Students Of Success

The issue of e-waste is heating up all across the country. It started with community disposal bans and has now spread to statewide disposal bans. There are even legislative moves afoot to mandate e-waste recycling nationwide.

At the center of the issue is your old computer. For years computer monitors have been banned from landfills in many places across the country. But another device is quickly taking center stage - the ubiquitous cell phone.

There are nearly 200 million cell phone users in the US all of whom upgrade their old cell phone, on the average, every 18 months. This means that more than 11 million cell phones are retired every month in the US alone. As of this writing less than 5% of these phones are collected for reuse and recycling.

Some claim that because of the small size of the average cell phone it’s easy for a consumer to simply trash it. Maybe one person trashing a cell phone doesn’t seem like much but surveys suggest that each of the 200 million cell phone subscribers have 2.5 old cell phones shoved in a desk drawer or stored in a closet somewhere in their home or office.

Imagine if all those cell phones, 500 million in all, were discarded in household trash over the course of a year. Over 80,000 tons of additional waste would be generated. This is not common household waste that becomes fertilizer. It has the potential to pollute.

It is common knowledge that electronic waste, or e-waste, contains toxins that are harmful to the environment. Electronic circuit boards in cell phones contain toxins such as arsenic, cadmium, lead, and mercury; just to name a few. Research has shown that cell phones, when disposed in landfill conditions, leach hazardous levels of lead.

Programs banning electronic devices from regular trash pickups are becoming more common throughout the country. There is even national recycling legislation being proposed to combat the problem. A couple of communities are leading the way.

Since October 1st, 2005 King County, WA has prohibited residents from putting out old cell phones, or other electronic devices, for regular trash pickup. Officials say the county’s Cedar Hill Landfill could become contaminated by the toxic heavy metals that exist in cell phones, computers and other electronic items.

On February 9th 2006 the State of California banned the disposal of cell phones in household trash. Instead, residents must recycle their old cell phones at local landfills.

“The good news is that most hazardous waste items can be recycled for free” said Jennifer Caldwell, Waste Reduction Coordinator for Yolo County California. Caldwell said that residents can drop off their recyclable items at the landfill.

Westchester County, NY will soon require that consumers recycle their cell phones. While other communities have not mentioned fines, Westchester residents will have to pay up to $250 on anyone caught putting a phone in the trash.

Industry is getting involved - creating solutions rather than just problems. Refurbishing and recycling cell phones, a growing business, is a step in the right direction. Attempts are also underway to replace lead with a less toxic substance in the manufacturing process.

But until then something needs to be done and cell phone recycling is the best solution. So the next time you retire your old friend, don’t banish him to your household hinterlands, make an effort to recycle. It’s great for the environment and your wallet.

James Mosieur is CEO of RMS Communications Group, Inc. RMS operates several cell phone recycling websites like http://www.CellForCash.com He has been in the electronics recycling business since 1985. James writes and speaks on cell phone recycling and related subjects particularly as they relate to the individual consumer.

What is a DVD Recorder; it is normally a disc recorder that permits you to record your favourite digital children’s programmes or videos onto re-writable DVDs. They can be found as both installable backup devices for desktops or as standalone components for use in studios or home cinema systems. When DVD Recorders were first bought you could pay anything up to one thousand pounds for a box standard system, this is at present no longer the case.

Digital Versatile Disc Recorders have to date exceptionally well-liked & have totally taken over the VHS recorder, which is now there or thereabouts in the past. Like all things that contain a technology base behind it there are numerous different DVD systems to pick from. The most admired ones to go for are ones with built in Hard Drives. This is a recording device but it doesn’t allow viewers to stop & rewind which would be in contrast to what you would be able to-do on live TV. The purpose of the Hard Drive in the DVD recorder is so that you are able to accumulate many TV dramas to the Hard Drive of which they can then be backed up on a rewritable Digital Versatile Disc. On top of this you can record straight onto DVD. Amazing prices on Pioneer DVD Recorder at Digital Direct Uk.

Many DVD systems with taping capabilities more often than not include an EPG for arranging recordings. There are currently hundreds upon thousands of DVD Recorders with Hard Drives available to purchase from respected brand names such as Sony, Panasonic, Sharp and others.

The good thing nowadays is that DVD hard drive systems have for no reason been this easy on the pocket, therefore it’s feasible for you to purchase a top of the range system for a very sound price. The market is motivated by the latest machinery, new advancements & product features, of which these are varying just about every calendar day.

Why Buy A Satellite Cell Phone?

The satellite cell phone is definitely the wave of the future when it comes to mobile communication. These phones debuted a few years back, and many people did not take them seriously. When these phones first came out, they lacked the range and roaming capabilities of the traditional cell phone that got its feed from local towers. The problem was most cell phone companies were supplying signal via nationwide towers, whereas a satellite cell phone was working off of a single satellite. This presented many problems as far as a quality signal was concerned. The first people to have a satellite cell phone complained about the quality of the calls. But this was when there were not a lot of satellites to get the signal from.

If you fast forward a couple of years, it looks like all cell phones are moving in the direction of satellites. Eventually a satellite cell phone will be able to provide the user with a signal regardless of where they are in the entire world. This is due in part because they will be using a satellite in the sky, as opposed to a tower on the ground. With the current set up, if you are not within the appropriate distance of a network tower, you cannot get the signal needed for service. As more and more satellites are being launched by service providers, the need for a satellite cell phone is going to increase.

A satellite cell phone is also able to have more features than a standard set up. One feature that is coming into its own is the ability of the cell phone to pick up satellite radio. This is going to be a huge selling tool for service providers in the next few years. In addition to being able to play MP3s, a satellite cell phone will also be able to get the signal for XM or Sirius radio.

A satellite cell phone may not be a good buy right now, but eventually this form of mobile communication will take over.

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The cellular telephone has taken the United States by force! You can not walk down the street without seeing somebody on a cell phone or hear the thousands of ringtones going off throughout the day. They are both useful and enjoyable. You can talk with a cell phone, you can take photographs, you can play games, you can listen to music, access the internet, organize a day planner and much more all from a little device you slip into your pocket or purse.

The market has now catered to the downloading of MP3 music for cell phone owners and even cellular phones that are not MPs capable there are short ring tunes for the other cellular phones. Wallpapers are available by the hundreds of thousands now for downloading. Everything to personalize your cell phone’s character. You can even find custom designed faceplates with numerous designs and colors to really change the looks of your cell phone.

The bigger question is what cellular service best will service your needs and area. There are many different companies to choose from. Just a little research will provide you with your best options in a cellular provider. Then you can start on the process of deciding which programs they offer are best suited for you. Last but not least you must decide on the choice of the right cellular telephone for your needs. Flip phones, slider phones, Standard Square, camera pone, MP3 cap bible phones or day planner or organizing.

There are lots to decide from and the entire process can be a fun adventure or the unprepared buyer can be in for a nightmare contract that will cost you dearly for unwanted services or add on services. Be smart and do a little research BEFORE you go into your local cellular service provider. You will make more educated choices and your pocketbook will that you.

Dennis Evans is one of the million cellular telephone users of the world. However check out my website “My Cellular Needs” and find all the latest MP3 music and desktop down loads. There are great cellphone comparsion charts and service providers. Great deals on many packages. Check out my one stop cellular website.
http://mycellularneeds.com/

Ciso PIX Security Appliance.

Cisco PIX Security applications can enforce policies on users and applications.

Cisco PIX can protect you from many different network and Internet based attacks.

Cisco PIX offers secure connectivity, using methods such as SSHv2 Secure Shell Two and VPN virtual private networks.

This is fairly easy to setup.

Cisco PIX can provide you with secure VOIP voice over internet protocol.
IPSec or Internet Protocol Security IPSec can be setup for VPN’s.

Cisco PIX Security appliances provide multiple layers of security.
This hardware/software based solutions is designed to look for anomolies aka weird traffic thats not normal on your network, which could be an indication of a attack.

There is over thirty different engines looking for different attack signatures.

The current version is Cisco PIX appliance version 7.0

Here are some of the feautures:

You can rollback previous configurations in IOS.

QOS- Quality of Service

You can update software on the fly with bringing down the hardware. No rebooting.

VPN client security

Layer 2 transparent firewall.

This is really interesting 3G mobile security services.

You can configure the firewall to block instant messaging, point to point networking P2P.

You have the ability to block applications trying to tunnel thru your network with encrypted
traffic.

Cisco PIX provide rich statefull packet inspection PIX can protect your voice, data, and video
traffic.

Version 7.0 also supports IKE or Internet Key Exchange.

Everything can be managed from Cisco Adaptive Device Manger which can be console and web based.

Benjamin Hargis CEO Phuture Networks
http://www.phuturenetworks.com
http://www.computersecurityadvice.com/

There has been an increasing amount of emphasis in recent times on the subject of keeping the information on your computer safe. The terms Back-Up, Archive, Data Storage and Security being mentioned frequently, but what is all about?

In simple terms, people are increasingly holding more and more information on their computers, be it photos, personal data and finance, business data, accounts, contacts, addresses and much more.

What everyone needs to understand is that the information held on your computer is a very vulnerable entity and can be very easily and completely lost, either by component failure, malicious acts or theft. If loss of the information you keep on your computer would cause you distress, then you need to take steps to ensure it is kept safe and that you would be able to continue even if your computer was stolen.

The only definite way of safeguarding against the many different kinds of threats is to have a copy of the valuable information and keep it away from the computer, this is commonly referred to as back-up. In case of loss, the information can then be restored to a computer from the safe back-up copy. A back up consists of an exact copy of this important data, kept on a separate storage medium such as a CD / DVD or an external tape or hard disk drive.

Naturally, a back-up is only as good as the last time that you actually made a back-up copy, so it is common practice to create a new back-up frequently and overwrite the old copy. How frequently you do this depends on how often your valuable information changes, the more changes, the more frequent the back-up. A back-up can be performed manually by simply copying the data you wish to back-up to your chosen media, or the process can be automated by using specialist back-up software programmes. Back-up software allows you to select the data that needs to be backed-up, when to make the back-up and where to copy the backed-up data to, this set up can then be memorised by the back-up software. Backing-up your data then becomes a relatively quick and simple process.

Many confuse back-up with “archiving”. Archiving is where you transfer data, which is important enough to keep, but no longer required (e.g. old photos, old accounts) to an external, safe storage medium for future reference. The archived data is then removed from the computers main hard drive to free-up space.

Whether backing-up or archiving, there is a choice of media you can record your copy on to:

Floppy or Zip Disk
A Floppy or Zip Disk drive provides a simple solution. The downside to this method however, is very limited recording space and not a particularly reliable or long-term solution.

Recordable CD or DVD
If you have a CD or DVD recordable drive, this is a better longer-term solution with more space. The downside is that the recording process can be a pain as you cannot just drag and drop and that you need CD’s or DVD’s to record on.

This type of backup can be cumbersome, time consuming and sometimes frustrating, depending on the software and the quality of disks used.

When using this method of backup, remember to check the disk you have transferred your data to, to make sure your computer can read the disc ok in future.

USB Pen Drives
Also known by various other names USB Pen Drives are an excellent low cost solution for smaller back-up purposes being easy to use and they are also great for transferring data from one computer to another.

External USB Hard Drives
For most users the best storage solution for back-up and archiving purposes is the USB external hard drive, being reliable, easy to install (just plug in to your USB port) and easy to use (just drag and drop your files to be backed-up). USB External Hard Drives are available in pocket or desktop sizes and storage capacities from a few Gb to 250Gb + offering a huge amount of recording space. Being a plug in device they can be easily disconnected and kept separate from your computer and out of harm’s way. Some external USB Hard Drives like Iomega come packaged with back-up software too.

Article by Iggy Quazi director of Ecommerce business www.Mouse2house.co.uk based in Essex, England stocking a wide range of digital imaging devices. For more information of a wide range of flash memory cards and more articles visit www.mouse2house.co.uk/index.php?CatURN=637

When it comes to ringtones, the battle of the sexes continues. While ringtones are universally popular with both males and females, females tend to purchase them more, according to a recent study by M:Metrics.

The measurement firm reports that 11.6 million American females downloaded a ringtone in August compared to 9.9 million American males. There’s also a difference in the genre of music that the sexes prefer. Females purchased 66% of the pop ringtones sold and 65% of the country ringtones sold. Not surprisingly, males dominate in the testosterone-laden world of heavy metal and hard rock ringtones where males purchase 68% of such ringtones.

The findings are not a surprise to Anthony Wayne who publishes the Cool Ringtones Blog (www.coolringtones.blogspot.com). “Males were the early adopters of ringtone technology, but now ringtone providers are seeing their largest orders being placed by females who want to accessorize their cell phones the same way that they accessorize their outfits. Ringtones provide personalization and a fashion statement to females and allow males to project their masculinity to those around them.”

The most popular kind of ringtones is rap ringtones; 6.7 million Americans downloaded a rap ringtone in a recent month. The next most popular categories are rock or alternative ringtones, pop ringtones, TV/movie/game theme ringtones, and classic rock ringtones. Rounding out the top 10 ringtone genres are country ringtones, hard rock and heavy metal ringtones, voice ringtones, oldies ringtones, and dance or electronic ringtones.

“Ringtones are all about making a personal statement of who you are, especially in the teen and young adult demographics,” said Wayne. And 22 million Americans are making personal statements every month.

Bob Bentz is known as Mr. Ringtone. He currently has 57 ringtones on his Nokia.

What is Video Encryption?

Video Encryption is an extremely useful method for the stopping unwanted interception and viewing of any transmitted video or other information, for example from a law enforcement video surveillance being relayed back to a central viewing centre.

The scrambling is the easy part. It is the un-encryption that’s hard, but there are several techniques that are available. However, the human eye is very good at, spotting distortions in pictures due to poor video decoding or poor choice of video scrambling hardware. Therefore, it is very important to choose the right hardware or else your video transmissions may be un-secure or your decoded video may not be watchable.

Some of the more popular techniques are detailed below:

Line Inversion:

Method: Whole or parts of the signal scan lines are inverted.
Advantages: Simple, cheap video encryption.
Disadvantages: Poor video decrypting quality, low obscurity, low security.

Sync Suppression:

Method: Hide/remove the horizontal/vertical line syncs.

Advantages: Provides a low cost solution to Encryption and provides good quality video decoding.

Disadvantages: This method is incompatible with some distribution equipment. Obscurity (i.e. how easy it is to visually decipher the image) is dependant on video content.

Line Shuffle:

Method: Each signal line is re-ordered on the screen.

Advantages: Provides a compatible video signal, a reasonable amount of obscurity, good decode quality.

Disadvantages: Requires a lot of digital storage space. There are potential issues with video stability. Less secure than the cut and rotate encryption method (see below)

Cut & Rotate:

Scrambling Method: Each scan line is cut into pieces and re-assembled in a different order.

Advantages: Provides a compatible video signal, gives an excellent amount of obscurity, as well as good decode quality and stability.

Disadvantages: Can have complex timing control and requires specialized scrambling equipment

The cut and rotate video encryption method is probably the best way of achieving reliable and good quality video encryption, an example of a good implementation of this system is in the Viewlock II

Implementing vice scrambling

The video scrambling hardware, in particular the decoder should function correctly even if there is a noisy (for example having what are commonly known as ’snow’ on the screen. ‘Snow’ is when there are flecks on your TV screen, often seen in poor reception areas) or unstable signal. If the link to the encrypted signal should stop working then this should not be a problem. The link between the video encoder and video decoder should be regained and the decryption quickly continued.

The very nature of security camera systems is that they are often outdoors as so must be able to withstand the rigours of the weather. The video encryption hardware should be stable under or protected from the effects of rain, sunlight, extreme heat and cold. It should not be damaged if there is a power spike in the supply. In these systems the video encoder emits a wireless signal to the video decoder unit before it is viewed, it obviously must be the case that the very act of broadcasting the signal does not effect the video encoding hardware and likewise the video encoding hardware should not effect the radio transmitter.

The most important item is that the video scrambling system should be secure, else why bother? It is amazing how some encryption methods can easily be cracked. For example certain cable television stations ‘encrypt’ their channel broadcasts via a relatively un complex method, which can easily be decoded using a number of cheap bits of electronics from radio shack. That would obviously be illegal! The cable TV’s method of encryption is very crude, they usually just dynamically alter the vertical sync signal so that your TV cannot get a proper lock on it and so it scrolls randomly.

The other extreme is to scramble the transmitted video signal too much so that it is costly both in equipment and time to the video at the receiver. Remember that this is a ‘live’ video scrambling broadcast followed by a ‘live’ video decryption display. ANY electronics can be copied, given enough money and time, but making this process as hard as possible is of benefit as it at least delays the time when illegal copies will be available.

Finally and most obviously each user must have a unique encryption key so that other users of the system cannot view the transmitted video by accident or purpose without the key owners knowledge. The total number of possible user keys must be such that it is highly unlikely for someone to guess the correct key.

Ovation Systems are specialists in the design and manufacture of high quality covert video surveillance equipment. Products include the Viewlock II video encryption system.

One of the bigger challenges facing display manufacturers is to develop a picture with the same warm characteristics as Cathode Ray Tube, but with far less weight and size.

The disadvantage of CRT, however is the size, weight and power consumption.
The focus has now shifted to flat panels.
Canon and Toshiba are about to introduce a new display technology called SED or Surface-conduction Electron-emitter Display.

The SED consists of layers of glass plates seperated by a vacuum. One plate is mounted with electron emitters, much like the electron gun in the CRT.
The number of emitters are equal to the number of pixels.
Another layer, is coated with a flourescent substance that reflects light at different wavelength, than the incident light.

When a voltage is applied, electrons are emitted from one side of a very narrow slit, and are scattered and accelerated by voltage applied on the other side of the slit, causing collision with the flourescent coated plated and light is emitted.
To the trained eye, a visible lag can be noticed when viewing LCD’s.

SED is similiar to CRT with the light emission theory, and the manufacturers claim the dynamic color can be expressed in sharp pictures and faster responses than LCD’s or plasmas.
Since no deflection of beam is required, screens of more than 40 inches and only centimetres thick can be created.
Power consumption is claimed to be one third that of PDP and LCD’s.

The introductory cost, at this point may be of some concern, however as with all new technologies, it can be expected to decrease as improvements are made.
We keep on the lookout.

Permission is granted to publish this article either
electronically or in print. Publication is granted free of
charge as long as the byline is included and the article is
published in its entirety.

Dale Davidson is the publisher of an on-line newsletter “the
eShopper on-line that provides free info, products and
services to on-line consumers.

With an extensive background in electronics, and membership
in the IEEE, ASME among others, the newsletter provides
regular info on from consumer electronics products.

Can be reached via email or visit website: the econsumershop .

There are many reason why one would want to buy cheap used laptops, the main, and most obvious reason being that a new laptop is simply too expensive. If your goal is to find a cheap used laptop, then take some time to do the research, and you will be sure to get a great deal. I will detail 5 ways you can use to locate the right used laptop that suits your needs, and price range.

One of the first steps in your research should be to get on the Internet and begin your search. Your first stop should be eBay. Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past few years, you already know that eBay is an auction site where you bid for items. It’s also a great place to find hard to find items such as, a piece of toast with a religious icon burned into it, or a clip Elvis’s sideburns. But, it’s also a great place to find inexpensive used equipment, i.e. laptops.

Once on eBay, you can do a quick search by typing “used laptop” into the search function. You’re sure to find hundreds of selections, and name brands too. Spend some time there conducting your research. You don’t have to bid right away so take your time. Compare prices, and look for sellers with good ratings. The higher the rating, the more reputable the seller.

Another place to find used laptops is Amazon.com. Amazon is not only a great bargain store that sells new items—you can also find used items for sale at a great price, often a lot cheaper than their respective new items. If you’ve used Amazon before, then you’ve probably seen the links “new & used.” By clicking on this link when you do a search, you’ll be able to see both options. But of course we’re interested in used. You’ll be given the prices for the used items, as well as its condition, and the rating of the seller.

Still another stop you should make before concluding your research is Craig’s List. This website is much like a newspaper classified section in its apparent simplicity. But don’t let that simplicity fool you. Do a search for “used laptop” and you will find a huge selection. You can even choose by location to find something local, or you can opt to expand your search to other regions if you wish. One bad thing about Craig’s List is that it doesn’t include a seller’s rating, so you have to be careful. One way to avoid being scammed this is to stick to buying locally, where you can have potential face-to-face interaction with the seller.

One more place where you can try to find cheap used laptops is Overstock.com. Although this site won’t yield as much of a selection as eBay, or Graig’s List, and perhaps even fewer than Amazon, it’s still a good place to look. You may find something in there you didn’t see in any of the other sites, so it won’t hurt to look.

You don’t have to limit your search to the Internet. You can also try doing a bit of off line research. Look in your local newspaper and see what turns up. Often times, some people will opt to sell their used computers by placing ads in the newspaper, so you may be pleasantly surprised by what you find. Try the Sunday paper since it usually has a larger classified section.

There you have it—5 ways to look for cheap used laptops. By doing some thorough research, you’re sure to find a great deal. With all of the selections you’ll have at your disposal, you’ll be able to find a laptop that has the features you’re searching for, at a price range you’re comfortable with.