For those who have looked at doing their own web hosting the acronym LAMP or WAMP is familiar: Linux/Windows, Apache, MySQL and PHP.  Wrapped in an easy to install package with some management thrown in this is a simple one step install to get yourself an up and running web based application.
I’m familiar with Windows so I tried out a few WAMP packages to get WordPress, Drupal and Joomla running on my network so I could see what they’re all about.  All fairly straightforward to get running but like a …

I’m a big fan of free and luckily there is no shortage of free real time anti-virus and anti-spyware utilities available to Windows users.  The big news of the week was Microsoft’s beta release of Microsoft Security Essentials.  As part of the Connect beta program 75000 slots were made available for beta testers which filled very quickly: I was lucky enough to get in.
Microsoft Security Essentials is a free Windows security package that’s a derivative of it’s enterprise Forefront Security package, pared down as a free simplified offering.  That’s not …

I’ve written a review for every version of Small Business Server but have never published any of them: the scope seems to broad to adequately cover.  I’ve sat on this one for a few months but decided to get it out there.

Some months ago Microsoft made available a release candidate of Windows Small Business Server 2008 for public preview: I downloaded and installed it to give it a whirl.  I ran it for a month to see what was new and to form an opinion, outlined below.
I’ve been a big fan and …

Can’t favor one system over another, so Dungeon Siege: Legends Of Aranna has occupied my free time for the last three weeks. Some may remember the original title from a few years ago: this is a follow up slash expansion, somewhere right in the middle. Legends Of Aranna follows the same game style: a third person point and click fighting game based on a fantasy genre, like Dungeons and Dragons or Diablo. You work your way through the world, fighting monsters, acquiring new weapons, armor and equipment, adding teammates, trying to finish various …

Being a true die hard fan of RTS ( real time strategy ) games, I had to give MechCommander 2 a try. The original had come out a few years ago, but I had missed out on that one and didn’t want to repeat that error. I’m a little behind the rest of the press pack on this review, but I was slow installing it. On the surface MechCommander 2 appears to be a limited RTS title, but just like your mother says it’s what’s inside that counts.
After an uneventful install I fired …

I’ve just finished six months of dual booting my PC with Windows XP Professional and Windows Vista Ultimate x64 (the 64 bit version of Windows).  Please peruse my initial installation here if you haven’t already before continuing.
Let me start by confirming I am still dual booting, but mainly because Vista x64 isn’t supported by the Connector software from Windows Home Server.  If I want my PC backed up I have to go into a 32 bit operating system to get it done.  A 64 bit version of this was to …

I signed up for the Microsoft Windows Home Server beta program early in the year and have been impressed and completely satisfied with the product. The final release came out a while ago, but my Microsoft PR contact never came through with a copy so I picked it up at NCIX.com for $153 CDN and upgraded my RTM (release to manufacturing) copy this past weekend.
For those not in the know, Microsoft Windows Home Server (WHS from now on) is just that: a small server operating system designed for the home. …

With even a passing interest in computing you would be hard pressed to have not only heard and shown interest in Microsoft Vista but also the deluge of bad press it’s received. Slower than Windows XP! User Account Control a failure! Version confusion! And so it continues. Whatever your feeling, Microsoft has the leading market share for an operating system and has moved to the Vista platform, with XP to go the way of the dinosaur over the next few months.
Of course XP will live on through your old PCs …

It’s been a few weeks since my last eWeakly, simply for the fact that I haven’t done anything computer related of interest.
Last week Microsoft released the Windows Home Server Community Technology Preview (CTP).  This put a lot more fit and finish to the product.  I used the upgrade option to upgrade my existing WHS beta 2 installation.  Things went well, but I was still getting a failing service and couldn’t install the client software.  I had hoped the upgrade would resolve these two issues.
Around the same time I realized my …

A few weeks since my last Weakly; went to the New York Comic Convention ( read about it here ).  I’ve also been running the Microsoft Home Server Beta 2 ( WHS ) and have found it quite useful.
For some reason I have a bunch of hard drives lying around at home for two purposes: to upgrade my Small Business Server ( SBS ) machine and to build a disk based backup machine.  I had a Xeon workstation sitting around so that was going to be repurposed to WHS, but …