 |
The Monthly Edition Of The k-Byte Newsletter |
 |
| v. 25, n. 5, May 2008 | Users Helping Users | |
|
The Monthly Edition Of The k-Byte Newsletter |
|
| v. 25, n. 5, May 2008 | Users Helping Users | |
|
Contents 1 The Switch to Digital TV - Sandy Berger 2 About k-Byte 3 Hulu Offers Free TV and Movies over the Net - Ira Wilsker 5 Moving on to Vista-Part 5 - Neil Stahfest 6 Calendar of Events 7 The Two Month Activities Calendar 8 Tip of the Month - File Layout for Excel Databases 9 Converting CD-based Music to Compressed Audio Files - Mike Moore 9 Photo Gallery 10 About Trading Post 12 Directions and Map to Meeting Place 12 FRPCUG Contacts Meeting Previews on Page 6:
 Quote of the Month Words are like leaves; and where they most abound, Much fruit of sense beneath is rarely found. Alexander Pope [1711] The Switch to Digital TV by Sandy Berger, CompuKISS, http://www.compukiss.com, sandy(at)compukiss.com The switch to digital is on the way. On February 17, 2009, U. S. broadcast stations, who are currently broadcasting in both analog and digital, will turn off their analog signals and will transmit only in digital. What's this mean to you? Most consumers who get their television from a cable or satellite provider won't notice a difference. Cable and satellite companies are not required to make the transition, so they can continue to broadcast in both analog and digital. Eventually, though, if your cable company moves to all digital, you will not be able to get the cable straight from the wall, but will need a box from your cable company. Most cable customers already have a cable television box, anyway. Don't worry about that now, your cable company will notify you, if and when that happens. And it may be years down the road. The people who will be most affected by the transition to digital are those who get their television over the air with rabbit ears or an antenna in the attic or on the roof. Older analog televisions will not be able to pick up the digital signal. You don't, however, have to go out and buy a new TV. You simply will need to add a digital-to-analog converter box to your television. These boxes are already available in stores like Wal-Mart, Best Buy, Circuit City, RadioShack, and Target. They will be priced between $40 and $70. Luckily for those with rabbit ears and old televisions, the government has created a $1.5 billion coupon program to subsidize the cost of the converter boxes. This program is being overseen by the National Telecommunication and Information Administration agency. Each household, regardless of how they receive their television, is eligible to receive two $40 coupons. The coupons are available now. As I write this, over 5 million coupons have already been requested. To get a coupon you can apply online at http://www.dtv2009.gov or call the 24-hour hot line, 888-DTV-2009 (888-388-2009). You can also mail a coupon application to P.O. Box 2000, Portland, OR 97208-2000. The program itself expires on March 31, 2009. The government is trying to get everyone ready as quickly as possible, so be aware that the coupons expire three months after they are mailed to you. Since many television stations are already broadcasting in digital, you can use the converter box immediately. If you are still asking why we are doing this, the official government explanation is that switching to digital TV will free up parts of the valuable broadcast spectrum for public safety communications such as police, fire departments, and rescue squads. The bigger reason, though, is that some of the spectrum will be auctioned to companies for advanced wireless services. This, of course, will be very lucrative for the US Government. It may also be a good thing for consumers, as well. With the digital converter box, even your old analog television may give you a better picture. You will also be able to see more channels as some broadcasters will choose to multicast programs. Multicasting means that a broadcaster can split up its signal into several channels, each with a different set of programs. This type of programming is only available with digital broadcasting. One thing to remember is that digital television is not high-definition television. Although high-def TVs will display digital television, you do not need a high-def TV just because of this transition. Digital broadcast television includes both Standard Definition (SD) and High Definition (HD) formats. You can watch both standard definition and high definition programming on an analog TV hooked to a digital-to-analog converter box, but the high definition won't give you the full high definition quality that you would receive on a high definition television. If you have a newer TV that you purchased in the last few years, it my already support digital. Look at the markings on the television to find out if it has a digital tuner built-in. Words like Digital Tuner or Receiver, DTV, or HDTV indicate that it will display the digital programming. However, if your television says HDTV Monitor, Digital Ready or HDTV Ready, you may still need a converter box. If you need more information on the move to digital television, check out the Federal Communication Commission's DTV Web site at http://www.dtv.gov. They have done a good job explaining everything you need to know. Obtained from APCUG with the author's permission for publication by APCUG member groups. This article has been provided to APCUG by the author solely for publication by APCUG member groups. All other uses require the permission of the author (see e-mail address above).  Published monthly, k-Byte is the official newsletter of the Front Range Personal Computer Users Group (FRPCUG): our mailing address is PMB 152, 305 W. Magnolia, Fort Collins, Colorado 80521. Opinions expressed in k-Byte are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the group or its members. Publication of information in k-Byte constitutes no guarantee of accuracy. Use of any information found in this publication is at the sole risk of the user. Neither k-Byte, nor its officers, nor its editors or contributors assume any liability for damages resulting from use of information in this publication. Submissions Articles, letters and short items of interest on computer-related topics are welcome and encouraged. All items submitted for publication are subject to editing. Send your contribution to the editor via e-mail attachment or submit on disk. If you have questions about a submission, please contact the editor for information. Copyright and Trademark Information k-Byte is copyrighted ©2008 by the Front Range Personal Computer Users Group. The k-Byte logo and the Front Range PC Users Group logo are Trademarked by the Front Range PC Users Group. Unless otherwise noted, other nonprofit users groups may reprint or quote from any articles appearing in k-Byte without prior permission, provided that: a) proper author and publication credits are given; b) that a copy of the publication in which the article appears is sent at no cost to k-Byte at the above mailing address, or emailed to contact(at)frpcug.org; and c) any additional instructions/restrictions contained in the article are followed. User groups wishing to exchange newsletters with FRPCUG are invited to send a copy of their newsletter together with an exchange request. Disclaimer IBM PC, OS/2, Compaq, HP, Dell, UNIX, Windows and other trademarks occasionally mentioned in k-Byte are registered trademarks of International Business Machines, Inc., Hewlett-Packard Corporation, Microsoft, Dell Inc., or their owners respectively. Neither FRPCUG nor its newsletter k-Byte are connected in any way with any manufacturer or seller. Acceptance by FRPCUG of donated products or services from suppliers, or inclusion of a supplier in the FRPCUG Partner list does not imply that any continuing financial support is received or expected by FRPCUG. Nor do such activities imply an endorsement of either the supplier or product or service. Such information is made available to members as a service. Use of any product or supplier found in this publication, or any FRPCUG publication, is at the sole risk of the user. Advertising Classified advertising is free to members for non-business ads. See "About Trading Post" for pricing for camera-ready display ads. Charges for ad makeup from sketches, etc., are available on request. Deadline for camera-ready and classified ads is 45 days prior to the month of publication. For example, ads for the March newsletter must be submitted by January 15th. For pricing and schedules for ad design, connect to contact(at)frpcug.org or kbyte(at)frpcug.org. About FRPCUG FRPCUG is an independent nonprofit computer society, so incorporated with the State of Colorado and open to anyone interested in Windows, or UNIX/LINUX microcomputers. Its purpose is to provide an educational and scientific forum of mutual benefit for members of the micro-computer community. FRPCUG holds a monthly meeting and conducts various special interest groups (SIGs) and seminars. Members have voting privileges, subscription to k-Byte newsletter, and access to SIGs and selected seminars. Annual dues are $25 for individual/family membership ($20 for students) and $50 for corporate/group membership. by Ira Wilsker, APCUG Director; Columnist, The Examiner, Beaumont, TX; Radio and TV Show Host, iwilsker(at)apcug.net WEBSITES: http://www.hulu.com http://www.hulu.com/browse/alphabetical/tv - TV Shows Alphabetically http://www.hulu.com/browse/genre/tv - TV shows by Genre http://www.hulu.com/hd - HD Videos http://www.hulu.com/browse/network/movies - Movies by Studio http://www.hulu.com/browse/genre/movies - Movies by Genre http://www.adobe.com - Adobe Flash Player (Free) One of my readers recently emailed me about an offer he received via email (probably a spam email) about a $50 program that will allow him to view what was described as satellite TV over the internet, without paying a monthly fee. According to the email, with this program, he could discontinue his cable or satellite service, and watch over 3000 channels on his computer. I researched the product he referenced and found that it was a multilevel marketed program that was, in my opinion, deceptive in that it did not offer real satellite TV, but instead only offered a software utility that could receive the thousands of streaming videos already available for anyone to view for free, and that often required no special software to view. I strongly recommended to the reader that he not purchase the product, and instead just search for streaming video, and to keep his current TV provider. In researching this service I came upon a recently released and legitimate way to view thousands of TV programs and movies over the internet, for free, and only using any of the common internet browsers. This free service (registration required) is the Hulu service available online at http://www.hulu.com. Hulu was founded in March of 2007, and is a joint venture owned by NBC Universal, and News Corp, and financed by $100 million of venture capital. As I type this, Hulu is offering advertising supported content from over 50 sources, such as Fox TV, NBC, MGM, Sony Pictures, Warner Brothers, Lionsgate, 20th Century Fox, and other providers. The content available for viewing includes TV shows, full length feature films, and clips. Several full length, prime time shows are available on Hulu the morning after they air, and include such popular shows as The Simpsons, and The Office. There are also dozens of classical TV shows, available as full length episodes, including such favorites as Miami Vice and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. If users are willing to put up with unobtrusive ads, often in the lower right corner of the image, or standard TV type commercials, they can watch for free such full length feature films as Ice Age, Three Amigos!, and many others. Hulu is headquartered in Los Angeles, with research and development being done in China. Hulu will play on almost all current browsers as they are currently configured, and require no special software or add-ons to utilize the service, and requires a broadband connection to view the videos. Almost all computers already have Adobe's Flash Player installed, but if not, Flash Player is a free download from Adobe at www.adobe.com. Once registered at hulu.com (free registration), a broad selection of videos becomes available for viewing at will. As I type this, there are about 11,200 full length TV episodes and feature clips available, with more being added daily. Currently available for viewing are almost all of the episodes of The Simpsons, 30 Rock, The Office, Knight Rider, House, Medium, Bionic Woman, American Dad!, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, 24, Prison Break, Heroes, about 160 full length children's cartoons (Woody Woodpecker, Spiderman, Astro Boy, and many others), and other TV shows of all genres. For those partial to Saturday Night Live skits, there are about nearly 500 available, including such contemporary issues as presidential politics. TV wrestling fans would appreciate the over 300 matches available for viewing, while NBA fans can view over 140 clips from professional basketball games. A collection of recent (2008) full length college football games, including many of the bowl games are available for viewing, including the 2007 and 2008 Sugar Bowl, Cotton Bowl, Fiesta Bowl, and others, enough to satiate any college football fans, and keep them glued to the computer screen for days on end. Soap opera addicts will appreciate the well over 100 clips from Days of Our Lives. In total, Hulu lists 25 different TV genres for every taste, making something available for everyone. The large assortment of TV shows (and movies as well) can be displayed by clicking on Type (TV or Movie), and then Genre; this will display only those selections that meet both criteria. Simply clicking on the image of the selection will play that selection. All of the TV shows can be displayed in one window alphabetically at http://www.hulu.com/browse/alphabetical/tv, and can be run by clicking on their titles. All of the TV shows can also be displayed in one window, sorted by genre at http://www.hulu.com/browse/genre/tv. Hulu is not just about TV, but also full length feature films, clips, and trailers. As I type this, there are 760 movies available, of which 80 are full length feature films, the remainder being shorts, clips and trailers. According to Hulu, the most popular full length films viewed by members are Ice Age, Master and Commander: The far Side of the World, The Girl Next Door, The Jerk, Usual Suspects, Planet of the Apes, Weekend at Bernie's, Dragon - The Bruce Lee Story, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Three Amigos!, All Dogs Go to Heaven, and dozens more. Movies are divided into 10 genres, including action and adventure, animation, comedy, crime and mystery, documentary and biography, drama, family and kids, horror and thriller, music, and sci-fi and fantasy. Movies can be selected by genre, or by studio. Opening http://www.hulu.com/browse/network/movies will display movies alphabetically by studio, with full length features being clearly indicated. Each of the movies shown is hyperlinked (click on the title) directly to the movie. Similarly, all of the movies can be sorted by genre, and displayed in one window at http://www.hulu.com/browse/genre/movies. Hulu is about to roll out HD (High Definition) videos, and currently has 20 HD movie trailers available to demonstrate the service at http://www.hulu.com/hd. Since HD video caries more data then conventional video, the system requirements are higher to view HD. In order to view the HD videos, the computer must have a minimum of Flash Player 9.0.115.0 (a free download from Adobe, available for most operating systems), a 2.5Mbs or faster broadband connection (many of the basic broadband services are incapable of operating at this speed, and a premium or upgraded broadband may be required to view HD), a fast processor (3Ghz minimum for Windows or Linux, or a 1.83Ghz Intel Core Duo for Mac). Almost all modern computers of recent manufacturer meet the minimum RAM and video requirements to view HD videos. While not a substitute for cable or satellite TV, Hulu can provide countless hours of entertainment for free. Since new content is frequently added, and additional providers are being solicited, Hulu has the potential for becoming a major entertainment resource. Obtained from APCUG with the author's permission for publication by APCUG member groups. This article has been provided to APCUG by the author solely for publication by APCUG member groups. All other uses require the permission of the author (see e-mail address above). by Neil Stahfest, Librarian, Tacoma Area PC User Group, Washington, http://www.tapcug.org, ncstahfest(at)msn.com As most PC users know, after you've used your computer for a while the data on your hard drive starts to get fragmented. This affects your computer's performance and causes programs to run more slowly. With Windows XP, as well as all previous versions, you had three ways to defragment you hard drive. You could do it manually (click Start->All Programs->Accessories->System Tools->Disk Defragmenter). You could do it manually (click Start->All Programs->Accessories->System Tools ->Disk Cleanup). Or you could create a scheduled task to do it for you automatically ( click Start->All Programs->Accessories->System Tools->Scheduled Task and the click on Add Scheduled Task" and follow the wizard instructions). Windows Vista automatically defragments your hard disk for you. Not only does it defragment your hard disk, but it does it in background mode. This allows you to do other things on your computer while the defragmenting program is being run. The down side of this is that programs will run more slowly while the defragmenting process goes on. On the other hand, because automatic defragmenting runs fairly frequently it should not take too long to complete. Of course you still have the ability to defragment manually. Right-click on the "Computer" icon on your desktop and select Properties. In the window that appears, click on "Performance" (lower left corner), then "Advanced Tools" (upper left corner) and then "Open Disk Defragmenter". Notice that at this point you have the options of scheduling when the defragmenter runs or running it immediately. At this point Vista will defragment ALL hard drives that it finds on your computer. Previous versions of Windows allow you to select which hard drive to defragment. Windows Vista SP1 (when it is released) is supposed to add this capability to Windows Vista. While we are on the topic of computer performance, lets go back to the "Performance Information and Tools" screen (right click on the "Computer" icon, click on "Properties" and click on "Performance" in the lower left corner of the screen). Note that this screen provides you with some general information about the performance of your computer. It numerically scores processor, memory, graphics and hard disk performance. You'll find links on this screen that explain what the numbers mean and how to improve your computer's performance. Many of the suggestions do not require changes to you hardware but recommend changes to the programs that you run or do not run. On the upper left side of the "Performance Information and Tools" screen you'll find a number of tasks which control how your computer performs. If your PC is a laptop, click on "Adjust power settings". On the new screen, examine the "Power Plan". The decision you make here effects the length of time that your laptop will run between battery charges and its speed. Most laptops come configured to balance performance against battery endurance. There are many options available. If you normally operate your laptop plugged into an external power source, you'll want to change the setting to maximize performance. Before we leave the Performance Information and Tools screen, you should also look at Adjust visual effects (in the upper left corner under Tasks). When you click on this item you'll see three tabs. We are only going to address the Visual effects tab for now. The first button, Let Windows choose what is best for my computer is probably selected. This gives you the maximized eye candy on your computer but may have a negative effect on performance when resource intensive programs are running (i.e. Video editors). Notice that you have additional choices to Adjust for best appearance and Adjust for best performance as well as a Custom button that lets you choose what features to turn on and off. If your computer performance appears to be sluggish, try selecting Best performance. Obtained from APCUG with the author's permission for publication by APCUG member groups. This article has been provided to APCUG by the author solely for publication by APCUG member groups. All other uses require the permission of the author (see e-mail address above). 2008 Graphical Events Calendar May General Forum Meeting We will meet at the Fort Collins Senior Center on Tuesday, May 6th 7:00 PM Meeting Agenda: 7:00 to 7:15 Announcements 7:15 to 8:00 Open Forum 8:00 to 8:15 Break 8:15 to 9:00 Personal Information Managers June General Forum Meeting We will meet at the Fort Collins Senior Center on Tuesday, June 3rd 7:00 PM Meeting Agenda: 7:00 to 7:15 Announcements 7:15 to 8:00 Open Forum 8:00 to 8:15 Break 8:15 to 9:00 Printer Technology See you at the meetings! Get full membership benefits. If you are not a current member, download an application from http://www.frpcug.org/memberap.htm Future General Forum Meeting Notes It's not just a telephone anymore (my apologies to Gene Komaromi--See page 9). The May General Forum meeting will offer a current view of Personal Information Managers. If your question is: "Are you talking about my 'Blackberry(TM)'?" Well . . . maybe. Come to the meeting and find out. If you have recently thought about buying a new printer (or even if you haven't) for home or business use, don't miss the June General Forum meeting. The meeting will provide information on current printer technology: for general use, for printing images, and, perhaps for other uses as well (you will have to attend the meeting to find out). There have been significant changes in the distribution and recycling of printer cartridges as well over the past year. You will get information that will save you money and help protect the environment. Future SIG's, Seminars, and Other Meetings Digital Imaging SIG The NEW Digital Imaging SIG is a forum for discussion of digital imaging hardware and software. The meetings are held every 2nd Tuesday of the month at 7:00 PM in the Senior Center Lobby. The meeting format is informal, using the Shop Talk sessions as a basis. For more information, contact Mike Morris at twriterext(at)gmail.com. Desktop Publishing SIG The DTP SIG is a forum for discussion of desktop publishing applications. The meetings are held every 3rd Wednesday of the month at 7:00 PM in the Senior Center lobby. The meeting format is informal, using the Shop Talk sessions as a basis. For more information, contact Mike Morris at twriterext(at)gmail.com. New Technology SIG The New Technology SIG provides advance support for all PC related operating system and telecommunication issues. The meetings are held at 7:00 PM on the third Thursday of each month at Bluebird Manufacturing Inc., 1421 Webster Avenue, in Fort Collins. For more information, contact Chuck McJilton at 970-493-2987. Shop Talk One-on-one assistance. Drop in to the Senior Center lobby on any Saturday (holidays excepted) from 11:00 AM to 1:00 PM Board Meeting FRPCUG's executive board meets on Wednesday of the week following the General Forum meeting. All members are welcome and are encouraged to attend. These meetings are held at 7:00 PM in the Staff Board Room of the Fort Collins Senior Center. 3 Shop Talk 11:00 AM to 1:00 PM 6 FRPCUG General Forum Meeting 7:00 PM 10 Shop Talk 11:00 AM to 1:00 PM 13 Digital Imaging SIG Meeting 7:00 PM 14 FRPCUG Board Meeting 7:00 PM 15 New Technology SIG Meeting 7:00 PM 17 Shop Talk 11:00 AM to 1:00 PM 21 DTP SIG Meeting 7:00 PM 24 Shop Talk 11:00 AM to 1:00 PM 31 Shop Talk 11:00 AM to 1:00 PM June 2008 3 FRPCUG General Forum Meeting 7:00 PM 7 Shop Talk 11:00 AM to 1:00 PM 10 Digital Imaging SIG Meeting 7:00 PM 11 FRPCUG Board Meeting 7:00 PM 14 Shop Talk 11:00 AM to 1:00 PM 18 DTP SIG Meeting 7:00 PM 19 New Technology SIG Meeting 7:00 PM 21 Shop Talk 11:00 AM to 1:00 PM 28 Shop Talk 11:00 AM to 1:00 PM File Layout for Excel Databases (Part 2) Courtesy of, and Copyright 2007 by The Office Experts. Reprinted with permission. Examples added by editor. Last month in this column, the ...absolute best layout for using Excel... was described. It is repeated here for convenience:
 If your intended audience for this information insists on having the dates in left-to-right columns, one way to make the switch is to use the Pivot Table feature of Excel, which is one way to rotate rows and columns. A Pivot Table is especially helpful when you have large amounts of data and you want Excel to do the sorting, subtotaling, and totaling for you. The Excel Help file has a good description of how to create a Pivot Table. To find that description (using Excel 2000), select the Index tab in the Help file; type pivot into the keywords field; select About PivotTable reports: interactive data analysis from the topics list. Here is an example of a Pivot Table based on the layout above:  Pivot Tables (and Pivot Charts) are an effective means of presenting data comparisons. They will require some practice before they will become a familiar tool. But they are particularly useful because of the automatic subtotals and totals. That will save you a great deal of time in the long run. But you must remember to use that absolute best layout. by Mike Moore, Editor, Bowling Green Area Microcomputer User Group, Kentucky http://www.bgamug.org, ml.moore(at)insightbb.com I spent the equivalent of two or three days in January, working a few minutes at a time, converting all of our CDs to MP3 format. I had been dreading this project, thinking that it would take too much time, but it really was not that bad and the results are going to be worth it. A few years ago I purchased a 400-CD jukebox type CD player. This device does has the capability of displaying a short line containing the album's title, using a standard PC keyboard, but the process is complicated with problems. It's easy to get CDs in the wrong slot and of course, you can only play them in the room where you've physically situated the jukebox unit. In the past few years, we've been getting away from the album and becoming more focused on individual songs. This lamentable trend has been fueled by the 99 cent price point associated with downloading music by the song. Artists and producers alike have vilified this process, claiming that the artistic sum worth of songs on an album is greater than the tunes taken as individual songs. I can buy into this sadness, to a point. I remember the smell of vinyl LPs, unwrapping the cellophane outer wrap, and the incredible detail the producers went into in packing artistic value into the finished product, right down to the order the songs appear on the album. These days, you just Google the album or artist title and download the Jpeg, that's about it. For a fee, a program called iTunes will do this for you automatically. So why would a guy spend the time to rip (compress) the tracks of a CD or other ancient audio product to MP3 files? There are a few good reasons to do this. For one thing, the devices that play music have become decentralized. What I mean by that is if you can imagine your computer as the "record player," then it's not much of a stretch to think of playing music anywhere in the house, car or workplace. Doing this in the past meant locating the song you want (which may or may not be an easy task), finding the CD (or tape, or LP) it's recorded on, and hoping that it's not damaged. Then once you've got it, you carry it to where ever you want to hear it. For me, this was often the car, and a car is a great place to scratch or otherwise ruin a CD, and I've also known friends whose entire CD collections have been stolen from vehicles. Physically moving music and other files from player to player is sometimes humorously referred to as "Sneaker Net" But once you begin to think of your songs and other media in terms of compressed MP3 files, they become at once more searchable, more replaceable, and more portable. Compressed audio files, though the wonder of a shared internet database called Gracenote (formerly CDDB), contain informational tidbits that can searched. On the other hand, ordinary music tracks on a Compact Disc have no information associated with them at all, not even the name of the song. By converting CD-ROM music to MP3 files, your database can pull up a playlist for you using information encoded in the MP3 file. Most ripping software (such as C-Dex, available at http://cdexos.sourceforge.net/) will query the CDDB so that you won't have to manually type in the names of the songs or the name of the CD. Compressed audio files can be stored on any hard drive in the house and can be made available on inexpensive MP3 players, iPods, and Multimedia computers that attach directly to your sound system. There is usually no special hardware to buy - you can just feed the stereo output from your computer's sound card to the audio input on your TV or stereo amplifier. Most of the MP3 player devices out there do not require a lot in the way of software - you generally plug them into a computer, they assign themselves a drive letter, and you can just copy your songs to the devices as if they were another hard drive. There are even self-contained wireless hard drives (see: http://www.apple.com/airportexpress/) that will broadcast your music wirelessly to any networked computer in the house! Compressed audio files cannot get scratched like CDs do, and if your iPod or MP3 player is stolen or accidentally formatted (happens all the time!), or even if your entire CD collection is stolen, it's no longer the end of the world. You just re-copy the files back to another device and you're good to go. Though not exactly small, compressed audio files do lend themselves much better to e-mail. A typical MP3 music file is around 3 to 6 megabytes, which is just under the threshold of being too large to send to someone using dial-up internet. If both ends of the connection have high-speed, it's no problem at all, as this amount of data can be transmitted by most DSL and cable internet services in about 10 or 20 seconds. The MP3 compressed format is "lossy" in the sense that some of the music data is lost during compression, compared to the original recording, however I've never been able to tell the difference between a compressed song and a non-compressed track on a CD. The data you lose is not data that manifests as part of the music. By the way, the songs as recorded on CDs you buy are very large - 50 to 80 megabytes would not be uncommon. For those of you audiophiles who need compression but don't want any data loss, consider using the FLAC mode of compression (See http://flac.sourceforge.net for information). FLAC stands for "Free Lossless Audio Codec" So, there are a host of reasons why we would want to compress our audio collection, but what is the downside? The only problem I can think of is that most automotive and older CD players cannot recognize the MP3 or any computer generated music format. Some of the newer CD players can, but it's not something that people generally know. So, for example, when I transferred an audio book selection to CD for my wife, she found that the CD player in her car refused to play the media, even though her car is not that old. My car, a Chevy Monte Carlo, played the disk without a problem even though it's an older car than hers. So in this situation you may want to take advantage of software that does the reverse of ripping - it would take MP3 files and lay them down on the CD as if they were ordinary Audio CD tracks. iTunes and many CD-writing utilities such as Nero will do this for you. Now does anyone wanna buy a used 400-CD jukebox player? Obtained from APCUG with the author's permission for publication by APCUG member groups. This article has been provided to APCUG by the author solely for publication by APCUG member groups. All other uses require the permission of the author (see e-mail address above).  Photo Gallery This month's featured photographer: Warren Ward, using the FRPCUG camera, a GE Model A730 with the following setings (retrieved from Irfan-View): Exposure Time - 1/32.6 seconds; F Number - 2.80; Exposure Program - Normal program; ISO Speed Ratings - 80; Shuter Speed Value - 1/33 seconds; Metering Mode - Average; Light Source - Auto; Flash - Flash ired, auto mode; Focal Length - 6.10 mm; Color Space - sRGB; Exposure Mode - Auto; White Balance - Auto; Digital Zoom Ratio - 1.00 x; Scene Capture Type - Standard Banjo Noncommercial Advertising k-Byte runs classified ads in Trading Post for three consecutive issues. Trading Post ads up to 10 lines (or 70 words) long are free to FRPCUG members and only $10 for non-members. To place an ad in Trading Post contact Rick Mattingly at 970-613-8968 or e-mail to rickmatt(at)q.com. Commercial Advertising Specifications (Per Issue) Full Page (8.5" x 11")*$50.00 Half Page (5.5" x 8.5")*$30.00 Quarter Page (4.25" x 5.5")*$20.00 Business Card (2" x 3.5")*$10.00 We ofer a substantial discount for repeat ads and continuing contracts. For an additional charge we will design your ad for you. Contact Rick Matingly for more information on this service at 970-613-8968 or email to rickmat(at)q.com. *Allow for 0.5 inch margins  The Fort Collins Senior Center The Fort Collins Senior Center is located at 1200 Raintree Drive. This site is situated at the northwest corner of the Shields and Raintree Drive intersection, on the north side of the Raintree Shopping Center, and just west of the bank building on the corner of Shields and Raintree (see map at right). Check the marquee at the main entrance for directions to the specific meeting room. |
| FRPCUG CONTACTS | ||||
| Telephone Area Code 970 | ||||
| FRPCUG Officers | Name | Work | Home | |
| President | Rick Mattingly | 613-8968 | rickmatt(at)q.com | |
| Vice President | Don Anderson | 498-3534 | 482-0943 | doande(at)gmail.com |
| Treasurer | Virginia Febinger | 498-2127 | gingercln(at)comcast.net | |
| Secretary | Jim Bragonier | 484-9061 | james.bragonier(at)comcast.net | |
| k-Byte Staff | ||||
| Editor-in-Chief | Mike Morris | 461-2002 | twriterext(at)gmail.com | |
| Features Editor | Mike Morris | |||
| Other Contacts | ||||
| Membership Coordinator | Jack Linder | 663-2151 | jack(at)frpcug.org | |
| New Technology SIG Leader | Chuck McJilton | 493-2987 | cdmcjs(at)gmail.com | |
| Digital Imaging SIG Leader | Mike Morris | |||
| DTP SIG Leader | Mike Morris | |||
| Publicity | Mike Morris | 461-2002 | twriterext(at)gmail.com | |
| Door Prize Coordinator | John Goldey | 221-0877 | johngoldey(at)juno.com | |
| FRPCUG Fax Line | 493-1408 | |||
| FRPCUG Home Page w/E-Mail | http://www.frpcug.org | |||
| FRPCUG Officer E-Mail | contact(at)frpcug.org | |||
| Membership in the Front Range PC Users Group is $25 per year for individuals and $50 per year for companies. | ||||
| Mail your completed application and payment to: | ||||
| FRPCUG | ||||
| PMB 152 | ||||
| 305 W. Magnolia | ||||
| Fort Collins CO 80521 | ||||
| or join in person at the monthly meeting on the first Tuesday of each month. | ||||
