18 Aug 2019

Choosing the Right Computer for School

It's just about time for school again and the assumption for many years has been that every student needs a computer. That's still accurate but now the question is more about what kind of computer students need.

The needs will be different for a high school student, a student entering art school, a computer science major, a liberal arts student, and a community college student entering a 2-year certificate program to master a trade. And before going any further than that I'd like to toss my hat into the ring as someone who wholeheartedly supports community college programs. Four-year college is not the right choice for everyone and the person who masters the skills needed to be an electrician, plumber, or mechanic will become a valued employee who enters the workforce with minimal debt. In other words, there is no shame in taking a path other than the one that leads to college.

No matter the setting, it's hard to imagine a student that doesn't need a computer. Several major categories of devices exist and selecting the right one is definitely not a one-size-fits-all affair.

• MacOS, Windows, or Linux desktop system
• MacOS, Windows, or Linux notebook/tablet system
• Chromebook
• IPad with a keyboard

Prices are all over the place, from less than $500 or to more than $10,000. Anything under $500 will have substantial shortcomings and anything over about $2000 needs to be justified by the student's needs. Some advisors recommend against even considering a Chromebook, an IPad, or any computer that runs Linux. Although well intentioned, that's bad advice. Consider everything. There's no reason to rule out a Chromebook or an IPad with a keyboard if it can accomplish everything the student needs to accomplish. And if both computing power and low price are essential, a Linux machine might be exactly the right choice. That assumes that the student doesn't need to run any applications that are limited to Windows or the MacOS.

Before selecting a computer, it's a good idea to check out the school and the curriculum. For students who will live on campus, it's important to know what's available in dorms. Perhaps more important is a quick review of suggestions or requirements for the student's major. This usually doesn't matter, but someone who's attending art school to major in commercial art will probably be told to buy a Mac. That's not because a Windows machine can't do the work but because agencies and in-house commercial art and illustration departments use Macs. A student who's planning to major in engineering will probably want a Windows or Linux computer.

For most students, though, the operating system is unimportant.

Look at the Screen

Although large screens are easier to see and use, they also add substantial weight. Instead of choosing a notebook computer with a 17-inch screen, one with a 14-inch screen will be much easier to carry around. The difference between 3 pounds and 7 pounds may not seem like much, but it's surprising how much more a computer seems to weigh when you have to carry it a long way. If it's important to have a large screen for homework (or entertainment) in the dorm, then buy an external monitor that stays in the student's room.

You should also check out the school's bookstore. Many have arranged for reduced prices from manufacturers. The discounts, while usually relatively small, typically still beat the best prices you'll find on-line. A lot of college bookstores have on-line options where students can use their student number to obtain the same prices they would get in person. Also, both Apple and Dell operate on-line stores for students. To obtain the discount, you'll need to be able to prove that you're a student.

And Pricing ...?

Let's start at the low end of the needs spectrum: An IPad with a keyboard. You can buy an IPad Pro starting at $800, but the price will balloon to well over $1500 in minutes. A better choice would be a standard IPad with 128GB of storage and Wi-Fi connectivity for around $430. You can add an Apple pencil for $100 and keyboards are priced from $100 to $150. So for $600-$700 you'll have a device that can handle email, website browsing, and basic text editing.

The next step up is a Chromebook. It's virtually impossible to spend more than $1000 on a Chromebook and most models are in the $500 to $800 price range and you'll find a few under $200. Chromebooks don't need a lot of memory because they depend on Google's cloud-based applications. They do, however, need an internet connection. Those who can get along without Microsoft Office applications and other Windows- or Mac-based applications will find that a Chromebook is a good choice.

Notebooks and convertibles are the next category. Notbooks have keyboards that are integral parts of the device while convertibles have keyboard that can be folded back or removed entirely. Although I own a Microsoft Surface Pro, I still find the practice of selling the keyboard/cover separately to be repugnant. I find it difficult to imagine anyone who would be able to use the device regularly without the keyboard and yet it doesn't come with the computer. You'll have to pay $130 on top of the $900 you'll pay for the tablet part. The computer has only one USB port and one video port. If you need more, you can buy the docking station for $200.

Other manufacturers provide a variety of options for systems that can serve as both a tablet and a laptop. Convertibles are generally more expensive than standard notebooks, but the conveniences offered by the 2-in-1 design might be worth the price difference. Some of these small computers come with Intel i7 processors, but most still have limited RAM and relatively small hard drives. Adding a USB hard drive solves the storage problem. Apple didn't offer any computers in this category, and really still doesn't, but the company is pushing the IPad Pro as such a device even though it runs on IOS, not the MacOS.

Desktop systems are uncommon today, except for people who need extreme processing power, extreme graphics processing, or extreme amount of storage. A student in a digital animation, computer games, or video production class might need this kind of power, but notebook systems are often sufficient even for these needs. The disadvantages of a desktop system are also significant. They're large and not mobile. They can also generate a lot of heat and noise. But there are big advantages, too: The CPU, memory, graphics processor, and disk drive(s) can all be upgraded individually.

Miscellaneous Tips, Tricks, and Thoughts

• Buy a computer with a solid-state drive. They're faster and more rugged than mechanical drives, so even a low-end computer will be faster with an SSD. Larger drives are generally better, but most people can get by with a 256GB boot drive (or even 128GB) and then use either cloud-based storage or an external hard drive to store files.
• Selecting the right computer for high school, college, or trade school is no less daunting a task that selecting the right computer for any other use. Reading recommendations from the school, asking questions, and checking trusted resources on the internet can be helpful. If it's possible, set your budget at $1000 or so. More than 30 years ago the "magic" price for the top-of-the line computer was usually $2000. The price stayed the same from year to year but the computing power increased each year.
• You'll get a much better computer for $1500 than you will for $1000 and if you assume that the computer will be in use for three to five years even a $2000 computer (about a dollar a day over five years) isn't unreasonable. Some sellers offer interest-free plans that allow the buyer to pay for the computer over 6, 12, or 18 months without interest. These are outstanding plans but be careful not to miss a payment or make a late payment.
• Both MacOS and Windows computers now use much of the same hardware. Regardless of the operating system, my recommendation is for as much computing power as you can afford. Intel i9 processors are fast but can be pricy; i7 processors may be the best compromise between performance and cost; i5 processors are also good choices but i3 processors (or even older Pentium or Celeron technology) will be found in low-cost computers. Avoid these because time spent waiting for a computer is wasted and it's annoying.
• The graphics processor (GPU) is of little concern unless you're majoring in photography, videography, or commercial art. If you are in a program like that, ask for recommendations from your instructors.
• Any computer should have at least 8GB of RAM. Some low-cost systems come with just 4GB and that's not enough. If you can afford 16GB, that's even better but you don't need to go beyond 16GB unless you will need to use applications that require extreme amounts of memory.
• Always opt for a solid-state drive (SSD) even if that means you'll need to purchase a computer with a small drive. 128GB is adequate for many users and 256GB or 515GB will suffice for nearly anyone. If you need more disk space for large photo, video, or audio files, buy an external USB drive. A 1000GB mechanical external drive should cost about $100.
• You may need to connect the computer to an external monitor someday so be sure that the computer has at least one HDMI port or DisplayPort port and preferably more than one. Having a combination of DisplayPort and HDMI ports is even better.
• The computer's screen size is of less importance if you have the ability to connect a large desktop monitor when the computer is at home. Otherwise you'll need to decide whether you want a computer with a large but heavy monitor or a computer with a light but small monitor.
• Universal Serial Bus (USB) has gone through many iterations. Any computer you buy today should have at least one USB-3 or USB-C port. One or more Thunderbolt ports would be even better. USB-2 and USB-1.1 ports have significant limitations and these will be found only on computers with suspiciously low prices.

Short Circuits

Some Scammers Are Just Plain Stupid

Dear Scammer: You really do need to try harder. Your silly attempt to steal my log-in credentials was laughable. It took less than two seconds to identify your scam, but I thought that I'd look a bit deeper.

Your email claims that you are a "Microsoft Administrator" but your email also claims to have been sent from secureserver.net. That domain is owned and operated by GoDaddy for use by its customers who use it to send email. I see two problems here.

• First, it is highly unlikely that Microsoft would use a GoDaddy server to send mail.
• Second, you did't actually send the message from secureserver.net; you just spoofed the address. When I examined the routing headers, it was clear where the message came from:

Received: from ip40.ip-198-50-141.net ([198.50.141.40]:52580 helo=secureserver.net)
by server.muscatlife.com with esmtpsa (TLSv1.2:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:256)
(Exim 4.91)
(envelope-from <admin@secureserver.net>)
id 1hsywN-0006E9-4w
for techbyter.editor@techbyter.com; Thu, 01 Aug 2019 00:27:31 +0000

It's easy to tell the SMTP server that you want to be known as "secureserver.net", but your IP address (198.50.141.40) says that's not the case. You see, there's a service that I can use to determine the owner of an IP address and I discovered that your IP address is registered to "Private Customer" at "Private Residence" in Mumbai, India. I checked just to be sure, but it seems that Microsoft is still headquartered in Redmond, Washington, and GoDaddy is still headquartered in Scottsdale, Arizona.

But I'll cede the point that most people won't do that and that far too many people don't even know how. But anyone can hover their mouse cursor over the links in the email — hover, that is; not click! This will reveal that the link (supposedly to a Microsoft server) is to "bogdangherman.ro" and the "ro" top-level domain is Romania. So I call your attention to my previous research showing that Microsoft is still headquartered in Redmond, Washington, and GoDaddy is still headquartered in Scottsdale, Arizona.

But let's look at the message itself. Would Microsoft send a message that's this ugly? The answer is self evident, but let's continue. The message shouts (1) "Email Administrator" at the top, followed by a much smaller (2) "Notice". That design is illogical. I won't even mention that the text is centered.

Your text clearly indicates that you were not successful in your study of English: "Our Mail (Why is Mail capitalized?) server Detected (Why is Detected capitalized?) you have [28] (Why is 28 in square brackets?) undelivered clustered mails (What is a "clustered mail"?) on the 30th of July. (You need a comma here, not a period.) 2019, at 08:22.09 AM which are awaiting approval from you to be delivered (The sentence ends here, so you need a period.)
please (New sentences begin with capital letters.) note that this may cause mailbox malfunctions (You need a period or a semicolon here. If you choose a period, the next word needs to be capitalized.) please follow instruction below:"

Below the main part of the message is (3) a section in bright blue. The writing continues to illustrate your lack of English skills: "Note : Messages will be lost and damaged if the above actions are not performed" (In US English, there is no space before a colon. It seems that messages will be lost or damaged, but probably not both. There's also a period missing from the end of the sentence.)

The (4) copyright line is correctly written but no competent designer would represent it in such large type. Microsoft has a lot of highly competent designers.

And finally, (5) you have a second copyright line that is a badly formed jumble. This tells me that in addition to failing at English, you also fail as a designer and and a programmer.

This miserable example isn't good enough even for a "nice try" comment.

But let's say I click the link. What exactly are you trying to do? I can follow the link without endangering the computer by using PowerShell. The PowerShell command $w = (new-object net.webclient).DownloadString("https://[REDACTED].ro/wp-includes/app/eenn.php? email=[REDACTED]@techbyter.com") returned another link (https://[REDACTED].com/skydive/aus/aus/mail.php?email=[REDACTED]@techbyter.com) that I used PowerShell to follow. That illustrated what the scammer wanted. Note that I have removed the domain name from the URLs because both seem to belong to people who haven't properly secured their sites are are not associated with the scammer.

The scam is just a standard-issue attempt to steal login credentials.

The End is Near for Flash

Despite the security vulnerabilities introduced by the Adobe Flash Player, some websites still require it. It's still possible to use the Flash Player in most browsers, but that support will end next year for most browsers.

If you need to activate Flash for a website that hasn't yet updated to using HTML5 and CSS3 to acomplish what once required the Flash player, here are instructions for all the major browsers: Chrome (Windows, Mac, or Linux), Firefox (Windows or Mac), Internet Explorer (Windows), Safari (Mac), Opera (Windows or Mac), and Chromium (Linux). The Flash Player should be enabled only when you visit a site that requires it and disabled at other times.

Beginning with Firefox version 52, support has ended for all Netscape Plugin Application Programming Interface  (NPAPI) plug-ins except for Adobe Flash. Firefox no longer activates plug-ins by default, so users will see a warning if the site they're on needs Flash. At that point, the user can choose whether to activate Flash or not. The warning will appear either as a black rectangle or as a message that drops down from the address bar.

Users can choose to allow or not allow the plug-in to load. Allow: Activates Flash only for a single visit. To automatically activate Flash for all future visits to that site, check the Remember this decision checkbox. The "remember" option will soon be removed. Don't Allow: Dismisses the notification prompt without activating Flash.

Flash will be removed from Chrome toward the end of 2020. Mozilla plans to remove support for Flash from all consumer versions of Firefox, but the Firefox Extended Support Release (ESR) will continue supporting Flash through the end of 2020. In September 2019, Firefox 69 will remove the "Always Activate" option so the browser will always ask for user permission and when Adobe stops shipping security updates for Flash at the end of 2020, Firefox will refuse to load the plug-in.

Chrome has a similar roadmap and the Chrome product blog notes that Flash has helped shape the way that we play games, watch videos, and run applications on the web but usage is declining. Three years ago, 80% of desktop Chrome users visited a site with Flash each day. Today that's only 17%. The blog explains the reasons for the change: "This trend reveals that sites are migrating to open web technologies, which are faster and more power-efficient than Flash. They’re also more secure, so you can be safer while shopping, banking, or reading sensitive documents. They also work on both mobile and desktop, so you can visit your favorite site anywhere."

For users, this shouldn't make much difference. Security conscious website developers have already migrated away from Flash or are working to do so because any website that relies on Flash will stop working as browsers terminate support for the Flash plug-in about 16 months from now.