Raymond.CC Blog

Category: Computer

  • Identify and Avoid Clicking Fake Download Buttons at File Hosting Sites • Raymond.CC

    Some advertisements are blended so well on a webpage that it is hard to be recognized as an advertisement with one quick look. This can be done by changing the font type, size, color, line spacing, and aligning the ads close enough to the text. In my personal experience, blending advertisements with text gets much higher click through rate (CTR) if compared to contrast, probably due to the background color not being black in color. Google allows Adsense blending but they don’t want you to confuse the user into thinking that the ads are content and tricking them into clicking on the ads.

    Recently I have been seeing a lot of really annoying advertisements in file sharing websites that makes you think you need to click on them to start downloading the files. Most of us are already familiar with the steps to download files from file sharing sites which involves clicking on a button to choose to download as free user, enter CAPTCHA, and then wait for about 30 seconds to a minute for the download link to get generated. As for the current trend, when you land on the webpage to download a file from the file sharing website, you are presented with multiple download buttons where most of it dominates the top of the page that normal users would most likely click on the fake download button. An inexperienced computer user may end up downloading something else because they were tricked into clicking on the wrong button.

    Here are some tips on how to avoid clicking the wrong or fake download buttons and also how to manually recognize them from your web browser.

    Below is a sample screenshot of the fake download buttons that appears on file sharing websites called Turbobit.

    Turbobit Fake Download Buttons
    Fake download buttons which are advertisements appearing on top, side and bottom of the page.

    The easiest way to stop all those fake download buttons that are advertisement from being displayed on your web browser is to use an advertisement blocker program such as AdFender, Adblock Plus, NoScript. I’ve installed Adblock Plus in Firefox, revisited the file sharing sites and the fake download buttons are all gone while only the real download buttons are being displayed.

    Another way is to use jDownloader, an excellent download management tool that is able to automatically download files from file sharing sites as free or premium user. If you are downloading as a free user, you will be presented with a small window for manual CAPTCHA input.

    Finally, if you prefer to keep your computer as clean as possible by not installing any extension or software, it is possible to identify the fake buttons as advertisements by right clicking on buttons or links and check the context menu. If you see either “About Adobe Flash Player” or “Save Image As” in the list, then very likely they are fake download buttons.
    Identify Fake Download Buttons

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  • Create Fake Dummy File on USB Flash Drive to Enable Write Protect and Prevent Modification
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  • Disable Automatic Photo Sharing when Drag and Drop Images to MSN Chat Window • Raymond.CC

    Sorry for the lack of updates from me for the past few days because I was away for the whole last week and the Internet in the hotel was way too expensive. Anyway I am back now and today I wanted to sharing something on Windows Live Messenger. There are a couple of ways to send files or images to another person in contact list but the method that I normally use is to simply drag the file and drop it to the chat window. Ever since Windows Live Messenger 2009, dragging and dropping images to an opened chat window will trigger Photo Sharing automatically and it takes up half of the chat window space until I disable sharing of photos.

    Disable Automatic Photo Sharing

    I can of course click on the Files button from the Chat window, then followed by Send a file or photo and finally browse for the image that I want to send, or if I keep the Windows Live Messenger program open, I can drag the image to the contact list. Logically I only send images or screenshots when I am chatting with the person and dragging and dropping the images directly into the chat window seems to be the easiest and most convenient way. Unfortunately there is no option that I can disable or turn off photo sharing in Windows Live Messenger but there is patch where it can disable auto enabling photo sharing when dragging and dropping images to chat window.

    Disabling Photo Sharing when drag and drop images in chat window requires hexediting of the Windows Live Messenger executable file msnmsgr.exe and the offset location changes whenever it gets updated. Some computer users especially newbies may find difficulties in hexediting. The easiest way is to use A-Patch which is a portable application where it can detect what version of Windows Live Messenger are you using and then provides a list of options for you to enable or disable.

    First make sure that Windows Live Messenger is closed. Right click on the Messenger icon at system tray and select Exit. Then run A-Patch, select Patch Messenger from the option and click Next. To disable Photo Sharing, check on the option that is last on the list and click Apply.

    Disable Photo Sharing MSN

    There are other useful options such as remove advertisements, remove what’s hot section, remove nudge delay, disable nudge shake, accept more than 3 files transfers at a time, run multiple MSN with polygamy, shorten status info in info bar, remove says text and remove billing info menu. The good thing about patching Windows Live Messenger with A-Patch is the modification is done on the program itself and you don’t need any other third party programs to run. You can download A-Patch from the link below and make sure that you download the version that matches with your Windows Live Messenger.

    [ Download A-Patch ]

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  • BEWARE: Phishing for RapidShare Premium Accounts • Raymond.CC

    I used to receive a lot email disguised as an official email from a bank, attempts to trick the me into giving away my account information by “confirming” it at the phisher’s linked website. Usually I will just delete it away because banks or any service providers don’t ask you to confirm your sensitive and private information through a website.

    Just yesterday, someone from Slovakia (I traced the IP address), or maybe he was using a proxy, posted a comment saying “If you have an premium account and you login http://www.rapidshare.xxxxxxx.xx/ then you get 10 000 premium pionts (= 30 day account).”

    Immediately I sensed that it might be fake because there is no such news in Rapidshare.com. Still feeling curious, I decided to check out the website because who knows it might be a hack or trick that can really give me 10,000 free points. When I click on the site, it is IDENTICAL as Rapidshare.com Premium-Zone login page.
    Fake RapidShare Phishing website
    If the link is different from the original website but looks exactly the same, chances are 99.99% the website is fake and it’s trying to cheat you to enter your private information.

    I noticed 2 differences if compared the fake website with the original Rapidshare.com website.

    1. POST submission link
    I checked the source code and found out that when you hit the “SSL-encrypted Login” button, it will submit to http://www.ncore_n.extra.hu/premiumpoints.php while the original link should be https://ssl.rapidshare.com/cgi-bin/premiumzone.cgi
    I believe that the premiumpoints.php will either send your information to an email or log it on the server.

    2. SSL
    The fake website did mention SSL-encrypted Login, but the URL only uses HTTP and not HTTPS.

    RapidShare Premium account is already so cheap and I find it hard to believe that there are people so desperate to have a RapidShare Premium account which made them go all the way to create a fake website. If my RapidShare premium account is being stolen, I’d immediately report it to RapidShare and have that account terminated.

    Important note: If you own a RapidShare Premium account, please do not believe all these fake rewards and make sure you login from the original RapidShare.com website.

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  • 5 Tools to Automate RapidShare Downloading for Free Users With No CAPTCHA • Raymond.CC

    RapidShare CAPTCHA has always been hacked no matter how tough they made it. Usually whenever RapidShare updates their CAPTCHA, it only took a few days for third party download tools to auto recognize it. One of the toughest CAPTCHA was with cats and dogs in them and it took 3-4 weeks to be cracked. A few days after the cats and dogs CAPTCHA has been cracked, RapidShare installed a new CAPTCHA system called TEABAG_3D.

    RapidShare 3d captcha
    The TEABAG_3D is developed by OCR Research Team and they are a bunch of CAPTCHA hackers too. They claim that after defeating several CAPTCHAs, they decided to make a CAPTCHA which is hard to break. I’ve been in communication with the developers of CryptLoad and jDownloader to keep track of the progress in defeating the latest 3D CAPTCHA in RapidShare. They were in 50% progress and suddenly RapidShare decided to eliminate the captchas to simplify the use of RapidShare’s free services significantly but with a catch that the download speed limit has been limited to 500kilobits per second, that is only 62.5KBps.
    rapidshare 500kbps download speed limit

    Now, we can all download from RapidShare using our favorite third party tools with ease without worrying on CAPTCHA updates or auto reconnect. I’ve consolidated all third party RapidShare downloading tools into one for your convenience.

    1. CryptLoad
    Download Cryptload
    – I’ve reviewed this tool before and this is most likely one of the most famous on-click hoster download tool. The interface is in English and configurations is not complicated. Other than downloading from RapidShare, it can also support downloading from many other One-Click hoster such as megaupload, gigasize, depositfiles and etc. Currently CryptLoad can only run on Windows with Microsoft .NET Framework and the next major update version 2 should support Mac OS and Linux as well. Supports automatic updates.
    [ Download CryptLoad ]

    2. JDownloader
    Download jDownloader
    – This tool has not been mentioned here before but I now tell you that this is a really good downloading tool for one-click-hosters website. JDownloader is open source, platform independent and written completely in Java. It simplifies downloading files from One-Click-Hosters like Rapidshare.com or Megaupload.com – not only for users with a premium account but also for users who don’t pay. It offers downloading in multiple parallel streams, captcha recognition, automatically file extraction and much more. Of course, JDownloader is absolutely free of charge. Additionally, many “link encryption” sites are supported – so you just paste the “encrypted” links and JD does the rest. Because it is written in Java, you can run JDownloader on Windows, Mac OS and Linux. Support automatic updates. Try it and you’ll love it!
    [ Download jDownloader ]

    3. CandiSoft Load!
    Download Candisoft Load!
    – Load! also has not been mentioned at this blog before. The interface is in German but it shouldn’t be too hard to understand as some words are pretty similar to English. You can always make use of Google Translate to help you translate from German to English. Runs on Windows and supports automatic updates. It also supports other one-click-hosters such as megaupload, netload.in, uploaded.to and etc.
    [ Download CandiSoft Load! ]

    4. RS Downloader
    Download RSDownloader
    – This tool has been mentioned at this blog before and the interface is in German. It runs on Windows, supports automatic updates and can only download from RapidShare. Can also automatic decrypt and recognized encrypted rapidshare links using YouCrypt plugin.
    [ Download RS Downloader ]

    5. Universal Share Downloader (USDownloader)
    Download USDownloader
    – USDownloader is another popular and powerful one-click-hoster download manager. It supports a lot of free hosting services, including the most popular ones like RapidShare, MegaUpload or YouSendIt. You can select up to 26 types of languages for the program’s interface and it runs on Windows. When want to do an update on USDownloader, you’ll have to use the server http://usd.cap-cap.ru/ because the one in the list doesn’t work.
    [ Download USDownloader ]

    There you have it, 5 tools that currently can automate rapidshare downloading with no captcha. Unfortunately (E)lephant currently doesn’t work as I get the error “download script failed at second page”. I am sure one day it will be updated to support the latest rapidshare changes.

    Some other changes that RapidShare made is premium downloads can generate up to 255 additional RapidPoints per day. Free users can upload and download 200MB files from RapidShare. No more wait time for free rapidshare users. As for the 500kilobit limit, I’ve consulted with the developers of CryptLoad and I am afraid that there is no way to bypass that.

    My favorite one-click-hoster download tool is CryptLoad and JDownloader. What about yours? If I missed any other tools, please let me know so I can add it to the list. Happy RapidShare downloading!

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  • Disposable Email Services: Tackle Spam Before The Inbox • Raymond.CC

    I’ve recently been receiving a lot of spam in my secondary inbox, one that I do not provide to the general public or Raymond.cc readers, but the personal email address that I use on my resumes and provide to close friends. This leads me to believe that I should have possibly used a disposable email service to receive my messages or try to figure out which people I shouldn’t have trusted so easily to allow them to spam me. However, there are a lot of different solutions to who or what could have spammed me and the easiest idea is quite possibly the most realistic: they spammed me in a blanket spam attack, basically sending it to all the Pauls at GMX.com. While there is no way to prevent something this, disposable emails are a godsend at keeping spam out of your main email accounts. And while I’m aware Raymond has covered this topic before, he covered it about five years ago so some services have come and gone in that time frame. Today I’m going to share with you the disposable email services I have used and continue to use whenever I need a disposable email address.

    Mailinator

    Mailinator is long considered by many to be a standard in disposable emails and is also one of the longest running, running all the way back until 2003. It does not offer a password system and your emails can be from one character to twenty-five characters long, but no matter what you choose, there is a ten character limit and only accepts plain text emails, for HTML emails and other add-ons we take for standard are ‘stripped away’, in their own words. While that means no infections though Mailinator, it does make for a limited mail experience. It has a list of alternate domains you can also send emails to, which will still forward onto Mailinator’s main domain and email box you choose. Mailinator also offers an additional ‘widget’ to post your emails to the disposable email account onto your website.

    YOPMail

    YOPMail is a lot like Mailinator, in that it offers the same basic features, though it also has some temporary domains as well as the permanent domains as well. Unlike Mailinator, however, YOPMail allows you to store messages as long as eight days from the original send date, as well as sending emails to other YOPMail users. While I don’t see a point to the latter of the two features, it is something different from the norm. YOPMail also offers browser integration for Opera, Internet Explorer, and Firefox.

    MyTrashMail

    MyTrashMail constantly changes it’s domains that it sends the mail to, but it’s next to never blacklisted on any of the sites I’ve used it on, making it one of the best disposable email services I’ve used in a long time. Sadly, it does come with the downside of storing the emails on their servers between 2 hours and 3 days. The maximum size for the inboxes are 4 mb and no emails are allowed over 2 mb, however, attachments are still allowed. It also allows for PRO features such as forwarding the MyTrashMail emails onto your real email, as well as allowing emails to be stored on their servers for up to 30 days, as well as Secure Temporary Email Addresses, and creating an RSS feed for your temporary email. For free or if you pay, MyTrashMail is a high cut above the basics that Mailinator and YOPMail offer you!

    Trashmail.Net

    Unrelated to MyTrashMail, TrashMail.Net makes itself a unique anti-spam service by setting up an temporary email address and will forward up to ten emails or last for one month, redirecting emails that the fake email address gets and forwarding them onto your real email address. Of course, there is also a paid option that will allow for unlimited forwards and unlimited emails as well, however, this will set you back about $5.49 USD a year. This is an amazing deal if you ask me, and if you need it, then by all means, go for it. It does offer 11 different domain choices, and none of them are restricted to only paid users, meaning you can use any of them without problems. It also has a Firefox add-on for you, in case you constantly use it.

    MeltMail

    MeltMail follows TrashMail’s lead, however, it’s email services only last up to 24 hours. While this might not be a long period of time, I saw nothing on the site that suggests you might be limited to a certain amount of email coming in. So if you are trying to get a lot of email coming in, MeltMail might be the best for a temporary email that can be emailed to. It also has an iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad application for those who have an Apple product that could use them. Otherwise, unless you expect high incomes of emails, MeltMail comes across as a thawed product.

    So there you have it. Five secure disposable email services for you. All of them are free for basic use, and two have highly advanced paid versions if you require more then what they offer free users. If you need more spam protection, there are other disposable mail services out there as well as fully featured spam guards as well. I’ve personally never had to go that far yet, but I might just have to, just to prevent the blanket spam that inspired this post.

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  • Upload Megaupload Files to RapidShare • Raymond.CC

    Yesterday I’ve shared with you all on how to transfer files from RapidShare to Megaupload. After a few hours posting that article, I received emails asking me how to do the opposite which is to transfer files from Megaupload to RapidShare. I guess more people would rather know how to transfer from Megaupload to RapidShare rather than the other way round since RapidShare is more popular and a lot of people are using it.

    The good thing about RapidShare is they have a built-in downloader called Remote Uploads. RapidShare Remote Uploads feature allows you to copy files quickly and easily from other servers directly into your RapidShare Premium sector. I’ve managed to get Megaupload files into my RapidShare premium account with Remote Uploads feature and the good news is this method also works for files hosted at FileFactory. It could probably work with a lot more one-click file hosting websites, so do let me know if you know any.

    There are some guides saying that you do not need a Megaupload premium account but during my test, I could not get the file downloaded to RapidShare using Remote Uploads feature without a Megaupload premium account. Weirdly it worked only once without using a premium account and then it never work again.

    1. Log in to your Megaupload Premium account and DISABLE Direct Downloads.

    2. Open a Megaupload link in your browser. Right click on the Download File button and select “Copy Link Location”.

    3. Log in to your RapidShare Premium or Collectors account. Click the Remote Uploads link.

    4. Paste the full Megaupload link to the box and click the Add button.

    I noticed that the full megaupload link generated for free and premium users are different. Look at the screenshot below. Both links are generated at the same time and the first link that shows Downloading is the one that is generated with a premium account. The second link that says “Download error! File not found?” is generated without a premium account.
    transfer megaupload to rapidshare
    It seems like the megaupload link for free users remembers IP address. What I meant is the IP address of the person that requested the file for downloading must match the IP address of the downloader. But when you request the link from a megaupload premium account, anyone can download the file even if the IP address don’t match.

    I believe other one-click file hosting websites such as FileFactory and etc does the same thing. Yesterday also I tried downloading FileFactory links to my RapidShare account via free user and it worked! However when I try it again today, it only downloaded a 31KB file which is the HTML page of FileFactory website. In short, in order to transfer files from one file hoster to another, you will need a premium account for both sites.

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  • Easily Generate RapidPoints to Covert or Extend RapidShare Premium Account • Raymond.CC

    I’ve only purchased a 6 month RapidShare Premium Account once and after that I didn’t need to. Usually before the end of the month, my Premium Account is able to generate enough (10,000) RapidPoints to extend another month of free rapidshare premium account. However, I’ve noticed that my RapidShare Premium account hasn’t been generating enough RapidPoints to cover the next month’s extension.

    I checked the uploaded files and they are still there. Then I tried downloading one of my 1mb file that is hosted in rapidshare using the free account and after finished downloading, the number of downloads increased by a point but my RapidPoints still remained the same. I checked RapidShare News section and nothing about rapidshare points were mentioned there. Then I check their FAQ and I found my answer.

    Last time we were able to generate 1 RapidPoint whenever we download a 1MB file that we upload to our Premium Zone. Heck, we didn’t even need to complete the download and the points are already added. But now, the file size must be BIGGER than 3MB 5MB, one free user can only generate 3 points per hour and the download must complete or else the point won’t count. I believe this is to prevent free users from easily generating rapid points to convert it to a premium account.

    Other than that, premium users can earn up to 255 premium points per day through premium downloads. When we purchase a new one month RapidShare Premium Account, we automatically get 8000 points. We still need another 2000 points to extend our premium account. I will show you how to easily generate the other 2000 points or even more using your premium account.

    I found a free tool called RSLoad which is programmed to generate the 255 points per day for premium users.

    Generate free rapidpoints

    As you can see, the interface of RSLoad is simple and pretty self explanatory. All you need to do is to upload a 3MB 5MB file to your premium zone and copy the link to the program. Then enter your rapidshare premium account username and password and click Start to get your free RapidPoints PU. There is a Check button which you can use to verify if you’ve entered the correct RapidShare Premium login information. You’ll need Microsoft .NET 2.0 or higher installed to run RSLoad.

    Although I couldn’t find an official website of RSLoad, but I’ve tested RSLoad with 36 antivirus and the file is clean. I’ve even submitted the file to ThreatExpert to run it on sandbox and didn’t find any suspicious activity. At first I was afraid that my rapidshare account will be hacked after using this program, so I changed my RapidShare Premium password to “password”. The next day, I wasn’t able to login to my RapidShare Premium account! At first I thought I was hacked but later found out that RapidShare auto changes password that are not secure.

    With RSLoad, we can get a maximum of 255 points per day, 7650 points per month, that is 75% of the rapidpoints required to extend or create RapidShare Premium account.

    [ Download RSLoad v1.0 by xx77aBs ]

  • How to Disable View Together in Windows Live Messenger • Raymond.CC

    hal9000 has written and published and excellent article yesterday on installing and activating English language of Kaspersky Security Suite CBE 12. I merely helped him with 2 screenshots on the region activation problem and the video recording on how to disable self-defense protection and copy the files to switch the German user interface language to English. When I have finished uploading the video tutorial to YouTube, I sent the link to hal9000 via Windows Live Messenger for him to take a look at it. Windows Live Messenger automatically fills up the whole chat window with the YouTube video together with a message “View together“.

    To be honest I am quite annoyed by this feature because obviously I have already seen the video and there is no need for me to view together with the recipient. This is actually very similar to the Photo Sharing feature which is found in earlier versions of Windows Live Messenger when you drag and drop photos to the chat window. The old trick to bypass the Photo Sharing feature is to simply send the hyperlink to the user but now Windows Live Messenger has been updated to detect the file extensions on a link that is posted to the chat window and automatically loads it on the chat window.

    Disable View Together Windows Live Messenger

    I would have to click on the X button located at the top right to remove the video from the chat window every time I post URLs to images and videos. I checked every settings available in the Windows Live Messenger options but could not find any where I can disable this view together feature in MSN. Since it is hard coded into the instant messenger program, the only probable solution is to look for a patcher or an extension that can disable this behavior.

    Fortunately my favorite patcher for Windows Live Messenger called A-Patch has been updated 3 months ago to support disabling Video Sharing for the latest Windows Live Messenger 2011 Build 15.4.3555.308. The good thing about using a patcher is it modifies the program itself so that you don’t need any unnecessary software to constantly run in background for this change to take effect. Simply download the latest version of A-Patch, run the program and check the Disable Video Sharing option (optionally you can also check Disable Photo Sharing from the list) and click the Apply button. Make sure that Windows Live Messenger is fully closed and terminated before applying the patch or else you’ll get the error “Could not run the patch. Windows Live Messenger is still running!”

    A-Patch Disable Video Sharing

    Download A-Patch

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  • How to Compare the Difference Between Two Identical Looking Images • Raymond.CC

    Have you ever had 2 images that looked exactly the same with your naked eye but the file size is different? Well I had such experience and even after zooming up to 400% and the pixels still looked the same. I am no image expert and I don’t know how JPG, PNG, GIF or any other image format works but if the size is different, logically something is missing or added in there. It’s just that we can’t see it with our eyes and again have to depend on technology to detect the difference. Here’s an example. Try comparing this first JPG image with the second JPG image.

    This picture is taken with a 5MP Canon PowerShot S50 camera and is scaled to 2592 x 1944 pixels. The second image is after re-saving which causes some information loss in the JPEG image. Most probably you won’t even notice any difference. I’ve found some software such as Image Comparer that cost money to find exact or close matches by actual photo content but I personally prefer to use this free method with ImageMagick.

    ImageMagick is a free software suite to create, edit, and compose bitmap images. It can read, convert and write images in a variety of formats (over 100) including DPX, EXR, GIF, JPEG, JPEG-2000, PDF, PhotoCD, PNG, Postscript, SVG, and TIFF. ImageMagick can translate, flip, mirror, rotate, scale, shear and transform images, adjust image colors, apply various special effects, or draw text, lines, polygons, ellipses and Bézier curves. The functionality of ImageMagick is typically utilized from the command line so be ready to type commands.

    There is a tool called compare.exe in ImageMagick that I will be using it to compare the two images for difference.

    1. Download ImageMagick. I prefer to use the portable version ImageMagick-6.5.6-Q16-windows.zip so I don’t need to install.

    2. Extract the ZIP file and you should see a compare.exe file in the archive.

    3. The most basic command to use ImageMagick’s compare.exe is:

    compare.exe image1.jpg image2.jpg difference.jpg

    4. After a few seconds when ImageMagick’s compare.exe has finished comparing the images, you should get a new file called difference.jpg. Open that file and it’ll tell you what has changed.
    ImageMagick compare difference

    You can learn about more advance usages of ImageMagick’s compare program from the official website.

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  • Compiling a Non-Sockets version of Kigen’s Anti-Cheat 1.2.0 Beta • Raymond.CC

    SteamBans Detox Anti-Cheat project is officially dead and currently the only good anticheat plugins are KAC and zBlock. KAC runs on SourceMod and zBlock is an independent server plugin. I personally prefer to use KAC because it’s open source and you can modify the plugin to suit your needs. Kigen’s Anti-Cheat (KAC) is a more advanced cheat CVar detector than ES Anti-Cheat or VBAC and was designed to detect most cheats. It will query and check for most cheat prone CVars and replicated CVars. Most cheats today currently disable CVar replication and also turn off sv_consistency and turn on sv_cheats and thus this plugin will detect those cheats. This plugin will enforce sv_cheats 0 on most servers.

    The official stable version for KAC is 1.1.9 and there are 2 versions, the regular and no sockets version. Many server admins would prefer to go for the no sockets version because they can avoid installing an extension called sockets which is quite unnecessary. Other than that, if you have custom modified version of KAC, you wouldn’t want it to be automatically updated when a new version is out. Kigen has released KAC 1.2.0 beta with many improvements to detect cheaters and this time it requires Sockets 3.0.0 alpha or later versions or else KAC wouldn’t load. Since there isn’t a non-socket version for the KAC 1.2.0 beta, I’ve decided to check out the code and managed to compile KAC 1.2.0 beta without requiring sockets.

    1. Download KAC 1.2.0 Beta Source Code.

    2. Extract the ZIP file, go to scripting folder and edit the kigen-ac-pub.sp file with a text editor. I recommend you to use Notepad++ to do that.

    3. Comment out line number 56, 100, 162 and 383 by adding double slash // at the beginning of the code.
    kigen anti-cheat 1.2.0 non socket
    4. Save the edited kigen-ac-pub.sp file and run compile.exe from scripting folder.

    5. Go to compiled folder and you should have a newly compiled kigen-ac-pub.smx that can be loaded without sockets.

    I can provide an already compiled KAC 1.2.0 beta without sockets but it’d be better if you learn how to do it yourself. Reason is KAC 1.2.0 is in BETA and when it gets updated to a new build, you are able to edit and compile it yourself rather than depending on this site. Kigen did mention that sockets doesn’t cause any lag, but logically less means faster because it doesn’t need to run extra commands.

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  • Nero 7.2.3.2b fixes audio CD skipping problem • Raymond.CC

    Nero 7.2.3.2b
    4 days ago, Nero announced a newer version of Nero 7 which is version 7.2.3.2b.

    Below is the list of changes/bugfixes for Nero version 7.2.3.2.b
    • Nero Burning ROM and Nero Express crashed after the DEMO version had expired.
    • Bad, scratchy sound when encoding files to mp3 using the ‘standard’ settings
    • Multisession was not automatically selected when burning to the image recorder
    • UNC support of Nero did not work anymore, so continuing a multi session CD with UNC paths did not work
    • Nero Burning ROM did not use the selected partition to create a boot CD
    • Nero Express crashed under Windows 98 when adding protected WMA files to a compilation
    • Nero Burning ROM had graphical problems under Windows 98 when changing the menu options any kind of animation
    • It was possible to select the ISO file system view in the folder panel of the compilation, although a UDF compilation was chosen
    • Error message was shown when starting to convert Audio CDs to Nero Digital Audio

    Let’s see if the latest version of Nero fixes the MP3 to Audio CD(CDA) skipping problem. It doesn’t say anything on the changes and bugfixes log, but I am going to test it.

    The audio skipping problem is caused by mp3PRO.dll in C:\Program Files\Common Files\Ahead\AudioPlugins folder. Nero v7.2.3.2b comes with mp3PRO.dll version 2.0.5.3
    mp3PRO.dll 2.0.5.3

    First, I tried burning mp3 to audio CD with full speed using my laptop but failed half way during burning. I replaced a new CD-R, chose the slowest speed and burn the mp3 to audio CD. This time it was able to burn completely without problems.
    I put in the CD-R to my card audio player and I’ve listened to a few songs, no obvious skipping problem like what I got last time. However, I noticed quite a few milliseconds of no sound when the song is being played. The millisecond of silence happened very fast but anyone would notice that there is problems with the CD.
    It might have been my laptop’s DVD writer causing this problem because it shouldn’t failed in the first place when I tried burning at full speed.

    I am going to do another test later which is using my computer DVD writer to burn at full speed. This time I will be using a different CD-R (Imation).

    [ Download Nero 7.2.3.2b ]

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  • Windows and Linux, the same, only different • Raymond.CC

    As a user of Linux and of Windows, I feel that I should explain a bit more about them and how both are very powerful operating systems in the right light. This is not to put down Macintosh, but seeing as I’ve never owned one, nor plan to, I don’t plan on including it. This is also meant to help people decide between the operating systems that heard me naming them off.

    Let me start by saying my personal favourite operating systems are the ones where you could tweak and modify it to as far or as little as you may wish. To a lot of people, that’s a very daunting task to modify an operating system, but the truth of the matter is, it can be very easy if you don’t feel there’s much to add. Many people find that Windows’ standard way of working is the normal way: a taskbar on the bottom, a button on the left to run a single menu that can be adapted to many things, and a showing of all the active tasks in the bottom left. For me, that’s rather bland, and have adapted a beta shell to control my Windows 7 laptop. Under my desktop, on the other hand, I’ve customized very little, because for me, Linux has very little I want to change, even though it can be modified all over.

    Under Linux, it’s not majorly different from what most people are used to with Windows. You can still click around, you can still explore the world of the internet, you still have your taskbar, your active tasks in your traybar, you still have your menu bars and everything. However, Linux differs greatly on the commands used to do things, as well as it’s background and it’s future. GNU/Linux, as it should actually be called (since Linux is the kernel and GNU is the kernel-less operating system), was founded as a community project, much unlike Microsoft and is one of the few operating system built by, supported by, and enjoyed by a community. Windows, on the other hand, was made by a corporation, for everyone, and supported by many. But they both have a lot that you can look at for support. I’m just going to cover the basics on this comparison, and if you’d like to know anything more, you are free to sign up to the forum here and ask me any questions, or post anything you’d like to know on this blog.

    Linux, for anyone used to Windows, is quite different from it in how the underlying system works. Instead of programs whom hog resources and that can’t seem to play fair, are forced to share resources. If you have used Windows Vista, you know how bad this seems, to have each process using it’s own share, without sharing the resources. It’s a memory hog, and because of this, the operating system feels slower and sluggish, just because it is running several instances of a single program. This also can lead to system instability because with all the processes running at once, it doesn’t take long for one of them have a memory leak and easily take up more RAM and CPU cycles then expected. Those that have used Firefox and Flash… they can agree with this easily. In Linux, processes are forced to co-operate and share the resources, making the system lighter and more stable. I’m pretty sure a lot of people, if using even Xubuntu for the first time off the LiveCD might be shocked to see how much lighter it is then their Windows operating system!

    But the major truth of the matter, with Linux, is that it stops what I was talking about before, the SAS/SUS that causes us to be infected. With Linux, we have a User/Root based system, or in the case of Ubuntu and it’s clones, a User/SuperUser mode. It is designed, unlike Windows and Macintosh, to have liberal use of the keyboard, though these days, a lot more can be resolved by the mouse then when I first started with Linux, three years ago. If you’re just starting out with Linux, you have a lot of choices to make. Which is why, if you’re in that position, I would recommend looking at DistroWatch and choosing not on looks but by the amount of support given on their official forums, and if it suits your needs. If you just want a generic recommendation, Xubuntu is what I would recommend. It is lightweight, based on Ubuntu (and supported by Canonical as well). If you really can’t be bothered to learn and demand everything to be installed on your first go, then Linux Mint is your best option… but be warned that if you do go with Linux Mint, you won’t be learning anywhere near as much. I hope this made a bit more sense then previous, and I’ll be posting more on Linux in the future, hopefully with pictures. If you need any exact help, feel free to ask away.

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  • Directly Edit Website Live from any Web Browser • Raymond.CC

    We periodically run contests in our forum to give out free licenses to registered members and we use a publicly available vBulletin add-on called vBulletin Raffles to automate the random selection of winners and also posting the results in a designated thread. The old method of asking the readers to post a comment to join the contest, manually extracting the names from the list, randomizing the list from random.org to pick the winner, contacting them via email and waiting for them to respond is just too much work. Moreover sometimes the email that I sent to the winner goes into their junk or spam folder and it takes even more time and effort in trying to send them the license. The good thing about using the vBulletin Raffles add-on is everything is automated as I only need to create the contest and send the license via private message where there’s no spam filter to block it.

    Recently we were continuously being asked on how the winners are being selected and to at least provide a screenshot as a proof. To be honest, screenshots can be easily faked when we can effortlessly edit the non-editable text found on other websites. The changes are of course temporary and only visible to the person who changed it but not to other visitors.

    The most basic method on editing a text or switching to a different image on a website is to save the webpage to your hard drive by simultaneously pressing CTRL+S and edit the saved HTML file with a text editor such as Notepad. However most modern web browsers today comes with developer tools (Web Inspector for Chrome & Safari, Firefly for Opera, Developer Tools for Internet Explorer) by default and that makes it even easier for us to directly edit the website live from the web browser. You can edit text, change or remove the attached images and even move the contents around the webpage.

    Let’s have a walk through on how easy it is to edit the text on random.org list randomizer results page using Google Chrome.

    1. First we enter 10 names in the part 1 box and then click the Randomize button.

    Random.org list randomizer

    2. Now we’ll have a list that is being randomized and the text are not editable. Move the mouse cursor over to the items, right click and select “Inspect element”. You will notice a bar being opened at the bottom of the browser showing the HTML code of the webpage.

    Chrome Edit Website

    3. Double click on the item at the bottom bar where it shows the HTML code to edit the text. As you can see, I’ve successfully changed the item number 1 from name2 to RAYMOND.CC. Now if I take a screenshot, you would have thought that it’s genuine but in fact the results has been rigged.

    Edited non editable text in website

    The “Inspect element” feature in right click menu bar is immediately available at Opera and Chrome. As for Safari, you will need to enable the developer tools in Safari by turning on the Develop menu. In Safari preferences, click Advanced, then select “Show Develop menu in menu bar”. For Internet Explorer, press the F12 key will enable the Developer Tools user interface. Do take note that the Inspect Element feature at Firefox doesn’t allow you to edit text. You will need to install the Firebug extension then right click and select Inspect Element with Firebug.

    There is an interesting bookmarklet which contains a short line of javascript that turns on contentEditable and designMode to enable editing of the webpage. There are some small differences between the two modes but turning both on seems to be the ultimate solution. Simply drag or save the Edit WebPage link below to your bookmark and opening this bookmarklet from your bookmarks will instantly allow you to edit any webpage live in your web browser.

    Edit WebPage <-
    Drag this to your bookmark or save to your favorites.

    Here is a video demonstration on how easy it is to manipulate random.org’s results using Google Chrome.

    Screenshots from computer as proof are no longer a source that can be trusted and probably video recordings would be more reliable and harder to manipulate. So if you need proof of someone doing something for you on their computer, ask for video recordings rather than screenshots. Also make sure that it doesn’t take them too long to produce the video recordings as it can be easily done with Screencast-O-Matic.

  • Best Backup and Synchronization Software • Raymond.CC

    For most computer users, backing up your files is a lot like going to the dentist – we tend to put it off until we really have to. By then, it’s often too late and the damage may have already been done.

    The good news is that there are now some excellent Windows backup software products available that make backing up relatively easy and painless. So easy that computer users at all levels can routinely and automatically protect their important data from disaster.

    I’ve tried a few well known backup software to ONLY backup files to my backup drive automatically and finally I choose to use…

    2BrightSparks SyncBackSE
    2BrightSparks SyncBackSE
    Features of SyncBackSE
    • Copy locked or open files (XP/2003)
    • Fast Backup and Smart Synchronization
    • Powerful FTP engine & AES encryption
    • Superb feature set and customization
    • Generous Licensing Policy
    • Extensive Help Documentation

    The SyncBack enables users to maintain backup copies of their files and folders or to synchronise them, so that both locations always have a complete copy. For example, a user may have a notebook and a desktop computer. During a business trip, he may be creating and changing files on the notebook. When he returns from the trip, he can have SyncBackSE synchronise those changes with the desktop.

    According to 2BrightSparks, the software offers different types of actions that let users choose how older and newer files are to be processed, and which files should be excluded. Features include standard file comparison based on the date and size, as well as optional MD5 checksum, which will detect even the slightest modifications to files. SyncBack also supports scheduled projects, advanced FTP backup with encryption, zip compression of backups, as well as network login and simulation runs.

    Although the SyncBack software is sufficient for many users, companies may prefer to use SyncBackSE for its added features, the company said. For example, the Fast Backup option makes the software perform faster on many general levels, such as directory scanning.

    SyncBackSE also uses a completely new and improved compression engine which is at least twice as fast, has better compression, and no limits on the size of the Zip file or the number of files in the Zip file. A new FTP engine also improves performance and compatibility with FTP servers, and offers new features like MODEZ transfer compression. The security of the commercial version has also been enhanced using 256-bit AES encryption.

    SyncBackSE is also available in French, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, Polish, Brazilian Portuguese, Simplified Chinese, and Traditional Chinese.

    My experience with SyncBackSE
    After the first backup which took quite a while to backup 15GB of data, the following incremental backup takes only seconds!
    It searches for new and updated/changed files and copies it over to my backup drive.
    Why I chose SynBackSE? One word, fast! Unlike the famous award winning Genie Backup, the incremental backup takes as long as the normal backup. The file scanning technology is quite slow and I don’t want that.

    This is a very basic, easy to use and very fast backup software for both beginners and advanced users.
    Highly recommended for people who backs up data daily.

    Surprisingly, this software is developed by Singaporeans!

    [ SyncBack Website ]

  • Monitor for File Changes in Important Folders or Directories • Raymond.CC

    It is important to monitor for file changes on a directory where you place all your important files even if you have backup. There will be times when you try running your files and found that it has been corrupted. Corrupted files are computer files that suddenly become inoperable or unusable. There are several reasons why a file may become corrupted.

    A corrupted file may occur due to a defect or bug in the software used to create and manipulate the file in question. At other times, the bug may be the result of an infiltration by a virus or other foreign software that disrupts the function of the program. When the user attempts to open the corrupted file, the system may lock up or provide a message identifying a problem with the file. And finally when you have a bad sector in your hard drive where so coincidentally your file is located at that location, you file will be corrupted.

    Even if you have backup, it doesn’t mean that you’re totally safe unless you have multiple versions of backup. If you didn’t know that your latest file is corrupted, you will most probably backup the file by overwriting the old one. There goes your important file and you can never get it back… To prevent this from happening, you can monitor for changes on your important folders.

    I’ve tried a few free file monitoring software such as the popular PC Inspector FSGuard, Folder Monitor, but in the end I still prefer to use FingerPrint.

    FingerPrint is utility to see if any files in a directory have been created, deleted, or changed since the last scan. It’s useful for checking if a program, e.g. viruses and trojans, has changed your system files (this is similar to such security software as Tripwire). The use of MD5 checksums guarantee detection of file changes. With it’s integration with the Windows Task Scheduler, you can automate your scans, e.g. scan your Windows directory every night. FingerPrint can also be used to calculate MD5 values for files and directories, and compare the results, search for files having a particular MD5 value, and find duplicate files.

    Monitor Folder

    There are two FingerPrint programs: the normal Windows program and a console program (FingerPrintCL) that can be used from the command prompt to calculate MD5 and CRC32 values for files.

    You can create a profile of which folder you want to scan for chances. Once you’ve done that, all you need to do is to select the profile by clicking on it once, and click the Run button to scan for changes. If you prefer automated mode, just click the Schedule button and it will create a schedule to scan for changes everyday at 9AM. Of course the scheduled tasks can be configured according to your needs. Some folder monitoring software installs service and add an auto startup to the program whenever Windows is booted up but FingerPrint doesn’t. It is designed not to affect your computer performance at all by running only when needed.

    You can also create a shortcut which will automatically run the profile and scan the configured folder for changes. All you need to do is to add the profile name at after the FingerPrint.exe. Here is an example. Let’s say I have a profile name called My Important Files.
    FingerPrint Profiles
    Now I go to C:\Program Files\MJLSoftware\FingerPrint, right click at FingerPrint.exe and select Create Shortcut. A new file called Shortcut to FingerPrint.exe will appear. Right click on the shortcut, select Properties and add the profile name at the end of Target. Make sure you include the quotes as well.

    FingerPrint Shortcut

    When you run a profile, if any files have been created, modified, or deleted then the Differences window will appear. The Save button saves the scan results (to be used as the comparison base for the next scan) and closes the window. Press the Cancel button to not save the results. If you do not save the results then the scan results from the previous scan are kept. It will also show you the log file that is in HTML file.

    FingerPrint is a simple yet powerful folder monitor freeware that works very well.

    [ Download FingerPrint v2.1.3 ]

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