Hardware

There's a new self-serve extended warranty program for consumer goods launching Saturday night: GreenUmbrella. Unlike the typical extended warranties you may get when you buy products, this is an umbrella plan: $9.95 a month covers nearly everything you own. It's a good deal when compared with other extended warranties, although that's not saying much.

The cool thing with GreenUmbrella is that if you are on the plan, you can just say, "No, thanks" when the drone at Best Buy tries to push the extended warranty on you. The GreenUmbrella program covers repairs to your computers, game consoles, cameras, refrigerators, TVs, air conditioners, etc. Anything less than $5,000 is eligible, and is covered for three years from purchase date.

To get a new purchase into the system, all you have to do is go online and enter the info about it. You don't need your receipts to register a product, but you will when you file a claim.

Repairs are handled by The Warranty Group, which maintains a network of certified repair shops for consumer goods. When you call in with a claim, ultimately you'll be routed to one of their providers for the repair or replacement of your item.

There are limitations, however. The service does not cover accidental breakage, doesn't cover your mobile phone, and doesn't cover products more than 3 years old. Also, keep in mind that all new products come with their own warranties. If you have a device that fails during the period of the warranty that comes with the product, GreenUmbrella might help a bit by offering a smoother experience through its service bureau, or by covering, perhaps, consumable parts (like a projector bulb) on a repair for a product whose native warranty only covers malfunctions.

But for the most part, the GreenUmbrella plan only covers products during their most healthy period--the two-plus years that fall between the product's in-warranty infancy (when it is most likely to fail), and its slip into creaky senescence when it's more likely to suffer wear-related problems or become obsolete. It's when you are most likely to need the plan that your products will not be eligible for its services.

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Recent rumors of Intel employees signing up for Facebook accounts en masse might not have been totally unfounded: Facebook has chosen to use Intel's Xeon 5400 processor-based servers to deal with its hardware and software demands. Additionally, the two companies have signed an agreement so that Intel can continue to assess how Facebook can stay stable and improve performance.

Facebook will have "thousands" of Xeon servers, a release said.

It's not an earth-shattering announcement by any means, but Intel's pretty psyched. "Intel is excited to engage with Facebook as they are a dynamic force … Read more

Are there things you can never have too much of? Sure. Money and closet space come to mind off the top of my head. What about hard disk space? You can, indeed, have too much hard disk space.

I know this seems ridiculous, but for Defensive Computing, large capacity hard disks are riskier than lower capacity ones. The reason is simple, cramming more bits in the same physical space means crowding them closer together. This is asking for trouble.

This came up on an old Security Now! podcast by Steve Gibson. Gibson is famous for security, but his day job … Read more

It's shoot for the moon daze, people! Following up on Al Gore's challenge to convert all electricity production to wind, solar and recumbent bike power in the next 10 years, two other probably even less likely to be accomplished challenges were raised.

First, TechCrunch wants users to build them a dead-simple web tablet for $200. There's that can-get-other-people-to-do-it spirit that made this country great! Make sure you get a tetanus shot before taking those test models for a spin! Some of those edges might be sharp.

Now one of the founders of Ubuntu maker Canonical, Mark Shuttleworth, … Read more

You bought an audio-video receiver a couple of years ago, and now you're wondering whether it's time to trade up and get a model that features Dolby and DTS' new lossless codecs, TrueHD and Master Audio, respectively.

Judging by the numbers they should sound markedly better than standard Dolby and DTS, but according to a recent article in Home Entertainment magazine, the sonic differences were small to negligible. You can read the full article here.

David Birch-Jones and HE's editor-in-chief, Geoff Morrison, visited Dolby Laboratories and DTS' headquarters to listen to the new formats under ideal conditions, comparing them to standard Dolby and DTS. Birch-Jones and Morrison were hard-pressed to hear significant differences.

I have limited experience listening to the two contenders, and I never managed to do speedy A-B comparisons. That said, from what I've heard, I thought that TrueHD and DTS Master Audio were better than the older formats, especially in the areas of imaging, spaciousness, top-end detail, and "air."… Read more

Do you block your phone number from appearing on Caller ID? If so, don't count on it. At The Last HOPE hacker conference, Kevin Mitnick, arguably the most famous hacker of all, demonstrated how call blocking can be hacked, and the hidden phone number exposed.

The hack starts with a VoIP telephone number. Mitnick uses Flowroute as his provider, but he told me afterwards that the same thing can also be accomplished with a few other VoIP providers.

He starts by forwarding calls to an Asterisk server that he maintains.

According to Wikipedia, "Asterisk is an open source/… Read more

In a review of Apple's quarterly post-conference call beating on the market (yawn, SEEN IT), ZDNet's Adrian Kingsley-Hughes hits upon a gem of an idea while musing on the much-discussed upcoming "product transition".

Revamped AppleTV that's App Store compatible - Give the AppleTV a Wii Remote-like controller and it's ready to bring Super MonkeyBall to the world.

Let's ignore the fact that Apple's sold more iPhones and iPods touch ("iPod touches" just sounds wrong) than Apple TVs so Super Monkey Ball already reaches a wider audience. And let's also … Read more

Lots of travelers have their checked luggage abused, but it takes a hacker to find out what really goes on behind closed doors. The first such hacker, who goes by the name "Algormor," is on the case.

In a presentation at the just-concluded hacker conference The Last HOPE, Algormor explained his method and motivation, and offered a glimpse behind the curtain.

No doubt, many can relate to his motivation, which started with one too many "Notice of Baggage Inspection" tags from the Transportation Security Administration. The last straw was when a zipper on his luggage was … Read more

The Last HOPE conference, now being held in New York City, is as much for people interested in hacking the real world as it is for computer techies.

One such real world presentation on Friday was called "Undoing Complexity--From Paper Clips to Ball Point Pens." Despite the title, it was about hacking high-security electronic locks from Medeco. (The paper clip in the title is a reference to using one as a way of bypassing one type of security in Medeco locks.) The presentation was very well attended, SRO in a large room.

The presenters, Matt Fiddler and Marc Tobias, … Read more