Info and forum posts by 'Yves'

Firewall alerts

If your firewall has successfully blocked an external attempt to access your PC, why bother to trace it? I prefer to switch off these alerts.

If you have a dynamic IP address, you are more likely to see these attempts to access your PC. In most cases, they originate from the previous user of that IP address who has not properly closed down his connections before closing his modem connection. So these attempts may be game servers and websites that are checking to see if the connection is still live.

This item was edited on Friday, 15th March 2002, 19:47

ZoneAlarm vs. Norton Internet Security

I can also confirm that the free ZoneAlarm package works very well. I have also used the Pro version until my 12 month licence expired. I find ZoneAlarm Pro particularly poor value at its current price of $50. I now use Norton Internet Security 2002 which, priced at around £30 for the upgrade version, offers much more than ZoneAlarm Pro.

I would also mention that Norton Internet Security 2002 Upgrade is actually a full install version and you do not need to own an earlier version.

So to summarise, if you want a free firewall then go for ZoneAlarm. If you can afford to pay, go for Norton rather than ZA Pro. If you don`t know about firewalls, load the free ZoneAlarm to learn.

This item was edited on Friday, 15th March 2002, 19:39

Wharfedale DVD-750 review comments

Having recently purchased the above from Tesco and just read Dave Smith`s review of it, I would make the following comments:

The unit is certainly very noisy when playing disks. It is much worse than my returned Samsung 807. It needs to be positioned carefully to minimise this noise.

It has a minor problem with a missing cursor on the Martix R1 disk. You can get the cursor to appear by pressing the "7" key on the remote. See Mark Jewiss`s column about a programming defect on the disk`s menu picked up in the Thompson report.

The zoom facility seems pointless as definition of the zoomed picture is much poorer. A slow motion facility would have been much more useful (perhaps its there but I haven`t found it yet).

On balance, its a nice cheap player but I would rather have had kept my Samsung 807 if the firmware could have been fixed. Its a shame it had to go back to Comet for a refund but such design defects are not acceptable in any circumstances.

Damaged rental DVDs at Blockbuster branches

So far I have rented 6 disks from the Wembley branch and 2 have had the same defect. This is cracks in the centre hub of the disk presumably caused by a previous renter forcing the disk off its retainer in the case.

This defect is annoying as the player cannot be firmly grip the disk so picture dropouts occur.

It would appear that Blockbuster staff do not examine returned disks for damage. On each occasion they have offered disk a replacement disk or credit without any argument but you do face a ruined evening`s viewing if you get one of these damaged disks.

I strongly recommend checking the disk hub for cracks *before* you leave Blockbuster so as to avoid a frustrating trip back to swap disks.

RE: Getting started

I bought a Samsung unit as a result of a Woolworths special offer in mid-summer. Its worth looking out for such deals if you are not in a rush. However, this is only the start of a slippery slope that could break the bank as you could get hooked on building up a DVD disk collection!