So, theoretically AMD is "getting serious about desktop gaming CPUs again"... which is hilarious to me, since they haven't BEEN serious about any kind of desktop or consumer performance for 10 years now.
But it got me thinking about the current state of desktop gaming, and what the current price performance optimums are...
And I was actually kind of surprised...
Because it looks right now, that the "sweet spot" is right where it was about 18 months ago... only it's cheaper...
Right now, the sweetspot in gaming GPU price/performance is still the GTX970... which has been out since the middle of 2014.
You can get a really good gtx970 for $300-350 right now... The lower performing Radeon r9 290x is still over $400, and as high as $500, and the even lower performaing r9-290 is just touching $350.
And GTX980s, are still $500.
On CPU's the price performance equation is certainly more complicated...
First question for CPU is actually not about CPU, it's about RAM... and then motherboards.
Do you want a DDR4 machine or not... 16gb ddr4 runs $85 to $100 right now for 2400mhz or 2700mhz, and more like $115 to $125 for 3000mhz. 16gb of good high performance DDR3 is more like $85 flat for 3000mhz.
More importantly though, the best ddr4 mobos are a bit more expensive, and the best performing DDR3 is actually faster in some ways than DDR4... and more overclocking stable, with more options of overclocking motherboards etc... though that won't be the case for long, and the very best mobos are now DDR4.
I'd probably go for DDR4 to futureproof... but really, the price performance right now isn't definitive. And if you want to overclock, DDR3 may still be a better choice.
For DDR4 gaming boards... basically you've got three price points... $170 $270, and $370.
So... you've got options for socket 1151, and socket 2011... the socket 2011 options obviously being the more expensive, and taking the more expensive CPUs.
Right now, I'd still go with an 1151... Though a lot of people are doing Xeon gaming right now, I still think your best option and best value is with an i7, and the skylake based Xeons are now on the 1151 anyway.
For DDR3, you can still go for LGA1150 boards, and basically pay whatever you want. $50 to $400, with really good boards in the $150 to $200 range.
And the best value for performance in an i7, is actually probably still an older i7 like a 4790 or 4790k from 2014... at $300-310ish and $330-340ish respectively.
If you want the new skylake, the i7-6700 will run about 50-60 more and a 6700k unlocked will run $420ish.
.. but guess what... clocked the same, on the same speed RAM... they benchmark out at about the same... with the 4790 actually slightly edging out the skylake in some things.
... and overclocked to their maximum, the 4790k will out perform the 6700k in a lot of benchmarks... though some of that is simply that the boards and ram are better worked out.
So, to my mind, the gaming sweetspot right now is:
cpu: i7 4790k $330
Board: any decent gaming 1150 board $150
RAM: any decent 3000mhz gaming ram $85
GPU: any decent gtx970 $300
That's $865 for the core components, that would be variable among gaming builds. The rest... case, psu, ssd... is all the same, and based on personal preference more than anything else.
Oh and before you ask, no, there is no AMD option worth bothering with at this point, unless you're trying to build a much cheaper system.
If you want to be more current and future proof
cpu: i7-6700k $420
Board: decent gaming 1151 board $170
RAM: decent 3000mhz gaming ram $125
GPU: any decent gtx970 $300
$1015... about $150 more than the DDR3 system.
Is it worth the difference... ehhhh.... Performance wise, probably not... But getting into a DDR4 platform with an 1151 socket... Especially if you're thinking about going higher end on the board, with an NVME-SSD... yeah, probably.
Showing posts with label Tech. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tech. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 03, 2016
Thursday, February 26, 2015
Stop Calling Government Regulation Net Neutrality
Stop using "net neutrality" to refer to government regulation of the internet.
That's not what net neutrality is, and it's certainly not what the government regulations promulgated by the FCC today are, in this case "Common Carrier Rules".
People who don't know any better are celebrating todays faux "net neutrality" FCC action as a victory for freedom and free speech on the internet, when in fact, it's exactly the opposite.
I've written extensively about net neutrality and this is very much NOT it.
All the FCC has done today, is impose common carrier regulation on every ISP (oh and by the way, lots of other organizations as well who "provide internet access". No-one has any idea how the regulations are going to be finalized, what the language will mean, who will be impacted and how... except everyone knows it's going to cost a lot), instead of just the telephone companies it was already imposed on. Verizon for example, who was already one of the worst violators of net neutrality, even with common carrier regulation already in place for them.
Thus it makes competition and breaking of existing monopolies even harder, while not actually doing a damn thing to secure or improve neutrality... oh and it gives the FCC more control over the internet.
Absolutely none of those are good things.
Common carrier regulation is a big part of what made the current near monopolies on Internet access happy in the first place, because small independent companies couldn't compete with the giant Telcom conglomerates under those regulations. So, they all got swallowed up.
I've been working with telecommunications companies, and common carrier regulations, for more than 20 years. I'm an expert in governance and regulatory compliance, and I can tell you right now, NOBODY understands these regulations, because they are not capable of being understood.
These regulations and the rulings and case law associated with them go back to 1930s... and in some particulars all the way back to the 1870s. And of course, rather than replace them with something clear when they wanted to make new regulations, congress and the FCC just amended and added on and countermanded and...
I've flowcharted them before to try to see what applied how and where and when... the only thing I could come up with was "nobody knows for sure, it all depends what a regulator or judge says at the time".
This wasn't a blow for freedom and free speech... This was a giveaway to big corporate donors in the telecommunications industry.
The big telcos have been trying to get their primary competition, non-telco ISPs, burdened with the same regulatory load they labor under, for DECADES. Now, in one stroke, the FCC at the personal direction of the president, has given it to them.
Oh and guess what else common carrier regulation includes... SURVEILLANCE. All common carriers are required to provide the government and law enforcement "reasonable access" for surveillance, as well as to give up records, usage details, and other subscriber and user data, WITHOUT A WARRANT.
What does "reasonable access" mean? Whatever the government says it means... and if you think I'm exaggerating, I'm not. I've dealt with the FBI on this issue, and that's a direct quote.
Yes, this is not only a massive corporate crony handout, it's also a huge gimme to the FBI and the NSA, who have wanted all ISPs stuck under common carrier for years as well.
Stop calling government regulation of the internet "net neutrality". Letting the liars control the language helps them lie to you.
Net neutrality is not government regulation, and these regulations are certainly not net neutrality, nor anything like it. Don't be taken in by fraud, cronyism, and statism, masquerading as freedom.
That's not what net neutrality is, and it's certainly not what the government regulations promulgated by the FCC today are, in this case "Common Carrier Rules".
People who don't know any better are celebrating todays faux "net neutrality" FCC action as a victory for freedom and free speech on the internet, when in fact, it's exactly the opposite.
I've written extensively about net neutrality and this is very much NOT it.
All the FCC has done today, is impose common carrier regulation on every ISP (oh and by the way, lots of other organizations as well who "provide internet access". No-one has any idea how the regulations are going to be finalized, what the language will mean, who will be impacted and how... except everyone knows it's going to cost a lot), instead of just the telephone companies it was already imposed on. Verizon for example, who was already one of the worst violators of net neutrality, even with common carrier regulation already in place for them.
Thus it makes competition and breaking of existing monopolies even harder, while not actually doing a damn thing to secure or improve neutrality... oh and it gives the FCC more control over the internet.
Absolutely none of those are good things.
Common carrier regulation is a big part of what made the current near monopolies on Internet access happy in the first place, because small independent companies couldn't compete with the giant Telcom conglomerates under those regulations. So, they all got swallowed up.
I've been working with telecommunications companies, and common carrier regulations, for more than 20 years. I'm an expert in governance and regulatory compliance, and I can tell you right now, NOBODY understands these regulations, because they are not capable of being understood.
These regulations and the rulings and case law associated with them go back to 1930s... and in some particulars all the way back to the 1870s. And of course, rather than replace them with something clear when they wanted to make new regulations, congress and the FCC just amended and added on and countermanded and...
I've flowcharted them before to try to see what applied how and where and when... the only thing I could come up with was "nobody knows for sure, it all depends what a regulator or judge says at the time".
This wasn't a blow for freedom and free speech... This was a giveaway to big corporate donors in the telecommunications industry.
The big telcos have been trying to get their primary competition, non-telco ISPs, burdened with the same regulatory load they labor under, for DECADES. Now, in one stroke, the FCC at the personal direction of the president, has given it to them.
Oh and guess what else common carrier regulation includes... SURVEILLANCE. All common carriers are required to provide the government and law enforcement "reasonable access" for surveillance, as well as to give up records, usage details, and other subscriber and user data, WITHOUT A WARRANT.
What does "reasonable access" mean? Whatever the government says it means... and if you think I'm exaggerating, I'm not. I've dealt with the FBI on this issue, and that's a direct quote.
Yes, this is not only a massive corporate crony handout, it's also a huge gimme to the FBI and the NSA, who have wanted all ISPs stuck under common carrier for years as well.
Stop calling government regulation of the internet "net neutrality". Letting the liars control the language helps them lie to you.
Net neutrality is not government regulation, and these regulations are certainly not net neutrality, nor anything like it. Don't be taken in by fraud, cronyism, and statism, masquerading as freedom.
Thursday, February 12, 2015
Guitar Heresy: PA speakers are Better than Cabs
If you really want to know how your amplifier, your guitar, or your bass sound; don't use a guitar or bass cab. Instead, use a high quality full range PA speaker of appropriate impedance for your amp.
Wait what?
Ayup, really, a high quality full range PA speaker, of the appropriate size, and properly set up; will always be more accurate, and often sound better, than all but the best guitar or bass cabinets; while being lighter, more durable, and MUCH cheaper.
What do you mean by "High Quality and Full Range" ?
By high quality, and full range, I mean a speaker that:
1. Is sturdily constructed, with no rattles, undamped harmonics etc
2. Has proper enclosure volume for its drivers
3. Is properly designed for its drivers
4. Has high sensitivity (minimum of 96db to 101db or so)
5. Has a broad flat frequency response (+/- less than 3db, preferably +/- 1db) in the frequency range of your instrument, and it's harmonic overtones to the 12th multiple of the fundamental.
That frequency range would be 31hz to 524hz (B0 to C5) for a 24 fret 6 string bass, with overtones to 6.3khz; and 82hz to 1.3khz (e2 to e6) for a 24 fret guitar, with overtones to 15.6khz.
The overtones are important, but they damp out very rapidly with each harmonic doubling. The first four multiples above the fundamental are called the "presence", and they can be heard and felt, inside ones head (particularly when amplifying acoustic stringed instruments). Generally because of harmonic attenuation, it's impossible to hear or feel anything above the 8th multiple of any fundamental (and above the fourth it's essentially inaudible) but you want the extra headroom, because even the best speakers attenuate towards the ends of their response curves, and harmonic attenuation mostly damps out the quieter harmonics above the second to fourth multiple already (I'm speaking in terms of multiples of the fundamental, instead of first through 16th harmonic, because I don't want to get into the variability of harmonics with scale, tuning, time and periodicity, resonating chambers, free air space etc...).
Speaking of that, you'll note that the lowest frequency on a five and six string bass is 31hz (it's 41hz on a 4 string). Unfortunately, almost no speakers have decent, clear, uncolored response below 45-50hz, even those in high quality bass cabinets. A good full range PA speaker will generally go down to between 45hz and 55hz, a will a good bass cab (classic Ampeg SVT cabs only go down to 58hz
This is deliberate, because unless you use a giant 15" or 18" subwoofer, (or use special very expensive 10" or 12" drivers) you just can't do 40hz or below and still sound good. Even with the giant subwoofer, the bass can sound muddy and rumbly.
Better PA speakers and bass cabinets still respond at frequencies under 455-55hz, they just roll off more than 3db (better speakers might have something like -3-6db at 5hz under nominal, and -6-10db at 10hz under nominal, with around 1-1.5db/hz attenuation for the next 10hz under nominal). This actually has the effect of making the bass sound "cleaner" and clearer; though at 31hz, it's still more felt than heard.
There are a few bass cabinets that have good response in those sub-bass ranges, like the Markbass standard 4x10 (response down to 35hz), and Ampeg Pro-Neo series (28hz in the 15" and 38hz in the 4x10,), but they're very expensive (they run about $900 to $1500).
Ok... so why is a PA speaker more accurate and "better"?
Frankly, most guitar cabs flat out suck. They're inefficient, heavy, expensive, and don't sound very good.
Generally, only the very best (and often most expensive) guitar caps sound great (or often, even good), and even then only in specific situations, for specific tones, with specific amps (because they have a strongly colored and biased voicing).
Even just a mid quality PA speaker, is generally better at reproducing sound accurately, than a very high quality guitar cab. The frequency response will be flatter and the sound will be clearer, with neutral coloration and voicing.
This is because a guitar cabs are deliberately designed, and their drivers are deliberately biased, to emphasize certain tones and attenuate certain tones (mostly attenuating very high and very low frequencies, with a curved response on the mids and mid-highs). When the speakers significantly alter the sound coming to them from the amp, this is called strong coloration, or strong voicing.
In general, it's very difficult (and expensive) for an 8", 10", or 12" driver to have desirable tonal characteristics across the full range of guitar frequencies and overtones, and most cabinets don't include high frequency horns (and the ones that do, generally don't voicematch them very well, blend them very well, or use good quality crossover networks, so they often sound harsh, thin, and "squeal" or "crackle").
Again, only the very highest quality (and most expensive) guitar cabs do so well (or at all); whereas even lower end PA speakers are specifically designed to use multiple drivers (a 12" or 15" full range will typically be a 3 way speaker, and may be as much as a dual woofer 5 way) to produce pleasing and even frequency response across the entire range of instrumental and vocal frequencies and their audible and "presence" overtones.
A single high quality high performance driver for a guitar cab, might cost as much as $450, and even midrange drivers can run $90 to $150. You can see how in a cheaper 2x12 cabinet retailing for $300, or combo retailing for $600, they've got to be buying lower end drivers, that just aren't that good.
At last with a combo amp, the manufacturer should have chosen drivers that match well with the amplifier. It's nearly impossible for a strongly voiced cabinet to sound good with a lot of different amplifiers. Manufacturers have to either try to make it as neutral as possible, in which case guitarists don't want it ("it sounds dead" or "it sounds cold"... it doesn't, it sounds neutral you just don't know how to use your gear to get the sound you want instead of having it done for you by the "strongly voiced" drivers), or give it a strong voice that sounds good for the amp they think most customers will want to use with it, for the style of music they think most customers will play with it.
This is one reason why you see many artists in certain styles of music or with certain play styles, all seem to have a strong preference for the same amps and cabs. It's not just fashion (though in part it is), it's because the manufacturer specifically voices those amps and cabs, to sound good for that style of music and play style.
Ok, forget about "voice" and "color", what about the rest of "better" ?
Decent PA speakers are also generally much more efficient than guitar cabs of equivalent quality, volume, and tone; because all but the very best guitar cabs have quite low sensitivity (some as low as 82db, and 86-92db are not uncommon for cheaper cabs and speakers, as opposed to 96-101db for the best of both PA speakers and cabs).
Higher sensitivity, means that for a given power level output to the speaker, the volume output will be louder. A 3db difference in sensitivity, means DOUBLE or HALF the power is required to produce the same volume.
Higher sensitivity also means allows a given sound at a given level, to be reproduced using less power, more accurately, with less tonal coloration or distortion (this is called headroom).
PA speakers are also generally much lighter, and often much better built and tougher than guitar cabs, even though they are much cheaper.
For some reason, many guitar cabs are surprisingly fragile. In part because they are meant to be prettier (they're often covered in decorative and relatively expensive this textured vinyl for example, vs throwaway dark grey or black industrial carpetlike material). In part it's because decent guitar drivers are VERY heavy, and can do damage to themselves and the cabs structure, if bumped about too much.
Whereas PA speakers are built to be knocked around. They're lighter, because the drivers they use weigh much less, and aren't as deep, so they can fit in smaller enclosures. These factors allow PA speakers to weigh as little as half the weight of an equivalent guitar cab, while still being built tougher.
These by the way, are several of the reason why I'm using a PA speaker for testing amps and guitars, and I'm not using my Ampeg 2x10 bass cab (I don't have a guitar cab right now). The cab is voiced specifically for bass, and in particular for the Ampeg PF500 and PF800 amplifiers (the other reason is I don't want to blow my good cab, if an amp malfunctions).
Guitars actually sound great played through bass amps and cabs by the way, particularly if you have a full range cab with a high frequency horn and good crossover (my Ampeg 2x10 PF-210he has +/-2b or less from 53hz to 17khz, at 98db, covering the full range of guitar harmonics with plenty of headroom).
Guitarists have been using bass amps for more power and a deeper "growl" tone, since Leo Fender invented the modern electric solidbody bass, and the first dedicated bass amp (in 1951 and 1952 respectively); particularly after they introduced the 50 watt 4x10 model in 1956 (setting the pattern for both bass and guitar speaker cabinets ever since).
In fact, the first "stacks" were Fender Bassman amp heads, with 4x10 bass cabinets; from way back in '60, when the loudest guitar amps you could get were Vox AC30s (30 watt 2x12. Still used by many artists today, including Brian May and the Edge. They mic them up on stage for the PA). Guitarists loved them, and bought every one that Fender could make. Even today, they are among the most prized vintage amps, easily costing $5,000 to $10,000.
When I'm testing, repairing, or reconditioning an amp or guitar, I want to hear as close to an accurate, uncolored, unshaped, neutral voiced tone as possible. A decent PA speaker is the best way to do that, without spending a massive amount of money.
I would love to have a top quality 2x10, 2x12, 4x10, or 4x12 guitar cab. Unfortunately, they're VERY expensive ($600 to $2000), as well as heavy and huge. Guitar cabs smaller than 2x10, generally sound like crap, and are still VERY expensive ($200 to $600 for good ones. The cheapest are 1x8", still cost $100 to $400, and they mostly sound like crap until you're past the midpoint of that price range).
Even just a half decent 10" or 12", two or three way, PA speaker ($100 to $300), set up properly, will sound as good or better, than all but the very best guitar cabinets.
Don't think so? I'll prove it.
Guess what... Any live show you've been to bigger than a coffee house or pub (and probably a lot of those gigs too), most of the guitar sound you heard wasn't coming from a Marshall stack. It was probably coming from that Marshalls preamp or DI output (or even directly off the pedalboard into a DI box), on a direct patch to the mixer, and out to the PA system.
The amp may or may not have also had the cabinets miked up and mixed in, but stage miking is difficult and inconsistent, and you need a wide variety of mics and rigs for different situations. It's hard enough with a single smaller amp and cab, never mind a big stack, or multiples. Some artists always mic their cabs, some never do, and some vary depending on the acoustics of the venue.
Either way though, the PA system has to sound pleasing while reproducing those guitar sounds. Which means they CAN reproduce those same sounds, and if they can reproduce those sounds when sent them from the PA amp, they can be made to make them in the first place.
Now, that doesn't mean the guitar cab doesn't sound good, and may in fact sound much better than a direct clean and "dry" signal from a preamp or DI box (if it's a good amp and cab, it almost certainly will). The guitar cab will be specifically tuned to accentuate the pleasing sounds and dampen the displeasing sounds, that a guitar and amp can make.
That however, is why most guitar specific DI boxes, modelers and the like, have something called "cab emulation", and many have "amp emulation" of specific amp types (and of course the whole point of modelers is that they do this).
These are circuits (or digital models) that when played through a clean and neutral speaker (or directly into a mixer or recording interface), emulate the way a well known amp and/or cabinet (like a marshall JCM800 through a 4x12, vox AC30, or Fender 2x12 combo... those are the most common emulations by far), will shape the tone of the guitar.
This is also why you have equalizers in any preamp, amp (and most amps with a DI can switch between equalized "wet" sound, and unequalized "dry" sound), modeler, mixer, and PA rig.
But using a PA speaker as a cab, you don't have to worry about that. We're not talking about playing wet or dry through a PA. What we're talking about is playing through your full sound chain, right up to the final drive stage.
In fact... give me $300 to get a half decent 2x12" 3 way PA speaker, and I guarantee I'll blow your $600 2x12" Fender cab, clean off the stage.
I know where I can get a 30hz 101db 2x15 4 way pa speaker for $300 (with eminence drivers even). That's stackable with a 101db 2x12 4 way in the same form factor also for $300. That's $600, in two cabs that collectively weigh in, and size up, just a bit bigger than Marshall 4x12. But sonically they would just blow the $1200 Marshall away. In fact, I'm certain they'd absolutely kill a full dual 4x12 stack costing $2500. Same amp, just two PA speakers instead of two cabs.
Between your pre-amp and amp (all guitar amps have a pre-amp. It's what makes them guitar amps rather than just power amps), amp and cab modeling or emulation, and proper equalization; you can get a good PA speaker to sound as good or better than an actual guitar cab of the same size, price, and quality (though not necessarily exactly the same as a specific amp and cab); and generally better than all but the very best cabs.
Wait what?
Ayup, really, a high quality full range PA speaker, of the appropriate size, and properly set up; will always be more accurate, and often sound better, than all but the best guitar or bass cabinets; while being lighter, more durable, and MUCH cheaper.
What do you mean by "High Quality and Full Range" ?
By high quality, and full range, I mean a speaker that:
1. Is sturdily constructed, with no rattles, undamped harmonics etc
2. Has proper enclosure volume for its drivers
3. Is properly designed for its drivers
4. Has high sensitivity (minimum of 96db to 101db or so)
5. Has a broad flat frequency response (+/- less than 3db, preferably +/- 1db) in the frequency range of your instrument, and it's harmonic overtones to the 12th multiple of the fundamental.
That frequency range would be 31hz to 524hz (B0 to C5) for a 24 fret 6 string bass, with overtones to 6.3khz; and 82hz to 1.3khz (e2 to e6) for a 24 fret guitar, with overtones to 15.6khz.
The overtones are important, but they damp out very rapidly with each harmonic doubling. The first four multiples above the fundamental are called the "presence", and they can be heard and felt, inside ones head (particularly when amplifying acoustic stringed instruments). Generally because of harmonic attenuation, it's impossible to hear or feel anything above the 8th multiple of any fundamental (and above the fourth it's essentially inaudible) but you want the extra headroom, because even the best speakers attenuate towards the ends of their response curves, and harmonic attenuation mostly damps out the quieter harmonics above the second to fourth multiple already (I'm speaking in terms of multiples of the fundamental, instead of first through 16th harmonic, because I don't want to get into the variability of harmonics with scale, tuning, time and periodicity, resonating chambers, free air space etc...).
Speaking of that, you'll note that the lowest frequency on a five and six string bass is 31hz (it's 41hz on a 4 string). Unfortunately, almost no speakers have decent, clear, uncolored response below 45-50hz, even those in high quality bass cabinets. A good full range PA speaker will generally go down to between 45hz and 55hz, a will a good bass cab (classic Ampeg SVT cabs only go down to 58hz
This is deliberate, because unless you use a giant 15" or 18" subwoofer, (or use special very expensive 10" or 12" drivers) you just can't do 40hz or below and still sound good. Even with the giant subwoofer, the bass can sound muddy and rumbly.
Better PA speakers and bass cabinets still respond at frequencies under 455-55hz, they just roll off more than 3db (better speakers might have something like -3-6db at 5hz under nominal, and -6-10db at 10hz under nominal, with around 1-1.5db/hz attenuation for the next 10hz under nominal). This actually has the effect of making the bass sound "cleaner" and clearer; though at 31hz, it's still more felt than heard.
There are a few bass cabinets that have good response in those sub-bass ranges, like the Markbass standard 4x10 (response down to 35hz), and Ampeg Pro-Neo series (28hz in the 15" and 38hz in the 4x10,), but they're very expensive (they run about $900 to $1500).
Ok... so why is a PA speaker more accurate and "better"?
Frankly, most guitar cabs flat out suck. They're inefficient, heavy, expensive, and don't sound very good.
Generally, only the very best (and often most expensive) guitar caps sound great (or often, even good), and even then only in specific situations, for specific tones, with specific amps (because they have a strongly colored and biased voicing).
Even just a mid quality PA speaker, is generally better at reproducing sound accurately, than a very high quality guitar cab. The frequency response will be flatter and the sound will be clearer, with neutral coloration and voicing.
This is because a guitar cabs are deliberately designed, and their drivers are deliberately biased, to emphasize certain tones and attenuate certain tones (mostly attenuating very high and very low frequencies, with a curved response on the mids and mid-highs). When the speakers significantly alter the sound coming to them from the amp, this is called strong coloration, or strong voicing.
In general, it's very difficult (and expensive) for an 8", 10", or 12" driver to have desirable tonal characteristics across the full range of guitar frequencies and overtones, and most cabinets don't include high frequency horns (and the ones that do, generally don't voicematch them very well, blend them very well, or use good quality crossover networks, so they often sound harsh, thin, and "squeal" or "crackle").
Again, only the very highest quality (and most expensive) guitar cabs do so well (or at all); whereas even lower end PA speakers are specifically designed to use multiple drivers (a 12" or 15" full range will typically be a 3 way speaker, and may be as much as a dual woofer 5 way) to produce pleasing and even frequency response across the entire range of instrumental and vocal frequencies and their audible and "presence" overtones.
A single high quality high performance driver for a guitar cab, might cost as much as $450, and even midrange drivers can run $90 to $150. You can see how in a cheaper 2x12 cabinet retailing for $300, or combo retailing for $600, they've got to be buying lower end drivers, that just aren't that good.
At last with a combo amp, the manufacturer should have chosen drivers that match well with the amplifier. It's nearly impossible for a strongly voiced cabinet to sound good with a lot of different amplifiers. Manufacturers have to either try to make it as neutral as possible, in which case guitarists don't want it ("it sounds dead" or "it sounds cold"... it doesn't, it sounds neutral you just don't know how to use your gear to get the sound you want instead of having it done for you by the "strongly voiced" drivers), or give it a strong voice that sounds good for the amp they think most customers will want to use with it, for the style of music they think most customers will play with it.
This is one reason why you see many artists in certain styles of music or with certain play styles, all seem to have a strong preference for the same amps and cabs. It's not just fashion (though in part it is), it's because the manufacturer specifically voices those amps and cabs, to sound good for that style of music and play style.
Ok, forget about "voice" and "color", what about the rest of "better" ?
Decent PA speakers are also generally much more efficient than guitar cabs of equivalent quality, volume, and tone; because all but the very best guitar cabs have quite low sensitivity (some as low as 82db, and 86-92db are not uncommon for cheaper cabs and speakers, as opposed to 96-101db for the best of both PA speakers and cabs).
Higher sensitivity, means that for a given power level output to the speaker, the volume output will be louder. A 3db difference in sensitivity, means DOUBLE or HALF the power is required to produce the same volume.
An aside on speaker sensitivity, volume, and solid state vs tube amps: Sensitivity ratings are given as db of sound energy output 1 watt, at 1 meter away from the speaker.
We don't hear 3db as a doubling of volume. 3db sounds roughly 10% louder to our ears, but it is a doubling of sound energy, and a doubling of input power.
It takes a 10db change for our ears to hear a doubling in volume, as well as taking 10 times the power (to double volume at the same frequency, impedance, and sensitivity).
However, because both our hearing, and the power requirements for sound energy are logarithmic, a 3db more sensitive speaker, will sound about twice as loud, if it's given 5 times the power as the less sensitive speaker, instead of 10 times the power. The difference gets even starker at 6db, or 9db and so on.
The most efficient speaker cabinet I've ever heard of was 103db. The least, 82db. Cheap combo amps will often have 86db or 89db speakers, while more expensive combos and cabs will generally 96db or 99db sensitivity. Let's see how that works out:
An 82db speaker will output 82db at 1 watt, 85db at 2 watts, 88db at 4 watts, 91db at 8 watts, 92db at 10 watts, 95db at 10 watts, 98db at 40 watts, 101db at 80 watts, and about 104db at 100 watts.
An 86db speaker will output 86db at 1 watt, 89db at 2 watts, 92db at 4 watts, 95db at 8 watts, 96db at 10 watts, 99db at 20 watts, 102db at 40 watts, 105db at 80 watts, and about 106db at 100 watts.
A 96db speaker will output 96db at 1 watt, 99db at 2 watts, 102db at 4 watts, 105db at 8 watts, 106db at 10 watts, 109db at 20 watts, 112db at 40 watts, 115db at 80 watts, and about 116db at 100 watts.
A 99db speaker will output 99db at 1 watt, 102db at 2 watts, 105db at 4 watts, 108db at 8 watts, 109db at 10 watts, 112db at 20 watts, 115db at 40 watts, 118db at 80 watts, and about 119db at 100 watts.
A 101db speaker will output 101db at 1 watt, 103db at 2 watts, 106db at 4 watts, 109db at 8 watts, 111db at 10 watts, 114db at 20 watts, 117db at 40 watts, 120db at 80 watts, and about 121db at 100 watts.
A 103db speaker will output 103db at 1 watt, 106db at 2 watts, 109db at 4 watts, 112db at 8 watts, 113db at 10 watts, 116db at 20 watts, 119db at 40 watts, 122db at 80 watts, and about 123db at 100 watts.
You'll note the 103db speaker is essentially as loud with one watt, as the 82db speaker is with 100 watts. It's also louder with 40 watts, than the 99db speaker is with 100; or louder at 20 watts, than the 96db speaker is at 100.
This efficiency factor by the way, combined with much higher gain in the preamp stages (which makes things sound louder at lower overall volume levels); is why cheap "100 watt" solid state amps, sound much quieter than very expensive 15 watt tube amps. The cheap solid state amp might have even cheaper 86db drivers in it. The tube amps have expensive 99db or even 101db sensitivity drivers.
That tube amp can get about 50% louder with 99db speakers at 15 watts, than the cheap solid state can with 86db speakers at 100 watts. With 101db speakers, it can get about 70% louder, and with 103db speakers it can get almost double the volume.
Tube amps used expensive high efficiency speakers, because they had to, because otherwise they didn't have enough power to get loud, or they would badly overheat. Solid state amps are much easier and cheaper to crank up the power on, and so they could afford to use cheaper, less efficient drivers.
Higher sensitivity also means allows a given sound at a given level, to be reproduced using less power, more accurately, with less tonal coloration or distortion (this is called headroom).
PA speakers are also generally much lighter, and often much better built and tougher than guitar cabs, even though they are much cheaper.
For some reason, many guitar cabs are surprisingly fragile. In part because they are meant to be prettier (they're often covered in decorative and relatively expensive this textured vinyl for example, vs throwaway dark grey or black industrial carpetlike material). In part it's because decent guitar drivers are VERY heavy, and can do damage to themselves and the cabs structure, if bumped about too much.
Whereas PA speakers are built to be knocked around. They're lighter, because the drivers they use weigh much less, and aren't as deep, so they can fit in smaller enclosures. These factors allow PA speakers to weigh as little as half the weight of an equivalent guitar cab, while still being built tougher.
These by the way, are several of the reason why I'm using a PA speaker for testing amps and guitars, and I'm not using my Ampeg 2x10 bass cab (I don't have a guitar cab right now). The cab is voiced specifically for bass, and in particular for the Ampeg PF500 and PF800 amplifiers (the other reason is I don't want to blow my good cab, if an amp malfunctions).
Guitars actually sound great played through bass amps and cabs by the way, particularly if you have a full range cab with a high frequency horn and good crossover (my Ampeg 2x10 PF-210he has +/-2b or less from 53hz to 17khz, at 98db, covering the full range of guitar harmonics with plenty of headroom).
Guitarists have been using bass amps for more power and a deeper "growl" tone, since Leo Fender invented the modern electric solidbody bass, and the first dedicated bass amp (in 1951 and 1952 respectively); particularly after they introduced the 50 watt 4x10 model in 1956 (setting the pattern for both bass and guitar speaker cabinets ever since).
In fact, the first "stacks" were Fender Bassman amp heads, with 4x10 bass cabinets; from way back in '60, when the loudest guitar amps you could get were Vox AC30s (30 watt 2x12. Still used by many artists today, including Brian May and the Edge. They mic them up on stage for the PA). Guitarists loved them, and bought every one that Fender could make. Even today, they are among the most prized vintage amps, easily costing $5,000 to $10,000.
In fact, guitarists loved them so much, and they were so rare and expensive, that Jim Marshall modified one to make his famous Marshall JTM45 (the first Marshall amp), deciding to use 4x12 cabinets with celestion speakers... And the Marshall legend was born.That said, the bass amps and cabs are distinctly biased for bass, and definitely do color the tone.
When I'm testing, repairing, or reconditioning an amp or guitar, I want to hear as close to an accurate, uncolored, unshaped, neutral voiced tone as possible. A decent PA speaker is the best way to do that, without spending a massive amount of money.
I would love to have a top quality 2x10, 2x12, 4x10, or 4x12 guitar cab. Unfortunately, they're VERY expensive ($600 to $2000), as well as heavy and huge. Guitar cabs smaller than 2x10, generally sound like crap, and are still VERY expensive ($200 to $600 for good ones. The cheapest are 1x8", still cost $100 to $400, and they mostly sound like crap until you're past the midpoint of that price range).
Even just a half decent 10" or 12", two or three way, PA speaker ($100 to $300), set up properly, will sound as good or better, than all but the very best guitar cabinets.
Don't think so? I'll prove it.
Guess what... Any live show you've been to bigger than a coffee house or pub (and probably a lot of those gigs too), most of the guitar sound you heard wasn't coming from a Marshall stack. It was probably coming from that Marshalls preamp or DI output (or even directly off the pedalboard into a DI box), on a direct patch to the mixer, and out to the PA system.
The amp may or may not have also had the cabinets miked up and mixed in, but stage miking is difficult and inconsistent, and you need a wide variety of mics and rigs for different situations. It's hard enough with a single smaller amp and cab, never mind a big stack, or multiples. Some artists always mic their cabs, some never do, and some vary depending on the acoustics of the venue.
Either way though, the PA system has to sound pleasing while reproducing those guitar sounds. Which means they CAN reproduce those same sounds, and if they can reproduce those sounds when sent them from the PA amp, they can be made to make them in the first place.
The dirty little secret of rock and roll?
It's really hard to get good natural sound, filling even a medium sized room, out of just a big amp and cab on stage. Most of the time, most performers (and importantly, most sound engineers), in most venues, don't even try.
On stage, amp stacks aren't for sound... They're for the show... the spectacle.
In a bigger venue, most of the time the artists don't even use ONE of the stacks for their OWN audio, using floor monitors or in ear monitors (like very high end earbuds, hooked into their wireless system, and letting them hear their tone evenly no matter where they are on the stage, as well as hearing the other band members, and crew communications).
At most, they'll have one stack miked up.
To get proper sound out of a full stack, you need to use EIGHT mikes (which are damn near impossible to set up, and even harder to mix and EQ properly), and a big acoustic shield to protect the mikes from excess reverb, echo, delay, and phase effects, and from spill sound from the house and the rest of the band; which screws up the visual look they're going for.
Here's another "secret" for you... A lot of the time, if you see an artist with big stacks out there on stage, and they want that "real stack sound"; the stacks you see on stage will actually all be unpowered dummies. Their REAL amp and cab will actually be back stage, behind noise insulation, properly miked up, mixed with the DI and turned way down, using only a few watts of power so as to not overload the mics.
This is also how Brian May, The Edge, and other guitarists that like to use lower powered classic amps, particularly combo amps like the Vox AC30; get their preferred tone, while filling a huge concert venue with sound.
If the artist wants a heavy feedback sound, they'll use a feedback or screamer effect. Either that, or they'll have a single amp with the gain turned all the way up, and a 2x12 floor monitor, or a single 4x12 cab on a riser to bring it to guitar height, that they'll walk up to for natural feedback. Even then, it will be miked, and mixed in the board, to go out to the in ears and PA.
Often, their sound guy will be watching for cues, and when they want the feedback, they'll turn that one amps mix up on the PA, and then turn it down afterwards so they don't get unwanted feedback, noise, and distortion.
Now, that doesn't mean the guitar cab doesn't sound good, and may in fact sound much better than a direct clean and "dry" signal from a preamp or DI box (if it's a good amp and cab, it almost certainly will). The guitar cab will be specifically tuned to accentuate the pleasing sounds and dampen the displeasing sounds, that a guitar and amp can make.
That however, is why most guitar specific DI boxes, modelers and the like, have something called "cab emulation", and many have "amp emulation" of specific amp types (and of course the whole point of modelers is that they do this).
These are circuits (or digital models) that when played through a clean and neutral speaker (or directly into a mixer or recording interface), emulate the way a well known amp and/or cabinet (like a marshall JCM800 through a 4x12, vox AC30, or Fender 2x12 combo... those are the most common emulations by far), will shape the tone of the guitar.
This is also why you have equalizers in any preamp, amp (and most amps with a DI can switch between equalized "wet" sound, and unequalized "dry" sound), modeler, mixer, and PA rig.
But using a PA speaker as a cab, you don't have to worry about that. We're not talking about playing wet or dry through a PA. What we're talking about is playing through your full sound chain, right up to the final drive stage.
In fact... give me $300 to get a half decent 2x12" 3 way PA speaker, and I guarantee I'll blow your $600 2x12" Fender cab, clean off the stage.
I know where I can get a 30hz 101db 2x15 4 way pa speaker for $300 (with eminence drivers even). That's stackable with a 101db 2x12 4 way in the same form factor also for $300. That's $600, in two cabs that collectively weigh in, and size up, just a bit bigger than Marshall 4x12. But sonically they would just blow the $1200 Marshall away. In fact, I'm certain they'd absolutely kill a full dual 4x12 stack costing $2500. Same amp, just two PA speakers instead of two cabs.
Between your pre-amp and amp (all guitar amps have a pre-amp. It's what makes them guitar amps rather than just power amps), amp and cab modeling or emulation, and proper equalization; you can get a good PA speaker to sound as good or better than an actual guitar cab of the same size, price, and quality (though not necessarily exactly the same as a specific amp and cab); and generally better than all but the very best cabs.
Friday, January 30, 2015
Why not use a TV as a monitor?
So, large screen LED backlit LCD televisions are amazing. They look great, and they've become quite affordable over the past few years.
Large computer monitors on the other hand, are still really expensive... Though the definition of "large" has changed over the past ten years from 17" to 19" to 21" to 24", to 27", and for the last couple years has topped out in the range of 30"-32". That's about the most people can comfortably fit on their desktop, and still be able to see the screen edge to edge without turning their heads.
Most people who want more screen area, just get two 24" monitors, because they don't need to look at a single big high resolution thing very much. Those who do, buy the 27" to 32" monitors bite the bullet, and pay the extra money.
So, since 32" tv's are so cheap, and so great, why not just buy one of those, or even a 37" or 40" etc... for a big monitor?
Yeah... why not use a flat screen TV as a monitor?
At first glance, it makes sense, and for some people in some applications, it absolutely does. But, there are a number of factors you need to take into account.
First, the sharpness, contrast ratio, luminance, and response time, are generally considerably better on decent computer monitors than on most televisions.
Those qualities are expensive, and get more so as screen size goes up. They're expensive on TV's as well, but to show a good HDTV image, you don't need as good a screen (technically a display panel).
Also, the image processing, color gamut, panel design and the like, are generally different between monitors and televisions.
Computer monitors are designed to display text and graphics very precisely but not necessarily naturally. PC monitors panels and image processing are designed to make text look very clear, readable, and high contrast, without being oversharp, especially black text on white backgrounds. Monitors (at least higher quality ones) are also generally designed to display a much broader range of colors, more accurately (meaning with less bias or distortion, at consistent brightness and contrast, across the whole panel. Better quality monitors can also be color, contrast, and brightness corrected and calibrated, and can adjust the display in ways to correct common computer display issues. Of course, how well they actually manage to do those is another question).
Televisions generally have panels and image processing designed to make live video and film images, especially fast moving images, more natural looking. They are also designed to make bright objects against a dark background look better, without popping or ghosting, and with a "natural" appearing color, softness, and motion blur. They also have different screen adjustments to address issues typical to HD video signals rather than computer display signals (overscan, position correction, aspect ratio etc...).
This by the way is one reason why professional video production monitors are much more expensive than normal televisions. They are designed with all of the capabilities of the best quality PC monitors, AND the best televisions, plus additional inputs, image controls, and correction and calibration capabilities (as well as some other things like refresh and color/refresh/channel sync lock).
Isn't 1080p good enough?
The issue isn't resolution... 1080p is good enough... at the right screen size and viewing distance.
The issue is our vision, contrast, pixel size, and viewing distance.
PC monitors are designed be looked at closely, from close distances. TV's are designed to be watched from farther away, looking at the whole screen at once.
A 1920x1080 screen at 50" vs a 1920x1080 screen at 24" have VASTLY different PPI (pixel per inch). The big screen will be 44ppi and the smaller screen will be 92ppi.
My phone has a 5.1" 1920x1080 screen at 432ppi.
That's a .6mm, a .28mm and a 0.06mm pixel size respectively.
Whether a particular pixel count is acceptable or not, depends on how far away your eyes are from the screen.
The average human can see an individual .6mm pixel in a contrasting field (one white pixel on black) from appx 78", a .28mm pixel from 37" and a 0.06mm pixel from about 8".
So what's the difference and what's the damage?
In the real world, you don't need super high quality, ultra contrast, ultra high pixel densityetc... for general computing. A 24" 1080p screen looks just fine for most things, including video, most gaming, and small text.
Cheaper 1080p screens in the the 32" size range are now available for $250 or so. They look fine for displaying HDTV. Unfortunately look like crap when used as computer monitors from typical chair to screen distances. The text can be difficult to read, window edges look weird, games look weird, colors don't look right, black and white look like grey and brighter grey (usually with some blue, green, or yellow mixed in).
That said, they're not entirely unusable, and for video, large text, status displays etc... they're fine for that. They're also fine at 6 feet away. A slightly more expensive TV in the same size range may also have more controls and options so you can calibrate and compensate and make it look better.
30" to 32" computer monitors start at twice that (for 1080p screens), and go up into the $5,000 range (for 4k 4096x2160). They also look great at typical chair to screen distances for anything but small text (at 1080p).
For small text, even 27" is iffy at 1080p. For a 27-32" you really want something like 2048x1152, 2048x1536 or 2560x1440, or go to a QHD/4k.
Professional video production monitors in the 30-32" range on the other hand START at around $5,000 for 1080p, and go into the $30,000 range for 4k. They look amazing at any distance (once you get used to a professional video screen, other screen look like crap in comparison).
If there weren't good reason for it, no-one would spend that extra money.
Large computer monitors on the other hand, are still really expensive... Though the definition of "large" has changed over the past ten years from 17" to 19" to 21" to 24", to 27", and for the last couple years has topped out in the range of 30"-32". That's about the most people can comfortably fit on their desktop, and still be able to see the screen edge to edge without turning their heads.
Most people who want more screen area, just get two 24" monitors, because they don't need to look at a single big high resolution thing very much. Those who do, buy the 27" to 32" monitors bite the bullet, and pay the extra money.
So, since 32" tv's are so cheap, and so great, why not just buy one of those, or even a 37" or 40" etc... for a big monitor?
Yeah... why not use a flat screen TV as a monitor?
At first glance, it makes sense, and for some people in some applications, it absolutely does. But, there are a number of factors you need to take into account.
First, the sharpness, contrast ratio, luminance, and response time, are generally considerably better on decent computer monitors than on most televisions.
Those qualities are expensive, and get more so as screen size goes up. They're expensive on TV's as well, but to show a good HDTV image, you don't need as good a screen (technically a display panel).
Also, the image processing, color gamut, panel design and the like, are generally different between monitors and televisions.
Computer monitors are designed to display text and graphics very precisely but not necessarily naturally. PC monitors panels and image processing are designed to make text look very clear, readable, and high contrast, without being oversharp, especially black text on white backgrounds. Monitors (at least higher quality ones) are also generally designed to display a much broader range of colors, more accurately (meaning with less bias or distortion, at consistent brightness and contrast, across the whole panel. Better quality monitors can also be color, contrast, and brightness corrected and calibrated, and can adjust the display in ways to correct common computer display issues. Of course, how well they actually manage to do those is another question).
Televisions generally have panels and image processing designed to make live video and film images, especially fast moving images, more natural looking. They are also designed to make bright objects against a dark background look better, without popping or ghosting, and with a "natural" appearing color, softness, and motion blur. They also have different screen adjustments to address issues typical to HD video signals rather than computer display signals (overscan, position correction, aspect ratio etc...).
This by the way is one reason why professional video production monitors are much more expensive than normal televisions. They are designed with all of the capabilities of the best quality PC monitors, AND the best televisions, plus additional inputs, image controls, and correction and calibration capabilities (as well as some other things like refresh and color/refresh/channel sync lock).
Isn't 1080p good enough?
The issue isn't resolution... 1080p is good enough... at the right screen size and viewing distance.
The issue is our vision, contrast, pixel size, and viewing distance.
PC monitors are designed be looked at closely, from close distances. TV's are designed to be watched from farther away, looking at the whole screen at once.
A 1920x1080 screen at 50" vs a 1920x1080 screen at 24" have VASTLY different PPI (pixel per inch). The big screen will be 44ppi and the smaller screen will be 92ppi.
My phone has a 5.1" 1920x1080 screen at 432ppi.
That's a .6mm, a .28mm and a 0.06mm pixel size respectively.
Whether a particular pixel count is acceptable or not, depends on how far away your eyes are from the screen.
The average human can see an individual .6mm pixel in a contrasting field (one white pixel on black) from appx 78", a .28mm pixel from 37" and a 0.06mm pixel from about 8".
You can get these numbers for yourself for any screen size here: https://www.sven.de/dpi/ and here: http://isthisretina.com/
So what's the difference and what's the damage?
In the real world, you don't need super high quality, ultra contrast, ultra high pixel densityetc... for general computing. A 24" 1080p screen looks just fine for most things, including video, most gaming, and small text.
Cheaper 1080p screens in the the 32" size range are now available for $250 or so. They look fine for displaying HDTV. Unfortunately look like crap when used as computer monitors from typical chair to screen distances. The text can be difficult to read, window edges look weird, games look weird, colors don't look right, black and white look like grey and brighter grey (usually with some blue, green, or yellow mixed in).
That said, they're not entirely unusable, and for video, large text, status displays etc... they're fine for that. They're also fine at 6 feet away. A slightly more expensive TV in the same size range may also have more controls and options so you can calibrate and compensate and make it look better.
30" to 32" computer monitors start at twice that (for 1080p screens), and go up into the $5,000 range (for 4k 4096x2160). They also look great at typical chair to screen distances for anything but small text (at 1080p).
For small text, even 27" is iffy at 1080p. For a 27-32" you really want something like 2048x1152, 2048x1536 or 2560x1440, or go to a QHD/4k.
Professional video production monitors in the 30-32" range on the other hand START at around $5,000 for 1080p, and go into the $30,000 range for 4k. They look amazing at any distance (once you get used to a professional video screen, other screen look like crap in comparison).
If there weren't good reason for it, no-one would spend that extra money.
Saturday, December 20, 2014
"Never speak of this again"
Many years ago, I used to have a "stupid" charge for clients.
I was completely upfront about it, and what I called it. i would explain this to my clients as part of my rates before starting a gig, or going out on a service call...
If you make me do something really stupid and irritating, because you didn't do what you were told to do, didn't follow instructions, repeatedly made the same dumb mistake, or called me out because you did something really dumb (like unplug the machine and not notice for example)... You got the stupid charge...
Double my hourly rate, two hour minimum charge.
If said call, or call out, was after hours, on a weekend, or a holiday, you got my "special stupid" charge, FOUR times my hourly rate... Eight times if it was any two, twelve times if it was all three.
At the time I was charging $35 an hour for basic IT service, including travel time from my office to their site if more than 15 miles.
So, sure enough, holiday weekend comes around, and I get a call at 8 o'clock at night from a very wealthy client (a good sized business owner who had a serious home office that I set up, with full connectivity to his business)... Systems not working... Can't connect to the internet, can't print. And this guy has a 24/7 monthly service contract with me, with a 4 hour response (he paid for it gladly, and in general he was a very good client).
I go through an hour or so of troubleshooting, including specifically asking the guy to check all his power and interconnect cables, and look for power lights, and explaining to him my stupid charge. He was adamant he checked everything and he needed me to come out there (over an hours drive each way) right now... I explained to him that if when I got there it wasn't a covered service, he'd have to pay a minimum of six hours service (3 hours travel, 2 hour minimum service charge, one hour out of hours phone service) at the "special stupid" rate (over $2500 total)... He was absolutely certain.
So, I drive out there to the middle of nowhere mountains, walk into the office, look hard and sideways at the hardware for about 30 seconds from across the room....
...Walk over and plug the power strip the modem and router were plugged into, back into the wall.
Then I turn them both on, plug the phone line from the modem back into the wall, wait for them to come up, turn to the PC next to them, try to access the net and dial out, hear the modem dial out, and watch the browser start loading a page, and the printer start printing a test page.
I turned around again, and the guy was already standing there with a signed check in his hand.
From greeting him at the front door, to that moment, I hadn't said a word... I started to say "that's not necessary" (in fact I wasn't going to charge him the stupid charge at all, just the 6 hours).
He interrupted me, handed me the check and said "Here's $5000... never speak of this to anyone".
... And I didn't, until after he passed on a few years later...
Monday, November 10, 2014
Net Neutrality… Obama… Cruz… How About Oliver?
Today, Barack Obama(D) has announced that he will pretend to support net neutrality:
In response, Ted Cruz (RPDGC*), has announced that Net Neutrality is the work of the devil:
The idea that either Democrats OR Republicans actually support net neutrality is a joke.
The Democrats have (and still do) very strongly supported big media and big communications, who are largely anti neutrality. It’s only now that net neutrality has obviously become a big issue among young liberals (who were largely unmotivated to turn out this midterm election), that they have pretended to support it.
The Dems could have made it a campaign issue, except then they wouldn’t have had the huge media and communications industry money for the elections, that they needed to avoid getting spanked even worse than they did.
If Obama had actually supported net neutrality, he wouldn’t have appointed an anti neutrality industry stooge as FCC chair… but again, if he did that, the Dems would have lost that sweet sweet big media money.
On the other hand, the Republicans are largely anti “big media” and anti “big communications”, and only became anti-neutrality when the Democrats decided to take it as an issue.
What is Net Neutrality?
Frankly, any libertarian should support net neutrality as a principle (government regulation is another matter).
Net neutrality as a principle, is simple. All legitimate traffic should be treated equally, no matter the source or destination. No internet service provider should filter, censor, or slow down traffic from their competitors, their critics, or because of politics or national origin; or for any reason other than technical requirements for safe, efficient, and reliable network operation.
It’s how the internet has always been run, up until recently, without any government action necessary. There’s a famous quote: “The internet interprets censorship as damage and routes around it”. Any internet service provider that censored, filtered, or slowed down traffic from anyone (for anything other than technical reasons) was routed around, and cut out of the net, by its peers. It was a great example of independent action and peer enforcement working in the marketplace.
Unfortunately, this is no longer the case.
Why is it an issue now?
Large media and communications companies like Comcast and Verizon have been deliberately and artificially blocking or slowing down traffic to and from their critics and competitors.
Of course, getting government involved does generally make things worse. In fact, it already did in this case, since the government has been involved from the beginning, and it was largely government action that created the current problem.
In a rational and unbiased competitive environment, consumers would have a reasonable choice of internet service providers, and any ISP that chose to censor or limit access, would lose customers, and either correct themselves or go out of business.
Unfortunately, we don’t have anything like a free and competitive market in internet access. Government regulation and favoritism has created huge monopolies (or at best duopolies, and no, wireless access is not realistic and reasonable competition given the distorted market and cost structures there either) in internet access.
We've reached a point where the telecommunications monopolies that government created and support, are in fact deliberately applying anticompetitive, unfair (and in some cases already unlawful) restraint against their critics and competitors.
Since they are government supported monopolies, the market is not allowed to correct the undesirable private action.
This means that, unfortunately, government action IS required… and even if it were not required, it’s inevitable, because politics is politics, and this is now an “Issue”.
So what do we do about the problem?
Please note, I don’t trust either Democrats OR Republicans on the issue in general, and I don’t trust either, or the FCC to regulate neutrality at all. Cruz does have at least one valid concern, in that the history of government regulation of almost every industry, but particularly technology, is mainly a long record of suppressing innovation and other negative unintended consequences.
The ideal solution is to end the government created internet access monopolies that most Americans live under, and allow free and open market competition to correct the problem.
Without government limitations on competition in actual high speed, high quality internet access; competition will increase, prices will fall, and any provider that filters or slows legitimate traffic will lose all their customers and go out of business.
This isn't just a prediction or libertarian idealism talking by the way. It’s been proved out in Korea, Japan… even in the UK. Everywhere that internet access competition has been allowed to flourish, everything has improved (conversely, in the U.S. where we have deliberately increased the power and scope of these monopolies, we have the worst internet access of any technologically advanced nation).
Unfortunately, that isn't going to happen.
The next best thing, is to mandate net neutrality in the least intrusive, least stupid way possible, and to react intelligently (and rapidly) to changes in technology and its uses, to avoid regulatory distortion and suppression of innovation.
Unfortunately, that isn't likely to happen either…
That said, it’s remotely possible for us get closer to that, quicker, than we can to disassembling the thousands of federal, state, and local regulations, which have created these monopolies, and made the barriers to entry for competition impossibly high.
Of course neither Democrats nor Republicans support or plan to do that.
The whole thing is a spiraling charlie fox of disingenuous cynical idiocy.
Personally, I say forget Obama, forget Cruz, and listen to Oliver (or if you don't care for Oliver, or can't watch a video, theres The Oatmeal):
*Reactionary Populist Disingenuous Grandstanding Cynic... not the Republican party, just Cruz
In response, Ted Cruz (RPDGC*), has announced that Net Neutrality is the work of the devil:
"Net Neutrality" is Obamacare for the Internet; the Internet should not operate at the speed of government.
— Senator Ted Cruz (@SenTedCruz) November 10, 2014
The idea that either Democrats OR Republicans actually support net neutrality is a joke.
The Democrats have (and still do) very strongly supported big media and big communications, who are largely anti neutrality. It’s only now that net neutrality has obviously become a big issue among young liberals (who were largely unmotivated to turn out this midterm election), that they have pretended to support it.
The Dems could have made it a campaign issue, except then they wouldn’t have had the huge media and communications industry money for the elections, that they needed to avoid getting spanked even worse than they did.
If Obama had actually supported net neutrality, he wouldn’t have appointed an anti neutrality industry stooge as FCC chair… but again, if he did that, the Dems would have lost that sweet sweet big media money.
On the other hand, the Republicans are largely anti “big media” and anti “big communications”, and only became anti-neutrality when the Democrats decided to take it as an issue.
What is Net Neutrality?
Frankly, any libertarian should support net neutrality as a principle (government regulation is another matter).
Net neutrality as a principle, is simple. All legitimate traffic should be treated equally, no matter the source or destination. No internet service provider should filter, censor, or slow down traffic from their competitors, their critics, or because of politics or national origin; or for any reason other than technical requirements for safe, efficient, and reliable network operation.
It’s how the internet has always been run, up until recently, without any government action necessary. There’s a famous quote: “The internet interprets censorship as damage and routes around it”. Any internet service provider that censored, filtered, or slowed down traffic from anyone (for anything other than technical reasons) was routed around, and cut out of the net, by its peers. It was a great example of independent action and peer enforcement working in the marketplace.
Unfortunately, this is no longer the case.
Why is it an issue now?
Large media and communications companies like Comcast and Verizon have been deliberately and artificially blocking or slowing down traffic to and from their critics and competitors.
Of course, getting government involved does generally make things worse. In fact, it already did in this case, since the government has been involved from the beginning, and it was largely government action that created the current problem.
In a rational and unbiased competitive environment, consumers would have a reasonable choice of internet service providers, and any ISP that chose to censor or limit access, would lose customers, and either correct themselves or go out of business.
Unfortunately, we don’t have anything like a free and competitive market in internet access. Government regulation and favoritism has created huge monopolies (or at best duopolies, and no, wireless access is not realistic and reasonable competition given the distorted market and cost structures there either) in internet access.
We've reached a point where the telecommunications monopolies that government created and support, are in fact deliberately applying anticompetitive, unfair (and in some cases already unlawful) restraint against their critics and competitors.
Since they are government supported monopolies, the market is not allowed to correct the undesirable private action.
This means that, unfortunately, government action IS required… and even if it were not required, it’s inevitable, because politics is politics, and this is now an “Issue”.
So what do we do about the problem?
Please note, I don’t trust either Democrats OR Republicans on the issue in general, and I don’t trust either, or the FCC to regulate neutrality at all. Cruz does have at least one valid concern, in that the history of government regulation of almost every industry, but particularly technology, is mainly a long record of suppressing innovation and other negative unintended consequences.
The ideal solution is to end the government created internet access monopolies that most Americans live under, and allow free and open market competition to correct the problem.
Without government limitations on competition in actual high speed, high quality internet access; competition will increase, prices will fall, and any provider that filters or slows legitimate traffic will lose all their customers and go out of business.
This isn't just a prediction or libertarian idealism talking by the way. It’s been proved out in Korea, Japan… even in the UK. Everywhere that internet access competition has been allowed to flourish, everything has improved (conversely, in the U.S. where we have deliberately increased the power and scope of these monopolies, we have the worst internet access of any technologically advanced nation).
Unfortunately, that isn't going to happen.
The next best thing, is to mandate net neutrality in the least intrusive, least stupid way possible, and to react intelligently (and rapidly) to changes in technology and its uses, to avoid regulatory distortion and suppression of innovation.
Unfortunately, that isn't likely to happen either…
That said, it’s remotely possible for us get closer to that, quicker, than we can to disassembling the thousands of federal, state, and local regulations, which have created these monopolies, and made the barriers to entry for competition impossibly high.
Of course neither Democrats nor Republicans support or plan to do that.
The whole thing is a spiraling charlie fox of disingenuous cynical idiocy.
Personally, I say forget Obama, forget Cruz, and listen to Oliver (or if you don't care for Oliver, or can't watch a video, theres The Oatmeal):
*Reactionary Populist Disingenuous Grandstanding Cynic... not the Republican party, just Cruz
Saturday, October 11, 2014
What exactly do I do?
In theory, I work in technology for a living.
In particular, I work in enterprise, infrastructure, and information security architecture; more specifically as a consultant and educator in those domains.
Really, what I do, is I talk to people about their problems.
Then I think about them for a while, and I write about them for a while.
Then I try to teach people how to solve those problems, and I write about that...
Then I mediate between groups of people who both need each other and hate each other; with competing agendas and incentives and fears and desires, and problems and styles and personalities etc... etc... etc...
...and most of all, I try to find nice ways of saying NO without actually saying no...
...and after saying NO, show them how to actually DO, what they ACTUALLY need to do (as opposed to what they wanted to do, or thought they needed to do), in the least stupid and least harmful way possible.
... and if I'm REALLY REALLY good at it, and REALLY lucky... I manage to do all that, while making them think it was always all their idea the whole time.
I see no meaningful functional difference between this, and a therapist.
In particular, I work in enterprise, infrastructure, and information security architecture; more specifically as a consultant and educator in those domains.
Really, what I do, is I talk to people about their problems.
Then I think about them for a while, and I write about them for a while.
Then I try to teach people how to solve those problems, and I write about that...
Then I mediate between groups of people who both need each other and hate each other; with competing agendas and incentives and fears and desires, and problems and styles and personalities etc... etc... etc...
...and most of all, I try to find nice ways of saying NO without actually saying no...
...and after saying NO, show them how to actually DO, what they ACTUALLY need to do (as opposed to what they wanted to do, or thought they needed to do), in the least stupid and least harmful way possible.
... and if I'm REALLY REALLY good at it, and REALLY lucky... I manage to do all that, while making them think it was always all their idea the whole time.
I see no meaningful functional difference between this, and a therapist.
What I Know About Teaching
About a year ago, a friend of mine was preparing to teach a class that he'd never taught before... He's done a lot of one on one education and training, but I he had never taught a group class, and he was looking for some advice.
I thought I'd offer him what advice I could, and so I wrote (most of) what became this piece down. I thought I had posted it to the blog at the time, but when I searched for it to reference it earlier today, I couldn't find it.
I decide to post it now, revising it with the new bits and pieces I was writing today.
Here's what I know about teaching, from my own personal experiences, in more than 15 years as a professional educator and trainer (and they are two different but related disciplines), and as a training and courseware developer.
Remember, this is about teaching a class, not giving a lecture or a presentation, or a demonstration or conducting a forum... those are all different environments, with different priorities and different techniques.
The Big Picture Stuff
Style and Philosophy
I have almost entirely moved away from traditional lecture classes (unless the courseware vendor or certification authorities require specific curricula and delivery).
I find that my students learn better, and that I teach better, in an interactive and participatory environment. An extended and guided conversation, with open digressions and contextual questions, answers, and explanations.
I believe in instructor lead, but participant driven, training and education.
As such, I tend to use a modified Socratic method to lead my classes into participation. I use a lot of leading questions, and logic and reasoning problems. I try to get my students to extend and generalize from examples and principles we've covered before, and then apply them to new situations.
I also encourage students to (civilly and constructively) argue and debate, both myself and each other.
When I think it'll be responded to well, I'll often deliberately misstate or poorly state or frame an idea, or deliberately misapply a principle or not fully extend a thought etc... in order to prompt my students into exploring the correct or complete thought. If they don't speak up on their own or catch me in it, I'll straight out ask them as I go "So, am I using this properly? Is there a better way? What if I did this... Was that earlier example wrong?"
Importantly, I always encourage... in fact, right up front I tell my students that I require them... to speak up if they think I'm wrong, or they have a different idea or different perspective, or a different experience.
HOWEVER... that doesn't work for all courses, or all students.
Different materials and subject matters lend themselves to different styles of instruction and presentation; and most critically, different students learn better with different styles and methods.
You MUST tailor your material, and your style, to your students, and the environment and requirements of that specific class.
The Classroom Environment
Obviously, I work in non-traditional educational environments. I am not generally (though I have) teaching classes full of 10th graders.
My students are generally adults, who have at the very least, taken a lot of time out of their life to attend my class. Often, they have paid (or their employers have paid) several thousand dollars to attend. They tend to have an entirely different level of motivation and a different set of incentives, than other instruction environments.
Also, I tend to have my students for a minimum of two straight hours (for short talks given at conferences, demos at group events etc...), and frequently for 6-8 hours a day (sometimes even 10 or more hours per day), for two to five days (for professional education and training).
In this kind of environment, we get to go as broad and deep on the subject matter, as our time, and the amount of material we have to cover, allow; and what we cover is largely dictated by the desires and needs of the students.
In general, I like to start a bit later... I find that anything I teach before about 9:30am doesn't actually stick... so I keep the first part of each morning light, or I make it review and freeform Q&A from the day before... or introductions and personal stories on the first day.
We get up and move around at least once an hour, for enough time to go to the bathroom, and get a drink, have a snack... then, refreshed, we get back down to the material with renewed focus.
The same for lunch, particularly if I can get it catered in. We get up, move around, eat, talk to each other, get to know each other and share experiences... and we relax, and try to enjoy our time.
It's critical for both you, AND your students, to take time to relax, and decompress, and get comfortable, throughout the day. Stay hydrated, keep your blood sugar right, and your electrolytes right. Avoid getting stiff, and avoid strain headaches. You will be more efficient and more effective, covering more material with greater comprehension and retention, if you are relaxed and comfortable.
Then, at the end of the day, I don't like to try to teach the material up to the bell. I always like to give at LEAST the last half hour as a freeform Q&A and review of anything the students want.
So yes... it's a different environment than a typical secondary education classroom...
That said, I think that professional trainers and educators, have some valuable insights and experiences to offer in improving secondary and university education.
The Detail Stuff... Technique and Technicalities
Preparation
The most important thing, is to be prepared. You don't have to be a total expert on the material to teach a class in it, but you do have to know it, understand it, and prepare yourself with it (and with additional supporting material).
When I'm fully prepared for a class, I can be much more comfortable, extemporaneous, I can explain things better in a more engaging way, and I can change things up when it is necessary to, or when the class feels like that's where it's going etc...
Preparation allows me to be flexible, to be interesting, to be funny, to be personal, to be engaging; and lack of it, prevents these things... or makes them much harder...
...Or worst of all, makes them all there is, and no-one learns anything; except how good you are at vamping, or how well you can monologue at them off the printed materials.
Know not just the material you're teaching, but the history of it, the reasons and motivations behind it... how it got to be the way it is now. Understand the context of it, and how it will impact your students.
Even if all of this is not part of the class, people may ask questions about it, and again, knowing this stuff, and being prepared for it, will help you explain things better.
Personality
It's important to allow yourself to show through in the material. Be flexible. Use humor. Be personal. Change it up. Use personal examples and personal stories (when appropriate). If you don't have personal stories, use anecdotes from others, but make them real, personal, relatable...
It doesn't have to be directly personal, what it has to be is RELATABLE.
Be open... but don't make it about you, make it about the material USING yourself as the example, or as a pivot point around which your students can see and experience the material.
Repetition
You need to repeat yourself.
Anything important you say, you need to say it at least three times; and if it's REALLY important, it's preferable to say something three times three...
That's three times at once, then three times again a little later, then three more times again near the end.
You can, and often should, say it in different ways, so long as it's absolutely clear that you're really saying the same thing. You don't have to say it three times over and over again in a row, but the repetitions should be close enough together to be clearly reinforcing.
Some folks don't need or want repetition, and almost everyone is bored or irritated by it eventually, which we certainly want to avoid.
However, so long as the repetition isn't excessive (more than four or five times -or more than four or five cycles of three repetitions- in a single lesson, unless each repetition is reinforced organically as a subpart of the lesson), even if the repetition bugs them a bit, they'll RETAIN it better.
... so long as you maintain...
Engagement
Engage everyone, both as a group, but also individually. When you engage individually, so long as you do so in a way that everyone can see and hear, and isn't too specific to the individual, the audience can relate, and it's almost as good as engaging each of them individually.
Stop regularly and ask for questions; and make it clear when it's possible, that they can ask questions any time. If there's a point where you feel like you know there are questions, but no-one is coming forth, ask the question yourself, or ask leading questions of your students.
Engage your students with problems, exercises... bring them up to the whiteboard or chalkboard... Capture their attention fully, AND capture their intellect fully, AND engage their EMOTIONS... get them analyzing, and relating what you are doing, to themselves, their own knowledge and needs.
Use game design theory, and psychology, to your advantage. A while back I wrote a piece on game design theory and engagement in sports, that I think has parallels and value to education as well.
Although it may not be immediately obvious exactly how this applies to education and training, I think you'll see the value, and I'm going to insert an extended quotation (feel free to skip ahead if you like):
"...Acquisition and retention are particularly critical to these games; and retention is achieved through engagement.
The way game designers accomplish these missions are with spectacle, and reward psychology (positive and negative reinforcement through anticipation, reward and penalty; with a very strong bias towards reward, leavened by the occasional penalty), particularly competitive reward psychology.
Something spectacular engages you for the duration of the spectacle. You are a passive participant. It attracts you, and fascinates you, but only for that moment. Retention requires maintaining engagement over time... becoming an active participant, either directly or as a metaparticipant.
So... what does that have to do with sports? Or with spectator sports fans in particular?
Simple... Sports fans are players in a metagame.
Spectator sport fandom, although passively received (the fan isn't an active participant in the games they are watching); isn't a passive, receptive, entertainment experience (like a movie or television).
However, much as television shows retain viewers by emotional engagement in the story (thus making them metaparticipants in the narrative); spectator sports retain fans by persistent emotional engagement with the sport, and particularly with their team (making them metaplayers in the game).
Sports fandom, is a kind of play by proxy; much as horse racing, and other betting games (roulette for example) where the players interaction with the game is not part of the gameplay. This makes it a metagame.
And metagames have the same success vectors as any other game.
One of the things that makes Boston sports fandom so... passionate and crazy I guess is the best way to put it... is that a Boston fan is being fed with a near perfect reward psychology cycle.
Boston teams win often enough (and often quite excitingly) to attract attention and generate spectacle. This acquires new fans (or brings back those whose engagement has weakened); and it presses the "happy button" in existing fans, engaging their reward pleasure mechanism.
Importantly though, Boston teams don't win so often that fans get victory fatigue, and need reward escalation to maintain engagement.
When they're NOT winning, Boston teams are rarely just mediocre... they tend to alternate between "oh God so close..." and "total abject failure" (at least psychologically if not objectively). It may seem counterintuitive, but this is actually far more engaging than consistent high performance or even consistent victory.
In terms of gaming theory, this 3 point cycle (victory, near victory, failure) helps create spectacle to attract and acquire participants; and helps create, reinforce, and increase engagement.
Very importantly, it also helps maintain engagement (and thus retention) by reducing victory fatigue, anticipation fatigue, and expectation escalation.
So... getting into that second and third part...
Retention is achieved through continued engagement. When engagement is weakened or broken, you lose participants (gamers, fans).
Engagement is created, reinforced, and increased; with spectacle, novelty, fascination, and competitive reward psychology as described above.
Engagement is weakened or broken and you lose participants (gamers, fans) through frustration, demoralization, boredom, and fatigue.
So, the challenge is to maintain or increase engagement over time.
In general, you deal with boredom and fatigue, through novelty. Change things up, so that a participants experience, expectations, and emotional engagement with the game are maintained, and thus they are retained.
I mentioned victory fatigue above, but didn't define it, I should probably define the three elements of "game fatigue" now.
Victory fatigue is what happens when a player receives too many rewards, or wins too much too easily. This tends to cause boredom, and frustration; because the rewards no longer feel like rewards. This weakens or breaks engagement.
In an interactive game you can deal with victory fatigue (and to a lesser extent anticipation fatigue) by varying gameplay (introducing new and different ways of earning rewards) increasing challenge (NOT just increasing difficulty, though that is one way of doing so), increasing penalty for failure (though you can't do that too much or you break engagement through frustration and demoralization), varying rewards (making the rewards new, interesting, and different), or by increasing intensity or spectacle (making the rewards bigger or more desirable). These mechanisms keep the players anticipation and pre-reward engagement high, and their reward pleasure mechanisms responding strongly to the rewards.
In most spectator sports however, you don't have those mechanisms available to you (or they are severely limited). The difficulty and rewards do escalate somewhat over the course of a season, but are basically fixed year to year (win a game, win a conference, win a division, win a playoff game, win a championship game). So, frequent and consistent victories, particularly championships, result in expectation escalation.
The three major exceptions to this issue of fixed challenge and fixed rewards by the way, are motor racing, premiership style football (soccer), and NCAA football and basketball. Not surprisingly, the first two are the two most popular spectator sports in the world; and the third creates a degree of unreasoning passion far greater than any other sports in America.
Anticipation fatigue is a more interesting issue. When you get that "so close" feeling too much, it actually tends to discourage and disappoint you, which increases frustration and breaks engagement i.e. "they get our hopes up every time then disappoint us every time... what's the point".
Expectation escalation, is what happens when performance or rewards consistently exceed expectations (or consistently exceed the mean performance of a peer group).This causes people to "reset" their emotional expectation of what poor, acceptable, and excellent are, such that their median level of performance, even if it is objectively far better than average, is simply "expected".
So, a team that wins 80% of the time, year after year, will eventually be expected to do so. If that team starts to win consistently less than 80%, even if they are still better than most teams and win 60% of the time; the emotional reaction of their fans will be the same as if they had objectively poor performance, rather than simply "less good".
Lesser success can feel like failure, when you're used to greater success.
Cycling between "not quite great", and "really bad" (even if "really bad" is actually mediocre statistically, the victories and near victories redefine emotional expectations such that mediocre FEELS like abject failure), actually creates and reinforces engagement, and passion; far more, and far more intensely, than consistently high performance.
This by the way, is the exact same reinforcement cycle that creates and reinforces addiction. Reward (the high), anticipation (the process up to the high), and penalty (the come down and the jones).
So... for Boston fans, it's like vegas slot machine designers were controlling things for optimum fan acquisition, engagement, and retention.
It's an almost perfect metagame... arising without design... which is kinda neat.
I realize that was an extended, and somewhat esoteric digression, but I think it provides real value, and direct parallels with education and training. If nothing else, let me pull out a small subsection and slightly modify it:
- Retention is achieved through continued engagement. When engagement is weakened or broken, you lose participants (or at least you lose their interest and attention)
- Engagement is created, reinforced, and increased; with direct participation or metaparticipation, spectacle, novelty, fascination, and competitive reward psychology
- Engagement is weakened or broken and you lose participants, through frustration, demoralization, boredom, and fatigue
It should be clear how those directly relate to engaging students attention and helping them learn.
After you've explained something important, ask particular participants to explain the point you've made, in their own words. If they don't get it quite right, lead them through figuring it out and explaining it properly.
Then ask THEM questions.
Then do it again with a different person, and ask them to explain it in a different way, or to come up with an example, or a scenario etc...
This is called mirroring. It's a communications exercise, that helps people understand what other people are saying, and how what they say is being perceived and understood by other people.
When you apply this to instruction, it serves those purposes, but it's also about making your students think through the problem or example or principle, and figure out how to relate to it, and relate it to others; rather than simply to repeat and regurgitate what they've been told.
It helps the student to truly understand and contextualize what they've learned, and to really show that they have done so.
It also helps you as an instructor, to be a better communicator, and to better understand how others communicate.
Comprehension and Retention
Finally... there is a basic instructional concept called the comprehension and retention cycle
- See
- Hear
- Read
- Show
- Do
- Repeat
To most effectively teach something, with the highest level of retention, your students should in some way:
- See the material (with handouts, whiteboard/blackboard, slides etc...)
- Hear the material explained (and remember the repetition above)
- Read the material, both silently and aloud (or aloud to themselves in their own head, which is different from silently... it sounds silly, but there really is a difference. Try it)
- Show them the material directly, in demonstration, preferably 3 different ways
- Do what it is they have read, heard, and been shown, applying it and solving it or using it themselves; preferably in 3 different ways
- Repeat it all again, preferably three times (or three times three for critical things); varying each time to explore the subject more fully, to maintain and increase engagement, and to allow the students different perspectives and examples to relate better to the material.
So... that's what I know about teaching and training... hope it helps.
Oh and one more thing...
Teaching is one of the greatest satisfactions, joys, and pleasures in my life. It helps me fulfill who and what I am... what I want and need to be.
I have learned far more from teaching, than I ever did from being taught... and perhaps separate from that... perhaps not... I have gained more insight and wisdom, about myself, and about the world, in so doing.
Take that as you will...
Friday, September 26, 2014
Shellshocked, Vectors, and Vulnerabilities.
So, the Shellshock vulnerability...
Yes, this one really is the biggest vulnerability to hit UNIX-like systems in decades.
Yes, it is in the wild now, and yes, it IS a major problem.
So yeah... you really do have to pay attention to this one.
Briefly, many UNIX-like systems, including most Linux systems, Mac OSX, and many others, use, or at least have installed on them, a variant of a program called "bash' (the "Bourne Again SHell").
To say that it's one of the most widely used pieces of software in the world would be a dramatic understatement.
Recently, it has been discovered that most bash variants (and by the way, there are hundreds of them, if not thousands, extending back to 1989), when invoked with certain variables, can be forced to execute malicious code.
There are already patches available for many systems which will either fix or mitigate the problem, but there are literally millions of systems out there, and it will take a lot of time and effort to fix them.
There are also many systems which either can't be fixed for some reason or another, or whose owners don't even know that there is a problem.
These days, just about every piece of computing hardware out there that isn't an actual Windows server or PC, runs a UNIX-like OS; and many of those have some variant of the software in question installed on them by default. Even if it's not actively used on the system, many systems have it installed by default, and few bother to remove it.
Even if you don't run any UNIX-like boxes, your vendors, your partners, your bank, your power company, your... everything... runs them.
...Hell, your TV or stereo might be running linux these days, and your router probably is.
Do YOU know what operating system is running on every single piece of computing hardware in YOUR company? In every embedded system? In your printers, your photocopiers?
Also, because this vulnerability extends back so far, it's entirely possible... actually it's a damn near certainty... that the code containing the vulnerability in question has been reused in other software (including other shells not considered bash variants, and other entirely unrelated software); which may now also be vulnerable.
So, the gory details...
https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/alerts/TA14-268A
Read the CERT link, then read this:
http://arstechnica.com/security/2014/09/bug-in-bash-shell-creates-big-security-hole-on-anything-with-nix-in-it/
And this;
http://arstechnica.com/security/2014/09/concern-over-bash-vulnerability-grows-as-exploit-reported-in-the-wild/
And if you want some technical depth, this:
http://www.troyhunt.com/2014/09/everything-you-need-to-know-about.html
I don't have much else to add about the vulnerability itself... but I do want to talk about a common problem with how people think of and respond to issues like this.
Confusing Vectors with Vulnerabilities.
I'm noticing a lot of folks out there seem to think that because they're not running a web server, or that they're not providing services to the internet, that they're not impacted by this vulnerability.
That is absolutely not the case.
It's very important to understand, the attack vector for this vulnerability is not JUST web services; that's just the most common and simplest way to exploit it remotely, and the first exploit seen.
This should be obvious, but any service that may pass unvalidated (or poorly validated) remote input to any external shell or command parser, is a potential point of compromise.
There are any number of common services that may do this, including DHCP and autoproxy config, various SSH configurations, various VPN services, some remote management or configuration services, GIT and other code and content management systems, various file sharing and syncing services, various media services, various backup and archive services...
Also remember the vulnerability applies to local command execution and local services as well, not just remote. This is a vulnerability in a core component of the operating environment, not just in any particular service.
Unlike most other operating systems, where an application or service might perform an external function for itself, or through a system API; because of UNIX-like systems fundamental architecture and long standing convention, almost any process might invoke and pass input to an external command parser or shell for almost any reason. When they do, it's usually the default shell for the system, or for the UID the process runs under, and often that default is bash.
Even if bash is not the default for a system or user, some processes may invoke bash explicitly, to avoid potential environment, syntax, or parsing errors (or simply because that's what the programmer was comfortable with).
Also, even if a process explicitly invokes a command parser or shell other than bash, it is common to find that bash has been aliased or linked to the command for the other shell. In many environments, running the command "sh" will in fact invoke a bash shell.
Finally, as I noted above, bash is so ubiquitous, and the code for it has been around so long; it's entirely likely that other shells and command parsers (and possibly other types of software as well) share this same vulnerability.
Again, these should be obvious, but it's surprising how easily we allow ourselves to overlook or forget the basics.
Don't assume you're safe just because you're not running a web server on the machine, or because the machine isn't providing services to the internet, or because you're " not using bash".
Address the vulnerability, not JUST the vector.
Yes, this one really is the biggest vulnerability to hit UNIX-like systems in decades.
Yes, it is in the wild now, and yes, it IS a major problem.
So yeah... you really do have to pay attention to this one.
Briefly, many UNIX-like systems, including most Linux systems, Mac OSX, and many others, use, or at least have installed on them, a variant of a program called "bash' (the "Bourne Again SHell").
To say that it's one of the most widely used pieces of software in the world would be a dramatic understatement.
Recently, it has been discovered that most bash variants (and by the way, there are hundreds of them, if not thousands, extending back to 1989), when invoked with certain variables, can be forced to execute malicious code.
There are already patches available for many systems which will either fix or mitigate the problem, but there are literally millions of systems out there, and it will take a lot of time and effort to fix them.
There are also many systems which either can't be fixed for some reason or another, or whose owners don't even know that there is a problem.
These days, just about every piece of computing hardware out there that isn't an actual Windows server or PC, runs a UNIX-like OS; and many of those have some variant of the software in question installed on them by default. Even if it's not actively used on the system, many systems have it installed by default, and few bother to remove it.
Even if you don't run any UNIX-like boxes, your vendors, your partners, your bank, your power company, your... everything... runs them.
...Hell, your TV or stereo might be running linux these days, and your router probably is.
Do YOU know what operating system is running on every single piece of computing hardware in YOUR company? In every embedded system? In your printers, your photocopiers?
Also, because this vulnerability extends back so far, it's entirely possible... actually it's a damn near certainty... that the code containing the vulnerability in question has been reused in other software (including other shells not considered bash variants, and other entirely unrelated software); which may now also be vulnerable.
So, the gory details...
https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/alerts/TA14-268A
Read the CERT link, then read this:
http://arstechnica.com/security/2014/09/bug-in-bash-shell-creates-big-security-hole-on-anything-with-nix-in-it/
And this;
http://arstechnica.com/security/2014/09/concern-over-bash-vulnerability-grows-as-exploit-reported-in-the-wild/
And if you want some technical depth, this:
http://www.troyhunt.com/2014/09/everything-you-need-to-know-about.html
I don't have much else to add about the vulnerability itself... but I do want to talk about a common problem with how people think of and respond to issues like this.
Confusing Vectors with Vulnerabilities.
I'm noticing a lot of folks out there seem to think that because they're not running a web server, or that they're not providing services to the internet, that they're not impacted by this vulnerability.
That is absolutely not the case.
It's very important to understand, the attack vector for this vulnerability is not JUST web services; that's just the most common and simplest way to exploit it remotely, and the first exploit seen.
This should be obvious, but any service that may pass unvalidated (or poorly validated) remote input to any external shell or command parser, is a potential point of compromise.
There are any number of common services that may do this, including DHCP and autoproxy config, various SSH configurations, various VPN services, some remote management or configuration services, GIT and other code and content management systems, various file sharing and syncing services, various media services, various backup and archive services...
Also remember the vulnerability applies to local command execution and local services as well, not just remote. This is a vulnerability in a core component of the operating environment, not just in any particular service.
Unlike most other operating systems, where an application or service might perform an external function for itself, or through a system API; because of UNIX-like systems fundamental architecture and long standing convention, almost any process might invoke and pass input to an external command parser or shell for almost any reason. When they do, it's usually the default shell for the system, or for the UID the process runs under, and often that default is bash.
Even if bash is not the default for a system or user, some processes may invoke bash explicitly, to avoid potential environment, syntax, or parsing errors (or simply because that's what the programmer was comfortable with).
Also, even if a process explicitly invokes a command parser or shell other than bash, it is common to find that bash has been aliased or linked to the command for the other shell. In many environments, running the command "sh" will in fact invoke a bash shell.
Finally, as I noted above, bash is so ubiquitous, and the code for it has been around so long; it's entirely likely that other shells and command parsers (and possibly other types of software as well) share this same vulnerability.
Again, these should be obvious, but it's surprising how easily we allow ourselves to overlook or forget the basics.
Don't assume you're safe just because you're not running a web server on the machine, or because the machine isn't providing services to the internet, or because you're " not using bash".
Address the vulnerability, not JUST the vector.
Wednesday, July 09, 2014
A Technological Life, or something like it
I have just been wasted the last few days.
I got sick last Thursday and was in bed all day, Then I thought I was better enough to go to a 4th of july BBQ and made myself worse. Because I'm an idiot, and do this almost every time I'm sick.
Then Monday, I have no idea what happened, I don't recall doing anything stupid to it other than... growing old I guess... but for some reason my lower back just locked up.
Rather painful that. Could barely move. I tried to get out of my truck and pump some diesel, and I literally couldn't manage it.
Two hours of little Korean lady sadists (yes, it took two of them. The first one could only last about 45 minutes before she was worn out) beating, elbowing, kneeing, and walking on my back (accompanied by repeated exclamations in mixed Korean and English to the effect of "Jesus christ... too much muscle... all too tense... all tied in knots") later, and I could almost sorta kinda walk upright again.
Almost...
The next morning however I was completely locked up again, and I've pretty much been locked up in bed, or on the couch, ever since.
Yay, pain.
Being sick, makes you dumb. Having back pain, very much makes you dumb. Which kinda leads to to the next thing...
My macbook pro is out for warranty service with Apple right now, so I'm on my windows laptop.
As it happens, I also just changed phones.
We switched from Verizon to T-Mobile a few months ago, but were using our old verizon phones (they're unlocked multiband global 4g phones) with t-mobile SIMs (yes, this works, you just have to know how to reprogram the phone to work on the new network, and it has to be fully unlocked).
A few weeks into this, my Galaxy S4 decided to stop working on T-Mobiles network, so I had to replace it.
After researching and comparing the current smartphone landscape, I ended up picking up a google Nexus 5. It's alright, but I don't really like it. I tend to work my devices hard, and the Nexus just didn't quite keep up with what I wanted it to do.
Mels phone was also unreliable, and since I have been preparing to start a new contract which will have me travelling a lot, we needed to get her a reliable replacement.
Or rather I got a replacement. Since I didn't care for the Nexus 5 but Mel likes it, she got the Nexus, and I grabbed a Galaxy S5 (which I'm quite happy with, as I expected I would be. I loved my S4, and the S5 is a straightforward upgrade to it).
Both my windows laptop, and my new phone, are wonderful, current, high performing examples of their type... However, neither of them had my full and current working setup or documents on them. The setups that typically take me a few weeks or more of tinkering and tweaking to get right, when I switch devices.
I am one of those folks who depends on their digital exobrains to run their lives; because, so to speak, I've got too many active tracks going, and I LOSE track of the ones not currently active.
I had forgotten to configure two pieces of software, and two accounts, on my windows laptop and new phone. A combination of just too many little things to remember, and the fact that I've been braindead the last week between being sick, and having really bad back pain.
This not having my digital exobrains properly updated and configured caused me to miss several messages, emails, and two con calls over the past few days.
Nothing that's going to kill me or anything, just one of those irritations of modern life.
I got sick last Thursday and was in bed all day, Then I thought I was better enough to go to a 4th of july BBQ and made myself worse. Because I'm an idiot, and do this almost every time I'm sick.
Then Monday, I have no idea what happened, I don't recall doing anything stupid to it other than... growing old I guess... but for some reason my lower back just locked up.
Rather painful that. Could barely move. I tried to get out of my truck and pump some diesel, and I literally couldn't manage it.
Two hours of little Korean lady sadists (yes, it took two of them. The first one could only last about 45 minutes before she was worn out) beating, elbowing, kneeing, and walking on my back (accompanied by repeated exclamations in mixed Korean and English to the effect of "Jesus christ... too much muscle... all too tense... all tied in knots") later, and I could almost sorta kinda walk upright again.
Almost...
The next morning however I was completely locked up again, and I've pretty much been locked up in bed, or on the couch, ever since.
Yay, pain.
Being sick, makes you dumb. Having back pain, very much makes you dumb. Which kinda leads to to the next thing...
My macbook pro is out for warranty service with Apple right now, so I'm on my windows laptop.
As it happens, I also just changed phones.
We switched from Verizon to T-Mobile a few months ago, but were using our old verizon phones (they're unlocked multiband global 4g phones) with t-mobile SIMs (yes, this works, you just have to know how to reprogram the phone to work on the new network, and it has to be fully unlocked).
A few weeks into this, my Galaxy S4 decided to stop working on T-Mobiles network, so I had to replace it.
After researching and comparing the current smartphone landscape, I ended up picking up a google Nexus 5. It's alright, but I don't really like it. I tend to work my devices hard, and the Nexus just didn't quite keep up with what I wanted it to do.
Mels phone was also unreliable, and since I have been preparing to start a new contract which will have me travelling a lot, we needed to get her a reliable replacement.
Or rather I got a replacement. Since I didn't care for the Nexus 5 but Mel likes it, she got the Nexus, and I grabbed a Galaxy S5 (which I'm quite happy with, as I expected I would be. I loved my S4, and the S5 is a straightforward upgrade to it).
Both my windows laptop, and my new phone, are wonderful, current, high performing examples of their type... However, neither of them had my full and current working setup or documents on them. The setups that typically take me a few weeks or more of tinkering and tweaking to get right, when I switch devices.
I am one of those folks who depends on their digital exobrains to run their lives; because, so to speak, I've got too many active tracks going, and I LOSE track of the ones not currently active.
I had forgotten to configure two pieces of software, and two accounts, on my windows laptop and new phone. A combination of just too many little things to remember, and the fact that I've been braindead the last week between being sick, and having really bad back pain.
This not having my digital exobrains properly updated and configured caused me to miss several messages, emails, and two con calls over the past few days.
Nothing that's going to kill me or anything, just one of those irritations of modern life.
Thursday, June 05, 2014
When you say "full" and "busy"... what exactly do you mean by that?
So, it's another one of those 68 hours awake nights... unintentional for much of it... a combination of insomnia, and just working my ass off, round the clock, the last few days.
In the first 55 of those hours I had NINE different job interviews, or prospect calls, or negotiation sessions, plus a couple extended email exchanges... seemingly all of which are likely to result in final job offers (9, possibly 10 different jobs prospects working, all of them good, a few full time, a few contract).
Plus I'm working on an actual short term contract.
Plus we are working on shutting down a friends old business, so he can move on with his new business; which today involved me mostly carrying a 9 foot couch down 3 split flights of stairs (6 runs plus landings), literally carrying it on my back (which worked out very well, and was much faster and easier than we expected.
Plus working with my friend to try to get his NEW company to understand that they have a critical need for an enterprise, infrastructure, and security architect (or two of us, or possibly three), at least on a contract basis for a few months... and really, they do (to be fair, most organizations could stand with some work in those areas, particularly most startups)... In the process making HIS life easier, improving outcomes for him and his new company, AND giving me a solid source of ongoing revenue while we deal with other opportunities.
Plus cleaning, organizing, and building organizational systems and infrastructure (for example I'm fabricating a custom shelving system for the garage, making use of every inch of wall space for either shelves, a server rack, or workbenches) for the house, garage, lab, and other stuff we require to recondition the large amount of gear left over from the previous business, and ready it for sale, reclamation, recycling, or donation... as well as have an actually usable garage/shop, and some storage space available back in the house.
When I say the garage is full... I mean that it's total volume (it's a two plus sized garage), and entire floor space has been taken up from ground level to chest height... Mostly with servers, networking gear, and assorted other IT crap; some with tools... only a tiny bit with normal "garage stuff"....
... Of course, for geeks like us... this IS normal garage crap.
Plus... you know... rebuilding our life which kinda blew into little pieces a while back...
The one legged man won the ass kicking contest a while back, then hopped across the Boston marathon finish line in under 2:05, hopped across the continental united states, swum the pacific ocean, and is currently engaged in attempting to face kick every taekwondoin in Korea.
In the first 55 of those hours I had NINE different job interviews, or prospect calls, or negotiation sessions, plus a couple extended email exchanges... seemingly all of which are likely to result in final job offers (9, possibly 10 different jobs prospects working, all of them good, a few full time, a few contract).
Plus I'm working on an actual short term contract.
Plus we are working on shutting down a friends old business, so he can move on with his new business; which today involved me mostly carrying a 9 foot couch down 3 split flights of stairs (6 runs plus landings), literally carrying it on my back (which worked out very well, and was much faster and easier than we expected.
Plus working with my friend to try to get his NEW company to understand that they have a critical need for an enterprise, infrastructure, and security architect (or two of us, or possibly three), at least on a contract basis for a few months... and really, they do (to be fair, most organizations could stand with some work in those areas, particularly most startups)... In the process making HIS life easier, improving outcomes for him and his new company, AND giving me a solid source of ongoing revenue while we deal with other opportunities.
Plus cleaning, organizing, and building organizational systems and infrastructure (for example I'm fabricating a custom shelving system for the garage, making use of every inch of wall space for either shelves, a server rack, or workbenches) for the house, garage, lab, and other stuff we require to recondition the large amount of gear left over from the previous business, and ready it for sale, reclamation, recycling, or donation... as well as have an actually usable garage/shop, and some storage space available back in the house.
When I say the garage is full... I mean that it's total volume (it's a two plus sized garage), and entire floor space has been taken up from ground level to chest height... Mostly with servers, networking gear, and assorted other IT crap; some with tools... only a tiny bit with normal "garage stuff"....
... Of course, for geeks like us... this IS normal garage crap.
Plus... you know... rebuilding our life which kinda blew into little pieces a while back...
The one legged man won the ass kicking contest a while back, then hopped across the Boston marathon finish line in under 2:05, hopped across the continental united states, swum the pacific ocean, and is currently engaged in attempting to face kick every taekwondoin in Korea.
Thursday, May 01, 2014
Significant Precision
Lawyers believe that they are trained to speak and write extremely precisely, particularly while in a deposition or courtroom.
It is pounded into their heads over and over again in Law School how important it is to communicate precisely. The law can be a very technical subject, hinging on very fine distinctions. They are shown example after example of the results of imprecise communication, and how it can be exploited.
Compared to "normal" people, they DO communicate precisely. After all, imprecision in a lawyers speech can lead to their clients losing a great deal of money, or going to jail.
They don't come within shouting distance, of the precision of communication required and regularly practiced, by either doctors or engineers.
When you internalize the notion that imprecision in your communication can kill someone... or lots of people... particularly after watching it happen... That changes things entirely.
At the same time, both engineers and doctors can be MADDENINGLY vague about anything they consider unimportant, irrelevant, uninteresting, or so basic as to be understood by them as unnecessary to explain.
Even... perhaps especially... when that is exactly what you are asking about, or need to know.
This can make for some... interesting... problems.
It is pounded into their heads over and over again in Law School how important it is to communicate precisely. The law can be a very technical subject, hinging on very fine distinctions. They are shown example after example of the results of imprecise communication, and how it can be exploited.
Compared to "normal" people, they DO communicate precisely. After all, imprecision in a lawyers speech can lead to their clients losing a great deal of money, or going to jail.
They don't come within shouting distance, of the precision of communication required and regularly practiced, by either doctors or engineers.
When you internalize the notion that imprecision in your communication can kill someone... or lots of people... particularly after watching it happen... That changes things entirely.
At the same time, both engineers and doctors can be MADDENINGLY vague about anything they consider unimportant, irrelevant, uninteresting, or so basic as to be understood by them as unnecessary to explain.
Even... perhaps especially... when that is exactly what you are asking about, or need to know.
This can make for some... interesting... problems.
Monday, April 28, 2014
Flash Fry
So, as happens every few months, another major vulnerability has been discovered in Adobe Flash:
The most important thing to do, is update your flash right now (and for Chrome users, update your browser as well... it should auto update, but some Mac and Linux users are having problems with autoupdate right now).
If you are unable to update Flash, you need to block or disable it (uninstall it, block it in your browser settings, block it with a plugin or security software etc...). This WILL break a lot of web sites, so be prepared.
Updating though, isn't enough.
Flash... or really any active web content for that matter... has so many major security issues, which you expose to the world every time you visit any web page, or access any open network... that you absolutely must take additional precautions.
Don't just update your flash, use less stupid browsers (chrome and firefox both do just fine for the most part). Never use internet explorer for anything unless you are absolutely required to; and then only use it for the absolute minimum required.
If you are required to use I.E. for work, or a specific site or application, ONLY use it for those things. Use another browser for everything else. Heck, that can be a good security or organization practice anyway, just to avoid mixing data accidentally (like saved passwords or form fill data).
That's step one... or I guess step one and two, counting a browser switch (though I would hope that after the last few years, and the number of times I've warned about it, very few of my readers are using I.E.).
Step three, once you are using a decent browser, you need to use a script blocker, an ad blocker, and a flash blocker. These stop active web content from running on your computer without your permission.
All are available as free plugins, and they only take one button push to install from the builtin plugin search in your browser.
The great thing is, in addition to improving security, they just reduce the general annoyance, stupidity, and irritation of the internet.
For example, they prevent auto-loading auto playing flash video and music, prevent most pop-up and banner ads, prevent some useless and stupid social media overlays... Hell, they even make your computer faster, because all that crap takes up bandwidth, CPU, and memory.
Browsing with ads, scripts, and flash blocked, makes living with the internet better in every way.
For those few sites where blocking tools breaks stuff, all the tools have a little button to pause themselves. If you're going to go to that site a lot, they all have an option to not run whenever you visit that site... Just remember if you manually paused the tool, to manually unpause it before you move on to another site.
It doesn't take a tech wiz to do it... it's no harder than clicking a link in a browser.
New Flash flaw could let attackers control Macs, Adobe urges users to update
Adobe on Monday disclosed a new vulnerability in its Flash platform that may allow attackers to remotely take over and control Macs, PCs, and Linux machines and advised users to update their system as quickly as possible.This problem was previously thought just to impact IE on Windows, but was proven yesterday to impact all common platforms and browsers.
The most important thing to do, is update your flash right now (and for Chrome users, update your browser as well... it should auto update, but some Mac and Linux users are having problems with autoupdate right now).
If you are unable to update Flash, you need to block or disable it (uninstall it, block it in your browser settings, block it with a plugin or security software etc...). This WILL break a lot of web sites, so be prepared.
Updating though, isn't enough.
Flash... or really any active web content for that matter... has so many major security issues, which you expose to the world every time you visit any web page, or access any open network... that you absolutely must take additional precautions.
Don't just update your flash, use less stupid browsers (chrome and firefox both do just fine for the most part). Never use internet explorer for anything unless you are absolutely required to; and then only use it for the absolute minimum required.
If you are required to use I.E. for work, or a specific site or application, ONLY use it for those things. Use another browser for everything else. Heck, that can be a good security or organization practice anyway, just to avoid mixing data accidentally (like saved passwords or form fill data).
That's step one... or I guess step one and two, counting a browser switch (though I would hope that after the last few years, and the number of times I've warned about it, very few of my readers are using I.E.).
Step three, once you are using a decent browser, you need to use a script blocker, an ad blocker, and a flash blocker. These stop active web content from running on your computer without your permission.
All are available as free plugins, and they only take one button push to install from the builtin plugin search in your browser.
The great thing is, in addition to improving security, they just reduce the general annoyance, stupidity, and irritation of the internet.
For example, they prevent auto-loading auto playing flash video and music, prevent most pop-up and banner ads, prevent some useless and stupid social media overlays... Hell, they even make your computer faster, because all that crap takes up bandwidth, CPU, and memory.
Browsing with ads, scripts, and flash blocked, makes living with the internet better in every way.
For those few sites where blocking tools breaks stuff, all the tools have a little button to pause themselves. If you're going to go to that site a lot, they all have an option to not run whenever you visit that site... Just remember if you manually paused the tool, to manually unpause it before you move on to another site.
It doesn't take a tech wiz to do it... it's no harder than clicking a link in a browser.
Saturday, March 15, 2014
A little computer advice
Being an IT professional, I get asked for computer advice a lot. The most frequent questions I'm asked by the "average user" are "why is windows 8 so horrible", "how do I fix this virus I've got on my computer" and "what computer should I buy".
I have lots of answers to why Windows 8 is awful, but none of them will help most folks, except my one suggestion: Download a program called Classic Shell. It's free, it's a 30 second download, and it makes Windows 8 suck FAR less.
The virus thing...
Well... I'll illustrate the issue with an anecdote...
I took a family friend on as an emergency client. They home school, and the system they use for homeschooling was well hosed up, to the point where it was completely unusable. It would boot, but applications and web pages wouldn't load, it would reboot randomly etc...
I looked at it... No exaggeration, there were over 6,000 individual pieces of malware, spyware, adware... and that's with 4 different AV/adware/spyware/anti-malware packages running, including the commercial and updated norton 360. They also had 4 different "system optimizer" or "system cleaner" packages running, and god knows how much other "helpful" garbage.
He asked what I charged and I said "I'm doing this as a family friend, because to clean this up... Labor alone would be more than you make in two weeks. It's going to take me at least two full days. It'd be faster to wipe it and start over but you don't have backups or install disks for a bunch of this stuff. Even then, I really recommend wiping it when you get the chance, because I might have missed something.
And yes, it did take two full days... actually more than. I actually put over 20 hours into cleaning the system up, then rebuilding it to a consistent and usable state, then locking it down and putting tools in place to... I wish I could say prevent, but it's a windows machine so I can only say reduce the likelihood... of that sort of thing ever happening again.
Just so he would understand and appreciate the amount of work involved, and what that kind of work costs, I printed him up an invoice, with a 100% discount. Yes, it was more than he made in two weeks. He just about crapped his pants.
So, my advice on the virus thing is this... Wipe the machine completely, and install from scratch. If you can't do that yourself, donate the machine or give it to a smart kid who can, and buy a new one. It'll be cheaper and easier for you.
Oh and NEVER EVER EVER EVER buy or install norton, or mcaffee, or frankly any of the major vendors anti-virus, "security suite" or software "firewall" packages, and never buy or install a "system cleaner" (except piriforms ccleaner aka crap cleaner, which I install on every windows machine automatically). If they come on your computer from the factory, clean them off completely before you try to run anything. They are actively harmful.
For anti-malware, use windows security essentials, and comodo, AVG, Avast, or malwarebytes as a secondary scanner, and run Winpatrol to keep control of your computers settings and startup programs etc...
In general, don't be an idiot. Don't download anything, or open attachments or web pages, you don't know, or are not well known and trusted sources etc... etc... Virus scan everything before you open it, and turn on live virus scanning in your security software.
Oh and NEVER load or use a browser toolbar of any kind, unless you are absolutely sure you want to use it, exactly what it does and who it came from.
Most importantly, always live behind a physical firewall. Never expose a windows machine to the bare internet, no matter what kind of software "firewall" you have running (software firewalls don't protect you worth a damn. Also they shouldn't be called firewalls, because they aren't). You WILL be compromised, within minutes, without question.
That just leaves buying a computer...
This is where things get more interesting.
Now, if you're looking for a desktop, the answer is pretty simple: if you plan on keeping it more than a year, buy the second best CPU, most ram, and best monitor you can afford.
If you can change out your own hardware when it breaks, brand doesn't matter. If you can't, buy an HP (seriously, don't even think about buying other brands of desktop unless you can support them yourself).
For a laptop... it's a hell of a lot more complicated and involved. Of course, most people only buy laptops these days, leaving a lot of folks having no idea what to buy or how to decide, and no resources available to them to help.
So mostly, they end up buying on price, and buzzwords, and mostly they end up unhappy. There are some very good reasons why laptop shipments have been trending way down the last couple years, and the much simpler and more user friendly tablet has been taking over as peoples casual computing device.
As it happens, in the last few weeks, I've had about a dozen people ask for my advice on buying a laptop. Also, I've ended up buying (as presents, as replacements, for projects etc...) six laptops in the last four months.
Since it IS one of my most frequently asked questions, I've given all of this advice many times before... in fact so many times I went through writing it all down to send to folks or post on forums, but I'd never bothered to post it here. Someone asked again tonight, so I decided to post my little guide on the blog.
Ok, here's my basic question list:
Prioritize the following for me:
- Performance
- Cost
- Ruggedness and durability
- Portability and light weight
The answers to these questions, along with some general guidelines (below) pretty much determine what machine to buy.
A word on Mac's
If you don't mind the cost, MacBook Pros are simply physically better machines than all but the highest end windows machines (which actually cost as much or more), and they can run MacOS, Linux, and Windows natively. I HIGHLY recommend them for anyone who intends to keep a laptop for more than a year or two.
I live in the world of high end IT consultants, and high end security professionals, and unless our employers ban us from using them, almost all of us use MacbookPro's (whether we run OSX on them or not). I personally run OSX, several versions of windows, and several linux distros on mine, in both multiboot mode, and as virtual machines.
Really, they are just PHYSICALLY, so much better than all but the highest end windows machines, as to be in a class almost by themselves.
Let me illustrate what I mean...
A typical windows laptop might last me a year... I've had them die in just a few months. I've NEVER had one last more than two years of hard use. They just get loose and creaky, get unreliable, lose performance no matter how clean you keep them software wise... or they just plain die, with hard use.
My macbook pros?
Well, I've been running my current 15" MBP for almost exactly 3 years, it's still in 100% shape, it's still faster than most machines out there (quad i7, 1gb discrete graphics, 500gb SSD and 16gb ram). I really have no need, and no desire to upgrade.
So please, take my advice here... if you use your laptop seriously, and do any kind of travel with it more than a couple times a year, consider an MBP, even if you aren't a mac user.
These are my general recommendations:
As of right now, I wouldn't buy anything less than a core i5 in a general purpose laptop, unless I was looking to minimize power consumption to the extreme, or looking to spend under $400 (which means a machine only good for facebook and email). The miniscule price difference isn't worth the major performance hit.
I will not use a current AMD CPU/APU for anything other than the cheapest possible facebook and web browsing machine. Multi-GHZ Quad core machines shouldn't be at 100% cpu just watching youtube. They're garbage now, as general purpose systems and graphics processors (their high end GPUs are still great, and they do some interesting things in distributed computing, low power computing, and other specialized tasks).
If you don't want an optical drive, or don't care if your optical drive is external, and don't need a 17" display, get an ultrabook (preferably an aluminum or composite one, unless your budget won't cover it).
I always recommend SSD's highly, for everyone, even if they don't care about performance. If you need more than 400-600gb in your machine and SSD prices for this size range are prohibitive for you, I strongly recommend a hybrid SSD ($95 for a 1tb hybrid drive).
Let me be clear: Once you have more than the absolute minimum amount of RAM necessary to perform well, the single biggest thing you can do to improve your machines performance is to use an SSD. The difference is night and day, such that I will never willingly use anything other than an SSD or at the very least a hybrid drive, ever again.
I STRONGLY recommend a minimum of 8gb of RAM for windows 8, for any heavy work, or for lots of multitasking. 4gb is barely livable for Windows 8 and what I consider the real minimum for windows 7. 16gb is preferable for any kind of heavy use, multitasking, or running virtual machines. 32gb is WAY overpriced and most machines don't physically support anyway.
If you plan on keeping it more than 2 years, if a metal or composite chassis model is available within reasonable reach of your budget, make that reach. Even if you have to go down in spec a bit to do it. You would not BELIEVE the difference in toughness, and just quality feel, you get from a stronger chassis based machine rather than a plastic clamshell.
As of right now, my primary vendor recommendations are as follows, in three tiers:
Tier 1
HP(high end, particularly high end business models)
Apple
Dell (high end, particularly high end business models)
Tier 2
HP (mid/low end models)
Dell (mid/low end models)
Lenovo (used to be tier 1, now I consider them tier 2)
Samsung
Panasonic
Toshiba
Tier 3
ASUS
MSI
The tiers I've grouped the vendors into correspond roughly to what I consider their "utility vector". A combination of design, features, quality, durability, CONSISTENCY, warranty, technical support, and customer service.
I wouldn't ever even consider laptops from other brands at this point.
If you're comfortable with handling your own support, and doing your own minor repairs, then feel free to buy from any of the brands I listed.
If you are going to need to use the vendor to make minor repairs though, I STRONGLY suggest you go with a Tier 1 vendor, and consider buying the 2 year full hardware replacement warranty (at least if you plan on keeping the machine that long; and presuming it costs no more than 25% the replacement cost of the machine of course).
HP, Apple, and Dell just handle this stuff better, IN GENERAL (there are always breakdowns and horror stories), than the other vendors.
The reason I rate MSI and ASUS as tier 3 (and why I downgraded Lenovo from Tier 1 to Tier 2), is because their overall experience is inconsistent. I've had great stuff from them, I've had garbage. I've had great experiences with their support, and I've had awful ones. Overall, I'd prefer to avoid them, unless they have a spectacular machine at a spectacular price.
If you plan on keeping it more than a year or two, I STRONGLY recommend buying a "business" line laptop, rather than a consumer laptop. They're generally better designed, and better put together, with slightly higher quality components. Also, they're almost always a lot easier to service when things DO go wrong.
At this point I only buy computers from Amazon, Costco, WalMart (for the really cheap low end semi-disposable machines), Frys Electronics (sometimes they have spectacular deals on discontinued models or refurbs), Newegg, or direct from the manufacturers website.
No matter how great you think a deal is, always check the manufacturers web site, because they often run pretty spectacular specials.
... And that's about it really. The market changes so quickly that I can't make any more specific recommendations than that.
I have lots of answers to why Windows 8 is awful, but none of them will help most folks, except my one suggestion: Download a program called Classic Shell. It's free, it's a 30 second download, and it makes Windows 8 suck FAR less.
The virus thing...
Well... I'll illustrate the issue with an anecdote...
I took a family friend on as an emergency client. They home school, and the system they use for homeschooling was well hosed up, to the point where it was completely unusable. It would boot, but applications and web pages wouldn't load, it would reboot randomly etc...
I looked at it... No exaggeration, there were over 6,000 individual pieces of malware, spyware, adware... and that's with 4 different AV/adware/spyware/anti-malware packages running, including the commercial and updated norton 360. They also had 4 different "system optimizer" or "system cleaner" packages running, and god knows how much other "helpful" garbage.
He asked what I charged and I said "I'm doing this as a family friend, because to clean this up... Labor alone would be more than you make in two weeks. It's going to take me at least two full days. It'd be faster to wipe it and start over but you don't have backups or install disks for a bunch of this stuff. Even then, I really recommend wiping it when you get the chance, because I might have missed something.
And yes, it did take two full days... actually more than. I actually put over 20 hours into cleaning the system up, then rebuilding it to a consistent and usable state, then locking it down and putting tools in place to... I wish I could say prevent, but it's a windows machine so I can only say reduce the likelihood... of that sort of thing ever happening again.
Just so he would understand and appreciate the amount of work involved, and what that kind of work costs, I printed him up an invoice, with a 100% discount. Yes, it was more than he made in two weeks. He just about crapped his pants.
So, my advice on the virus thing is this... Wipe the machine completely, and install from scratch. If you can't do that yourself, donate the machine or give it to a smart kid who can, and buy a new one. It'll be cheaper and easier for you.
Oh and NEVER EVER EVER EVER buy or install norton, or mcaffee, or frankly any of the major vendors anti-virus, "security suite" or software "firewall" packages, and never buy or install a "system cleaner" (except piriforms ccleaner aka crap cleaner, which I install on every windows machine automatically). If they come on your computer from the factory, clean them off completely before you try to run anything. They are actively harmful.
For anti-malware, use windows security essentials, and comodo, AVG, Avast, or malwarebytes as a secondary scanner, and run Winpatrol to keep control of your computers settings and startup programs etc...
In general, don't be an idiot. Don't download anything, or open attachments or web pages, you don't know, or are not well known and trusted sources etc... etc... Virus scan everything before you open it, and turn on live virus scanning in your security software.
Oh and NEVER load or use a browser toolbar of any kind, unless you are absolutely sure you want to use it, exactly what it does and who it came from.
Most importantly, always live behind a physical firewall. Never expose a windows machine to the bare internet, no matter what kind of software "firewall" you have running (software firewalls don't protect you worth a damn. Also they shouldn't be called firewalls, because they aren't). You WILL be compromised, within minutes, without question.
That just leaves buying a computer...
This is where things get more interesting.
Now, if you're looking for a desktop, the answer is pretty simple: if you plan on keeping it more than a year, buy the second best CPU, most ram, and best monitor you can afford.
If you can change out your own hardware when it breaks, brand doesn't matter. If you can't, buy an HP (seriously, don't even think about buying other brands of desktop unless you can support them yourself).
For a laptop... it's a hell of a lot more complicated and involved. Of course, most people only buy laptops these days, leaving a lot of folks having no idea what to buy or how to decide, and no resources available to them to help.
So mostly, they end up buying on price, and buzzwords, and mostly they end up unhappy. There are some very good reasons why laptop shipments have been trending way down the last couple years, and the much simpler and more user friendly tablet has been taking over as peoples casual computing device.
As it happens, in the last few weeks, I've had about a dozen people ask for my advice on buying a laptop. Also, I've ended up buying (as presents, as replacements, for projects etc...) six laptops in the last four months.
Since it IS one of my most frequently asked questions, I've given all of this advice many times before... in fact so many times I went through writing it all down to send to folks or post on forums, but I'd never bothered to post it here. Someone asked again tonight, so I decided to post my little guide on the blog.
Ok, here's my basic question list:
- How portable/light/small do you need/want it to be? Will you be travelling with it more than a couple times a year?
- How long do you plan on keeping/using the machine
- How big a screen do you want?
- Do you want an optical drive? If so, DVD or BluRay drive? Is an external drive acceptable?
- Since you can run MacOs, Windows, and Linux on one, is a Mac acceptable?
- Are you going to be doing any non-casual gaming on the system
- Are you going to run any engineering graphics or calculation packages
- Will you be running any large spreadsheets, desktop publishing, design etc...
- Will this be your primary computer
- Will this be your primary digital device for consuming rich media (music, video etc...)
Prioritize the following for me:
- Performance
- Cost
- Ruggedness and durability
- Portability and light weight
The answers to these questions, along with some general guidelines (below) pretty much determine what machine to buy.
A word on Mac's
If you don't mind the cost, MacBook Pros are simply physically better machines than all but the highest end windows machines (which actually cost as much or more), and they can run MacOS, Linux, and Windows natively. I HIGHLY recommend them for anyone who intends to keep a laptop for more than a year or two.
I live in the world of high end IT consultants, and high end security professionals, and unless our employers ban us from using them, almost all of us use MacbookPro's (whether we run OSX on them or not). I personally run OSX, several versions of windows, and several linux distros on mine, in both multiboot mode, and as virtual machines.
Really, they are just PHYSICALLY, so much better than all but the highest end windows machines, as to be in a class almost by themselves.
Let me illustrate what I mean...
A typical windows laptop might last me a year... I've had them die in just a few months. I've NEVER had one last more than two years of hard use. They just get loose and creaky, get unreliable, lose performance no matter how clean you keep them software wise... or they just plain die, with hard use.
My macbook pros?
Well, I've been running my current 15" MBP for almost exactly 3 years, it's still in 100% shape, it's still faster than most machines out there (quad i7, 1gb discrete graphics, 500gb SSD and 16gb ram). I really have no need, and no desire to upgrade.
So please, take my advice here... if you use your laptop seriously, and do any kind of travel with it more than a couple times a year, consider an MBP, even if you aren't a mac user.
These are my general recommendations:
As of right now, I wouldn't buy anything less than a core i5 in a general purpose laptop, unless I was looking to minimize power consumption to the extreme, or looking to spend under $400 (which means a machine only good for facebook and email). The miniscule price difference isn't worth the major performance hit.
I will not use a current AMD CPU/APU for anything other than the cheapest possible facebook and web browsing machine. Multi-GHZ Quad core machines shouldn't be at 100% cpu just watching youtube. They're garbage now, as general purpose systems and graphics processors (their high end GPUs are still great, and they do some interesting things in distributed computing, low power computing, and other specialized tasks).
If you don't want an optical drive, or don't care if your optical drive is external, and don't need a 17" display, get an ultrabook (preferably an aluminum or composite one, unless your budget won't cover it).
I always recommend SSD's highly, for everyone, even if they don't care about performance. If you need more than 400-600gb in your machine and SSD prices for this size range are prohibitive for you, I strongly recommend a hybrid SSD ($95 for a 1tb hybrid drive).
Let me be clear: Once you have more than the absolute minimum amount of RAM necessary to perform well, the single biggest thing you can do to improve your machines performance is to use an SSD. The difference is night and day, such that I will never willingly use anything other than an SSD or at the very least a hybrid drive, ever again.
I STRONGLY recommend a minimum of 8gb of RAM for windows 8, for any heavy work, or for lots of multitasking. 4gb is barely livable for Windows 8 and what I consider the real minimum for windows 7. 16gb is preferable for any kind of heavy use, multitasking, or running virtual machines. 32gb is WAY overpriced and most machines don't physically support anyway.
If you plan on keeping it more than 2 years, if a metal or composite chassis model is available within reasonable reach of your budget, make that reach. Even if you have to go down in spec a bit to do it. You would not BELIEVE the difference in toughness, and just quality feel, you get from a stronger chassis based machine rather than a plastic clamshell.
As of right now, my primary vendor recommendations are as follows, in three tiers:
Tier 1
HP(high end, particularly high end business models)
Apple
Dell (high end, particularly high end business models)
Tier 2
HP (mid/low end models)
Dell (mid/low end models)
Lenovo (used to be tier 1, now I consider them tier 2)
Samsung
Panasonic
Toshiba
Tier 3
ASUS
MSI
The tiers I've grouped the vendors into correspond roughly to what I consider their "utility vector". A combination of design, features, quality, durability, CONSISTENCY, warranty, technical support, and customer service.
I wouldn't ever even consider laptops from other brands at this point.
If you're comfortable with handling your own support, and doing your own minor repairs, then feel free to buy from any of the brands I listed.
If you are going to need to use the vendor to make minor repairs though, I STRONGLY suggest you go with a Tier 1 vendor, and consider buying the 2 year full hardware replacement warranty (at least if you plan on keeping the machine that long; and presuming it costs no more than 25% the replacement cost of the machine of course).
HP, Apple, and Dell just handle this stuff better, IN GENERAL (there are always breakdowns and horror stories), than the other vendors.
The reason I rate MSI and ASUS as tier 3 (and why I downgraded Lenovo from Tier 1 to Tier 2), is because their overall experience is inconsistent. I've had great stuff from them, I've had garbage. I've had great experiences with their support, and I've had awful ones. Overall, I'd prefer to avoid them, unless they have a spectacular machine at a spectacular price.
If you plan on keeping it more than a year or two, I STRONGLY recommend buying a "business" line laptop, rather than a consumer laptop. They're generally better designed, and better put together, with slightly higher quality components. Also, they're almost always a lot easier to service when things DO go wrong.
At this point I only buy computers from Amazon, Costco, WalMart (for the really cheap low end semi-disposable machines), Frys Electronics (sometimes they have spectacular deals on discontinued models or refurbs), Newegg, or direct from the manufacturers website.
No matter how great you think a deal is, always check the manufacturers web site, because they often run pretty spectacular specials.
... And that's about it really. The market changes so quickly that I can't make any more specific recommendations than that.
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