Rs 100 :
www.thinkdigit.com |
Tips to get the most out of your media player
Works!
> _.4 How to Install and Uninstall software @#HOYR, Not again ne | Reviewed: Sony CLIE PEG-TG50, Apple iPod
"D oH a M "i 4c ial Sto irritat ing 19 pop- ups ~ Keep vour e-mail spam free
Enter the Matrix, X2: Wolverine's Revenge
Hi-Tech battle gear for future wars
La Beat the heat Discover the me coolest solution apa your CPU
m editorial
Picking the Rights Fight
uying a computer and the assorted peripherals is quite an expensive Be r. If you have owned a computer for any length of time, you would
be acutely aware of how far computers are from painless, ‘install it, for- get it' consumer electronics. There are always issues with component failures or upgrades due, and for those there is the inevitable interaction with your local dealer who will tell you that the replacement will be available in 2 weeks time. If you get him to talk to you, that is.
Try taking it upon yourself to pursue the matter with the company, and you end up talking to some call centre executive who can only answer questions that are on his or her list, and will forward your matter to the company "soon". Call centres too don't always have their act together, so no surprises if a "sys tem failure" means you will have to wait another 3-4 days just to have a tech-
nician give your once-proud PC a look-see. Sumod Hajela Assistant Editor
Real experiences with major brands reflect this sad truth.
When was the last time you had a quick and satisfactory response from the Mt company you paid in full for a 17-inch monitor? Long term
| purchases... The monopoly moda that the cable broadband vendors enjoy almost every- where across the country means that you either stick to your trusty modem and have No recu rang freedom to choose an ISP that gives you what you want, or put up with what- value and poor ever your local cable guy can manage. With lower up-front costs, low barriers to switch providers and plenty of choice in every city, call phone customer customer suppo rt
service levels are consistently higher than any other service company.
cannot cause
Once a high value purchase has been made, the vendor has effectively taken any financial advantage of whatever value it can offer. Long term purchases such as moni- . tors, hard-disks, motherboards, etc., have no recurring value and poor cus- conseq uences IN tomer support cannot cause any financial consequencesin the short-term. Very the short-term few consumers have the leisure to actually take a company to court, and ensure
their problem is redressed.
Some things never change. Or do they?
Please voice your opinion in our reader poll this month.
S = ann AL “pa! /
Sumod_hajela@asubhai.com
Bex | pdex m, magazine
PULSE our Daily goes Wherever You
ipul Shah talks about getting the latest ition of your favourite newspaper, no matter where you are
FEATURES
ired Warriors: The Super- runts of Tomorrow Fast forward into the future for a limpse of battles fought using cutting ge technology
omputer Boom...Environment BUSTS parae 34 echnology doing its best at polluting he environment and finding the answers to prevent it
TEST DRIVE Dream SCreenS.ssessrrnee 40 Your window to the world of displays!
Fortify your PC essesi 64 Here's what to do when invaders (read: viruses,worms, etc.) come marching in!
A ready reckoner for the best in hard- ware
INSIGHT What the Spam! neeesser 92 If that’s what you feel, find out how to deal with it
A A 40 ™ sterling displays that delight!
FEN 4
Down with (Pop)-Ups............. 100 Stop them before they get out of hand
Virtual Desktops in WINGOWS uu cccccceessssesssseeesessssaeees 103 Put an end to the clutter on your desk top. Use multiple desktops!
Follow your mastel..........c08 104 Cruise through a presentation, using master slides in PowerPoint
2-Minute installation Learn to install software swiftly in Linux!
ay
Ly
Jumpin! JUKeDOXES .eresreenes ie
Power tips on getting the best out of your audio players
$ $ m| a
G a 4 a F ee
>>
Tackle the enemy of the state, with the technology of the future!
et ready to cook up a soft- are installation in Linux, in
a jiffy.
ring a Surprise on the pop-ups before ey surprise you!
JULY 2003
103
Put your Desktops to work
104
Work fast with master slides
es |
Secure your PC
he- eet gaitt A
ain
3 pate : pane
40
ve Ee reo wt, EE _ We de
ait Install and un-install \gjës software before you ii
can say ‘Linux’
69
Cooling solutions for your PC
NEWS FEED
UNDERCOVER QUICKSTART....
TIPS & TRICKS .. OFF THE SHELF DIGIT DIARY ....
To subscribe to Digit, fill out the subscription form available online at www. thinkdigit.com/ subscribe
HER 5
HARDWARE
A EiS oma na eee ere: 82
E Acer TravelM ate C100 ©
Convertible Tablet PC
E Apple iPod 30GB
E BenQ V991
™ Canon LBP 1120
E Canon S530D
E Creative Megaworks THX 5.1 550
E Creative SoundBlaster Audigy 2 Platinum
E Gainward FX 5800
m HP Scanjet 4570C
E Intel Pentium 4 3.06 GHz
E Maxtor 250 GB DiamondM ax 16
E Microsoft Wireless Intellimouse Explorer
E Micrsoft Multimedia Keyboard
E MSI 845PE Max2
™ MSI CD-RW CR52-A2
E Olympus C-5050ZOOM
E Sony CLIE PEG-TG50
E Sony Ericsson P800
™ SONY SDM-N80
Baza 2 cen e 84
E SApacer Audio Steno
E Bose MediaM ate
E Hotcard Bizcard Finder
E Mercury Desknote A- 907
E Philips Xenium 9@9+
™ Samsung SGH-S300
E Seagate Barracuda ST380023AS
CRTs
™ Beng G774
E BenQ V991
E Compaq MV7500
m HCL HCM 780M
™ HCL HCM 785 RFM
E LG 700S Studioworks
E LG E700S
E LG Studioworks 900B
E Microtek Flatvison 43F1
E NEC MultiSync 75
E NEC MutliSync 95
™ Samsung SyncM aster 753DFX
E Samsung SyncM aster 763MB
E Samsung SyncM aster 955DF
LERS Fite eterna 53
E Acer AL 712
E Acer AL511
™ Beng FP 767
E BenQ FP 781
E CMV 1512
Choose your View
92
Use the spray on Net pests
Reviewed this month
E CMV 1515 TFT
E Digi-View DGL-115SP
m HCL HCM 500 LSA
m HCL HCM 700 LSA
E LG 566LE
E LG Flatron 1710B
E Philips 150 MT20P
E Philips 150 P4AB
E Philips 170 B4 MG
™ Samsung Syncmaster 151MP
E Samsung SyncM aster 152 s
™ Samsung SyncM aster 171MP
E Samsung SyncM aster 171s
E SHARP LL-T1520-B
E SHARP LL-T15G3
E Sony SDM-S51
Sony SDM-S71
ViewSonic VG700
SOFTWARE
Anti-virus .......... 71 E Anti-Virus 2003
™ AVG 6.0 Free Edition
E eScan Virus Control © Edition
™ McAfee VirusScan 7.0 E Home Edition
E Norton AntiVirus 2003 E Panda Antivirus
© Titanium
© PC-cillin
Anti-Spyware ....... 78 ™ Ad-Aware
E PestPatrol
E Spy Remover
E Spy Sweeper
E Spybot
E X-Cleaner
BaZdale atta eae 84 E Adobe Acrobat Professional 6
E CD Architect 5.0
E eMonitor and e Monitor Pro
™ Ulead VideoStudio 7 Firewalls E ISS BlackICE
E Keno Personal Firewall E McAfee Personal Firewall E Plus
E Norton Personal Firewall 2003
E Quick Heal X-GEN
E Sygate Personal Firewall Pro
E Windows XP Intemet Connection Firewall
E ZoneAlarm Pro 3.0
JULY 2003
m digit interactive
Acrobat 5.0.6 (Linux) Type: Free Size: 8.45 MB Mindware\ Software\ Essentials
Code Chameleon Type: Trial Size: 1.51 MB M indware\ Software\ Developer Tools
DVD Writer Pro Type: Trial Size: 3.5 MB M indware\ Software\ Developer Tools
Fresh Download 5.70 Type: Free Size: 1.4 MB Mindware\ Softwarea Internet
GTRipple v1.3 Type: Free Size: 0.7 MB Mindware\ Software\ Home
LogoM anager 1.3 for Nokia Phones Type: Trial Size: 0.6 MB Mindware\ Software\ Home
Majesty (Linux) Type: Trial Size: 41.3 MB Playware\ Arena\ Games
M usicM atch Jukebox 8.0 Type: Trial Size: 10.6 MB M indware\ Software\ Multimedia
Pacific Gunner Type: Trial Size: 32.7 MB Playware\ Arena\ Games
PacM ania ll Type: Trial Size: 4.8 MB Playware\ Arena\ Funzone
StartRight 1.1.1 Type: Free Size: 0.3 MB M indware\ Software\ Developer Tools
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4 Type: Trial Size: 132.7 MB Playware\ Arena\ Games
Unforgiven Organizer Type: Free Size: 6.7 MB Mindware\ Software\ Office
XMMS 1.2.7 (Linux) Type: Free Size: 2.7 MB Mindware\ Software\ Multimedia
ha AT E
kA hi ee 2 a
M movie Uckets catch Ta i the Trailer
The Number One Technology Destination
Net India Where Technology takes you
www.zdnetindia.com
Pa TY TFs aTa $ pr" i
N THE CD ;
KNOW YOUR CD
MINDWARE \ CONNECT
The Connect section of the MindwareCD helps you to extract more from the Internet. It has two sub- sections: bookmarks and newsletters. Every month, the bookmarks section brings you some of best sites on a specific theme. This month, we bring to you online test- ing sites. These sites test your skills on a wide range of fields, from serious stuff like IQ and psychological make-up to
MUST TRY SOFTWARE
UNREAL II: THE AWAKENING
|
mingWare — a"
Unreal Il is the sequel to the original Unreal. As the player, you are the lone representative of the Law in a distant sec- tor of space. You patrol your beat in the starship, Atlantis. Things are quiet, until the sector erupts in a full-scale interstel - lar war. You are caught in the middle of it, and must balance your responsibility to protect the colonists, archaeologists, miners and other civilians in your sector. Type: Trial Size: 153 MB
Playware\ Arena\ Games
OpenOffice.org for Linux
OpenOffice.org is an Open Source multi- platform office productivity suite. It includes the key desktop applications such as a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation manager and a drawing
19it
PEA
[mee hilarious topics such as what comic character you resemble. So, go ahead and get into the testing mode.
In the Newsletters section, we give you the sites that offer periodic newsletters on a specific topic. Recipes and cocktails are the flavours of this month. The chosen sites send mouth-watering recipes periodical- ly to prevent your taste buds from dying.
program. It has a user interface and features set similar to other office suites. OpenOffice.org also works transparently with a variety of file formats, including
OpenOf fice.org
those of Microsoft Office. Type: Free Size: 70.2 MB M indware\ Software\ Office
Photoshop Album Starter Edition
Photoshop Album is designed to help you find and organise all your digital photos. In the Starter Edition, you can see 250 of your favourite pho- tos, audio clips, video clips and creationsin one place, organised by date, or any Subj ect you choose. You can also fix basic flaws and share your photosin slideshows, albums, cards or calendars.
Type: Trial Size: 134 MB
M indware\ Software\ M ultimedia
Photoshop Album
hes ee? dem reig mp br a pom iael sdai = pc Eee pac
JULY 2003
contents E E online
www.think(Cii.com
taste technology at www.thinkdigit.com
D SPECIAL Á SUBSCRIBE f
Your 24-hour finance Want to subscribe to Digit? Or is it time to renew your subscription? manager You can now subscribe online!
Do you still pay your bills by cheque,
ib by hand at your bank branch and
a. prefer a personal visit to your banker, om much the way your parents did? If yes,
then you haven’t heard about online
finance services and online banking, or
probably never tried it. Guess what? It's
worth a try.
SS
K re | Account Transfer
EEAECH |
Your PC as a TRI Piga Tired of hunting tor bark. widen casse hire cAI Cacr tine you wank to record wour tawourtic chap whika yoa ara aaay? Thara a Batter RARD way i yia buik hewrarih tee diilal rashin =
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bB A DEMAND NEP
You get to choose what goes on Digit Interactive. This month, you have chosen: Me, Myself and
Workin’
Long, hot hours of Forte Free Agent traveling, difficult work Size: 2.29 MB environments and slave Mindware drivers are all passé.
Be your own boss, Rise Of Nations work in the comfort of Size: 194 MB your air-conditioned, Playware music-filled room and
make big bucks! Expect these on the August 2003 CDs
HEN 9 JULY 2003
ne Ba colophon
VOLUME 3, ISSUE 7
Chairman Jasu Shah
Write Back ADVERTISERS’ INDEX
ay
Printer, Publisher and Editor Got feedback on Digit or Maulik Jasubhai PEGE : Head Puoli a Mido ae www.thinkdigit.com? Have something to say CLIENT PAGE
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Software on CD
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mm 12 JULY 2003
pulse a Se
news
JULY
700 3
hypethesis
Serial Attached SCSI
E What is it?
The prototype version of Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) developed by HP, Seagate and Adaptec. This technolo- gy is expected to bea
step ahead of a lower-end, but increasingly powerful standard-Serial ATA (SATA).
E How does it work?
Data is transferred through a small number of high-speed serial wires, instead of a large number of parallel wires. SAS can accept cables upto 8 metres in length. It uses thin cables instead of the usual broad ribbon cables that obstruct the air- flow inside PC cabinets. SAS has a transfer rate of up to 3 Gbps. Vibrations misalign ATA drive components, slowing performance, but SCSI drives can withstand more motion.
E What does it do?
SAS is a sequel to SCSI drives, used for jobs done by servers where every whit of performance mat- ters. SAS will be adopted for demanding server tasks such as databases with
a heavy transaction rate.
Snapshot
using
receive on a daily basis
Source: Symantec
Since 1978, more than 1 billion Intel x86 processors have been sold
"EN 14
Unique code
suit filed in March 2003,
Santa Cruz Operation (SCO) seeks at least $1 billion in damages from IBM’s alleged breach of its contract with SCO; another $1 billion for breach of the Unix contract signed by Sequent, = which IBM acquired in 1999; and another $1 billion = for pù unfair competi- “= tion. The suit specifically blames Linus Torvalds for allowing propri- etary Unix code into Linux.
SCO claims IBM has made multiprocessor operating sys- tem technology available for free distribution to anyonein the world, which can be used for anything, including devel- opment of weapons of mass destruction. SCO also accuses
n an amendment to its law-
ILLUSTRATIONS: Farzana Cooper
that IBM of copying its Remote Copy Update (RCU) system, for relieving some memory bottlenecks on mul- tiprocessor servers.
Recently, SCO uncovered a 1996 amendment to the contract, under which Novell sold many of its Unix assets to SCO’s | predecessor, Santa Cruz Corpora- tion. Now, SCO Group has revoked IBM's license to sell its version of Unix, called AIX. It said that this termination not only applies to new business by IBM, but also existing copies of AIX that areinstalled at all customer sites, thus all of it has to be destroyed.
IBM maintains that it has donenothing wrong and that its customers need not worry.
Matrix Reloaded, offloaded!
atrix Reloaded has been
banned in Egypt. The country’s censorship board was concerned about the sto- ryline, which revolves around the search for the God and
control of the human race. Vio- lence scenes
were also citied as a reason for the ban. While the committee, consisting of 15 critics, academics, writers and psychologists, gave credit to the movie's fabulous
effects; it felt the movie
handles sensitive issues relat- ed to three divine religions. Also, it added that these issues
have caused a crisis previously. Thus, they felt that screening the movie could cause trouble and harm social peace. This press too, added fuel to the fire by launching a campaign against the Jewish and Zionist ideas portrayed in the movie.
Earn Money from Unreal!
Vidia, and the makers of
Unreal Tournament are offer- ing prizes amounting to $1,000,000 in search of great mods. For UT 2003, or the unreleased UT 2004. "TARTIM Thecontest ET eae is divided i into best mod, best character, best use of 3D sound, and best real-time non-interactive movie.
The winners also receive a UT game engine license and high performance PC hard- ware. To participate, all you need to do is develop a free working mod, and then regis- ter at www. makesomethingunre- al.com/. The contest is divided into three levels and the results will be announced in The Game Developers Confer- ence, San Jose in 2004. The contest also serves as a talent hunt for the developers who are most likely to hire the win- ner for future projects.
Intel takes the Pentium 4-M beyond the 3 GHz mark
JULY 2003
pulse Ba News
ATi Express unstoppable
redalert
Ti’s new graphics card,
the R420 will haveacom- pletely different architecture from the R3XX series. The R420 is being developed under the project name Loki. ATi is looking at releasing it late November 2003, and making it publicly available from early 2004. The card fea- tures support for both, Pixel Shader 3.0 and Vertex Shader 3.0. It is soeculated that the card will soort GDDR2 mem-
ory and a clock speed of 500 MHz.
It will be fabricated on a 130nmM process. The company recently said that its next-gen- eration VPU would have more than 200 million transistors.
May the best game win
very year, Electronic Enter-
tainment Expo, (E3), the platform for bold new ideas or great sequels of the gaming world.
One of the most antici- pated games exhibited this year was Half Life2, the sequel to the popular best-selling game. Half Life 2 has been in development for the past 5 years, and grabbed four major
Statattack
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ue AMET uy
awards at E3, this year.
Halo 2, the sequel to the Xbox hit, bagged the Best Con- sole Game award. Halo 2 is well under development, and is looking to be as good, if not better than the original game.
E3 also saw massively mul- tiplayer online role playing games (MMORPG) making a wide emergence like never before. City Of Heroes was an
R420 will have native sup- port for PCI Express(formerly known as 3GIO). The PCI Express will be the interface for both, video cards, and other add-on cards, thus replacing the AGP/PCI combi- nation. The support for PCI Express will be available from mid-2004. Till then, ATi plans to use the AGP-PCI Express bridge to make the card work with the existing AGP 8X interface.
ambitious project, that took the honours for the Best Online Multiplayer Game. The game will be made such that you will stand apart from other characters by way of unique costume combinations. The game will feature nemesis sim- ilar to the super villains seen in major comics. The developers, Cryptic Studios, havenot seta release date for the game.
The PSX is coming
Sr has announced an pgrade to the popular PlayStation 2 gaming console making it more than a gaming device. The new PlayStation,
Bugbear
BugBear.B spreads through e-mail and shared network drives, and e-mails itself to addresses found on the local system. It gathers e-mail addresses from files that contain contact informa- tion—from both the To and
From fields.
The virus also carries an attachment, with a double
file extension, <file> html.exe.
Upon execution, the worm creates two .DAT files into the Windows folder with different file names, and then copies these files into the Windows Startup folder.
It also contains a keylogger that is copied into the Win- dows system folder as a DLL file. A backdoor component is also executed, that listens on the TCP Port 1080 for instructions. Visit http://secu- rityresoonse.symantec.com/avc enter/FxBgbear.exe for a
removal.
Fortnight F
JS/Fortnight.c@M spreads by inserting HTML code into messages sent through Microsoft Outlook Express. It creates a new HTML file,
and sets it as Outlook Express’s default signature file. It exploits a flaw in
dubbed PSX, will have a DVD writer, a TV tuner, a 120 GB hard drive and the ability to download movies and music. It also offers a USB 2.0 port, sup- port for amemory stick and is equipped with an Ethernet adapter. The optical drive will have a slot-loading interface, and the processor will be the same as that of the PS2. The company claimsthat thisisnot PlayStation 3, but an entertain- ment box that is a crossover between game machines and consumer electronics devices.
Internet Explorer in order to propagate itself.
When the message is accessed, a remote site is contacted. The site contains encoded JavaScript, which loads an applet that carries the exploit. The virus makes several changes to IE’s set- tings, designed to take you to the virus author’s Web site. You can download a patch at http://www.micro- soft.com/technet/security/bul- letin/ms00-075.asp.
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Microsoft takes over the Romanian firm, GeCAD Software, makers of anti-virus technologies for Linux and Novell
ŒN 16
JULY 2003
pulse E PENE
No IE for Mac tA heroes
Super fast |nternet2
icrosoft has halted
the development of Internet Explorer for the Apple platform. Although security and performance updates may be provided, no new versions will be released. The company feels that Apple’s browser, Safari, is better suited for Apple customers. M icrosoft also said that it does not have access to Macintosh, which it needs to compete against Safari. The 5-year deal that the company had with Apple for providing Mac versions of its browser and Office suite, has expired. This may put the Mac community in afix, as many sites need Internet Explorer for optimum viewing. Surveys show its market to be an astounding 95 percentage.
Apple launched the development of its browser In January this year, based on the open-source KHTML development project, which is designed for use with KDE.
Although Apple has released many versions of the Safari, afinal version is yet to be released.
Snapshot
There are close to
access points in
are open nodes closed
Source: Intel and the Public Internet Project
| n a recent development, a research team at California Institute of Technology have developed a system called Fast TCP, which could run on the same Internet infrastructure we § have today.
In Fast TCP, the time taken by the packets to reach, and the time taken by acknowl- edgements to come back is measured con- tinuously. This reveals the delayson theline, giving early warnings of likely packet loss- es. The Fast TCP software uses thisto predict the highest data rate the connection can sup-
The mother of
pplied Digital Solutions
(ADS) has taken a step into the future, with the test- ing of its proto- | type sub-der- ği mal GPStrack- ge ing device— Digital Angel, which is 6.35 cm in diame ter and 1.27 cm thick—about the size
of a cardiac pace maker. It is designed to fit into the human chest cavity, so as to be able to track you wherever you go.
sape offer on page 94-95
port without losing data.
By ganging 10 Fast TCP systems together, the researchers achieved transmis- sion speeds of over 8.6 Gbps, f which is more than 6000 times the capacity of ordi- nary broadband links.
In a collateral effort, ™ researchers at Los Alam- ait OS National Labs were
able to send oneterabyte of data from California to Geneva in under an hour using 10 Gig E NICs from Intel, with a standard Linux TCP implementation. At this 2.38 GBps rate, users could send a full CD in 2.3 seconds, or 200 full-length DVD moviesin an hour.
all big brothers
The device consists of an antenna and an induction- based rechargeable battery sys- tem that can be recharged through your skin. It connects
‘lt’ ~via a cell phone network to
relay the satellite tracking data to another person. There are also chips under develop- ment that could i monitor your child and tell you when he falls, or how bad the wound is, or tell the paramedics about his exist- ing allergies, and finally give the doctors at the hospi- tal the entire medical history. You could even be automatically billed for the medical expens- es, with the identifica- tion and health insur- ance chip that could be embedded in your hand. Although this may sound too farfetched, the only factor standing in the way of ther Implementation is pub- lic acceptance.
3G
3G just got a shot in the am after NTT DoCoMo exhibited its products and services at CeBIT, New York. DoCoMo is now planning to introduce fuel cell powered 3G phones by 2004.
Open Source
To combat proprietary licenses, Brazil plans to migrate 80 per cent of all computers in state institutions and state owned companies from Windows to open source solutions, such as Linux. In Europe, Munich too has opted to put in Linux in over 14,000 desktop PCs.
E-Commerce
E-commerce is picking up in Europe. A recent study predicts that European e-commerce should cross the $200 billion mark by 2006.
Zeroes
A bill currently being debated in the US Congress, will permit the FBI to develop a program to track online file-swapping for copyright violations. The information gleaned could be shared between other law enforcement agencies, as well as copyright owners and ISPs.
With the threat of DRM implementation in DVDs and CDs, the format is attracting the ire of consumers. Other than Sony and lomega, no other company made DVD writers that are compatible with all exiting formats.
In Europe, Wi-Fi hasn’t taken off as expected. Analysts say that the service is bound to be patchy, and roaming with Wi- Fi equipment will be cumbersome due to incompatible billing systems.
Transmeta signs a deal to develop, and sell its Linux versions meant for embedded devices in China, and the Asia Pacific
mEn 17
JULY 2003
pulse Ba News
This DVD will self-destruct In 5 seconds...
lexplay and Buena Vista Home Enter-
tainment have unveiled a new technology that makes DVDs unreadable after 48 hours. Known asan EZ-D, onceit is removed from the pack- aging, its exposure to oxy- gen interacts with the disc’s coating to make it Inoperable, roughly two days later. Thisis all part of a new offer from Buena Vista Home Entertainment’s DVD
rental program to be launched this
August. The Flexplay sys- tem, which uses materi- als from GE’s plastics division, can play on any system. The DVD with alimit- ed shelf life isn't new. Circuit City tried to roll out the first timed DivX disc format and failed. Robert Moore, president of 321 Studio, said, “This move to create self-destruc- ting DVDs by Buena Vista Entertainment
implies that consumers are dishonest in their use of technology”.
The creation of these non-recyclable, one-use products will create unnecessary landfill waste, or release harmful toxins into the air when such trash is incinerat- ed. Environmental experts agree that self- destructing DVDs are extremely harmful to the environment. In addition, con- sumers are displeased with the negative environmental impact of these products. Consumers that rent DVDs would rather prefer to either to purchase or rent tradi- tional DVDs.
PS2...00ps, | mean a Supercomputer...
lentists at the National Center for Cierne Applications at
he University of Illinois's Urbana- Champaign campus have developed a supercomputer by wiring 70 PlaySta- tions together. The consoles were stripped off their plastic casing and net- worked together using a high-speed HP network switch. The project is powered by the open source Linux operating sys- tem, and otherwise, uses all standard components. Its computing power comes from a highly tuned custom designed silicon chip, called the Emo- tion Engine. This superchip is capable of churning out an amazing 6.5 billion mathematical operations a second, and was originally intended to quickly ren-
der and transform pixelson atelevision screen to produce lifelike graphics.
Though there is a memory band- width limitation when using such con- soles, scientists claim that the cluster can solve problems in a narrow range of sci- entific applications. They are currently writing specially tuned applications to run on the system to benchmark it.
The centre chose the PlayStation 2, because unlike the Xbox, Sony sells a special Linux module and a high- speed network connection and a disk drive. With each console costing less that $200, this could mean a whole new shift towards building supercomputers with low-cost off the shelf technology.
*s00 Otter On page 94-95
Snapshot
The typical gamer
isa
» playing
for 9 or more years, and averages of playing time per week
Source: netcraft, 2002
Microsoft has dropped the prices of Office XP worldwide and announced a special edition for Thai customers of Windows XP and Office XP for just $38.50.
EN 20
You've got Spam!
ccording to reports, two- thirds of mobile phone owners have been victimised
blocking legitimate and important SMS messages. Governments and corpo-
by spam. The Independent rations are Committee for the Supervi- beginning to sion of Standards of Tele = take notice.
Microsoft has wee started a project
called Penny Black- named after the first British postal stamp in the 1830’s—to find a way to make spammers pay per e-mail they send. The Australian government
phone Information Services (ICSTIS) has f suggested that SMS Spam is a greater viola- tion of one’s privacy, and the limited phone capacity for SMS stor- es age may soon not be = x enough—possibly
has announced that mobile service providers carrying unsolicited bulk messages could be fined up to 10 mil- lion Australian dollars.
It is obvious that SMS spam will never be as big a problem asjunk email, asthe costs of sending bulk SMS messages are much higher. Most people are still learning to live with junk emails, and to have the privacy of our mobile phones invaded might just be the last straw.
JULY 2003
Open-source in open-sky
reenberg and O'Neal, heading the Portland State Aerospace Society (PSAS), plan to launch a Linux-pow- ered rocket, equipped with an AMD 586 processor, to 55,000 feet at a speed three times faster than the speed of sound In September 2003. The rocket hasan onboard computer with an AMD 586 processor, a Jumptec MOPS/520 PC/104+ board, along with a power sup- ply, aPCMCIA card carrier for an 802.11b card to i WA transmit data to the ground and a car- rier board for a 128 MB Com- pactFlash card for long- term stor- age. The flight comput- er runs a bare version of Debian Linux, with the 2.4.20 Linux kernel. Microcontrollers run every- thing from the inertial meas- urement system to the recov- ery device, which triggers a small explosive to deploy the parachutes. The flight com- puter transmits data to the ground through a 2.4 GHz wireless link.
Never say never again
n a total turnaround of
their earlier policy, M etal- lica is now embracing the online world, and has just opened up www.metalli- cavault.com, that comes with thetagline ‘Download. Burn. Share. Kick A**’. Fans who buy Metallica's new album, will find a code inside the package that lets them download over six hours worth of content in the MP3 format, for free. Eventually, Metallica hopes to have sev- eral hundred hours of con- tent on the site.
Three years ago, M etalli- ca drummer Lars Ulrich and rapper Dr. Dre spearheaded the drive to bring down Nap- ster, by compiling lists of over 3,00,000 users who were swapping their songs and other copyrighted mate- rial. Napster responded by
= itp: Ss Sy i ant i = T METALLICA oo
filing counter claims and then blocking material by specific artists, but eventual- ly the service floundered.
Metallica released their new albums five days earlier than expected, claiming that “substandard versions” of the tracks were already avail- able widely on the Internet.
After this announcement by Metallica, a host of artists are considering adding select- ed tracks online, to appease their fans. Roxio is restarting the controversial service—but it's going to be paid.
“SEP offer om pape 4-95
“The most unfortu- nate thing is that India still seems to believe in proprietary solutions”
President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam
praising open source software
“GameBoy is for 10- year-olds... If you're 20 or 25 years old, it's probably not a good idea to draw a Game- Boy out of your pock- et on a Friday night in a public place”
Ilkka Raiskinen, Nokia's head of entertainment and media,
attacking Nintendo’s Game Boy Advance
“kids are just as susceptible to being bombarded by spam advertising inappro- priate products and services.”
Steve Cullen, Senior Vice President, Consumer and Client Product Delivery at Symantec. Their survey of netizens between the ages of 7 and 18 revealed that
47 per cent received e-mails with X-rated Web site links
tomorrow’stechnology
Snapshot Memory a-billion
Business Process Outsourcing
market worldwide is expected to grow to
Source: Gartner, Aberdeen Group
N antero, a US based com- pany has developed the firt 10 GB nanotechnology memory (NRAM ) device using standard chip production techniques. NRAM works with carbon nanotubes that are balanced on silicon ridges. Under differing electric charges, these tubes can be
placed into one of two posi- tions, representing zero and one. Very less power is need- ed to place these tubes, being very small, and much more conductive than copper. This makes it easy to sense the position and read the data. Since they haveahigh tensile strength, they are expected to
survive over a trillion write cycles. Nantero solves the problem of misaligned nan- otubes by using lithography and etching to remove them. The company is looking at a $100 billion market of such NRAM chipsthat might even- tually replace all forms of standard memory devices.
Linus Torvalds is taking a long leave of absence from Transmeta, and is going to be working in the Open Source Development Lab fulltime.
MEN 21
JULY 2003
pulse “a letters
Calling Vikram Ti Hello, a al | read th , na | e letter by Vikram Či They got it all wrong: AR aat? ae Orissa (Digit, June i reciat- PSRs Te: » Short Byt pa ding the piracy of software was extremely apP lemme great interest, iene icle regardin : the issue. ie TEM The article ei Nike to present my view on The yonder that Been otest part of the coun- ed, and ! wer ¢ the software today, It Is aie hood ~~ eee rY, where | read each issue Given the sn ae e running to the friendly neighbour Peewee ° My technology Naviga- e ar a! pert Lay e more and more peop d games. H KETTE DEEE A ect software an
tor only by the 20th of the | i month. | have an assem-
~ | bled computer with a g5 modest CPU speed of 1.6 GHz.
he lat CD-wallah fort 7 Offer them an alternative and i as we convince ourselves, ses ee ing as user-friendly as Windows. ’
u can see their confusion. AS iol he g diey has a long way to go In a gill rely on brand nam :
hat the software offered bY
i The new games revi 7 ee ee a Evilewed in Digit i l ions. The truth ist ublic, and p | and! would! git Interest mea | make our buying eae to be affordable to the general P » | the means oo them. However, | don t have ee. er if we want to cur- [= a a pirated copies, | would like ren Enna: iracy ishere n t, howev pe a HS P sa are difficult to implemen v post ‘Business worth $70 [Rae sae
t rates do not wan e corpo t is time they became mor
eoplefriend- |, BE V. Malsawma tail piracy, and peop
; ' ill in business, Pal ee ne Via e-mail million lost due n ane sf the people that they are still in be Set ae it is bec ‘eee ly. After all, It is ay round. | +} Respected sir and not the other way ER This is my first letter to Digi eee! the ama Igit. | just wanted Mukund kaaa mail ID of Vikram (refer to Digit to know Via e-mail o Tauseef , June 2003). ae Via e-mail ; | d ihe | . t Agent 001 anc ie af, la a HI, . 1| was reading abou doubt FEL rl —Nice work! pues one small do ah Le 5 -E an ieee of all software IS pirate a ee of Office Ea Dear Sumod, i < | foundtha utilisethe 15, ud
f us actually here. How many o! ©: nd italics A d, with paa E e effects. Thething iS,
formatting, Or Adobe for view-
ost of the xp—we use Wor ea
me ! ct ent of the users =| Ganesh ntioned in the past issue? || ing pictures, Or at hiai or not at all. So its only 20 sie i | Via e-mail j poneis a she pirated software to its full potential. Lp _ Aaa wh Be which : e Issue, there is a letter from Vikram i pan | Thanks mae p 1€ talks of pirated game CD Vikram in | Abilash | | Æ give me his email ID S costing Rs 25, SAE Via e-mail ee ey Ankit ) E ar [tine ans Cera ete Big "e pe or ' aaa Ta wee be deh pe Bed EE RL Viae-maill ~ OYO Dear Abilash and Mukund, digii; K eos EU 7
Well said! Everyone wants only the best, i ath and when the resource is infinitely repro- ©
digit
| Dear Readers,
4 ducible, such as software, itis harderto == think of it as ‘theft’. This is a very difficult » problem to solve, especially when soft- = 7
fhe _ of pirated software, Vikram seems to ~~ much sought after for his Rs 25 CDs. How-
spama ever, we are unable to honour any | if i, ware prices show no signs of decline, Hen which the | hols Out the language | : i! ; ~| requests to get in touch with him. p _ unlike hardware prices that come down H] san, etter is written? @ a pe ; ET hes anchit " È, I every year. While the volume of the real
demand for piracy is definitely lower, it
piracy in the world, but still in excess of |
20 per cent.
vi eae ie a 1 | Via e-mail Sr ae ee a a rah i z still is a significant number. Accordingto | |
ema Dear Sanchit, BSA, the US has the lowest rate of | i,
T Just as language translators are available online, there are also _. language guessers on the Net. One of the most popular ones
TF4 is TextCat Language Guesser (http://odur.let.rug.nl/~vanno- RESP Wg ord/TextCat/Demo/textcat.html), which not translate the text, |
diit READER)"
Q. What kind of forum would you like to use on the Digit Web site?
Trouble shooting Magazine feedback | All of the above and advice discussions
36% 6% % 54%
Pen 22
Ht but will tell you what language it is in.
Your vote counts
This month’s question:
Question:Do you think publishing bad after-sales expe-
riences that our readers endure will help improve ven- dor's service levels?
O Yes O No Log on to www.thinkdigit.com and vote
JULY 2003
~~, Asan instant validation of the popularity
ae: nline. 1, for one, would be extremely || ARN o h,
| TRAI, dial-up access 'S
| dozens of our readers enjoyed MAMAMA E REE -the anniversary issue. As always, © |
| Readership improvement suggestions
Dear Sumod,
| saw the poll results in June issue of my favourite
~~} magazine and was happy to see that many of your | | readers want to see more utilities on the CDs. With ten of my best friends (who are also regular Digit
www.2shareit.com Ad Muncher 4.5 Final www.admuncher.com
readers), | summed up a list of 61 of the best utilities 4 | :
that we would like to see on the Digit CDs: CD Ripper 1.72.20 www.maskbit.com
Flyer Screensaver Builder (Standard and Pro) 5.2.1 www.2flyer.com
e i 2 oe Chip in April 1999. THE hardware |i
af if art f
i -binding. . plas = ae iff hikes by the ph l ent tarl i vd Fen LF to eee an uneconomical way for Pea ea, spend a considerable amount O a Fe
ide aaa delighted if you were to run an artic fae
dband services tee or Te secing that the Digit Team I i
we try to give our readers what fet cma wea
e. EEAS agazine for the years to Com
| cece Was WE meimekarnas gt Sane are | review presented In the June issue Raa ea
i Well, that's all | had to say! Hope you include these on your
forthcoming CD. Please let us know what you think, and
the 11 of us will work harder to make our favourite maga- zine more popular than ever.
hase Sundeep - | Aare MP3 WAV Converter 3.6 Via e-mail Way To Go! i ce A ef ae = i list! | a © 8 many Oe expect wane i | te wee val E
oe oe by e des : fe i / PEN sre on ai Seca we would ike i i 3 a 4 i PE Eri and the Digit Team p issue. | : E ; 2 appreciation rends a set of the = 2 Saf een TEN: ae a lara see a of your maga- alae i A A and look forward to being your peel el firs picked up a COPY of er
z can fie ee li we te ie a ER z
Arn, E 5
m Ramnath Shenoy has pointed out an error
on page 49 of the June 2003 Digit Special. Under the ‘Add Holidays to your calendar’ tip, the modification should be [India] 3 and not [India]3. Also, it should
be Republic Day, \| are, 2003/01/26 and not fi he Matrix as WE à ithe as big a fan of T find some way to de Republic could you please, isodes of The 4 Day:2003/01/26. 7 ep k Peat ive readers free SP the aa nd pore Plus, a review of ee ath Vee m Arun Vasudevan has Matrix would just put US n : if brought to our notice ie buch gi 4 that the tip ‘Creating hot 1 he : ai, ; Very faithfully yours, Sah wh eels effect’ resembles a , a ‘ee tip by the same name Krishnan RajagoP tr given in the book Photo- Via e-mail i ath the | i P hia Shop 6, Down & Dirty digit Spee et i r| aT L i i o rear red l ~ ja Tricks by Scott Kelley. Dear Krishnan, l Weite Be AgS hia ie thoikant ; oe A Ha de Team Digit is glad that you, and | pi
Arun has also pointed
out that the image modes from RBG to CMYK, and vice versa should only be changed after editing the docu- ment and not before.
they will like most and this issue | aig [I] you can check out our review of W PEA E -Enter The Matrix. Getting Anima- = = | Shri 4) trix on CD though may turn out GERTE EEA by post | to bea hard nutto crack, butwe SA a : g : z M. ed ee | will certainly give it a shot. Rae 5 ; m
Send your letters marked ‘Readers Letters’ to the Digit office:
Notice any goof-ups? Write to goof@jasubhai.com
D-222/2, MIDC, TTC Industrial Estate, Om Sagar Building, Nerul, Navi Mumbai 400 706,
Phone: 022-7629191/9200 Fax: 022-7629224
E-mail: readersletters@jasubhai.com
23.
JULY 2003
pues E opinion
i Mana
peton s i oF Cea, LPen stn
VIPUL SHAH
d l oa
are that someone in Brazil may
read the Mumbai edition of the Times of India
at the same time as someone in Mumbai, who gets it at seven in the moming
"EN 24
Your Daily goes Wherever
You do...
n a daily basis, people read either one, O or two newspapers, published in their
hometown or country, or in the region of their business interests.
Until recently, a traveller could get news- papers from across the world, two days after the day of publication. They were flown in and sold at five star hotel bookshops, airport book- shops, and delivered regularly to companies and embassies. But, post 9/11, this freight has become less attractive to airlines because of the reduction in number of flights and increas- ing fuel costs. Agreed, that most newspapers are now online, but you don’t get them at home, with the same news items and adver- tisements. Also, vernacular newspapers havea very limited online presence.
In the past two years, two new services have come up to serve this market efficient- ly—NewsPaperDirect, based in Vancouver and Satellite Newspapers of Netherlands. Both use remote location printing, and give you the publication of your choice at thesametime— or even few hours before—it is available in its place of publication. So chances are that someone in Brazil may read the Mumbai edi- tion of the Times of India at the same time as someone in Mumbai, who gets it at seven in the morning.
Both companies offer similar deals. Almost all publications today are prepared using DTP software. Before printing it, a publisher can export these pages to an Adobe Acrobat file, and upload it to NewsPaperDirect and Satellite Newspapers. In 30 minutes, this newspaper will be available world-wide.
NewspapersDirect is availablethrough the business centres of five star hotels and cruise liners. A small setup of Pentium III PCs, run- ning their proprietary software, with 128 Kbps Internet connectivity and an A3 size laser printer is all that is needed. A fresh installa- tion would cost $ 8,000, or less. Usually sold for $ 3 to $ 5 apiece, part of the money goes to NewsPaperDirect that passes on some money to the concerned publication.
The Taj in Mumbai, the first Indian hotel to offer this facility, has a PC and a laser printer with a 512 Kbps leased line. When-
ever guests order a publication, it is down- loaded, printed and delivered to the room in 30 minutes or less. The newspaper's cost starts from Rs 210, and depends on the number of printed pages.
NewsPaperDirect is also used by Qatar Airlines. They are printed and loaded onto the plane before the flight. NewspaperDirect offers 170 publications and on atypical day, prints 2,500 newspapers, and magazines around the world.
Satellite Newspapers have satellite linked kiosks, each with a touch screen for making selections, acredit card swipe slot for accept- ing payments, and an A3 laser printer that staples and delivers newspapers in few min- utes. These are already present in two hotels at New Delhi. Each kiosk costs $ 10,000 and the newspapers typically cost $ 4to$5a piece. These kiosks will be seen in the future at airports, hotel lobbies, cruise ships, apart- ment buildings, embassies, etc. Satellite Newspapers carries as many as 120 publica- tions that are limited to 48 pages. The editor decides on the pages to keep; NewspaperDi- rect doesn’t have such a limit.
Both systems are able to limit or customise the newspaper selections made available at a particular place, or kiosksin any country so as to avoid problems with the local authorities, or culture police. Often, a publisher has exist- ing region specific agreements, and hence may not print those newspapers there.
Delivering newspapers overseas, in time, isa logistical nightmare. Using this technolo- gy, it can now be done without any printing, paper or transportation costs. The number of copies sold through these systems also account for their audited circulation figures.
The advantages are huge for everyone, and the environment. Since you order and pay to get the newspaper printed, there are no unsold copies. Also, the publisher gets to keep the advertisement money, but doesn’t have to handle distribution costs. In the future, when paper-thin flexible displays replace paper in newspaper business, both these infrastructures can serve as single points for the content of several hundred newspapers. ©
Vipul Shah is a chartered accountant, and writes and consults on Internet, e-commerce, banking and finance
technologies. He can be reached at vipuls@yahoo.com
JULY 2003
features a technology next
WIRED WARRIORS:
Th po" per -Gr unts æ of TOMorr ow
Cutting edge computing technology and breakthroughs in civilian and military technology are going to be powering the war machine of tomorrow. Here come some of the more interesting developments that will fight the wars of the future
World War, put it, "...no b*e ever won a war by dying for his country. You win a war by making the other poor dumb bere die for his country”. In a world that has enormous poten- tial for conflict, militaries around the world are taking Patton’s words very seriously. T Right from ancient times, the foot soldier has fought and won g i the battle for the victor. However, over the past decade or so, the
N s George S Patton, the strategist US General of the Second
infantry’s role has changed—the emergence of smart munitions
ge } and precision aerial bombardment has resulted in the infantry-
N ns man entering tough urban combat situations to mop up any LE, remaining resistance.
F.A Blood, guts, cordite...and a computer Z {È ù — Tomorrow’s heroic soldier isn’t going to jump into battle with just “= fem, a bullet-proof Kevlar vest, a backpack-sized field radio and a com -HF } mando knifeclutched between histeeth. Researchers arelooking to equip soldiers to win wars with fewer casualties. The Land Warrior System isthe first of several such programs that are looking at revamping the infantry sol- dier’s gear. Prototypes that ka were developed by sev- car En eral contractors y iE Ad (including Pacific Consultants and Raytheon), are cur- rently being tested by crack troops of the US Army, at their research facilities at the Natick Soldier Centre in Massachusetts. The progress is being watched with interest by several other coun- tries, and are developing similar systems. The Land Warrior is expected to hit the frontlines somewhere around 2006. The US Army is looking at about 30,000-odd Land Warrior systems join- ing into service then.
The next generation system that is expected to follow is the Objective Force Warrior, expected to enter service around 2010. The core idea of this is integration of computers, navigation and communication technology with infantry weapons systems, mak- ing theindividual soldier and the soldier's team alethal networked tool of war.
The designers of the Land Warrior prototype, and the Objec- tive Force Warrior, have put considerable thought into calculating what is needed to re-inforce today’s soldier. They started by strip-
equ USS RAY 1S MOL WHS
Mm dsit26 | A By a8 JULY 2003
ping apart the conventional soldier’s gear, armour and clothing, and then working from scratch. The primary constraint here is weight. Studies have shown that in bat- tle, soldiers tend to throw away gear that is too heavy. The system is designed so that the components are extremely portable and light, yet rugged enough to withstand battle conditions. Finally, to put together the whole system, all future combat systems are planned in such a way that they are built over several upgradeable subsystems—the integrated helmet subsystem, the computer and communication subsystem, the weapons subsystem, the protective clothing, and the software that powers the hardware. The infantry will see integrated weapons systems, such as satellite linked radio, rifle mounted thermal sensors and video cam eras, and GPS systems, all of which will give them the edge and tell them where they areand more importantly, wherethe enemy Is.
Sarge... | see unfrniendlies in my HUD...
Today’s warriors jump into combat situa- tions armed with increasingly sophisti- cated weapons, but with information that is at least a few hours old. Things move amazingly fast in battle, and soldiers are put at risk if they are just dropped into a hot zone with vague information. The Integrated Helmet Assembly Subsystem
This is how the land warrior is going to be outfitted
Ct 27
(IHAS) isstraight out of a sci-fi movie—in the battle zone of the future, the very vis- ible helmet and helmet-mounted gear, is going to be the soldier’s networking and communication device. The prototype feeds up-to-date information regarding a combat zone into a HUD (Heads-Up Dis- play), straight off a satellite. Initial sys- tems that will rapidly update tactical information on a map-like layout, and detail the positions of squad mates are on the drawing board. The optical systems come with daylight cameras that will transmit everything a soldier sees, in real time. Additionally, there are lightweight thermal sights, night vision, as well as ten digit GPS and grid coordinate displays. Soldiers will no longer have to carry mul- tiple sights-thermal vision, night vision and so on. Researchers claim that the image that the soldiers will seein the full colour SVGA HUD micro-display should be equivalent to two 17-inch displays right in front of their eyes!
But there is more to come for the HUD, especially for the Objective Force Warrior. Chemical and biological sensors as well as 3D imaging systems, will allow a soldier to view his surroundings from different angles, such as from a squad mate’s perspective. The initial systems will allow them to view images and video straight from the weapon mounted sight- ing cameras. With the HUD integrated with the warrior’s rifle sights and firing system, the soldier could accurately fire his assault rifle or soot an inaccessible tar- get and call for indirect fire.
War zones are not the place for deli- cate instruments, thus the computer and communications subsystem is designed to take a beating and yet continue work- ing. Interestingly, the initial prototypes were developed using a mobile Pentium Ill class processor, boasted of USB con- nectivity and ran on aspecially developed version of Windows 2000. The computer comes with a solid-state Flash drive with 800 MB of storage, which stores maps and overlays, graphics, battle field informa- tion, orders and tactical aids. There will also be real time intelligence getting piped into theflash drive that will be rap- idly updated.
But this is just half of the computer and communications subsystem. The other half is what soldiers call the ‘battle rattle’—the wireless LAN that networks all the Land Warriors. Everything that a sol- dier sees, is transmitted from the display mounted on his helmet to all other team
Sorry Sarge, l'm a techno-ignoramus...
Today’s trained wamiors are as much at ease with a computer, or taking down a network using hacking tools, as they are with stnpping apart an assault rifle and putting it back together. M ilitaries around the world are dealing with a new exercise in warfare—and the turf is the Intemet. No army can afford to have soldiers that can’t bring down any enemy’s communi- cation networks, or repair a network out- age whilst under fire. Cyber warfare involves anticipating, averting, and responding to cyber terrorism attacks that try to yank down world-wide com- munications networks.
Future programs will look into bring- ing down all possible infrastructure that has been hooked to the Intemet. The US military training schools have been actively training cadets in cyber warfare, and so have other countries, such as China. Most of us believe that redundan- cy Is built into the Internet, and that with multiple nodes, traffic can be re-routed to ensure that the network is always up. But, recent attacks on key nodes have shown that concerted attacks can succeed. The battlegrounds of the 21st century will include the Intemet.
members, as well as the control centres, via a Satellite hook-up. At the heart of the communication box is an Intel Stron- gARM RISC processor that runs Win- dows—in this case, Windows CE. The hook-up to the LAN is achieved through a wireless LAN card. Under battle condi- tions, messages can be relayed at 1.3 Mbps up to arange of 1.3 Km—research is currently on to raisethe limit to 2 Mbps at 5 Km. The network traffic is encrypted using military grade encryption and authentication codes.
To find out just where the soldiers are located, the navigations system runs a military grade GPS receiver that tracks the precise geographical coordinates of all the warriors in action. Backing this up is an inertial navigation module that kicks in where the GPS satellite signals don’t pen- etrate—such as deep inside ajungleor in city streets between tall buildings.
A big hiccup are power supplies, which have to be able to withstand com bat conditions. Currently, cells have lim ited endurance and tend to be heavy. The Land Warrior system draws juice from
JULY 2003
reatures a technology next
rechargeable lithium-ion batteries that can last a maximum of 8 hours, and a non-rechargeable backup battery that is good for an additional 12 hours. Undoubtedly, with the kind of rapid advances in fuel cell technology, batter- ies are going to get lighter and last longer. Finally, to ensure that none of these hi- tech gizmos land up in the wrong hands, soldiers or the control centre can effec- tively destroy everything at the press of a button.
Though it may be a tad disappoint- ing, the networked soldier of the future will still go to war with his modified M4 by his side—and not a light sabre or a phaser set on stun. TheM4 isa variant of the US Army standard-issue M-16A2 rifle. The main improvement in the design is the addition of the Thermal Weapons Sight system, a daylight camera, a laser
í @ Machines don't fight wars. People do, and they use
rangefinder and digital compass. The optics within the M4 will also be hooked up to the helmet mounted displays— super soldiers can sight and fire at targets anywhere, even around corners, and avoid getting their heads blown away. The clothing that will be used by the soldiers is also going to change radically- in the Objective Force Warrior program, the uniform is a multifunctional device that works from the inside out. The suit comes with microclimate conditioning,
that has warm or cold air blown in through an intricate network of capillaries. Theuni- form will also come equipped with multi- ple physiological sen- sors that let the sol- dier, as well as medics and the control centre monitor vital signs— medics will know when a soldier is hurt, and further advance- ments may see them diagnosing his condi- tion, while still on the
re: ae * ah le
4 ; a Li TD i of a: OE iu ae
way to his location. It The Stryker—Pouncing up fc
has also been built to protect the soldier in chemically and bio- logically contaminated areas. Some radi-
Deve ics, the Stry| ell-wired
77
The late Colonel John R Boyd
cal new advances in camouflage have resulted in technology that prevents detection from thermal imaging, locking in the body heat. With all this technolo- oy, the face of the infantryman in battle might transform from a blood, guts and cordite stained warrior into a super-geek.
Infantry...nah, | drive Armoured
One of the USArmy’s most eagerly await- ed armoured combat weapons system is the Stryker or the ‘smart battlefield taxi’.
JSTARS— Looking beyond to the other side and co-ordinating with ground-based units
EH 28
armoured troop carrier that can carry up to nineinfantry soldiers and has a crew of two. This selectively eight-wheel-drive, and full time four-wheel-drive, armoured combat vehicle offers unbelievable tactical mobility and traction over all sorts of sur- faces. It weighs 19 tons, can speed up to a maximum of 62 Mph (about 100 Kmph). The Stryker comes with three unique touch-screen flat-panel displays that give its commander all the information that he needs—there is an electronic visor that shows the troops in the rear an enhanced view of what the driver sees. Think of it as an electronic control room that monitors squad-level intelligence as well as equip- ment. An onboard micro-Ethernet hub from Cisco, networks all this data. The Stryker gives the troop commander the rapidly updated battleground information that he needs to wage war
It’s also well hooked up for TV—the Stryker’s fire control is linked to powerful cameras that include day and night vision capabilities. Through it, the battlefield commander can sight and aim at targets, and givethe command to fireany weapon, including 105 mm calibre heavy guns, a MK19 40 mm grenade launcher, and even guided missiles that have been mounted on the roof of the vehicle. This is just the sort of heavily armoured, rapidly deploy- able troop carrier that the US Army expects to use for highly localised conflicts.
JULY 2003
Features Pa technology next
Even more interesting is the focus towardsan integration of forces. TheJoint STARS (Surveillance Target Attack Radar System) program does just that. Joint STARS is a long-range air-to-ground sur- veillance system that is designed to locate and track all ground targets in all weath- er conditions within a250 Km range. The program uses US Air Force E-8C aircraft along with US Army Ground Mobile Sta- tions.
| Fly UAV Around theworld, militaries are develop- ing new aircraft to replace the current generation of combat aircraft. These will be lighter, faster and have far greater range. With precision guided munitions and built-in BVR (Beyond Visual Range) capabilities, these will spearhead the move towards detecting and engaging hostile targets. An example of thisis the still-under-development F-22 Raptor. There is also considerable interest in UAVsor Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, which have been around for some time now—as UAVs have no humans on board they are considered expendable. The most eagerly awaited UAV is the Northrop Grumman’s RQ-4A Global Hawk. Surveying 100,000 Sq Km in 24 hours, the Global Hawk’s visual sensors can read magazine print from 65,000 feet away, even in bad weather— with the help of infra-red cameras, ther- mal imaging equipment and state-of-the art synthetic aperture radar. It has a singu- lar mission—to let military commanders access high-resolution, near real time imagery of large areas. It’s smart enough to fly itself, though it does get human instruc- tions from a control centre when taking off and landing. With afull tank of gas, the Global Hawk can fly for 36 hours; one Global Hawk went 12,000 Km across the Pacific from the US to Australia.
Silent and lethal— The USN Seawolf, preparing to submerge and go to war
EHI 30
rye pa a Se eres a LT TT oes oe i
The Global Hawk— Electronic eyes |
Air warfare is also going to change radically, perhaps over a longer period than with what we will see on land or at sea. But elements of the change are
already in place. We've seen them with the ‘televised’ wars of recent
at home in extremely shallow water.
The Manta is a robotic AUV that is designed to be anchored, with several other Mantas, on the body of a mother- ship. The mother-ship will launch Mantas
from deep waters, and the
times. Air power is increasingly 37 per cent Mantas will make their way making the first assault over of the weight to the shores. Communica enemy forces, first knocking out of a soldier is tion between the two will be early warning systems and accounted for through an acoustic link. The attacking infrastructure. by weapons and Manta is designed to run as
electronics, 63 an observer, maintain a Launch the Manta... per cent Is defensive patrol, and also run
l accounted for . i l
There has been remarkable inter- by the clothing offensive operations right estin undersea warfare, in which and individual through narrow canyons up submarines are the most potent — equipment to local shore facilities. The
weapons. The US Navy’s nuclear
submarine fleet may arguably be
the worlds most silent and deadly attack platform. But, even billion dollar sub- marines (each Sea Wolf class submarine costs $2.1 billion, and the upcoming Vir- ginia class will cost over $1.65 billion per submarine) are still a deep-water attack platform. In coastal waters, these sub- marines are in grave danger. This is when the US Navy came up with a futuristic solution, based on the use of Autonomous Undersea Vehicles (AUVs). It’s been code- named the Manta, and will be 20 to 30 meters in length. Still in the early stages of research and development, it is going to bevery much
really cool bit is that these
M antas will spawn swarms of even smaller robotic AUVs, and thesmall- er AUVs could spawn still other robotic drones and sensors, and so on. This may sound rather futuristic, but designers are already running sea trials on an early pro- totype.
Of Electrons and bullets Even with all of these programs, war isn’t going to change. But, the way we wage war is going to change dramatically. It is what the military calls the RMA, or the Revolution in Military Affairs, where the entire command and control structure is slowly changing to give the soldier, the airman and thesailor thetoolsto help tri- umph against all odds. It’s not full-scale science fiction yet, but we are not too far off the mark. As an electronic warfare spe cialist in Afghanistan said, “We're shoot- ing electrons, not bullets.” 4
SRINIVASAN RAMAKRISHNAN
™ JULY 2003
features E
m droolmaal
44 Sony Network Walkman digital music Sat Aa NW-MS700 digital
With 256 MB of in-built memory, Sony’s Network Walkman can store up to 11 hours of music on its 2-inch frame. You can download music, rip it as CD tracks to the hard drive and then transfer them to the player viathe USB port. A MagicGate Memory Stick Duo slot provides unlimited expansion when used with thetiny new media
elig
State of the art audio components to drown you in an ocean of music
D a
be!
t
44 BeoSound 9000 Express yourself
BeoSound 9000 is an audio system from Bang & Olufsen that embraces CD, radio and digital music files. It comes in an aluminium and black colour combination, and can be placed in a large number of different positions—vertically, horizontally, upright or lying down, on the wall or on a stand. The control panel and the display change to suit your choice.
Creative TravelSound MP3 Symphony on the run
TravelSound is the first palm-sized, portable speaker with a built-in 32 MB MP3 player. It features two premium titanium drivers for clarity, and digital amplifiers for longer battery life. It has a built-in SmartM edia card slot that allows memory expansion to up to 160 MB.
H32 JULY 2003
Radio Shack 15-2133 Kameleon Remote-control your life
The Kameleon is a remote control with an aqua-
coloured, electro-luminescent backlight, broken
up into controllable segments and then placed pea over a touch membrane layer. There are no hard y buttons on this 0.69 inches thick remote. It only i illuminates the set of keys needed to control each entertainment device.
Technics RP-FDA100 Fr Pure eartopia
The RP-FDA100 has a two-way,
double-drive speaker system—a large 57 mm Woofer and a 20 mm Tweeter—
and full open-air design. It can reproduce the 3
Hz to 100 KHz ultra-wide frequency range used by DVD-Audio. It comes with a 10-foot detachable cord,
and a freely adjustable headband for supreme comfort.
¥ ay Hard Drive Micro System CMT-L7HD ¥ Sleek and talented
With an integrated hard drive, the CMT-L7HD provides storage capacity for up to 300 CDs. It can stand on a desktop, or be mounted on a wall. It also comes with a USB-type PC Link kit for easy control and editing of tracks on the 2.5-inches thick hard drive. It offers CD-R/RW playback capabilities. The slim- line speakers give 50 watts of power.
ee ee et te Ee Pee e m a, A P ' Lc
j 7 . a sa | i ve a F f)
ET 33 n prame- a JULY 2003
features Ma firsthand
hen the surge in pi, ie. comput- Sar =| Ẹ ing power became Oi ie pe apparent, ~it. was - thought that an industry, based on efficiency, was born. In the last couple of decades India has seen the installed base of computers rise from | zero to millions. With the rapid progress of technology, most of these computers become - obsolete in 2-3 years, adding to the pile of garbage on the street cor- = ner. This is an environ- =- mental nightmare just waiting to happen. This is | further aggravated by the -fact that little was known about technology, and establishing lifecycles for any product is difficult. Researchers in current times have dissected the issue, resulting in a reality check for most people. This has also highlighted several other issues that were previously ignored.
Microchip pollution The production of computer com ponents requires hundreds of materials that are potentially harmful to the environment. The basic build- ing block of any unit in your PC from modem to motherboard is
IMAGING: Atul Deshmukh
Computer Boom...
Bust!
inan age that worships faster computing and sci- i fi devices, Mother Nature goes ignored. Here's ` how technology bytes its way into pollution
the Printed Circuit Board (PCB). These boards. are laminated: boards on which various components are mounted. Cir- cuit tracks are etched onto this board, which results in a hardwired circuit.
Silicon and Gallium Arsenide arethe main materials used in the manufacture of these components. These components are then treated to adjust their electrical properties. Now, Silicon or Gallium Arsenide crystals are formed, which are then shaped and sliced to thin wafers. These are covered with multi-resistant chemicals. This step of the manufactur- ing process can pollute the surrounding environment. A process called doping is carried out using toxic gases, and an unsafe solvent is used to wash away the multi-resistant chemical.
The surface of the PCB must be kept clean using Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). The volume of chip production is extremely high. Together this means that chip production facilities use up a large amount of CFCs.
The effect of these processes on the environment is adverse—air and ground water pollution are the two obvious side effects. The use of CFC's depletes the ozone layer and the leakage of such sol- vents causes water contamination.
The amount of resources required to make a small memory chip is equally stunning. According to the research done by the United Nations University in Tokyo; the cost of a 2 gms memory chip with capacity of 32 MB requires 1,400 grams of materials—fossil fuels, chemicals and the raw materials. Thisis a ratio of about 700 times the material used for the chip, as compared to a ratio of 2 for cars. If 1,400 gms of materials does not seem much, think of the num ber of integrated chips used in a PC.
Major manufacturers, such as AMD
and Intel, are implementing designs =>
JULY 2003
features a firsthand
Water, Water Everywhere but not a Drop to Drink!
The most important resource of life is water. Unfortunately, this is true for the semiconductor business as well. Ultra-pure water is the most crucial component required for manufacture of semiconduc- tor components and chips. The city of Austin, Texas is home to three semicon- ductor giants: AMD, Motorola and Sam- sung Austin Semiconductor. In the year 1999, Motorola used 1.78 billion gallons of water, AMD 1.18 billion gallons and Samsung used 353 million gallons. This is just a small example of just how thirsty microchips are. According to figures of Texas Instruments, the cost of designing a single fabrication in 1993 was 591 million gallons of water.
df
eventually be ingested by humans and animals. It is responsible for colicin chil- dren, and long-term effects of lead poi- soning also include osteoporosis.
In certain parts of the world, CRT recycling centres have been set up that are catering to localised needs—including the US, UK and Singapore. The CRT recy- cling process mainly works on separating the heavy metals out of the other moni- tor wastes that can be disposed safely or recycled. Some systems process one tube every 3 to 5 seconds. The Andela CRT Recycling system is one such system. The main problem here is the dearth of CRT recycling centresin India. An ideal imple- mentation is to make the manufacturer take responsibility of recycling.
Computer dumping Computer dumping is n place—a visit to a landfil
The fruits of our high-tech revolution are
improperly disposed of at the end of their
such as lead-free computing, resource conservation and waterless processing. But to a large extent, the industry has done nothing about this resource hog- ging. The drive to increase performance has made people overlook this issue. The only solution isthe development of bet- ter production facilities and standards.
Display pollution
Cathode Ray Tubes (CRTs) are the heart and soul of most display devices. While CRT screens providereliable and safe per- formance throughout their operating life—as long as their outer structureis not damaged—the inner components of the CRT are quite hazardous. The most noto- rious component is lead. Monochrome monitors have 2 to 3 per cent of lead, whereas colour monitors have up to 28 per cent lead. The Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC), California has designated CRTs asa Universal Waste. It requires special procedures for proper disposal and recycling. The lead con- tained in the CRT does not harm the user during its lifetime as it is encased in glass. A small CRT may have up to 1.9 Kgto 3.8 Kg of lead. Larger CRTs have proportion- ally more amounts of lead. Lead leaking from improperly disposed monitors can find its way into ground-water, and may
mH 36
Te
depressing picture of what many refer to as a computer graveyard. The term used to define these wastes is e-waste. E-waste is a source for more than a thousand haz- ardous substances such as lead, mercury and beryllium. The rising amount of e waste is also due to the fact that it is more cost-effective to replace damaged components than to repair them due to the rapid evolution of technology. Reuse isoneof the most effective and often the most neglected facets of e-waste. Certain computer components can be refur-
bished with afew minor repairs, such as wiping of disks and alignment of disk drives.
In India, dumping is yet to be seen on a large scale. Thisis partly due to the large market of used computer systems. Also, computer products are used for a significantly longer time in such a cost- conscious market as India.
A disturbing aspect of computer dis- posal is the dumping of PCs in third world or developing countries. The trade of toxic goods is banned by the interna- tional Basel Treaty. But the Basel Treaty does not focus on computing specifical- ly and loopholes in the treaty can be exploited. Further, this treaty has not been ratified by the US. Thus, it provides an easy path to third-world countries, which recycle (read: reuse), the compo-
dia, China and Pakistan are the porters of these components.
e products are
77
Why do people import this scrap? Thehigher profit margin isthe main rea son. Unlike centres situated in first world countries, the recycling process does not have a high investment cost for the machines used. Trace elements of gold, silver and platinum are found in a typi- cal computer. These precious metals are recovered and then sold at a high price in the market. The fact that is over- looked by most people is the environ- mentally lethal procedures that must be carried out in order to recover
The Devils Alchemy: What goes into your computer
The materials inside the ubiquitous white box have a concentration of materials, which are the sure shot recipe for bereavement:
Component Health Hazard
CRT Silicosis, Inhalation of hazardous materials
PCB Exposure to toxic substances such as tin and lead
Plastics Exposure to heavy metal
Connectors Exposure to Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAH)
Cartridges Carcinogen exposure
Source: Exporting Harm, SVTC.
Environmental Hazard
Leaching of heavy metals such as lead or banum into groundwater. Possible release of toxic phosphor Emission of toxic substances
Emission of heavy metals Emission of PAH hydrocarbons
Toner materials with varied toxicity
JULY 2003
df
them.Where lies the responsibility A problem that can be much more ram pant than the pollution caused by dis- plays or micro chips, is that of printer reusable products. Printer cartridges are discarded once they are used, and not much care is taken to provide proper facilities for their recycling. The car- tridges contain chemicals that are extremely hazardous. Black toners con- tain substances such as carbon black that are carcinogenic and cause respiratory tract irritations. Also, colour toners(CMY) may contain heavy metal elements.
In the US and Europe, IT companies such as IBM, Dell and Intel have com mitments to ensure environmental safe- ty. However, there are no visible assur- ances in India. Clearly, environmental laws are a major factor in these efforts. For example, AMD maintains the goal of a lead free development program. In response to the deadline of July 1, 2006 set by the European Community. National Semiconductor has a detailed Corporate Environment, Health and Safety (EHS) policy. The company has recycling programs for process water, chemicals, lubricants, paper, packaging materials, and scrap products. The process water is used for irrigation or cooling. Chemicals arereused, or burned for energy. National Semiconductor also uses a method of recognising and rewarding employees for recycling pro- grams. It has also issued various certifi- cates for various processes, which come under scrutiny for safety of the environ- ment. Intel also has a complete EHS pol- icy, which entails the safety standards observed for all manufacturing process. They also address issues such as computer recycling—Intel has created an online product ecology centre, which can be accessed for information as regards computer recycling. The listings can be used to determine an effective way of disposing your PC. How- ever, they do not provide India-specific information.
On the fifth of June, HP embarked on the Planet Partners Return and Recy- cling Program. The target is to eradicate the problem of cartridge dumping. The
mH 37
I've seen a lot of dirty operations in Third \ shocking was seeing all this post-consum
Jim Puckett, re
program will initially target its Most Val- ued Customers (MVCs), spread across a network of 42 cities and towns. Infor- mation about the program and the adverse effects of unsafe dumping is being sent to the MVCs via mailers or direct contacts. Parikshit Tomar, Marketing M anag- er of the supplies business of HP says, “HP is fulfill- ing its moral obli- gation to society. The services pro- vided by HP will be absolutely free of cost.” If MVCs have any interest in the program, the logistics team of HP periodically collects the used printer supplies and recycles them in proper facilities. HP also plans to develop its partici- pant base in the future to accom modate the com mon customer. It is hoped that initia- tives such as this will pave the way for a cleaner and greener technology roadmap.
ut what was
lution to the growing prob- lems of waste from the electronic world is still not clear. This is because the fact that electronic waste is very real, and becoming a large threat to the environ- ment is ungraspable. The new age busi- ness cannot have a squeaky-clean image. A move that could rapidly clean up the growing waste problem would be to identify and make manufacturing units responsible for the entire lifecycle of the product. When a product becomes defunct, the producer must not shirk its responsibility. If a corporation is made liable for its own products, it can use its economic power to effectively recycle its products. Also, since this model of recy- cling becomes product dependent, the manufacturer will be able to recycle the product with maximum efficiency. AAYUSH IYER
1/4th page AD
JULY 2003
test drive a. start up
It looks good and the technology is glitzy, but does it do the job?
e Digital Media Test & Research Centre (DMTRC) conducts a series of elaborate tests to eval- uate the merit of each hardware and software product. To ensure that our readers have all the information they need to make an informed buy- ing decision, engineers at DMTRC evaluate and review the latest hard- ! ware, software and technology services in accor- dance with the most up-to-date evaluation processes and methodologies used around the world.
Comparison Tests
Weusea dual rating system, the first of which is applied to the Comparison Tests in which we compare the performance of products within a particular category.
Each product is evaluat- ed under different parame ters such as performance, value for money, features, warranty and support, etc.
Weightages are then applied to the various test parameters according to their importance for that particular category of products.
These weightages are then used to arrive at an overall grade for each indi- vidual product. An overall grade of A+, therefore, indi- cates that the product is close to perfection.
Overall Grades “gy
The Awards
Digit awards out- sanding products by selecting a Best Peformance and Best Value winner in each comparison test. The winner of the Best Perfor- mance Award will be the product that scored the highest in the performance seg
-o ment of our tests.
This award represents the best performing prod-
uct in our tests and doesn’t factor in any other parameter such as value for money, features, sup- port, etc. The winner of the Best Value Award will be the product that scores the highest in our value for money parameter which is derived taking into account the ratio of a product’s performance and fea- tures to its price. The product winning this award offers good performance at a great price.
In Bazaar
The second part of the rating system is used to evaluate individual hardware and software prod- ucts in the Bazaar section. The evaluation covers parameters such as performance, ease of use, value for money and the build quality/features of the product in question and then arrives at an overall rating.
Here each of these parameters is given a weightage of 25 per cent and is rated on a scale of 5, which is represented by arrows (>).
The greater the number of arrows, the better the product. Thissmple five-point rating system is designed to give you an easy-to-interpret assessment of a product. For example, a product that receives an overall score of five arrows sig nifies an outstanding buy!
The 5-point Rating System used in Bazaar Excellent: A brilliant combination of price, performance and features—far
beyond expectations
Good: A good buy, better than most products in its category Average: Reasonably competent but nothing spectacular about the product
hr rr Mediocre: Does not live up to expectations, needs improvement in many areas
> hr rd
>rh rm b>
used for its target application
HEN 38
Poor: has serious drawbacks and needs improvement before it can be
In Test this Month
This month, delight yourself with the best display in town. Here's a mammoth test compnsing of 14 CRT and 23 LCD monitors. LCD monitors are a good deal for those who do not want to take up
much desk space. Of course, there is always the 17-inch and the 19-inch CRTs that are economically viable. Variety is the flavour of the month in Bazaar. Keeping that in mind, we appease the appetite of the audio- phile by reviewing Bose Mediamate Speakers. Also served up is the Apacer Audio Steno and the striking Apple iPod MP3 player that comes with a huge 30 GB drive to dump your favourite numbers into. Wanna go mobile? Check out Samsung and Phillips latest offering.
Also reviewed is the
A JE Serial
J — ATA 80 GB drive.
| PRN Take a look at the SeN & CD-RWSs that might
just lure you into buying
them. For the tech sawy, we have the DigiCard Holder, the Sony CLIE handheld and a desktop laptop! What's more! Take a look at how eMonitor and eMonitor Pro helps you to catch the Judas in your organization!
JULY 2003
test drive me ors | S
n a hii
Beaty E; Man
Leet cate
siete as : ii gea: a
T dit 40 mE JULY 2003
Wander into the
realm of displays that | show you the world
on your desktop
EE det 41
veryone wants to enjoy
breathtaking and dazzling
graphics of their favourite
movies on their PC monitor.
Entertainment and multime
dia are driving forces that are changing the capabilities of the humble computer display.
The market for Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) monitors and Liquid Crystal Dis- plays (LCDs) is on the rise, with manu- facturers tweaking the interface for more comfort and user friendliness. With big brands falling all over themselves to the consumer’s heart and wallet, soon you may have to make the choice between a TV and a computer. And with the new range of monitors comming with remote controls, the TV is surely on its way out. And not only is it vying for the space occupied by the TV, with its USB ports, the new LCDs and CRTs are also showing the Mac the door.
How we tested
The monitors were tested keeping in mind the performance, features, value for money and the warranty offered.
Performance: We used the Display Mate benchmarking software to gauge a monitor's performance. This software uses Images to test a monitor for criteria such as geometrical accuracy seen in the instance of parallel lines. This aspect is especially Important in applications where accurate geometric shapes need to be generated like in CAD and CAM software.
Another important factor to consider isthe ability of the monitor to hold a sta- ble shape of images. Sudden changes in brightness levels occur—like when you are watching a movie—can create distor- tion. This leads to eyestrain and is caused when the monitor lacks the precision to prevent adjacent pixels from lighting up.
In the sharpness and resolution set of tests, we tested the image sharpness offered by the monitor and the resolution it displayed pictures clearly at. Another check point was if, while watching a
movie or a moving object, the screen dis- played the object with same sharpness across the screen, as it did in the centre.
We also evaluated the ability of a monitor to generate perfect lines (includ- ing vertical, horizontal and diagonal), cir- cles and various other geometric patterns. Even thehighest resolution systems show jagged lines, inability to discriminate between closely spaced lines and object fusion or merging of pixels.
The colour and grayscale test helped gauge how well the monitor is able to reproduce colour, as well as any type of ghosting and streaking that might happen with different colour shades, brightness and contrast. It also checked for overlapping of darker or lighter shades on other colours. This test had the high- est number of sub-tests (nine) as well as the highest weightage.
A few tests other effects such as the uniformity of the display and a flicker test were also carried out. In the flick- er test, a white background was displayed by thetest utility, and the monitor was run at different resolutions to see if it flickers. The Defocusing, Blooming and Halos test, told us how much thicker an object will look than its darker counterpart.
The pixel persistence test was run specifically for the LCDsto check for jerks or image blurring. Another LCD- specific test was the viewable angle test. Unlike CRT monitors, when you view an LCD screen from an angle, things are not as bright and clear as with a straight view. A document containing different fonts was viewed from various angles, thereby letting us determine the angles at which the object still looked crisp and sharp.
Features: In the features test we looked for value-additions and other aspects which aimed at increasing the user- friendliness of the display. The features noted varied in their significance—some- things as simple as the clarity of the fonts on the OSD (On Screen Display) and the prescence of energy saving features that can be enabled from the BIOS. Other
things duly noted and suitably awarded where whether the symbols on the settings buttons were self-explanatory, allowing the user to adjust the settings without con- sulting the user manual; the presence of Back and Forward keys for the selection of different menus. Thesecan be great advan- tage when you enter a wrong menu and can get out of it, just by pressing the Back button, instead of being forced to go through the entiremenu. Thelatest mon- itors come with integrated speakers—some have the speakers built into the same cas- ing, while others are detachable. The mon- itors that came with their own set of speakers earned more points.
An important matter was that of the monitor base that decided the tilt of the monitor—the more thetilt, the better. The grip of the display was also checked. In the case of LCDs, those that could be wall- mounted afforded more convinience, and hence won more accolades. Since most monitors and graphics cards will be shift- ing from the VGA cableto the DVI output in afew years, monitors with a DVI output were preferred. The height adjustment of the monitors decieded if the displays could be adjusted for maximum comfort. Some LCDscan be rotated vertically—landscape to portrait—this can be boon while read- ing long Word files or PDFs without the aid of a scroll-wheel mouse.
An often overlooked feature is the user
manual. This mandato- ry piece of documenta- tion was dissected to see the level of details it contained, if it used diagrams to aid the explaination of the dif- ferent menus, buttons and functions. It isalso helpful if the manual states the technical specifications of the monitor clearly.
CRT Monitors
Test Analysis
17-inch Monitors
The BenQ G774 comes with four blue buttons on its front panel that help in adjusting the OSD menu. This monitor has a bandwidth of 110 MHz, resulting in a flicker free display and supports a high- est resolution of 1280 x 1024 at 67 Hz— however, it does not come with a full and flat picture tube (F&FST).
The OSD is quite intuitive and self- explanatory; the buttons are convenient- ly placed, and offer ease of use along, with a good OSD menu structure. The moni- tor isa bit bulky and on the heavier side, but comes with a sturdy swivel base with a small foot print. It comes in a plain
Important Standards for Displays
In the world of today, where the usage of computers has increased tremendously, and computing has seeped into almost all industries, prolonged usuage is bound to have its repercussions. But have you ever bothered to find out if your monitor complies with the safety norms? Given below is the history of various safety standards that have been accepted by monitor manufacturers.
In 1980, Swedac, a Swedish testing company expressed concern over possible health issues related to monitor, and also about its ergonomics and emission levels. After taking these into considera-
vanilla package, and does away with any extras such as USB hubs, speakers or mul- timedia—an optional USB hub can be purchased separately. It has the requisite manuals and driver disk for installation.
The Samsung Sync Master 753 DFX monitor comes with F&FST, making it an absolute delight to use. The monitor has four buttons on its front for adjusting the various OSD settings, which is intuitive and simple to use.
The latest release from Samsung, the 763 MB, sports an absolute flat screen. The ‘MB’ stands for Magic Bright, which auto- matically adjusts the brightness of the monitor according to the application you are using. It has the options of Text, Inter-
modes—on, standby, suspend and off—at user-defined periods.
Simultaneously in 1993, EPA Energy Star; a power saving stan- dard was made compulsory in USA and was also adopted across Europe. Even though this standard was initiated in 1993, it wasn’t implemented till the year 1995.
In 1995, TCO again modified its standards, changed the
requirements for visual ergonomics and added a range of condi- tions to cover environmental issues, including the use of certain chemicals in manufacturing and the recycling of components.
tion, they drew up a standard called the MPR1 [FULL FORM]. Then in 1990, this standard was amended, and a new standard called MPR2 was to be exercised by all the monitor manufacturers. MPR2 ensured a reduction in the emission level, and also a conductive coating on the monitor screen.
A newer standard called TCO92 was invented in 1992 by the Swedish Confederation of Professional Employees. Unlike the M PR2 level, here the emission levels of the monitor were decided by the manufacturers themselves. This standard sets far stiffer levels of emission and required monitors to meet the international EN60950 standard for electrical and fire safety. [HUH? CONTRADICTORY].
In 1993, VESA started a new standard called DPMS (Display Power Management Signalling), which set the four monitor
EE 42
TCO95 became the first global environmental labelling scheme. It was more comprehensive than the German Blue Angel label, and more exacting than ISO international standards.
TCO99 is the latest iteration of the standard. It doesn’t change the emission levels from the previous versions, but does alter the test- ing procedures to deal with certain loopholes. This new approval mainly concentrates on improving the visual ergonomics require- ments that include better luminance uniformity and contrast. There is also a new requirement that the screen colour temperature adjust- ment, when present, should be accurate. To reduce eye fatigue caused by image flicker, the minimum refresh rate is increased to 85 Hz for displays of less than 20-inches, with 100 MHz recommended, and a minimum of 75 Hz for diplays measuring 20-inches, or greater.
JULY 2003
net and Entertainment menus that can be accessed using the Magic Bright button on thefront panel. Thereisalso the Highlight button that ensures clear images on the screen while video-conferencing, by high- lighting areas that emphasise the overall clarity of the picture. The OSD is very easy to use and is well-complimented by seven buttons that make browsing through the menu a breeze. It bundles an exhaustive user's manual and a quick-start guide, along with the driver CDs and colour pro- filing software. For added functionality, you have an optional USB hub and multi- media speaker stand thrown in.
The LG Studioworks 700S was the lightest monitor that we received. The fac- tor that differentiates it from the LG Fla- tron E 700S is the much-appreciated fully flat tube. The MV7500 17-inch monitor from Compaq was the best looking moni- tor in the comparison test. With a dual tone paint finish—a gorgeous opal front bezel and a black carbon finish—this monitor has the edge when it comes to aesthetic appeal. Its OSD menu is icon-based, with just three buttons for configuring the vari- ous parameters of the monitor. The slight- ly large blue power button lends a good character to the otherwise plain front panel. It has a conventional FST (Flat Square Technology) picture tube with no anti-glare or anti-static coating, which is the only chink in its armour. The monitor comes with detachable) BL platinum speak- ers, a colour management software and all the other necessary cables and guides.
19-inch monitors
The BenQ V991 comes in a white body shell, and iscomplimented by four easy-to- use blue buttons and a large prominent power switch on thefront panel. Thehigh- light of this monitor is the resolution, which can go up to 1600 x 1200 at 78 Hz. The monitor comes with an anti-glare and anti-reflective coating, making it a sight
Beng G774 + High refresh rates
fe 47
Compaq MV 7500
+Good overall performance;
- Heavy includes external speaker set
- No antiglare coating; expensive
that won’t cause sore eyes.
This monitor was quite a performer, battling to the top of almost every test we threw at it. Its results in the geometry and the sharpness and resolution tests were especially good, making it stand out among the crowd. The only downside was that the entire package had no extra addi- tions, such as USB hubs or speakers— which could have provided value added enhancements for the monitor, in the absence of a full flat picture tube.
The 955DF comes from the Samsung's professional monitor series which claims to be featurerich, and at the same time, performs to the brim. This monitor, based on Samsungs Dyna Flat technology was one of the fully flat 19-inch monitors that wereceived. The monitor is well designed, moulded to hide bulk of the 19-inch mon- itor. The front panel is home to nothing but the power switch; all the other controls are hidden by a pop-open flap panel. Despite such entrappings, the buttons were unobtrusive and easily accessible.
The 900B from LG belongsto thestan- dard revamped Studioworks series and hence, does not offer a full flat picture tube. It is designed to be practical, with a six-button, easy-to-use OSD menu. The monitor is capable of displaying a resolu- tion of 1600 x 1200, but at a respectable frequency of 75 Hz. It isa good buy for its price of Rs 14,990, and hasthe usual cables, guides and warranty card.
NEC’s MultiSync 95 sports the usual monstrous looks of a 19-inch monitor with a contemporary design that lacks aesthet- ic appeal. The monitor has a decent OSD menu that can be accessed through the three buttons provided on thefront panel. A commendable aspect of the MultiSync 95 is the excellent resolution at which it can be operated—it is capable of displaying a resolution of 1600 x 1200 without any flicker. It comes bundled with the usual stuff such as users manual, colour profile
HCL HCM780M + Economically priced - Poor performance overall
HCL HCM785 RFM +F&FST; fine dot pitch - No antiglare coating
s E nja First CRT scanning
device constructed by German scientist, Karl Ferdinand Braun Nipkow disc and CRT is demon- strated Zworykin patents the Iconoscope pickup tube for television. The complete TV system, including kinescope, or pic- ture tube is demonstrated Ben Laposky uses oscil- loscope to display waveforms that were pho- tographed as artwork | George H Heilmeier and Richard Williams publish a report suggesting the use of liquid crystal materials for display IBM 2250 console worth $125,000 is intro- duced with the IBM 360 computer Tektronix Direct View Storage
| | Tube (DVST) is introduced = The Tektronix 4010 is released F
Sutherland Head Mounted Display (Sword of Damocles), developed in 1966, is shown
An improved Liquid Crystal Display is invented by James Fergason
The first ‘touch sensor’ is developed by Dr Sam Hurst
IBM 3279 colour terminal introduced
IBM introduces 4-colour monitor
VGA (Video Graphics Array) invented by IBM
LG Flatron E700S +F&FST
- Poor performance in the Geometery test
JULY 2003
test drive Ea monitors
Colour Profiles
You may have bought a new monitor, but are aware you need to assign the right colour profile to it? The purpose of colour profiling your computer is to reproduce accurate colours from one device to another, by map- ping each device's colour gamut. When done correctly, this means that the photo you scanned will be displayed as accurately as possible by your monitor, and printed just as accurately by your printer. This process will never be perfect, as each device has certain inherent limitations on its level.
You have a system RGB colour profile, such as Adobe 1998 RGB. This is the basis of all the other colour management on your computer; all other devices look to this to display proper colour. Your monitor should have a profile created by the manufacturer. The same applies for your scanner, printer and any other device that uses colour. Any file you open will be checked to see if it has a colour profile attached, and whether it should convert the colour to your profile,
CD, drivers CD, etc. and does not provide any additional multimedia features.
Performance
The Geometry test was the main evalua- tor of the the monitor’s capabilities. Dis- playmates’ internal pincushion and Barrel distortion test is done to rate the accura- cy of the geometrical shapes produced. The screen doesn’t wrap the raster from corner to corner, and hence the screen corners are cut or show the black back- ground. Thiscan beirritating when work- ing with applications such as image edi- tors. This test helped wrap the screen to the raster perfectly, to eliminate the geometry distortion and providethe max- imum screen area. In the 17-inch catego- ry, Microtek 43F1 and LG E700S disap- pointed us by yielding below average
LG Studioworks 700S
+ Overall good performance; light weight
- Flimsy construction
+Good looking
EN 48
Microtek Fatvision 43F1
- Average overall performance; no antiglare coating
keep the old one, or assign one to it, incase it does not have one.
Monitors should be set manually, using your eyes as the best judge and not the monitor profile. This is because every user has different preferences, and the room lighting will also affect the display. You can calibrate your monitor to your eyes by using Adobe gamma, a utility that comes with your monitor, or programs such as Colorific. However, if you are not the only one using your computer, this may be a problem. In which case you can save multiple profiles and re-use them accordingly.
Since monitors are easily adjustable, they are also wrong most of the time. You may have increased brightness for a game, or a power outage may reset your settings, in which case the display will be radically different to what your printer prints. Moni- tors also succumb to age, the electron guns age at different rates and affect the colour balance.
results in four image regulation tests— except for the Pincushion and Barrel dis- tortion test—and the variation in the size and shape of the test images was drastic. These monitors tend to show a variation in screen size while toggling between two Word documents or Excel sheets.
The Compaq MV7500 shone in the Geometry tests for the 17-inch category. It had an impressive overall screen geom- etry score of 22.5. This was 2 points ahead of its nearest rival, the Samsung Sync- Master 753DFX that scored 20.5 points. This performance was largely due to the impressive scores in the regulation test, where there was hardly any changes in the size and shape, and no perceptible clipping of the screen when brightness levels were suddenly increased. Surpris- ingly, the monitor gave only average
NEC Multisync 75 +Good refresh rate - Bulky; Semi-tint coating - NA
Samsung Syncmaster 753DFX +F&FST; good performance overall +F&FST, Magic Bright feature
results when generating parallel lines pat- terns in the Distortion tests.
Another impressive performer was LG Studioworks 700S, which showed very lit- tle image distortion and stood third only because of some variation in the dimen- sions during the screen regulation tests.
BenQ V991 and LG Studioworks 900B, both topped this test in the 19- inches category, by logging a score of 26.75. Thus, they are ideal for graphic and Web designers who have to deal with lot of vector diagrams and animations. Sam- sung Synmaster 955DF stood second with score of 16.5 points.
NEC MultiSync 95 was the worst per- former with ascoreof only 16 points—this was dueto the poor performancein all the regulation tests. With respect to the price criteria, NEC MultiSync 95 was the lowest costing Rs 17,000. However, its perform- ance was not acceptable, and definitely not recommended for professionals.
For the sharpness tests, Samsung SyncMaster 763MB came first, scoring 22.5 points, asit performed exceptional- ly well in most subtests,except for a few such asthe horizontal bar resolution test. On the other hand, Compaq MV 7500 scored 21.75 points. Hence, people who need high resolution to work with 2D or 3D engineering drawing, should opt for the Samsung SyncMaster 763MB. The monitor which finished at the bottom in this test was the NEC MultiSync 75 that suffered in all seven sub-tests, taking a maximum beating in the horizontal bar resolution test.
In the 19-inch category, BenQ V991 emerged as the winner, scoring 23.25 points. It performed well in all the tests, although it did take a beating in the diag- onal resolution and fine resolution matrix test. NEC Multi Sync 95 and Samsung Syncmaster 955DF were poor performers, and came last due to their average per- formance in all the resolution tests.
Samsung Syncmaster 763MB
- Atad expensive
JULY 2003
There was a tie between two moni- tors—the Compaq MV7500 and the BenQ G774; both scoring 4.25 points in the Screen pixel resolution tests. The LG E700S came a very close second, scoring 4 points. The NEC Multi Sync 75 showed poor performance here again—a lot of Jaggedness, as well as merged pixels near the intersection of two lines were noticed.
In the 19-inch category, LG Stu- dioworks breezed through the test, scor- ing a perfect 5. BenQ V991 came very close by scoring 4.5, while NEC MultiSync 95 and Samsung SynMaster 955DF both stood last, but scored a respectable 4.25 points.
For the Colour tests, the 17-inch Compaq MV 7500 wasa clear winner asit breezed remarkably through all the tests, including ghosting and streaking. LG Stu- dio Works 700S came second with a good performance in most tests—except for its average performance in the colour streak- ing one. The Microtek 43F1 had a below average performance—we could distinct- ly notice the streaking and ghosting, and the colour red was not uniform in the colour purity test.
Moving on to the 19-inch category, BenQ V991 emerged asthe winner because we could barely make out any sort of streaking and ghosting. The LG Stu- dioworks 900B lost the race only due to slight ghosting and streaking. NEC Accu- Sync 95 F wastheonly monitor which did not perform well. It displayed streaking and ghosting, and logged an average score in the colour purity test.
In the Miscellaneous Effects test, the LG Studio Works 700S won in the17-inch category by scoring 19.75. The BenQ G774 stood second with a respectable score of 18.5, and the Compaq MV 7500 came very close with 18 points.
Compag lost because of its extremely poor performance in the dark screen test, whereas the BenQ lost because of its aver-
age performance in the Screen Uniformi- ty test. The HCL HCM 780 stood last as it performed badly in the trio of Dark Screen, Screen Uniformity and Defocus Blooming halos tests.
In the 19-inches category, BenQ V991 was the top performer and scored an astounding 17.5. Except in the Dark Screen test, it performed brilliantly in all the tests. The Samsung SyncM aster 955DF came in second, with a score of 16.75 points. It lost out due to its average per- formance in the CRT Shadow Mask Dis- tortion test. The LG Studio Works 900B came last owing to its below average per- formancein the Screen Uniformity, Defo- cus Blooming and Halos tests.
The clear picture
It was a well-fought out battle between the brands dominating the Indian sce nario, with a proper photo-finish race.
The 17-inches category saw the max- imum number of monitors—a total of 10 monitors, representing seven different brands. The winner was undoubtably, the Compaq MV 7500, costing Rs 13, 500, which puts it out of reach for home users, but within the scope of professionals. The best monitor in the price-performance slot was the LG Studioworks 700S. This monitor costs only Rs 7,450—its low price and admirable performance make it the preferred choice of users across the board—be it the home user, the office user or even gamer.
The 19-inches category crowned the BenQ V991, which scored 38.9 in the performance test as the fitting winer. This monitor produced impressive results in all the tests in our evaluation. The BenQ V991 is best suited for graph- ic applications, multimedia authoring and other high end 3D applications. It also won the best value award because of its extremely competitive price of Rs 12,999.
Beng V991
+ High refresh rates; + Support for highest
very good performance video bandwith
- Low on features - Poor performance in Screen Uniformity test
EN 49
LG Studioworks 900B NEC Multisync 95
+ High refresh rates - Semi-tint coating; expensive
Samsung Syncmaster 955DF
+F&FST
- Low refresh rate; Heavy
Test your Own Monitor
It’s a great feeling to have a new monitor on your desk. However, to get a near per- fect display, use an excellent utility called
_ DisplayMate. To calibrate the monitor,
you can tweak the following settings:
_ Brightness and contrast adjustment: Cal-
ibrating brightness and contrast for the monitor is very important for proper colour reproduction and details. DisolayM ate offers a screen with text written in dark
| grey, grey and white. You need to calibrate
the monitor till this text is clearly visible. Screen framing and aspect ratio: This
= screen presents you with the rectangle
and circle which is needed to be wrapped
_ perfectly to the raster. After the wrapping
is done, check out for the parallelism of
-the lines with respect to the monitors
frame. In most monitors it will be tilted on one of the sides. Use the geometry con-
— trols tilt and rotate to correct this. This may be time-consuming, but its very
important for optimal viewing. Circular test pattern: This setting dis-
_ plays a set of concentric circles in the
middle and the four corners of the screen. All you have to do is pick up the deformed circles, and correct the prob- lem using the Pincushion or Pinbalance function in OSD.
= Resolution: Because the resolution of the
monitor is not necessarily the same as the resolution provided by graphics card,
~ there isa loss in details. This screen dis-
plays tightly soaced bars at full resolution. If there is a visible loss of details or moiré pattern, try reducing the refresh rate. Also try to increase screen horizontally if possi- ble, and decrease the contrast a bit. Colour scales: This screen has 10 colours displaying 25 intensity levels. Ideally, the intensity of each level should increase as you move from light to dark region. If not, try changing the Colour Temperature to one of the two settings, i.e., 9300K and 6500K. Some monitors also have the user settings where you can set the RGB levels independently.
Screen Regulation: This test flashes a very bright screen. The screen size increases when bright and contracts when it dims. To reduce this problem, try decreasing the contrast to a level where the size variation is not substantial and screen is not dark enough to read a document on it.
JULY 2003
CATEGORY
Brand
Model
Size (Inches)
Viewable (Inches)
F&FST
Dot Pitch (mm) (Diagonal) Vertical Scan Rate (Hz) Horizontal Scan Rate (KHz) Maximum Resolution/ Refresh Rate Video Bandwidth (MHz) CRT type
W x H x D (mm)
Weight (KG)
Built in Speakers
Anti-Glare Coating
Emission Standard Followed
Bundled Accessories
(Manuals, Colour Profile,
Driver and Calibrating software...) Performance (50%)
Geometry test( Scale of 30) Sharpness and Resolution (Scale of 35) Screen Pixel Resolution (Scale of 5) Color and Gray Scale (Scale of 45) Miscellaneous Effect (Scale of 25) Overall 50 % (performance only) Overall 20 % features only)
Overall 20 % Value for Money Overall 10 % warranty and support Warranty and Support
No. Of years/Type of warranty Overall Product Score
Ranking
Vendor Details
Contact
Phone E-mail
Web site Price (Rs)
Compaq MV7/500
he Compaq MV7500 monitor is an
affordable and practical 17-inch CRT solution that offers excellent performancein a sleek new carbon and silver casing. This monitor is ideal for everyday home and office activities such as Web surfing, gaming, email and working with office suite soft- ware. The 110 MHz pixel clock speed, .28mm dot pitch and refresh rates of 30 to 79 KHz (horizontal) and 50 to 140 Hz (vertical) ensures sharp visuals. The Compaq MV7500 monitor also boasts of a variety of features that make it ideal for everyday use. The mon- itor isincredibly easy to set up and maintain, with a wide range of icon-based on-screen controls, so you can customise brightness,
HEN 50
Benq
G774
17
16
x
025
50-120
30-72 1280x1024@67 Hz 110
Shadow Mask
406 x 423 x 412.5 16.4
z
Y
MPRII,
TCO 99 (optional) Manual, power cable
195
21.25
4.25
31.25
18.5
33:92
12 14.41674419 10
3 years/onsite 70.33674419 <>
Beng India Pvt Ltd
022-25705231 salesenquiryin@ beng.com www.benq.co.in 8,600
Compaq
MV7500
17
16
x
0.28
50-140
30-70 1280x1024@60 Hz 110
Shadow mask
432 x 422 x 444.5 17.23 kg
Y
x
Energy Star compliant
power cord,captive signal
cable, JBL speakers with audio cable,
1 year/carry-in 62.9536
O
AVI Electronics 022-26465522 aviteam@vsnl.com
www.hp.com 13,500
17” CRT
HCL
HCM 780M
17
16
x
0:27
50-160
30-70 1280x1024@60 Hz NA
Shadow Mask 410 x 402 x 420 15.5
x
A
Energy Star
Monitor stand, Driver Floppy, User Manual, Power cord
175 20.75 3/5 29.25 1525
30.802 5 14.3208 4
1 year
54.1228
<>
HCL Infosystems Ltd 044-22340165 kiruba@hclp.com
www.hclinfosystems.com 6,750
tests we ran.
HCL
HCM 785 RFM 17
16
Y
0.21
50-160
30-72 1280X1024@60 Hz NA
Shadow Mask 410 x 402 x 420 16Kg
x
x
MPRII
Manual, driver floppy disk.
16.5
21
3.5
28.5
16.5 30.642
10 13.716675 4
1 year 58.358675 2
HCL Infosystems Ltd 044-22340165 kiruba@hclp.com
www.hclinfosystems.com 8,000
colour contrast, and other features to match your preferences. This monitor fea- tures a detachable set of JBL Platinum series speakers and also has the Coloreal colour management software bundled— which lets you calibrate your monitor to perfection. The monitor’s tilt-and-swivel features let you adjust the positioning of the unit according to their individual needs. This feature is especially useful when surfing the Web with friends or gaming with multiple players.
On the performance front, it gave some outstanding numbers and stood first in three of the five main performance
JULY 2003
LG
700S Studioworks 17
16
x
0.27
50-160
30-70 1280x1024@60 Hz 110
Shadow Mask 400 x 395 x 420 14.4
x
Y
MPR II
power chord, signal cable, manual, install disk
19.75
19
35
33.5
19753
33.97
10 15.93543624 10
3 years/onsite 69.90543624 2
LG Electronics India Pvt Ltd
0120-2560900 response@ Igezbuy.com www.lgezbuy.com 7,450
LG
E700S
17
16
Y
0.25
50-160
30-70
1280x1024@60 Hz
110
Shadow Mask
400 x 395 x 424
16
z
Y
¥Y, MPR-II
Low-Emission Compliant Manual, Driver (floppy), power cable
13
21.5
4
30.75
17.25
30.537
10 11.64360638 10
3 yeary onsite 62.18060638 <>
LG Electronics India Pvt Ltd
0120-2560900 resoonse@lgezbuy.com
www.lgezbuy.com 9,400
Microtek Flatvision 43F1 17
16
x
0.28
50-120
30-70 1280x1024@60 Hz 110
ShadowM ask 406 x 404 x 423 15.5
x
x
MPR II
Users manual, captive signal cable, swivel base, power cord,
12
20.5
575
30.25
16.5 29.199
8 13.949625 8
3 years Carry in 59.148625
<2
Microtek Intl Ltd 022-28362406 an.bome@mtk.sril.in
www.microtek.com 7,200
17” CRT
NEC
MultiSync 75
17
16
x
027
55-120
31-70 1280x1024@66 Hz NA
Shadow Mask 403 x 420 x 418 15.4
x
Semitint
MPR II
Manual, power cable
14.25
18.5
3
28
16.25
28.322
7 14.67221538 4
1 year/carry-in 53.99421538 pet
Moon computer Manufacturing Industry 022-22653390 sales@moonindia.com
www.nec.com 6,500
Samsung SyncMaster 753DFX 17
16
Y
0.2(H)
50-160
30-70 1280x1024@65 Hz 110
Shadow Mask
398 x 400 x 412 15.7
x
Y
TCO 99
power cable, manual, signal cable
20.5 20.25 55
30 1775 32.957 11 13.1871 10
3 yeary onsite 67.1441 2
Samsung Electronics India Information & Telecommunication Ltd. 011-51511234 marketing@ samsungindia.com www.samsungindia.com 9,000
Samsung
SyncM aster 763MB 17
16
Y
0.2(H)
50-160
30-70 1280x1024@66 Hz 110
Shadow Mask
398 x 412 x 400 16
x
Y
TCO 99
Users manual, colour profile CD, power cord
18.25
22.25
4
32.25
16.25
33.009
10 12.09628125 10
3 years/onsite 65.10528125 2
Samsung Electronics India Information & Telecommunication Ltd. 011-51511234 marketing@ samsungindia.com www.samsungindia.com 9,600
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CATEGORY
19” CRT
Brand BenQ LG NEC Samsung Model V991 Studioworks 900B MutliSync 95 SyncM aster 955DF Specification and Features of 17" Monitors Size (Inches) 19 19 19 19 Viewable (Inches) 18 18 18 18 F& FST x x% z Y Dot Pitch (mm) (Diagonal) 0.25 0.26 0.26 0.2(H) Vertical Scan Rate (Hz) 50-160 50-160 55-160 50-160 Horizontal Scan Rate (KHz) 30-98 30-124 31-96 30-85 Maximum Resolution/Refresh Rate 1600x1200@/8Hz | 1600x1200@/5Hz 1600x1200@/6Hz 1600x1200@68Hz Video Bandwidth (MHz) 115 203 145.92 135 CRT type Shadow Mask Shadow Mask Shadow Mask Shadow Mask W x H x D (mm) 455 x 466 x 463 448 x 470 x 454 442 x 452 x 455 440 x 461 x 460 Weight (KG) 20 20.5 20 21 Built in Speakers x x Y Anti-Glare Coating x Semitint VESA DPMS, Energy Star, NUTEK Emission Standard Followed MPR II, M PRII MPR - II TCO 99 (optional), CE (optional) Bundled Accessories Manuals. Manuals, driver CD, Users manual, captive | Manual, WarrantCard, signal cable, (Manuals, Colour Profile, cables. Signal cable, swivel power chord, CD with drivers, Driver and Calibrating software...) base, power cord, installation guide booklet, Natural color management system booklet, Performance(50% ) Geometry test( Scale of 30) 26.75 16.5 Sharpness and Resolution (Scale of 35) 23,25 17.5 Screen Pixel Resolution (Scale of 5) 4.5 4.25 Color and Gray Scale (Scale of 45) 36.5 30.5 M iscellaneous Effect (Scale of 25) 17.75 16.75 Overall 50 % (performance only) 38.938 30.422 Overall 20 % features only) 3 6 Overall 20 % Value for Money 14.44 8.29 Overall 10 % warranty and support 10 10 Warranty and Support No. Of years/Type of warranty 3 Yrs/Onsite 3 Yrs/Onsite 1 year/Carry-in 3 Years/onsite Overall Product Score 66.38157258 65.21012875 47.56617647 54.71369231 Ranking > GD << 2 Vendor Details Contact Benq India Pvt Itd LG Electronics India Pvt | Moon computer Samsung Electronics India Ltd Manufacturing Industry | Information & Telecommunication Itd. Phone 022-25705231 0120-2560900 022-22653390 011-51511234 Email salesenquiryin@ response@lgezbuy.com | sales@moonindia.com | marketing@samsungindia.com beng.com Website www.benq.co.in www.lIgezbuy.com www.nec.com www.samsungindia.com Price (Rs.) 12,999 14,990 17,000 19,500 LG Studio Works 700S BenQ V991
he LG Studioworks 700s Monitor can be di
yours at a relatively low cost. It has a flat ACH outer screen, is user-friendly and delivers good picture quality. The OSD menu was clear and easy to operate, and the button placement was logi- cal. It also has an anti-glare coating to shield the strain on your eyes. It was also the lightest monitor that we received in our comprison : test. mI
On the performance front, it stood second amongst the rest of the brands in its catego- ry. This monitor is ideal for home users who want good performance at a rock bottom price.
Te BenQ V991 is a 19-inch flat-screen CRT with a viewing expanse of 18 inches. Its highest refresh rate gives flick- er-free images for pleasant viewing. The diagonal dot pitch is set at an ultra-fine 0.25 mm, and it also has an iScreen OSD control for instant adjustment to the most Suitable settings.
The BenQ topped four out of our five tests. This monitor is ideal for page layout artists and those who use a lot of geometric F drawings, given its crisp images with mini- mal amount of jaggedness, even at high resolutions.
Its three-year on-site warranty is the clincher, as users can have peace of mind after buying this monitor. The on-site warranty assures that you will never have the headache of carrying this monitor to a service centre, in the rare even of a component failure.
GD)
aj at
ui oat
52 JULY 2003
LCD Monitors
CDsare fast becoming the display solu-
tion of choice for most offices, due to their size, elegant looks, and the fall in prices over the last couple of years.
LCD prices have dropped 25 per cent in the last one year or so. Due to this, some major PC vendors have started bundling LCDs with their PCs, particu- larly Zenith, HP and HCL. This has creat- ed more awareness amongst the buyers, and caused more vendors to jump the bandwagon—D-Link, Umax and CMV have launched their monitors in the past few months. Certain brands, such as Sony and Acer, have pulled out of the CRT seg- ment altogether, and are concentrating solely on LCDs.
The entry level LCDs are available at a price tag of Rs 18,000 upwards. Sharp has a large product range with around 17 monitors catering to all kinds of users ranging from Rs 24,000 for the home seg- ment, to Rs 1,00,000 and beyond for the money-is-no-object segment.
How we tested
In the LCD comparison test, we again evaluated the performance, features, value for money and warranty details. The performance was evaluated using the same tests as the CRTs. LCDS were addi- tionally tested for jerks or image blurring. We also looked for features such as the various accessories bundled, the design, look and feel, the placement of buttons, whether onecould adjust the height, and other little extras—such as USB ports, DVI connectors etc.
15-inch monitors The Sync Master 152S was one of the most elegantly designed LCD monitors in the test, with a choice of silver, or carbon black colours. We received a silver LCD monitor, and it blew the competition away in the looks
Acer AL511 CMV 1512 +Light weight +Overall good performance; - No built in soeakers and wall mounting -NA EN 53
department. The front face has five but- tons for configuring the screen and using the OSD, and also an auto configure but- ton. This monitor can be wall mounted, and also comes with an adjustable height stand. Various accessories, such as a power adapter, colour calibrating software and wall mounting accessories are bundled with it. The only sore point was the absence of DVI support. At 2.9 Kg, it was the lightest monitor in its category.
On the other hand, the AL 511, which is the latest offering from Acer, was the cheapest in the entire 15-inches LCD category. The design is very simple, with a white plastic body. The OSD menu is quite detailed, with lot of options, but is too complicated to use. The AL 511 lacks many features, such as built-in speakers, wall mounting and height adjustment—but it has a 60
degree tilt angle for easy viewing. Also at 3.2 Kg, it was one of the lighter LCDsin this category.
The Sharp LL T15G3 is one of the most space saving LCD monitors in its category. The design is quite simple, and it is available in white and black options. TheLL T15G3 comes with five buttons for screen configuration, including one auto configuration button. Other interesting options, such as Auto-Gain, can also be set. The screen can be tilted 60 degrees for easier viewing, and can also be wall mounted. This LCD does not come with speakers, which is the only dissapoint- ment, but has the manual, drivers, and a signal cable bundled along.
The Samsung Sync Master 151M P was the most feature-rich LCD in the 15-inch category. Boasting of HDTV and TV tun- ing capabilities, it certainly stands out from
The Mystique of the LCD
Why are LCDs so costly, if they are smaller in size, and use less power? The reason is their high rate of failure during manufactur- ing. As every pixel has individually con- trolled transistors that switch on and off, manufacturing calls for a higher degree of precision—which becomes a much greater challenge as compared to CRT manufactur- ing. There is certain level of quality control adopted by every manufacturer while fabri- cating LCDs. Therefore, a large numbers of fabricated LCDs are rejected during quality control check because of high dead pixel count, (malfunctioning transistors). These screens have to be discarded and the costs are passed on to the consumer.
Due to this high failure rate, most companies do not consider three or less dead pixels to be a defect—but, as a user you should watch out for this. Also, as the
CMV 1515 +Good luminance
Digiview DGL 115SP +Good performance Light weight; High luminance -NA -NA
screen size increases, the number of dead pixels increase—hence the yield takes a nose dive, which further inflates the cost of large screen LCDs.
The current LCD manufacturing tech- nique is similar to applying paint to a wall with a roller. Companies such as IBM have researched alternatives to this unreliable technique. The new technique uses electri- cally charged atoms to position the transis- tors, hence increasing the accuracy of crys- tal placing and lowering the failure rate. A very fine layer of carbon is soread over the LCD-to-be and then an ion-gun is used to shoot aside the surface carbon atoms, hence forming rows on which the transis- tors can be precisely placed. This tech- nique now awaits adoption by various LCD vendors. The faster they implement this technique the better.
HCL HCM 500 LSA +Good refresh rates - Poor performance
JULY 2003
test drive aa monitors
How to buy an LCD
LCDs are the latest in display technology. With their sleek looks, and crisp displays, they are becoming a viable alternative. They use liquid crystal filled grids, activat- ed by electric fields to create even, smooth, finely defined images. They are especially useful for places where desk space is in short supply. Here are a few things to look at before buying one.
Digital or Analogue Inputs: If you want a Sharper display, you can look for a flat panel monitor with a digital input—also called Digital Video Interface (DVI). Remember that you will need a special graphics card with a DVI output connector.
Resolutions: Make sure that the native res-
thecrowd. Thedesign is gorgeous, the OSD IS displayed in translucent blue and the control buttons beep when pressed. It has four buttons on the left side of the front panel to control the PC, Picture-in-Picture (PiP), Video and Audio settings. There is also an auto adjustment button to auto- matically set the properties to default val- ues. To make the TV viewing even more enjoyable, aremote control is provided. It has in-built speakers that can provide vir- tual surround sound for a sweet and enjoy- able experience. The only thing this monitor lacks is the support for DVI input—though it does have support for RCA and S-Video. To complete its ‘home theatre’applications, the LCD can be wall mounted. It comes bundled with the mandatory user’s manual, driver and colour calibrating software.
Built on similar lines as the Samsung's 151 MP, the Philips 150 MT 20P LCD monitor is dressed for the future. The fea- tures include support for HDTV, an exter- nal TV tuner, built-in speakers and a remote control. It has blue LED buttons
izes = a E
m
LG 566LE
+Good performance - No in-built speakers and low good luminance on features
EN 54
Philips 150 MT20P + External T.V. tuner card;
- Low in performance
olution of an LCD monitor matches ~ what you normally use. Also look for moni- tors that offer the one-touch auto adjust feature that matches your screen display with your computer resolution.
Dead Pixels: One thing to look for
in LCD monitors are dead pixels. These are pixels that are always on or always off. The simplest way to test for this is to display a totally white screen and look for black or coloured dots, and then display a totally black screen and look for white or coloured dots. A few dead pixels here and there won't really make a difference, but too many in the wrong place can become an irritation, and mar the display quality that you bought the LCD for.
for accessing the translucent blue OSD menu. The buttons are feather touch and ajoy to operate. It also has an auto button to automatically adjust screen settings. Onenotablefeatureisthehigh luminance of 310 (cd/m2). It supports RCA and S$ Video, and comes with the necessary audio and video cables to connect it to a PC or DVD player. An interactive multi- media CD is provided, which doubles as the users guide and the driver CD.
LG’s 566 LE has 5 buttonson thefront panel, to help you navigate about the OSD. Thisisasleek metallic looking mon- itor, with a sharp display—second in its category in the sharpness and resolution tests. The OSD takes a little getting used to. The monitor itself comes in a plain vanilla package, and includes only the user manual and a CD containing the drivers. We expected at least one colour profiling software to be included with the monitor, as LCD’s are still considered to be premium products in India. The man- ual is also not exhaustive and contains only basic instructions for installing the
Philips 150 P4 AB +Compact design; height adjustable
- Expensive
ready - Expensive
Samsung Syncmaster 151MP +Good performance; HDTV
monitor. It should have had a manual containing instructions on troubleshoot- Ing and maintenance of the LCD monitor, which would have helped this monitor gain some more points. Overall, it was a good competitor, but could have had some additional features—considering Rs 24,000 that you shell out to purchase it.
CMV, alesser-known brand and anew player in the market, has monitors that provide a high luminance of around 400 cd/m2, which drastically boost the bright- ness and contrast levels for vivid and live ly pictures.
Lastly, the sleek looking Sony SDM S51, doesn’t support wall mounting or height adjustment. Neither does it have DVI support, which is expected from a monitor priced at Rs 31,000. The maxi- mum resolution supported by this moni- tor is 1024 x 768 at 60 Hz, which is below par, compared to other 15-inch LCD monitors. The accessories provided include the driver CD and a user guide. This monitor is suitable for home and office use, but the hefty price that you have to pay for thisis not justifiable.
17-inch monitors
Built on similar lines as it’s sibling in the 15-inch category, the Samsung Sync Mas- ter 171 MP offers the same set of features and extends the elegant design aura to this monitor. The overall looks are enhanced by the metallic silver colour, with sleek styling and practical design. The 171 MP boasts of some impressive features, such as HDTV and an optional TV tuning capability. A full, function remote control provided along with it, makes your entertainment hours even more enjoyable. It has feather touch but- tons on the front panel that beep when you press them to configurethe OSD. The in-built speakers, envelope you with vir- tual surround sound. Its PiP feature allows you to watch TV and work on your com- puter simultaneously—the most impres-
Samsung Syncmaster 152S +Good performance, Feature set; Light weight
- No in-built soeakers
JULY 2003
-9
test drive Ea monitors
sive feature of the lot. Other nifty fea- tures, such as wall mounting, support for DVD player connectivity via RCA or S- video inputs and colour calibrating soft- ware, are also available.
The Samsung 1715S is built around a different strategy—it is made for the value conscious buyers. This LCD features an all carbon black body with the buttons placed at the upper right hand corner of the 17-inch screen. One interesting fea- ture is the ability of the monitor to be used in landscape or portrait mode—this can be achieved by using the provided software. The monitor also has other nifty features, such as height adjustment, wall mounting, etc. Unfortunately, it lacks DVI support and in-built speakers. The accessories provided along with the monitor include a user guide, colour cal- ibrating software, driver CD and the pivot configuring software.
The Philips 170 B4MG was another feature-packed LCD in the 17-inch cate- gory. This monitor comes with the option of portrait or landscape mode, which isa niche feature considering that only two LCD monitors in our test had it. It also has an optional USB hub feature, in-built speakers, height adjustment and a screen tilt angle of 175 degrees. The package included the monitor, manuals, and the driver CD. The user manual was pretty exhaustive, but there was no colour soft- ware included.
TheLG Flatron 1710B had three USB ports, and atilt angle of 140 degrees. The ViewSonic VG700 LCD wasalso gunning for the glory with a decent design. The VG700 comes with integrated speakers and a Kensington lock as an optional accessory, so that you can secure it to your desktop. It also comes with its own colour calibrating software.
All other 17-inch LCDs in our test either had too few features to mention or they came with the standard features that did not justify their high price tag.
Sony SDM-S51
+Good looks
- Average performance, low refresh rates, minimal feature set
a
- Heaviest
HEN 56
Sharp LL-T1520- +Above average performance
Test Analysis
LCDs were put through three additional- tests, namely OSD usability, a viewable angle test in which adocument contain- ing different fonts was opened and read at various angels, and the LCD Pixel Per- sistence test to check for blurring, ghost- Ing or streaking.
The CMV1512 topped these in the 15-inch category, as it was the only mon- itor in which we could read the docu- ment clearly from an angle of 160 degrees—perfect for presentations. The OSD is also very convenient and easy to Operate.
It performed above average in the pixel persistence test.
The Sharp LL-T15G3 stood second, because despite a good score in the Pixel Persistence and Viewable Angle tests, it performed poorly in the OSD test.
There were five models vying for the third position. The HCL HCM 700LSA, the HCL HCM 500SLA and the CMV1515 TFT’s performances were below average in the Pixel Persistence and Viewable Angle tests—the document could not be read, and a distinct blue and yellow tinge was seen. This makes these LCDs a bad choice for watching movies or playing games.
Moving on to the 17-inches catego- ry, Samsung Syncmaster 171s stood first because of its good performance in the Pixel Persistence and OSD Usability test. Its performance in the Viewable Angle test was also above average.
The LG Flatron 1710B stood second by performing extremely well in this test. It lost out because of its poor per- formance in the LCD Pixel Persistence test, when a certain amount of blurring was noticeable.
On theother hand, theAcer AL 712’s performance in this test was mediocre, especially in the Viewable Angle and Pixel Persistence tests—the document could be read at a maximum angle of 140 degrees.
Sharp LL-T15G3B +QOutstanding performance
- No built in speakers; minimal feature set
Glossary
Aperture Pitch: The equivalent of hori- zontal dot pitch on shadow mask CRTs;
_ the distance between one stripe and the - next one of the same colour, expressed in
millimetres; also Known as Stripe Pitch. Auto sizing: The ability of a monitor to maintain a consistent image size across
| different video modes.
_ Anti-reflective coating: A special coat- _ ing, applied to the front of the CRT, to
_ reduce glare. Anti-reflective coatings
enrich the colour black by decreasing the
amount of light reflected off the front of _ the screen by outside sources. This helps | black text stand out on white back-
= grounds, aiding in readability.
_ Bandwidth: Expressed in megahertz,
bandwidth is a measurement of a moni-
_ tor’s pixel clock. The higher the pixel _ clock, the higher the Bandwidth
requirement of the Video Amplifier.
_ Bezel: This is the outer frame of the front _ face of a computer monitor that holds the
CRT inside the monitor cabinet.
| BNC Connector: A connector for coaxi-
al cable designed to lock two ends together when one end is inserted into the other and turned 90 degrees. BNC connectors do not support the Windows
| Plug and Play Standards.
Colour Calibration: The necessary
_ adjustment of colours that causes the
colours on the monitor to match the
= ones produced by the printer. Without =- adequate calibration, the printed page <- may not accurately reproduce what is
displayed on the computer screen.
l Colour Depth: Colour depth is deter- | mined by the number of bits used to
produce colour in each pixel on a moni-
_ tor display. The more bits used, the _ greater the number of colours that can
be displayed, provided that a graphics card and monitor have the capability to
_ display them. Common bit ranges are
8-bit colour (256 colours), 16-bit colour
_ (thousands of colours), and 24-bit
colour (millions of colours). Most moni-
_ tors in use today can display at least 16- _ bit colour.
Colour Temperature: Measured in
| degrees Kelvin, reference to colour tem- _ perature provides a standard for defining
standard colours emitted from computer displays. This rating indicates the colour of a CRT or bulb when it is lit. It also indi- cates the general atmosphere (warm or
- cool) created by a particular CRT or tube.
JULY 2003
-=
test drive Ea monitors
CRTs Vs. LCDs
CRT
LCD
Physical Size
Large businesses and banks are concerned about the cost of providing extra desk space. CRTs take up space, which costs money.
One of the biggest advantages of LCD monitors is that they are compact and weigh less. An LCD monitor is based upon a very thin screen as opposed to the bulky tube of a CRT monitor. This means that not only do they take up less of your desktop space, they can also be used in many places where a larger CRT monitor cannot fit. Some LCD displays can even be mounted on the wall.
Display Size
Resolution
CRT monitors are not sized by their actual viewable diagonal measurement. For example, the viewable area on a 17-inch CRT monitor will typically only measure 16-inch diagonally.
CRT monitors are usually capable of displaying multiple video resolutions, each with the same quality.
LCD monitors are typically sized by their actual viewable diagonal measurement. For example, the viewable area on a 17-inch LCD monitor will measure 17 inches diagonally.
LCD monitors usually have what is called a Native resolution, or the resolution that it displays best. The native resolution is generally the highest resolution that the LCD can display and this is the display resolution that will appear the crispest and sharpest.
Viewing Angle
A CRT screen can be looked at from a very wide angle, practically from the side.
An LCD monitor typically has a smaller viewing angle, needing to be viewed more directly from the front. From the side, the image on an LCD screen can seem to disappear, or invert colours. Newer displays that are coming out have wider viewing angles so this is not as much of an issue as it has been in the past.
Radiation Emission
CRT monitors have a flicker and give off radiation leading to headaches, eye strain, tears and may be blamed for eye damage to consistent users.
LCD flat panel monitors have no flicker, and produce no harmful radiation.
Power Consumption
CRT monitors consume, depending on their
size, between about 100 watts to 250 watts of
electrical power.
LCDs consume about 40 watts on an average. This makes the LCD great for portable computers and other wireless devices such as PDAS.
CRT monitors are generally more affordable. A CRT monitor will cost less but will use more energy than an LCD monitor.
An LCD monitor will cost more up front, but will conserve energy in the long run. The energy savings may not be much for an individual user, but if you are looking at a corporate office where hundreds of displays are in us, the energy savings might be more of an issue.
In the Screen Pixel Resolution test, the Samsung Syncmaster 152S and the Sharp LL-T15G3 scored the maximum in the 15-inches category. One could seethe objects clearly without any sort of distor- tion in the lines. Samsung sync Master 151 MP stood second and all the others
DaS
Acer AL712 BenQ FP767 BenQ FP781 +High refresh rates + Above average performance, + Light weight - Heaviest amongst all light weight, Economically priced - Low luminance & feature set - Low in features 58
performed well, except for the below average performance of the Philips 150P4Ab.
In the Sharpness and Resolution tests, we looked at the displayed image for pixel bleeding, i.e. additional and blurry lines at the edge.
HCL HCM 700 LSA +Extermely lowly priced - Poor performance
In the 15-inch category the Sharp LL-T15G3 emerged as the winner. It per- formed exceedingly well in the resolu- tion matrix, the fine resolution matrix, the diagonal resolution matrix and the fine focus matrix tests.
TheLG 566LE stood second, as even
pw 4 i, Ta
LG 1710B
+ Excellent performer, Wall mountable
- No speakers
JULY 2003
Most people don’t know that normal brightness and contrast settings are not | optimised for games. In fact, 3D games require different settings altogether to give _ the same graphical effect that the design- ers intended. For example, you might miss an essential item because your screen was too dark, or you might not be able to see an opponent in time for you to take action. This is where 3Deep comes in. By adjusting your gamma and colour settings to work _ with games that support it, you can get the best possible output from your monitor.
Using 3Deep is a very simple process. The moment you've finished installing the program, a calibration wizard pops up and guides you through the process. We used Sony’s SDM-N80 19-inch LCD display for our workshop.
There are seven steps to calibrating the display, the first step is choosing the kind of display you use. The angle at which you view the LCD screen is very important.
though it performed exceedingly well in the resolution test its horizontal bar res- olution was average. The Samsung Sync- master 152S stood third because of its average performance in the horizontal and vertical bar resolution test. The Acer AL511’s performance was way below average in all the subtests.
Moving to the 17-inch category, the BenQ FP767 stood first, as its perform- ance was simply outstanding in the res- olution test. The LG Flatron 1710B stood second because of its below aver- age performance in the Horizontal and Vertical Bar Resolution tests. The Sam- sung Synmaster 171s stood third due to a reasonably poor performance in the horizontal bar resolution test. The Philips 170B4 MG performance was just not acceptable in any of the subtests
Philips 170 B4 MG
+ Convertable from landscape to portrait; wall mountable; In- built in speakers
- Poor performance
+ Sleek looking; TV tuner
Very expensive
HEN 59
Samsung 171MP
- Low luminance;
Whites, whiter; Colours Brighter
Now, you have to set the elevation and angle of the screen to what you normally use. Once this is done, the software will determine the actual contrast level, in order to set the optimal view distance for your display.
In the next three steps, you need to set the optimal levels for each colour compo- nent of your display—red, blue and green. This is the most important part of the test, as things can go awry if not done carefully.
in deciding the | exact point at
and stood dead last.
When it comes to Colour and Grayscale, the Acer AL511 stood first as it aced the three subtests, with no visible streaking or ghosting. The Sharp LL- T15G3 came close, but lost out by a mar- gin of 0.25 points.
The HCL HCM 500 SLA’s perform- ance was disappointing, as there was lot of ghosting and streaking visible, and its performance in the White and Black Level shift was mediocre.
The LG Flatron 1710B won the 17-inch category, with a good perform- ance in the white and black level shift. For the second place, it was a tie between the Samsung Syncmaster 171S and the Sony SDM-S71. The Philips 170 B4 MG's performance in this test was way below average.
Samsung Syncmaster 171S +Good performance; Convertable from landscape to portrait; Wall mountable
- No in-built speakers
Sony SDM-S71 +Good performance - Low on features
which the intensity of the middle strip equals the background.
Finally, in the last step, you can do some extra tweaking to get exactly what you want. Keep an eye out for the ‘Before\ After’ section to view the results of your set- ting. Clicking on the ‘Set Game Gamma’ but- ton will apply the results. This button also forces games that don’t support 3Deep to accept the calibration settings that you’ve chosen.
Remember, it’s a good idea to rerun the program every once in a while, espe- cially if you change your resolution, bit depth, or your entire display. Have fun beating the bad guys!
In the Miscellanous tests, the Sam- sung Syncmaster 151 MP got the maxi- mum score as the screen was uniform throughout and there was absolutely no flicker. The Philips 150 MT came close by standing second as its performance in the Screen Uniformity test was average. CMV1512 put on a valiant fight but lost the second position just by 0.25 marks and came third. The Philips 150 P4 AB performance was disappointing as one could notice dark and light regions on the screen.
In the 17-inch category Samsung Syncmasterl71s performed quite well hence stood first. The Sony SDM S-71 also performed quite well and camein second. The Acer AL 712 and Samsung Syncmas- ter 171 MP both performed poorly and stood last.
Viewsonic VG700 +Good feature set
- Low refersh rate; Average performance
JULY 2003
CATEGORY
Brand
Model
Size (Inches)
Pixel Size (mm)
Luminance (cd/m2)
Maximum Resolution/Refresh Rate Vertical Scan Rate (Hz)
Horizontal Scan Rate (KHz)
W x H x D (mm)
Weight (KG)
USB hub (/W/%) / No. Of. ports In-built speakers (4/3)
Rotating angle of screen
Wall Mounting (//%)
Height Adjustment (cm or inches) Landscape to portrait (W/%) In-built TV-Tuner (“/%)
Emission Standard Followed Bundled Accessories
(Manuals, Colour Profile,
Driver and Calibrating software...)
Sharpness and Resolution (Scale of 35) Screen Pixel Resolution (Scale of 5) Color and Gray Scale (Scale of 45) Miscellaneous Effect (Scale of 20)
LCD Additional Test (Scale of 15) Overall 50 % (performance only) Overall 20 % features only)
Overall 20 % Value for Money
Overall 10 % warranty and support
No. Of years/Type of warranty
Overall Product Score Ranking
Contact
Phone E-mail
Web site Price (Rs)
Acer
ARSIMI
15
0.297
250 1024x768 56-75
24-60 353x368x204 3.2
x
x
APP. 60 DEGREES x
x
x
x
TCO 99 Power cord, video cable
16.5 4.25 41.5 18
9.5 34.596 3 1222 6
1 year on site
55.82081241
Acer India Pvt Ltd
080-5219520
rajesh_aiyar@ acer.co.in www. acer.co.in 19,990
CMV
T512
15
0.297
400 1024x768@/5 Hz 55-75
28-65 384x376x180
233
XXX HQ X
TCO 99
Manual, video and power cable, warranty card.
28.25 4.5 40.75 18.25 11.75 39.765
12 62 8
3 years carry in 65.3827381
>
Chemoplast
022-26733353
chemoplastmumbai@ vsnl.net www.chemoplast.com 21,000
15” LCD
CMV
1515 TET
15
0.297
400
1024x768 ©75 Hz 99-75
28-65 384x391x160
85
XXXIX X
TCO 99
Manual, Warranty registration card, Audio Cable,
Signal Cable, Power Cord, DC Adapter
24.75 4.25 37.25 1575 9.5 34.955
eZ 8
3 years Carry in 59.16897727 <>
Chemoplast
022-26733353
chemoplastmumbai@ vsnl.net www.chemoplast.com 22,000
Digi-View DGL-115SP 15 0.297x0.297 250 1024x768 50-70
29-60 390x375x150 4.2
x
Y
350
Y x x x
FCC
Manual, power cord, VGA Cable, Audio Cable, DC adapter
27.15 4.25
36.75 17.75 11.25 37.84
12.66 4
1 year
59.49468182 LE
D-Link India Ltd
022-26526696 sales@dlink.co.in
www.dlink.co.in 22,000
HCL
HCM 500 LSA
15
0.297
N/A
1024x768 @/5 Hz 55-75
30-60
356x356x160
37
%
Y
30
x
x
x
x
EPA Energy Star Manuals power and video cable and driver disk.
26 35 31.5 13:25 9.5 31.87 3 10.31 4
1 year
49.17329832 ©
HCL Infosystems Ltd
044-22340165 kiruba@hclp.com
www.hclinfosystems.com 21,990
EEN 60
JULY 2003
LG Philips Philips Samsung Samsung Sharp 566LE 150 MT20P 150 P4AB Syncmaster 151M P SyncM aster 152 s LL-T1520-B 15 15 15 15 15 15 0.297 x 0.297 0.29 0.297 0.297 0.297 0.297 250 310 250 250 250 250 1024x768@/5 Hz | 1024x768@/5 Hz 1024x768@/5 Hz 1024x768 1024x768@/5 Hz 1024x768@/5 Hz 50-75 56-75 56-76 56-85 56-75 60-75 31-61 31-63 30-61 30-69 30-61 31.5-60 356x351x182.1 392x374.1x167.8 314x319x218 358.6x361.5x175.5 357.5x346.7x184.5 337x355x185 4.1 4.1 3.9 4.2 2.9 4.9 % x ¥ 8 x Y x x x x 90 Y x v Y x x VY x x x x x x External TV Tuner x x TCO 99 Energy Star EPA Energy Star, TCO 99 TCO 95 User guide, driver | power cord, signal TCO 99 Manual and driver CD, 1 power cord, 1 AC adapter, | Display cable, power CD, Power cord, cable, External TV No power cord, VGA Cable, | Manual, 1 CD with drivers, cable, floppy with driv HD15 Cable tuner, Remote , HDTV Audio Cable, AC adapter, | 1 wal mountable stand, 1 set | ers, 1 audio cable attached compatibiity Remote and internal TV | of 7 screws with 4 jumpers,
tuner card 1 display cable, 1 booklet on
Natural Colour Mngt system
30.25 20.25 4.5 35 37.5 34.5 16 15.5 10.25 11.25 3757 32.753 2 6 10.72 5.04 10 8
3 years onsite
60.286875 bE
LG Electronics India Pvt Ltd
0120-2560900
response@ Igezbuy.com www.lgezbuy.com 24,000
3 years comprehen- sive including Panel warranty 51.79189778
=
Philips India Ltd
022-56912353
sanjay. maheshwari@ philips.com www.philips.co.in 49,990
3 years comprehen- sive including Panel warranty
55:3155
2
Philips India Ltd
022-56912353
sanjay. maheshwari@ philips.com www.philips.co.in 32,000
15” LCD
3 years/onsite
61.68158333 2.
Samsung Electronics India Information &
Telecommunication Ltd
011-51511234
marketing@ samsungindia.com
www.samsungindia.com
60,000
3 years/onsite
69.44375
Samsung Electronics India Information & Telecommunication Ltd. 011-51511234
marketing@ samsungindia.com www.samsungindia.com 26,000
1 year
54.84274194 2
Sharp India Ltd
011-26431313/ 26438866 Icd@sharp-oa.com
www.sharp-world.com 31,000
HEN 61
toge Offer on page 94-95
JULY 2003
CATEGORY
Brand
Model
Size (Inches)
Pixel Size (mm)
Luminance (cd/m2)
Maximum Resolution/Refresh Rate Vertical Scan Rate (Hz)
Horizontal Scan Rate (KHz)
W x H x D (mm)
Weight (KG)
USB hub (¥/%)/ No. Of. ports In-built speakers (v /%)
Rotating angle of screen
Wall Mounting (//%%)
Height Adjustment (cm or inches) Landscape to portrait (v /%) In-built TV-Tuner (v /%)
Emission Standard Followed Bundled Accessories
(Manuals, Colour Profile,
Driver and Calibrating software...)
Sharpness and Resolution (Scale of 35) Screen Pixel Resolution (Scale of 5) Color and Gray Scale (Scale of 45) Miscellaneous Effect (Scale of 20)
LCD Additional Test (Scale of 15) Overall 50 % (performance only) Overall 20 % features only)
Overall 20 % Value for Money
Overall 10 % warranty and support
No. Of years/Type of warranty
Overall Product Score Ranking
Contact
Phone Email
Website Price (Rs.)
15” LCD
Sharp
LL-T15G3
15
0.297
260
1024x768@/5 Hz 56-75
31.5-60.2 338x313x145
3.8
x
x
90
Y
x
x
x
TCO 95
Manual, floppy with drivers, signal cable
1 year 62.20235556 <>
Sharp India Ltd 011-26431313/ 26438866
Icd@sharp-oa.com
www.sharp-world.com 22,500
Sony
SDM-S51
15
0.297
250
1024x768@60 Hz 28-60
48-75 387.35x330.2x177.8 37
TCO 99
Manual, Warranty card, Audio Cable, Signal Cable, Power Cord, AC Adapter, utility CD-ROM
2 year/onsite in metros and carry in rest of India
53.75568254 ba
Rashi Peripherals
022-28260258 ho@rptechindia.com
www.sony.com 31,500
Acer
AR
17
0.26
250 1280x1024@/5 Hz 56-75
24-80 374x394.5x204
7
x
A
80
Y
x
*
x
TCO 99
Power cord, video cable
1 year on site
57.47007402 O
Acer India Pvt Ltd
080-5219520
rajesh_aiyar@ acer.co.in www. acer.co.in 39,990
17” LCD
Benq BenQ FP 767 FP 781 17 17 0.26 0.26 290 200 1280x1024 1280x1024 56.25-75 56.25-75 31.47-83 31.47-81.18 382.7x404.3x200 | 404.6x449.6x202.1 4.4 4.7
x
Y
x
x
x
x
x MPRII MPRII Power cable, users | power cord, manual, color soft- | Driver/Manual CD, ware and driver CD. | Quick Start Guide,
Power Adapter, HD15 Cable, Audio Cable
28.25 4.25 36 16.5 10.75 36.83 5 10.08 10
3 years/Onsite 3 years/onsite
68.05796028 (>
61.90603805 O
Benq India Pvt Itd | Benq India Pvt Itd
022-25705231 022-25705231
salesenquiryin@ salesenquiryin@
beng.com beng.com www.benq.co.in www.benq.co.in 38,499 41,499
Sharp LL-T15G3
So 15-inch LCD monitor is ideal or first time LCD monitor users, or busi- nesses looking for a value-oriented solution for multi-monitor applications. It uses a bright, vivid 15-inch TFT liquid crystal panel with a wide viewing angle—the LL- T15G3 provides bright, clear pictures, in which even small letters are clearly legible. The monitor’s one-touch automatic screen adjustment feature easily renders all syn- chronization and geometry adjustments to
MEN 62
match your computer's video sig- nal. In addition, the auto gain control function automatically
matches the black level and į contrast, optimising the mon- itor for best viewing. The į monitor colour management func- tion compatible with the ‘SRGB’ international stan- dard for colour reproduc-
also features a
tion. By performing colour conversions that adjust to “liquid crystal characteristics, = the LL-T15G3 displays pic- tures with natural tones, and colour matching is achieved with sRGB compatible periph- eral equipment. On the performance front it aced three of our five tests, securing its winning position.
JULY 2003
HCL LG
HCM 700 LSA Flatron 1710B 17
x 0.26
x 250
x 1280x1024@/5
x Hz
x 56-75
x 30-83
x 370x421x223
x 6.6
x v/3
X% x
x Swivel 360
x Y
x x
x x
x x
Manuals power and TCO 99
video cable and driver disk.
User guide +info CD, power cord, DVI cable, HD 15 cable, USB cable
20 325 32 135 7.5 29.09 O x 7.66 4
1 year/ carry in
3 years onsite
40.75031579 Ld
68.81419512 <>
LG Electronics India Pvt Ltd
HCL Infosystem
044-22340165 0120-2560900
Philips
170 B4 MG 17
0.26
260 1280x1024 56-76
30-82 375x413x184 6.3
% / Optional Y
175
x
Y / 50 Mmm
Y
x
Energy Star power cord, signal cable, manual, user guide on CD,
3 years comprehen- sive including Panel warranty 53.64725741
2
Philips India Ltd
022-56912353
Samsung
SyncM aster 171MP 17
0.264
240 1280x1024@/6 Hz 56-85
30-81 412x418x203
5
x
Y
80
x
x
x
Y
TCO 99
Manuals, Installation CD, 15-pin D-Sub Signal Cable, Scart Jack, DC Adapter, Remote Controller.
3 years/onsite
64.0328 <>
Samsung Electronics india information & telecommunication Ltd 011-51511234
Samsung SyncMaster 171s
17
0.264
250
1280x1024@/6 Hz 56-76
30-81 444,.5x457.2x208.3
5 4i
x
x
1602/1202 (H/V)
Y
Y
Y
x
TCO 99
Manual, Signal Cable, Power Cord, CD with drivers, 1 CD with Pivot Software, Natural color management system booklet, monitor installation guide
3 yeary onsite
72.91628571 LA
Samsung Electronics india information & telecommunication Ltd 011-51511234
Sony ViewSonic SDM-S71 VG700 17 17 0.26 0.26 250 260 1280x1024 1280X1024@60 Hz 48-85 50-85 28-92 30-62 423x399x233 410x421x119 6.5 52 x x x Y x x x Y x x x x x TCO 99 Energy Star, 1 Manual, 1 limited | TCO 99
Manual, color profile software, driver, calibrating software, kensington lock.
warranty card,
1 power cable,
1 display connector cable, 1 CD with drivers, 1 power adapter
22.5 4.75
35.25 | ys
12 | 34.22
8 | 5.53
10
2 years/onsite in 3 years onsite. metros and carry in rest of India 53.46902703
2
57.75302703 .
Rashi Peripherals Roop Technology
Pvt Ltd 022-28260258 022-26681921/ 022-26681923
kiruba@hclp.com respoonse@ sanjay. maheshwari@| marketing@ marketing@ ho@rptechindia.com | roop@vsni.com Igezbuy.com philips.com samsungindia.com samsungindia.com www. hclinfosystems.com | www.lgezbuy.com | www.philips.co.in | www.samsungindia.com | www.samsungindia.com | www.sony.com www.viewsonic.com 38,000 41,000 52,990 75,000 42,000 74,000 49,000 Samsung Syncmaster 1715S f you're looking for a monitor that is colours for every application. developers. Plus, convenient
small in size, but big on performance, the Syncmaster 1715S has it all. This TFT- LCD monitor has the features of a quality 17-inch LCD with a space-saving elegant slim design. It’s ideal for the crowded office or the home user looking to maxi-
mize space.
Read e-mails, view your critical data, and play games on the 1715, as it delivers the same crisp, clear text and bright vivid
EN 63
At 1280 x
1024 maximum res-
olution, it is flicker-free with automatic adjustment. This monitor produces razor sharp images, high brightness, and a 330:1 contrast ratio, for picture
perfect images every time.
An exceptional responsetime
ideal for video, 3D technologies, and Web
one-button auto-calibration and
colour control add new levas of precision to any application.
On the performance front
it scored very high marks
(40.817 per cent) and moreover
due the price tag of only Rs
| 42,000, it won the award of the Best Value category. © MITUL MEHTA, BHASKAR BANIK and SHIJU THOMAS
JULY 2003
test drive E CER
Spyware, virus and unauthorised access, —we bring you the tools that will protect your PC, and the world within it
66 Firewalls 71 Antivirus BEA | Lene 78 Anti-Spyware oop iA i | ItLUsTRATINS: Mahesh Benkar
EN 64 JULY 2003
test drive a ne ER
Where is the Fire?
he Internet is one of the best things that ever hap-
pened to mankind. But like all good things in life,
it also comes with its share of woes. What was once
meant to be a means for sharing important infor-
mation across geographical boundaries, has now
turned into a vehicle that lets hackers sit in the comfort of their dens and wreak havoc on unsuspecting users. Securing systems and data from such malicious activity has been the top concern of leading corporate houses across the globe, and has led to a billion dollar Internet security industry. Almost all organisations employ the services of professional security companies to secure their networks from hackers. Despite this, there has been an increase in hacking activity and security exploits worldwide.
home users? Aren’t they prone to the same level of vul- nerabilities? Well, not really; it’s actually much worse. A
If this is the case with corporates, then what about O.. are
requests from the dan- iii eee gerous ones. In short, TETEA Si bya they should have enough intelligence to catch newer tools that use some variations of the older techniques in the same way as anti-virus CE eR od Bap betel aig software have to use [ERI Onis nei e heuristics to catch newer A software firewall sits on your laptop or strains of older viruses. desktop and scrutinises all Internet traffic Firewalls use three primary techniques to protected you from malicious code and hackers. These are Packet Filtering, State Inspection and Appli- cation Level Inspection In Packet Filtering, the firewall simply inspects the IP addresses of the packets, and compares it with an
majority of home users access the Internet without like doors to access control list to decide upon the fate of the con- installing any security software in the belief that their your system, cerned packet. Since the firewall does not have any in- computers are too unimportant to be hacked. This is no and if left ajar, built intelligence and it does not remember any longer the case (see box, ‘W hy would Anybody Hack my any smart previous information about the packets transmitted— PC?’), and even if it were, there are enough mischief mon- hacker could the overhead place by this technique is minimum.
gers out there who wouldn't mind spending hours hack- break into The next level of security is provided by State ing into a PC just for fun. your PC Inspection firewalls. They not only inspect the con-
So what do you do about this threat? Simple, just install one of the personal firewalls that are specifically tailored to protect the home user against crackers. These appli- cations quietly sit on your PC and look through all the tons of traffic that goes through your network connection everyday. They protect you against all the bad guys out there trying to get ahold of your PC.
The internals
A firewall’s basic function isto protect your computer against any form of Internet abuse. This is easier said than done for the num- ber of new methods and tools available for hacking issmply mind- boggling. Fortunately (or unfortunately), all these tools are based upon certain age-old exploits that were found in the protocols run- ning the Internet. These include various forms of Port Scanning, Packet filter- ing and Denial Of Service (DOS) attacks. Firewalls are always standing guard at your PC’s doorstep trying to figure out genuine pings (see box on ‘Useful Com- mands’) and denying
Packet filtering firewalls only look at the source and destination IP address- es of a packet, and then decide its fate
tent of the packet, but also look through their behav-
ioural history to decide whether to grant access or not. Application Level Inspection is the most advanced tech- nique, whereby every layer of the TCP/IP protocol stack is inspected, and a decision is taken accordingly. Obviously, this level of inspection also places maximum overhead on thesystem.
How we tested
The tests were designed to test the firewall’s capability for pro-
viding basic security, as well as all the enhanced features. Information Leakage Tests: The firewall’s ability to resist
external users from gaining information—such the operating sys-
tem used, number of open ports—about the target machine is
tested here.
Helpful commands
Apart from using a firewall, there are some very useful commands that can be used to monitor your Internet connection. One of the most commonly used commands is ‘netstat’. It gives a list of the all the open ports on your machine along with the protocols being used, the foreign addresses that are accessing the ports, and the state of each connection. This command can really come in handy at times when you are suspicious of the activities going on your PC. Other commands that can be used to troubleshoot your Internet connection are ‘ping’ and ‘tracert’.
JULY 2003
fri es x EPEE E LE -u i o
Why would anybody hack my PC?
Hackers might break into your computer for various reasons. For one they may want to use your computer as a stepping stone to launch other attacks. This may be to use your machine remotely, to hack into another PC, or to use your PC as part of a distributed denial of service (DDOS) attack. They will use your machine to exe- cute their own programs, which might be anything from password crackers to port scanners. The hackers can also use your hard disk space to host data related to their hacking Web sites, so in case things go wrong, they can easily escape, as a site trace would lead to your computer.
Port scan testing: Port scan testing takes care of the fire wall’s ability to detect, and resist port scan attempts. Two stan- dard port scanners were used—nmap and LANGuard. A third utility called Port Fun was also used. Finally, Open Ports is an HTA application that loads inside your browser, runs the netstat command locally, and then uploads the results to a server, along with displaying the results in your Web browser.
Detection of existing Trojans: In this test, Port Fun was installed on our test bed prior to installing the firewall. This program opens up ports on the test bed without specifying any service, or application using it. The fire wall’s ability to block it from opening up the ports was recorded.
OS Detection: Here, nmap was used with the -o option to perform active stack fingerprinting—a tech- nique of sending custom IP packets to the victim’s PC, and identifying the OS by analysing the response. This test was performed since detecting the operating system on the victim’s computer is one of the first things that a cracker does. It gives him details of the version and patch level of the OS on thetarget, thereby letting him use relevant exploits available on various underground Web sites.
Hostile scripts test: In thistest, the firewall’s capability to detect and resist malicious scripts was tested. This has been included because firewall vendors claim that their offerings can detect and protect the host PC from all embedded objects on a Web page. This includesJ avaScript, applets, ActiveX objects, etc.
The hostile Java applets used for this test are available at http://packetstormsecurity.org.pk/java/. One of these isthe Consume
Applet whose sole purpose is to waste processor power. To seif | | the firewall actually inspects all the internals of the HTTP stream, the applet page was renamed with a .txt extension instead of an-
«html extension. prah To test the hostile embedded ActiveX resisting capability of
the firewall, we used the ActiveX object test provided at the Fin-
jan.com Web site (http://www.finjan.com/mcrc/demos/activex.cfm).
Resource Utilisation
Firewalls protect your network at various security levels—from absolutely no inspection levels for trusted networks, to highly paranoid levels of packet inspection. But all these levels place additional overheads on system resources, proportional to the level of packet inspection specified. All memory resident programs from the system were removed and the firewall was then activated to test resource utilisation. The increase in kernel and memory utilisation was then measured to give the
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HEN 67
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additional system overhead placed by the firewall in the non-operational state.
Features: Additional features provided by the firewall—Ad Blocking, Mail Scanning, online alerts of malicious activity, update mechanisms, report generation and logging, Traffic Authorisation policies, inbound and outbound connection port blocking, provision for blocking using protocols, security levels provided, and the default security level—were noted.
Test set up: The test set up consisted of three machines. One wasthe target machine with the firewall installed on it, and the other two were used for hacking into the target. The target computer ran Windows XP. One of the attacking machines also ran XP, while the other was Linux based. The Linux machine used nmap for all thescanning and OSfingerprinting tests, while the Windows PC used LAN Guard.
Sygate Personal Firewall Pro v5.0 build 1175:
his firewall is pleasing to the eye, and instead of alist of hack- ing events that your PC is subject to, it displays eye-catching graphs that show all the traffic in your little corner of theInternet and the work done by villainstrying to get into your system. Also, it logs almost all the Internet activity into four logs—the Security Log, Traffic Log, Packet Log and System Log. It also gives you a list of all the applications currently accessing the Internet in their full iconic glory. It also does a very good job at stopping port scans, going asfar as specifical ly stating that nmap was trying to do a port scan on your machine. It was also one of the few firewalls that stopped Open Ports from loading directly from the Web site. However it was toothless when Open Ports was run locally; it could not stop it from uploading
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JULY 2003
test drive a Sorters
What is a Hardware Firewall?
Extremely large networks have what is known as a Hardware Fire- wall. This is a group of dedicated servers running a special OS and nothing else but the firewall. These servers are placed along the periphery of the network, such that no access to the Internet is available except through them. This creates a demilitarised zone (DMZ), an area that cannot be trespassed by unauthorised individuals.
the results to its server. It also did aterriblejob at stopping Port Fun from opening up ports on the test bed.
Price: $39.95 m System requirements: Windows XP, 2000, NT, Me, 98, 95, Pentium 133 or equivalent CPU, 32 MB RAM, 10 MB free disk space, IE 5.0 or later Web site: www.sygate.com m Grade: A-
Microsoft XP Internet Connection Firewall:
he default Internet Connection Firewall (ICF), bundled with
Windows XP, is as barebones as can be. It got the maximum score in installation since you just have to click on a check box to enable the firewall. It was also very easy to configure, although the number of features that could be configured was pretty much less than any other firewall we tested. But it did a good job at resisting port scans. One good thing about the ICF is that it has avery high default security level, although email clients such as Outlook Express can still access and download e mails unrestricted. Another shortcoming isthe absence of alert- ing mechanisms and avery cryptic log file that hardly makes any sense to the layman.
Price: Free with Windows XP m System requirements: Bundled with Windows XP m Web site: www.microsoft.com m Grade: B
Kerio Personal Firewall 2.1.5:
his firewall from Kerio Technologies stood fifth overall—
not really impressive, but it does have some features that were absent in the other firewalls. For one, it has a feature that saves configuration settingsin multiple config files, so that they can be loaded as and when required—you don’t have to recon- figure tasks such as letting your colleagues access your shared folders. Unfortunately, it could not stop Port Fun from open- ing up ports, even when set to the highest security level.
Price: Free for personal use; $39 for a single user commercial license System requirements: Pentium class Procesor or higher; Windows 9x, NT4, ME, 2000, XP; 32 MB RAM; 10 MB available disk space
Web site: www.kerio.com Grade: B+
The Honeypot project
A Honeypot is a machine that is put up on the Internet with the purpose of attracting hackers and then extensively tracking their behaviour. The results obtained from thousands of such Honeypots, spread across the Internet, are then analysed
by the Honeypot project researchers and released in the
form of reports or books that are used to develop effective counter attacks.
MEN 68
Norton Personal Firewall 2003:
his is a very efficient firewall that resisted all port scan
attempts. Norton Personal Firewall uses the same LiveU pdate utility as Norton AntiVirus. It offered excellent resistance to port scanning. In fact, it even stopped Open Ports from running the netstat command and uploading results to the server. It has a friendly security assistant that lets you configure home network- ing, program scans, privacy control and password protection.
Price: $49.95 mSystem requirements: Windows XP, Pentium II 300 MHz or higher processor, Windows 2000 Pro, Me, 98, Intel Pen- tium 150 MHz, 25 MB hard disk space, 64 MB RAM, IE 5.01 = Web site: www.symantec.com m Grade: A
ZoneLabs ZoneAlarm Pro v3.7.159:
oneAlarm has been one of the best firewalls for Zc some time; and it was no different this time. It was easy to install, configure and provided very good protection.
Immediately after the install, the configuration wizard guides you through the privacy control, level of alerting and password protection settings. You can also let ZoneAlarm preconfigure per- missions for the browser and its components to access the Inter- net. After this, you can walk through a nine-step tutorial that will get you started with configuring the firewall.
The MailSafe feature lets you quarantine, or allow attach- ments based on their file types. For all its bells and whistles, ZoneAlarm does place some serious overhead on your Internet browser.
Price: $40 mSystem requirements: Windows 98 SE, Me, 2000 Pro, XP; 233 MHz Pentium CPU or higher; 10 MB of available hard disk space, Internet access, 48 MB for 98 SE/Me, 64 MB RAM for 2000 Pro, 128 MB RAM for XP m Web site: www.zonelabs.com m Grade: A+
ISS BlackICE PC Protection 3.6:
his firewall