CNET Live: April 17, 2008

[ music ] ^M00:00:09 >> Coming up on CNET Live it's Earth Day and we're celebrating. Believe it or not, we're gonna do so by driving a forklift. >> Yeah, and recycling rain water with solar powered water collector thingies. We have someone who knows a lot more about it than I do. It's all coming up as we go green on CNET Live. ^M00:00:25 [ music ] ^M00:00:32 >> Welcome to it everybody. >> Hola. >> It's CNET Live, Brian Cooley and - >> Tom Merritt. >> - Tom Merritt. >> I'm Tom Merritt. >> How are you? Good to see you, Brian Cooley. >> Good to see you Brian. >> Nice to meet you. >> Yeah, nice to meet you. >> I've seen you on CNET Live. >> You want my card? >> You're very good. >> Thank you, you too. >> Forty two, good number. >> Yeah. That's the answer to the great question of life, the universe, and everything. >> Of course. And we've got answers almost that good for your questions when you call 888- >> We're just gonna answer everything with forty two today. >> Not nearly that good. 888-900-CNET. >> When you call, Cheryl will pick up the line and you'll get a chance to chat with Cheryl. >> Uh-huh, there's Cheryl. >> Get you all set up and prepared to come on the show live, and we'll try to answer your questions. >> Right before we dig into those, to our own personal shame, let's show you a couple of Things we Crave. ^M00:01:09 [ music ] ^M00:01:13 [ background music ] >> These are some of our favorite things from the Crave blog at crave.cnet.com. This is actually something I'm not craving any longer, I actually have it. It's called Fring. >> Fring. >> Which is a voiceover IP application for the iPhone. Allows you to make internet calls if you're at a Wi-Fi. You can put this on the iPod Touch also. But the key is you have to jail break your iPhone. So you have to bust your warranty. You have to go and do something like - >> Right. >> - Xyphone or something from the iPhone dev team, like Ponage. Jail break your iPhone so you can put third party apps on it. But if you do, you get this you know, it's got a full dialer right on there. >> Looks good. >> It's got a bunch of, you can make Skype calls, you can make SIP calls, that's the internet - >> Yeah. >> - protocol, and you can also do Google Talk, or ICQ - >> Yeah. >> - voice. You can also do some chatting, you can Twitter on here, which I know you like. >> Oh great. >> But it's a really cool looking dialer. >> Yeah, great interface. >> Go look in app, and hopefully they'll translate this to the actual legitimate iPhone apps once Apple - >> Yeah, the new - >> - unveils those - >> The new approval program - >> - some time this summer. >> - instead of creaking along with the SDK and all that. >> Exactly. So Fring - >> Fring. >> You can go take a look at it at Crave, or I think it's at fring.com. >> Do you remember Frings from Jack in the Box? >> Oh that's right. >> They were French fried onion rings mixed. >> French fried rings, I'd totally forgotten about those. >> They were great. >> Those were tasty too. >> Okay, I've got something not nearly as tasty, but it's kind of cool. This is more of a concept of what's coming for Bluetooth headsets. It's adding Ybrey [assumed spelling] technology to give you what's called a hybrid headset. So Bluetooth today, yeah what a name, Ybrey, makes no sense. I don't know what it stands for. But it is a very lower power short haul wireless. Like Bluetooth, but instead of battery life measured in a few days perhaps with a current Bluetooth headset, then you got to charge it or battery it again, this could be measured literally in a year of standby time. Uses a little button cell like you might use for a hearing aid, and extremely lower power. One tenth, or less the power consumption of Bluetooth. >> That's very attractive, but there are no phones that support it yet. Right? >> That's the little hitch. >> You got to wait for a phone to come out. >> I don't know of anything you can use this, again this is a concept product that came out at a medical device conference because they're looking to use it in medical devices right away. >> But you think the phones will come out to support it? >> Yeah, and I think also a lot of home automation is gonna come out with this stuff. >> All right. >> So you can build mesh networks of things in your house. >> Nice. >> That's gonna build up the install base of the chip technology. >> Little Ybrey. >> It's got to be a tiny - >> It's kind of a Bluetooth'ish type thing. >> Yeah, it's thirty foot ranged like Bluetooth, so it's the same idea, but a lot less power. That could be the next big thing, so look for those hybrid headsets. Coming soon. >> Shall we get to some telephone calls? >> Let's do it. >> As that is what we are supposed to do. >> Where do we go first? >> Let's start right at the top. In England, Matthew. >> Hey, how's it going? >> We're doing well, how are you? Where are you calling from? >> I'm calling from Woodmouth [assumed spelling]. >> Oh very nice, thanks for making the long trek through the phone lines. >> Yeah. >> What's your question toady? >> Okay, well for my computing [inaudible] Microsoft Access. But the school has these really ancient versions of Microsoft Access, meaning like Access 2003 or something. >> Okay. >> And uses really ancient [inaudible] it's .mdb. So unfortunately I can't seem to get it to work on my [inaudible] because there's no version of Access for a Mac. >> Have you tried to open it in Appleworks yet? >> I'm running an Intel Mac. >> Ah, okay. Don't have Appleworks. You know what, you could try, try downloading, do you have Open Office for Mac? >> I've tried that but it doesn't open .mdb files. >> It doesn't open the .mdb file. All right, I'm out of options, you got anything Brian? >> Yeah, .mdb is, boy. >> It's kind of old. I'm sure there's something out there that'll do it, I'm just not aware of it. >> Yeah, see getting away from the old app of the old Apple suite is the, Appleworks would have been your sneaky way in. Let me see if I got one other one here that might do it. Well, couldn't File Maker open an .mdb? I could have sworn that File Maker would, do you have File Maker on your Mac? >> I've actually never heard of it before. >> File Maker is a very popular database, originally I want to say was a favored Mac database, it's now popular on all platforms. You mighit want to go grab a, I don't know if they have one, but I'm pretty sure you can get an evaluation version of File Maker. Install that, use that to interpret the .mdb, and then you know, spit it out as a comma separated or whatever you want to do to move onto a different platform. But that might be your missing link is File Maker. Cause that is a very contemporary program to Access over the years. I'm pretty sure it has .mdb import, at least there's a good chance. So try that out, okay? >> Only other solution I saw was people saying get a Microsoft computer and export it as comma separated, and then you could open it - >> Right. >> - as a comma separated file. That's kind of a hacky workaround that requires you to have access to a Windows machine. >> Right. If you have access to Windows [inaudible] that's the way to do it. But otherwise try File Maker, I'm sure you can find a demo version to play with just long enough to open this file and spit it out as something else. >> Next call. >> Good luck with that. >> Carson, California. Matthew on the line. Thanks for calling, what can we help you with? >> I'm doing pretty good, how are you guys doing? >> We're doing great. >> Doing great. >> Still waiting for files, but oh well. Okay. >> Me too. >> I've got a question here. I'm trying to understand RAID a little bit. Now I originally said RAID zero but I really guess I meant RAID one. Now RAID one makes it that copy. So let's say I build my next computer that has RAID built in, like well whatever, it has RAID built in and I turn it on and have two hard drives. Now does that make an absolute exact copy to where the first one died? The first one died, I replaced it with a second one, would everything be there? The exact OS and everything? >> Yeah. That's the way, it'll mirror the drive bit for bit, pretty sure bit for bit, it's an image that's going to be constantly kept up. Now it may not be in absolute real time. I think it'll depend on the RAID chipset you're using, whether it's doing it every single bit that is written, or if it's doing it when it has a moment, in computer think, to do some overhead maintenance. But that's the idea. >> Anybody who doesn't know out there, RAID is redundant array of independent disc, so there's - >> Expensive discs, yeah. >> But it allows you to see multiple disc drives as one disc drive. >> Yeah. >> And so there's different types of RAID. >> Well that's type one. Yeah, RAID zero that you mentioned first, which is probably not what you're looking for, is striping, so you have an AB, so every other bit goes to the other drive. You do that for greater speed. It's often done on systems where you're editing video. You've got to move a lot of data. One drive can't keep up with the flow, so you bounce it, ABABABAB. So bit one goes here, bit two, bit three, bit four, bit five, bit six. That's striping. But you want mirroring, which is RAID one. There's another RAID that does mirroring as well, but the most common mirroring is RAID one. And yeah, you should basically have a fail proof system when you do that. I mean this has been used in banks and critical applications for decades. That's one of the reasons they came up with that architecture. And it's really good. I used, all my backup servers are all rate one machines - >> You know - >> - never lost a bit. >> I used RAID as a workaround once in an old Dell that didn't have the right SATA connector. >> Yeah. >> So I had a RAID thing that had SATA connectors that would fit into the Dell's connector. >> Yeah. >> And then I just did a RAID array of one disc, and replaced the drive with a much bigger drive. >> Always a different way to slice the onion, courtesy of Doctor Tom Merritt. >> Yeah. >> From the man who loads - >> Not practical. >> - Linux on a pen drive. Coming up we'll be talking to Michelle Kaufman, an architect who's leading a revolution in the design, construction, and most importantly the affordability of energy efficient, friendly homes. That's coming up. >> But first, sure you've heard of hybrid cars, what about fuel cell forklifts? Take a look at the forklift of the future. ^M00:09:10 [ music ] ^M00:09:14 [ background music ] >> I'm riding one of the hottest green vehicles in Silicon Valley today, the methanol powered forklift. Michael Kinelis for News.com here, at Orja Protonics [assumed spelling], a startup in Sunnyvale that makes a power system for one of the fastest growing vehicle markets around. This Toyota forklift contains a methanol fuel cell created by Orja. The fuel cell continually charges the battery, and the battery powers the forklift. The fuel cell however, can also power the forklift on its own. >> Best forklift I've ever ridden. >> Who cares? Warehouse owners. >> If you look at the day in the life of a forklift, you would start the morning, three, four, five hours into the shift, the forklift operator [inaudible] off the batteries. >> Drivers have to bring in their rigs mid-day to huge charging stations to swap their batteries. That takes a lot of real estate and a lot of space at places like Wal-Mart and Target and Costco. >> With this you could go two shift operation if that's what the - >> Really? >> - customer demands. Or you could go three shift operation. >> A lot of companies have tried to bring fuel cells to market for years, but they've been mostly looking at cell phones and small electronics. Orja's trick is that they are doing it for a big honking system like this. >> Here's the fuel tank. >> Okay. >> And you connect, you just drive past a refueling station, and in less than two minutes this is filled up, off you go. >> Here's how it works. Methanol, which is wood alcohol, is mixed with oxygen and then run through a catalytic membrane in this blue box. The reaction rearranges all the atoms and produces water, carbon dioxide, and electrons. The electrons are then fed into the batteries, which is that yellow box. >> Today I think there are about a million and a half electric forklifts in the U.S. existing. >> Really? >> So how come it's taken so long for fuel cells to hit the market? >> It's the scientist syndrome. Engineer has to develop what the customer wants. [ background music ] >> I'm Michael Kinelis for News.com. >> Yeehaw, Doctor Kinelis, no one like him. Okay, let's talk to Michelle Kaufman. Eco friendly architect and home designer who's doing some very different things with making the home of the future that has such a light green footprint, but also doing it in a way you can actually afford. Hi Michelle. >> Hi there. >> Now people hear about these new advanced homes that are so you know, low emissions, low energy consumptions, sustainable, yada yada ya. But you always see rich people who read Dwell magazine affording them. Can this be done in a way that is affordable to all of us? >> Exactly. That's really the mission of our work, is to make thoughtful, sustainable design that's accessible. Because if it's only for the wealthy, what's the point? >> It's not gonna scale. >> Exactly. And it needs to be for everyone. So we're doing that through using pre-fabricated technologies, so that way we can bake in all the green aspects - >> Yeah. >> - as well as doing single family as well as multi-family where we can mix in market rate and affordable units. >> Okay, so you can do those kind of below market rate developments and such, as well as single family homes. It all works this way. Now pre-fab you mentioned is how you do this. You've got a plant near Seattle. >> Exactly. So we do modular construction, which is one type of pre-fabrication. >> Yeah. >> That's building volumetrically, but it's very different than manufactured, because modular is build to site build code. >> Yeah. >> It's shipped as a series of completed boxes, with all the electrical, mechanical, finishes, then assembled on a permanent foundation. Once it is, it's considered real estate and you don't ever have to talk about [inaudible]. >> So this is not a mobile home in the world of titling and all that. >> Not a mobile home. >> It's a real house. Okay, that's key. >> Exactly, it's key. >> Cause you can't sell or get mortgages, or do lots of stuff with what's considered a movable property. >> Exactly. So this is really different. And this is getting to the point of the fact that we use automation and technology in almost every other industry to bring good design to [inaudible]. >> Right, right. >> But we've been building buildings the same clunky way for hundreds of years. >> We're out there with a hammer and nails still - >> Exactly. >> - sawing. Yeah, here's one of your homes here, a demonstration that you did after it's been put together. I mean this is a beautiful home. >> Yes. >> This is not a trailer, by no stretch. >> No sir, no. And with this technology we're able to achieve fifty to seventy five percent less waste. >> Wow. >> Plus we can really - >> That's a big difference. >> - do everything in the factory where we can install the solar - >> Yeah. >> - we can install all of the technology there. >> See, it's like an automobile assembly line or a computer assembly line, where it's really being done with precision, as opposed to a guy with a pencil behind his ear, woo woo woo woo. >> Exactly. >> Sawing stuff on site. Now other technologies you use inside the house, monitoring is becoming big. What does that mean in an e-house? >> So we do energy metering, which means it provides a dashboard, kind of like my Prius. >> Yeah. >> Where then our clients can see in real time their energy use in terms of gas, power, and also water. So that way they have the information at hand to be able to adjust accordingly to use less. >> Yeah. >> Still taking hot showers every day, but doing it in a way where you can use less. >> Now if I have a portable hand-held device, an iPhone or what have you, and I want to be able to run my home, we're getting to that point aren't we? >> Yes, yes, exactly. So what we're doing also is hooking it up to things like iPhones. So that means if you're leaving your house for the weekend, you don't have to leave on your heating or cooling system that you normally would because you want it - >> Yeah. >> - warm or cold when you come home. >> Running the same profile as if it thinks you're home all day. >> Yeah, exactly. So that way then you can turn it off for the weekend or the week when you're gone, and with your iPhone then a half hour before you go home turn on that heating system. >> Yeah. >> And that way then you walk into a warm house, but without wasting all that energy while you're gone. >> Now here's what gets to me. There's a very big turn of the tide against traditional fireplaces, and yet we saw in the video here you've got a fireplace in one of your homes here. What's it burning? >> It actually burns alcohol, which is a clean way to burn. >> On the weekend I do too. [ laughter ] >> Right. Because while we love the wood burning stoves - >> Yeah. >> - and the wood burning fireplaces, not so good for the environment. >> Yeah. >> Not so good for the air quality. So with the alcohol it allows us to have that flame, the warmth of the flame, and the warmth of the heat - >> And super clean obviously, basically no emissions from that. Another thing I want to talk to you about is the stuff we're doing with lighting. Now a lot of us hear about the capsule fluorescents, and they're basically giving those things away with utility subsidies. >> Thank goodness. >> But boy there's some ugly light coming out of some of those. You're a designer, you don't like ugly light, I know this. You want things to look good, you want these colors that you selected, materials to be true and to reflect nicely. What's good about alternate lighting these days? What's hot? >> Yeah. So luckily CFLs are getting better, they are becoming - >> Yeah, they are. >> - adjustable with warm. But LED fixtures are really where we should be looking, because LED fixtures can be ninety times as efficient as incandescent. So they're actually much more efficient than compact fluorescent. >> Yeah. >> The issue is that they're currently still at a price premium, but I'm hoping it's like organic foods where ten years ago - >> Right, right. >> - where there was a significant price premium, but over time then and as people have them more, then they don't cost that much more. So hopefully that's happening - >> Yeah, all these technologies, they all sound great. There's some great materials you're showing us here, sustainable, renewable, you know, hard materials, flooring materials. >> Recycled glass. >> Recycled glass that turns into what, these are tiles? >> Yeah, exactly. >> So everything's coming together in terms of the technology. But what about the cost and the financing? If I want to get this kind of a home financed, do I run into problems with the lender saying, a what? You know, they're gonna truck it from where? What is that? >> Well hopefully not. And we have different lenders that we use, like Country Wide and [inaudible]. >> Okay, big ones, the biggies. >> And while it's no different in terms of financing, in terms of rates for the client, there is a little bit of difference in terms of how the bank actually pays the factory versus the shipping. So that's why we try to work - >> Yeah, it's like a purchased product that they're buying from a vendor. >> Yeah. >> It's a different thing. >> It's a little bit different. >> Yeah. >> But for the client they shouldn't see any difference. >> Okay. And then in terms of cost, I mean I know it varies in every market, but here in the bay area you budget you know, a quarter million for a lot, three fifty or four hundred for the build and the design services. Are you in that same ballpark of what it costs to make the home? >> Yeah. So we're definitely in the ballpark, and it should cost no more than the equivalent non-green home or site built home. In some cases it can cost less. But I think we also in addition to that need to rethink costs. It's not just about the up front costs. >> Yeah. >> For those of us who aren't paying cash - >> Yeah. >> - it's not that, it's the monthly bills. So the more that we can actually look at the performance of the home - >> Yeah. >> - and review monthly bills of energy and water, and have those added into it, then the cost for green homes is actually less - >> You've actually done - >> - than the non-green home. >> like a nutrition label for a home, but it's a sustainability, the real cost. Not the cost of what all this new technology is, but the cost of ownership is really what it is. >> Exactly, so that way you can see - >> The cost of living. >> And I think our homes should come with nutrition labels. We should be able to see - >> I know, wouldn't this be great if we had labels here? Here's an old school home and how it gobbles up energy, and here's a big difference. >> Big difference in terms of your carbon emission, and therefore also your cost of your power bills. >> That's interesting how those two are tied, yeah. >> Yes. >> You've got some great stuff up on your site. All right, good stuff over at Michele Kaufman.com, and her blog link also has a lot, we just showed you there about the energy consumption charts. You've got a home going up in Chicago. >> We do, it's opening May eighth at the Museum of Science and Industry. >> Okay. >> So people can experience what a green home is - >> Great. >> - and play with the technology. >> Okay, so our Chicago viewers, if you want to check out one of Michelle's places, Museum of Science and Industry, May eighth until end of the year, it'll be opening there. You can actually walk through and see all this stuff, and Michelle Kaufman at MichelleKaufman.com. Coming up next it's our Download of the Week, right after this. ^M00:18:30 [ music ] ^M00:18:46 [ background music ] >> Catch the baddest textploitation vids at cnettv.com. ^M00:18:50 [ music ] ^M00:19:09 >> Welcome back to CNET Live. I'm Tom Merritt, Brian Cooley's still talking to Michelle because it's so darned interesting. >> Give me a second while I finish up with Michelle, will you just give me a minute? >> That was really cool, we're gonna have to have her back. >> All right, all right fine, all right. So the phones are open, 888-900-CNET, 888-900-2638. You call, we answer, or make a reasonable facsimile thereof. >> Time now for the Download of the Week. >> You better believe it. ^M00:19:29 [ music ] ^M00:19:32 [ background music ] >> Download of the Week is brought to you by our good friends at CNET's Download.com, purveyors of free spyware, free downloads. Today we're looking at Test Disc and Photo Rec. And actually what I'm gonna focus on mostly is the photo rec part of it. It's a file that was made, or a program that was made to recover photos, but it works for any file. So I've plugged in a USB drive into my computer that's kind of broken - >> Yeah. >> - doesn't really read and write well all the time. >> Yeah. >> And I'm gonna use this program here to actually go - >> Pretty interface. >> Yeah, yeah it is. To actually go and recover the file. >> All right. >> So yeah, you come and you give this DOS looking thing, it might look really scary - >> Oh yeah. >> - but it's actually just simple. >> Yeah. >> It's a Windows program. >> Yeah. >> You can you know, move around with your arrow keys and everything. It'll put your drive up here, which I haven't refreshed it so it's not showing the thumb drive. >> It's your actually hard drive. >> Showing your hard drive. But it'll put a thumb drive up there, you select it, it will go through and look at all the open space on that drive, and take all that data, convert it into files, and put it on your hard drive for you. >> Yeah, because open space is really not open, it's just where your stuff is, but it's no longer tabled. >> Right, cause Windows sees it as empty, doesn't mean there isn't any data there. >> Yeah. >> There actually is data there - >> Right. >> - that this program can recover. So you can see an example here. I have got the results of my scan. >> Okay [inaudible]. >> And so you see a lot of trash, right? A lot of one kilobyte files. >> Yeah. >> This 8356 kilobyte file doesn't work, so it's - >> Um-hmm. >> Anything that's been overwritten, it's not gonna find the whole file and it's not gonna work. >> Yeah, if part of it's missing, it probably can't recover it. >> But if you look down here, we've got a string of MP3s that were deleted. >> Yeah, the artist information showed up, so clearly it's a solid file. >> And you can actually, I can actually click on these, and this is cool. >> This is basically just recovery software. >> Yeah. >> Like they use at those various, oh there it is playing. >> Plays fine. So there you go, go to download.com and check out Test Disc and Photo Rec, Test Disc is a whole cool thing of its own. >> All right, back to your calls at 888-900-CNET, 888-900-2638. Let's take a run here to, who's been waiting the longest? I want to go see Chuck in Chico, California. I think his question is charmingly quaint. Hello Chuck, welcome to CNET Live. What can we do for you? >> Hey, how you doing guys? I try to watch you guys maybe every other week, I don't get it every time. But I have - >> You get there. >> I have about thirty hours of high eight tapes that since I switched over to the Macintosh world I'm having a problem trying to import those - >> Yeah. >> - because it wants it to be USB. Well my camera does not output USB [inaudible]. >> No. >> Either I have composite or S video. >> Yeah, what you've got is a high eight camcorder and tapes, and that's analog, even though it was a higher fidelity in those days it's still analog tapes. So you have to digitize that, which means take the video signal coming out of your camcorder with you know, the output jacks that you know about, and run it through a little device that'll digitize it, and then go out from that device via firewire into your Mac. So go to any of the places where you buy tech products, and you're looking for a digitizer. There are a bunch of them from Pinnacle for example, they have the Dazzle line, which are devices that are between sixty and a hundred bucks. And they're gonna take analog video plugging into one side of a little box, and firewire coming out the other side of the box, and that goes into your Mac. They'll also come with software, whether you use it or not, to manage and edit those files, but you probably already have much better video editing software from Apple. But that's what you've got to do, you've got to digitize. There's no computer that's gonna recognize that video coming out of the camcorder now. It has to be turned into ones and zeros. >> I know a lot of Mac users use iTV, El Gato's iTV. >> Yeah. >> It's just a little digital stick - >> Digitizer. >> And that, if it fits up to your camera, it'll easily, just take that and put it into the USB drive, and then you can use whatever software you want. >> Yeah. And you'll take the S jack out of your camera, that's as good as high eight video ever got, you don't need any better connector than that. Try not to use the little yellow RCA jack, that's a little bit reduction of your video fidelity. >> iTV's around a hundred fifty bucks. >> Okay, a little more but it's probably a better product, cause after all it's Apple oriented. Okay, who do you want to take next here? >> Let's go to the Linux on a PS3 question. >> Why not? >> Sanjay [assumed spelling], I hear you want to run Linux on a PS3 eh? >> Yeah. >> Okay. What's your question in particular? Where are you? >> Well I've tried to burn an ISO image of PS Bundu [assumed spelling]. >> Uh-huh. >> I was trying to make a Bundu on my PS3. >> Uh-huh. >> And my PS3 won't recognize the installer disc. >> Okay. And you've tried to do it multiple times? >> Yeah, like four or five times with different DVR, DVD-Rs. >> Okay. You know what? The nice thing about this people might not realize, Sony actually wants you to install Linux on your PS3. They make it an option in the menu, they even put it in their marketing materials. You can run Linux on the PS3, fully operational system. PS Bundu is one distribution that's out there that a lot of people use. Have you tried Yellow Dog Linux? >> Well I've seen it, but I heard that it costs money or something? >> I don't think so. It is the official Linux for the Playstation 3, it should not, you should be able to download an ISO for free. Yeah, it's free software. >> It's free open source software. >> Okay, but I'm just wondering how to burn the ISO image. Because when I burn it, it won't recognize [inaudible]. >> Okay so you're, when you're burning it, what software are you using to burn it? >> I'm just using Windows XP regular burning. >> Okay. You might want to try to get something like Nero. What's your favorite burning software? >> I like Nero. >> Nero. >> That's what I've been using a lot lately, yeah. >> Nero's a good one, there's some other free burning software out there. Don't - >> A bunch of them. >> Try not using the Windows one. See if PS Bundu works if you burn it that way. You want to make sure you're burning its data too - >> Right - >> Yeah. >> - bit for bit ISO to that CD. >> Right. >> Long as you're doing that, it should work. >> Okay. And should I format the disc to FAT-32, or - >> Do you mean the PS3? >> No, I mean like the disc. >> The CD? >> Yeah. >> You just want to burn it as an ISO, you shouldn't need to format the CD at all. >> Yeah. ISO's the format, which is an absolute image of the file, so it'll be recognized certainly as a bootable. >> Okay. >> So yeah - >> Thank you very much. >> Try all those shots and give it a try. >> Give it a go, and call us next week if it doesn't work, and we'll give you another answer, all right? >> All right. We got an email in from Paul, let me see if I can - >> Yeah. >> - pull it up there. >> Old Paul. >> He says my dad is deploying to Afghanistan for a year in a couple of months, he has a third generation iPod. But per Air Force regulations he cannot download any program onto his government issued PC. He can however, download data, like songs and podcasts. How would he go about putting a podcast onto his iPod without iTunes. I'd really like some help on this. Well Paul, first thing's first. Make sure that iPod has been checked as mountable in iTunes. There's a place where you can say like treat this as a hard drive. >> Is that on the iPod or in iTunes? >> It's in iTunes. >> Okay. >> So attach it to a computer he has control of, make sure it's mountable as iPod, and then put a program called Flula [assumed spelling] on it. Or you can put on Ifpod [assumed spelling] or xPlay, there's a couple of other programs. In fact, let me have this next video explain that. It's today's Insider Secret. ^M00:26:40 [ music ] ^M00:26:44 [ background music ] >> Ever wish you could manage your iPod with something other than iTunes, or from any computer you want? I'm Tom Merritt from CNET.com. On this edition of Insider Secrets, I'll show you how to free yourself from the iTunes chains. [ music ] Flula is donation supported software for managing your iPod. And on top of that it's cross-platform, which means it can run on Windows, Mac, or Linux. Let's take a look at it. Go to Flula.com and download the version for your OS. When you unzip it you have a choice. You can either run it on your PC, or unzip it to your iPod directly and run it from there. That way you can use any computer to manage your tunes. Now if you just reformatted, or you've never used your iPod before, you'll need to run iTunes at least once, and put at least one song on the iPod. Once you've done that, close iTunes, then launch Flula. The first time it runs it will set itself up. Mine asked me what kind of iPod I had. Then it warned me that I have an unknown version of iTunes. I pressed yes to continue, it worked out fine. The interface looks and works similarly to iTunes. It has all your songs sorted by artist, album, and genre, as well as any play lists you've created. Adding items is easy. Go to the item menu, choose add. Then just drag the files into the window. Once you have them all in, press the add button. There's also an option to add You Tube videos directly from the web. Sounds cool, but I couldn't seem to make that work. It also ran a little slow, so I put it in fast mode. Here's how to do that. Go to preferences, choose advanced, and check the fast mode box. This will make Fula start and close a little slower, but it should run faster the rest of the time. Also make sure you close Flula before you unplug your iPod. And one really interesting thing is how easy Flula is to uninstall. From within Flula, go to the tools menu, choose advanced, then choose uninstall. Then just delete the Flula program, done. So it's worth trying out since it's pretty easy to get rid of. All in all, if you just can't stand iTunes, or you want a way to manage your tunes on multiple computers, Flula will be useful for you. I do highly recommend reading through the instructions on Flula.com to get the most out of the software. Also, Molly Wood suggested a couple of others called Ifpod and X-Play 2. So you might want to check those out as well. That's it for this edition of Insider Secrets. I'm Tom Merritt for CNET.com, enjoy your independence. ^M00:29:13 [ music ] ^M00:29:18 >> It's like the American Revolution starting all over again. >> Really? Shot heard round the world? >> Enjoy your independence, is that what you said? >> Yeah, cause then you're away from that whole iTunes system. >> I wanted to pull out my Paul Revere outfit - >> Don't tread on me. >> - and do a little dance. Okay. >> Next week we got some folks from Digibar, Bruce Daymar [assumed spelling] and Allan Londell [assumed spelling]. >> That's right. >> They have the greatest private computer museum, might be the greatest computer museum, period. >> And we're gonna bring in our favorite [inaudible] too to go with those guys. And that's gonna be next week on CNET Live. Four eastern, one pacific. >> Ten a.m. Hawaiian. >> Right on. See you then. ^M00:29:47 [ music ]