC L0540 GhostScript zseticcspace function flaw - FC L0542 ViewVC multiple file query flaws - FC L0543 Evolution emf_multipart_encrypted flaw - FC L0544 SynCE packages shell metacharacter and vdccm flaws - FC L0545 MediaWiki api.php and BotQuery flaws - FC L0546 NX Xserver byte swapping and memory errors - FC L0547 Lighttpd calculate descriptor & CGI source send flaws - FC L0549 Libtirpc svcauth_gss RPC long string kadmind error - FC L0550 Kronolith Horde Turba2 IMP and Webmail validation errors - FC L0552 Ruby WEBrick encoded backslash flaw - FC L0553 Dovecot mail_extra_groups & login errors - FC L0554 Roundup property permissions error - FC L0555 Boost invalid regex errors - FC L0560 OpenLDAP objectClasses and slapo-pcache error - MDV Updated Checks: W1142, W1986, W1999, W2067 Anti-Virus Signatures L1519 Thunderbird multiple vulnerabilities - FC Sunbelt Network Security Inspector version 1.6.95.0 was released March 24, 08). Sunbelt Software recommends you download the new SNSI version 1.6.95.0, scan, and patch your machines today. To get the latest SNSI version, visit: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Sunbelt-Network-Security-Inspector

	WServerNews FAVE Links

This Week's Links We Like. Tips, Hints And Fun Stuff. This is the U.S. national anthem in five part harmony. It's more than worth a listen. It choked me up, and I wasn't even born in the U.S. http://www.wservernews.com/080331-US-National-Anthem The N.Y. International Auto Show: High-tech under the hood http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Auto-Show Cute site, they went out and took pictures of what food packaging says something will look like, but then the third shot is what it -actually- looks like. Rather funny. (in German) http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Food-Packaging Beethoven's 5th Argument - a live television sketch comedy from the 50's: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Beethoven-5th-Argument The BigDog quadruped robot by Boston Dynamics is both stunning and spooky. We have featured this robot before, but here is more footage from even more challenging environments like snow and ice. Fascinating! http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Quadruped Six-legged tractor walking through the forest. Spooky but real: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Six-Legged-Tractor And course a spoof of the BigDog quadruped... it's so stupid it's hilarious http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Quadruped-Spoof The world's smallest car. Made in Germany. This guy is asking for some serious injuries: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Smallest-Car "Points of view" Interesting ad from The Guardian: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Points-of-View On November 7, 1940, only four months after it opened, the Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapsed in a wind of 42 mph due to wind-induced vibrations: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Bridge-Resonance Sculptures using ferrofluid and electromagnets causing movement synthetically to music: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Ferrofluids Y2K predictions from the 1930's - American fashion designers from the 30's imagine what the well-dressed man and woman would be wearing in the year 2000: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-Future-Trend-Predictions What would your website look like in one of, oh, 45 other browsers? Do you dare find out? Check out the Browsershots Org, it's very busy though: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-BrowserShots TimeMachiner is a new mini-app that lets you email people in the future. Use it to remind yourself to do something that you'll more than likely forget, keep your future self on the straight and narrow, even wish your friends happy birthday... http://www.wservernews.com/080331-TimeMachiner

	WServerNews - Product of the Week

Sunbelt Exchange Archiver Wins 'Most Valuable Product' Award The brand new in-depth review of SEA in Redmond Magazine said: "Sunbelt Exchange Archiver makes e-mail archiving and retrieval accessible to the rest of us. Overall, Sunbelt Exchange Archiver is a significant upgrade over the base archiving, retrieval and compliance capabilities in Exchange. In particular, the installation and user documentation are among the best I've seen, and help make the product very usable. If you have a good reason for ensuring your e-mail archives are accurate and easily accessible, Exchange Archiver may be the best way of achieving those goals." Read the full review: http://www.wservernews.com/080331-SEA-POW