Letters to PC World, September 2003

Zapping Adware and Other Pests

Regarding your article on the scum of the Internet, adware ["Pest Zappers," July]: Apparently no laws prevent this form of invasion by advertising. The big question is where do you draw the line between an advertisement program and a virus? I had an ad program on my computer recently that I would describe as more a Trojan horse than an ad program. It installed itself with my permission (I thought I'd be supporting the app it came with), but it then hid itself and installed files all over my system, much the way a virus does. If the program isn't a virus, I would think its uninstaller certainly is: Instead of uninstalling, it mutates the program into a different variation of itself.

Darren Forster, via the Internet

I just downloaded and installed Spybot Search & Destroy because of your recommendation in "Pest Zappers." You would be surprised at the number of files that it found. (Well, at least I was surprised.) The updated version of Spybot Search & Destroy has a pop-up help menu that explains what each file does. I hadn't known what a lot of these things did. I am fairly confident my computer is actually clean for once.

Dave Lawson, Kankakee, Illinois

Lavasoft's ad-aware seems to work very well. I was going to purchase the upgrade, but then learned that no live technical support is available in the United States! Questions must be addressed by e-mail, and for me and many of my colleagues, this won't work. I canceled my subscription (and got a prompt and full refund). If there were live tech support, I'd purchase the product again.

Michael Rubin, via the Internet

Best of 2003?

You listed Pinnacle Studio 8 as a "best of breed" for video editing software in the July issue ["Best of 2003"]. People who don't challenge the program seem satisfied with it, but if you try to use all the features, it becomes unstable. The reviews at Amazon.com are a good place to start to find comments from frustrated users. I've contacted Pinnacle about my own problems with Studio; when one official finally suggested that I reformat my system and start again, I moved on to Adobe Premiere, which works fine.

Steve Blackwell, Calgary, Alberta, Canada

I must question your choice of Adobe Photoshop Album for photo management software. I found this program so lacking that I removed it from my PC. Besides Album, I've used Extensis Portfolio and ACDSee. Portfolio works very well. ACDSee is as fast as Portfolio and faster than Album, and it has nice file-listing and graphics-display capabilities.

Lionel R. Khaton, Louisville, Colorado

Congratulations to PC World for its new award of World Class Loser of the Year [to Microsoft's Trustworthy Computing Initiative]. Perhaps you can grant this distinction to Bill Gates in perpetuity. After all, Microsoft has owned the operating system standard for over 20 years and has yet to produce a reliable product.

Tragically, the user community accepts this lamentable situation as normal; protest is only a feeble sigh, drowned out by the thunderous hosannas of bottom-liners. And only a cheap sneak would dare hint that the Trustworthy Computing Initiative is another bogus PR ploy.

Wm. B. Fankboner, La Quinta, California

Manes's Virus

Stephen Manes [Full Disclosure, July] mentions a virus that Norton AntiVirus couldn't find on his computer. I had a similar problem. On impulse, I ran the free virus scan available at www.symantec.com. It found the virus (Klez), and I was then able to remove it using the corresponding Symantec removal tool.

Alan Fleischer, via the Internet

Tripped By Interference?

Steve Fox [Plugged In, July] describes the Federal Communications Commission's interest in broadband over power line to allow high-speed Internet over electricity lines. But BPL is likely to generate interference with radio communications using frequencies in the 1.7-to-80-MHz spectrum, used for police, fire, and military communications, among other things.

Such interference is a consequence of the laws of physics: Power lines' long stretches of elevated wires make effective antennas, while high-speed digital data streams generate radio noise.

Donald Chester, Woodlawn, Tennessee

Your Photo Kiosk May Vary

July's "One-Stop Digital Photography Guide" reviewed several printing options, including kiosks. I work in a Wal-Mart Photo Center that uses both Kodak's Picture Maker and Fujifilm's Aladdin. Overall, I agree with your opinions, but I noticed some omissions.

The comparison chart lists the Picture Maker as printing out 8.5-by-11-inch sheets only. However, some models of the Kodak machine include a small-format printer for 4-by-6 prints. These prints are of higher quality and are one-tenth of the price of an 8.5-by-11 sheet. Also, the article lists the Aladdin as a direct-print kiosk only. In Wal-Mart, the Aladdin is networked to a Fujifilm Frontier minilab machine via a Photo Imaging Controller.

Chris Brooke, via the Internet

Editor's response: Our findings were based on our kiosk visits. None of the shops we saw had the Kodak 4-by-6-print option or a networked setup for the Aladdin service.

--Grace Aquino

XP Patch Confusion

Your online "Bugs and Fixes Update" hit the nail on the head. My most recent experience with XP's service patches involved a new computer I had installed at the office. System performance degraded 23 percent after I installed every one of the "critical updates" at the Windows Update site.

I strongly recommend that Microsoft listen to what its customers are saying. Telling us that nothing's wrong--and that the problem isn't widespread--is every bit as dumb as telling the Emperor that his new clothes look just fine, when in fact, he is as naked as a jaybird.

Ed Poplin, via the Internet

Editor's note: To contact Microsoft on this problem, see September's Bugs and Fixes, "Browser Patch Keeps Intruders Out."