On Feb 13, 6:53*pm, "
wrote:
On Feb 13, 12:08*pm, harry wrote:









On Feb 13, 2:39*pm, "
wrote:

On Feb 13, 2:50*am, Tegger wrote:

harry wrote in news:dbd3954d-ae20-4dfe-b022-
:

An ex-neighbour of mine has a PV system/battery that powers his
electric driveway gates. Cheaper than running a quarter mile of cable.
They are installed where it would be costly to provide an alternative
source of power

Where I live, such solar panels are often installed immediately under
existing power lines. For example, those flashing lights that sit atop
certain traffic signs; until recently, those lights simply had a short drop
of cable from the overhead power, but now have a solar panel. Abominably
stupid and expensive, but in keeping with the current tyrant's Green
dreams.

--
Tegger

Yes, harry is as clueless as ever. *Probably 95%+ of the solar
installed
is at spots that already have power. * Here in NJ, in addition to
seeing
small ones on utility poles, there are bigger arrays on the roofs of a
lot
of homes and businesses. *They don't work without the grid being
alive.
If the grid goes down, you have no power.

Well ****fer that is intentional, it is a safety and cost thing.

Safety thing? *Cost thing? *Clueless as ever.
The essence of the problem is that without the
grid, the power from a solar array would vary all
over the place. *What do you think would happen
to your furnace or TV every time a cloud came by?

But you haven't the wit to understand this.
There are standalone systems but they are much more expensive.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

You haven't the wit to understand that those solar
panels mounted on utility poles by the power company
are obviously connected to the grid. *THAT is what
you were replying to.

Of course domestic PV are connected to the grid ****fer. How else can
power be exported?
One reason they are disconnected on power failure/outage to prevent
them feeding back into the grid and electrocuting whoever is making
the repair.

BTW, the ones on poles are not "obviously connected to the grid"
I can think of several reason why this might nor be so.
All of them to do with money.

Micro-power generation is beneficial because it can be connected to
the grid without needing to enlarge/modify the grid, the power
generated is used locally.
Also it is more secure, if one generator goes down,it's neither here
nor there.

On Feb 13, 7:16*pm, wrote:
On Wed, 13 Feb 2013 09:06:23 -0800 (PST), harry

wrote:
Clearly you have never been to Germany.
Solar panels are cost effective *because they need no fuel to run
them. Their projected life is around 25 years. *And they produce no
pollution once manufactured.

It is clear the German government put a lot of money into solar but
they end up paying about 5 times as much for the electricity as I do
from a nat gas plant. About half of that price shows up on the tax
bill, not the electricity bill..

The solar panels will be running when you have run out of natural gas.
So you are proposing to squander yet another asset?
How very banksterish.

On Feb 13, 7:24*pm, wrote:
On Wed, 13 Feb 2013 12:51:19 -0500, Dan Espen
wrote:

And you have to buy a new Solar DC-AC convertor, when the old one fails
after a few years.

A few years?

My first hit on MTBF for DC-AC converter says 1 million hours.
365*24 = 8760. *Looks like 114 years.

Seems a little high, but a few years sounds nuts.

I agree that the MBTF is out beyond a few years but we don't know how
well they hold up to lightning. That may not be important everywhere
but we have an ass kicking thunder storm just about every day here in
the summer. (Florida). Then there is that 150 MPH hurricane thing.
I wonder how well a collector holds up to a coconut hitting it at
100mph or so? I know my pool collector didn't hold up too good and it
is just a low tech plastic deal.

Some of us are condemned to life in nasty undesireable places;-)

On Feb 13, 8:48*pm, "
wrote:
On Feb 13, 2:26*pm, wrote:

On Wed, 13 Feb 2013 13:31:43 -0500, "Ralph Mowery"

wrote:
I think he said right now you could get about a 60% tax credit so the cost
is less than half the list price.

That is the only way these things make sense, perhaps the most
regressive program since the Social Security tax.

Poor people pay more for power and a bigger tax bite *so rich people
can buy solar collectors.

That pretty much sums it up. *Here in the Peoples Republic
of NJ, that's how it works. * They put a tax on everyones
electric bill. *That money goes to send nice, big fat checks
to the NJ folks that put up solar collectors. * Those checks,
plus the federal tax credits are what makes it have an
acceptable pay back to install. *And you get those big fat
checks, not for any excess power you produce, but just
based on the total power you produce, whether you use
it for you hot tub or send it to the grid. *Most people use
all they produce.

Well it would cost you just as much to build any other form of power
generation. At least with solar PV, the householder gets the money
rather than the banksters.

The present total cost for solar power will be the normal price for
electricity in a few years.

On Feb 13, 9:05*pm, chaniarts wrote:
On 2/13/2013 1:48 PM, wrote:









On Feb 13, 2:26 pm, wrote:
On Wed, 13 Feb 2013 13:31:43 -0500, "Ralph Mowery"

wrote:
I think he said right now you could get about a 60% tax credit so the cost
is less than half the list price.

That is the only way these things make sense, perhaps the most
regressive program since the Social Security tax.

Poor people pay more for power and a bigger tax bite *so rich people
can buy solar collectors.

That pretty much sums it up. *Here in the Peoples Republic
of NJ, that's how it works. * They put a tax on everyones
electric bill. *That money goes to send nice, big fat checks
to the NJ folks that put up solar collectors. * Those checks,
plus the federal tax credits are what makes it have an
acceptable pay back to install. *And you get those big fat
checks, not for any excess power you produce, but just
based on the total power you produce, whether you use
it for you hot tub or send it to the grid. *Most people use
all they produce.

even better, here in AZ, they just increased the eco monthly fee because
the utility isn't making enough profit, because everyone is generating
too much power, economizing, installing cfl, and shifting power usage to
off hours.

That can only be good.

harry wrote in
:

On Feb 13, 5:29*pm, Sjouke Burry s@b wrote:
harry wrote in
news:3c5379c8-51f5-4c8b-a3cf-
:









On Feb 13, 2:34 pm, Robert wrote:
On Feb 13, 4:16 am, Harry Johnson wrote:

Where I live, we are running out of fossil fuels.

Maybe we should capture free energy from the sun?

Not if it takes more fossil fuel to excavate, refine,
manufacture and distribute a solar panel than the
energy the panel can produce during it's working life.

It is a toy for people who can get government subsidies.

Here's a real world example:

A 25 watt panel costs about $125 . That is the cost
to produce the panel and get it into the hands of a
homeowner -- i.e. the selling price, typically.

Use Dallas as a location. 10 cents per kwh
and a yearly average of 5.5 hours of "full sun" per day.

OK $125 means 1,250,000 watt-hours of electricity

That means 1,250,000 / (5.5 x 25) = 9091 days of
power generation at full panel ability.

That means 9091/365 = 24.9 years to break even on
cost of generated power, assuming zero maintenance
and zero damage from rain and hail.

An unsustainable scenario.......

And if you figure in the cost of external infrastructure
that's needed --- batteries, wiring, power converter,
installation costs, maintenance on the infrastructure...

..... the business decision is a no-brainer....

Solar is a TOY, unless there is no other possible
way.......Even a gasoline generator is more
cost-effective...

Clearly you have never been to Germany.
Solar panels are cost effective *because they need no fuel to run
them. Their projected life is around 25 years. *And they produce no
pollution once manufactured.
You have to buy gasoline to run your generator. You have to
maintain it and it has a lifetime of a few thousand hours at best.
And the cost of fossil fuels will rise.
And fossil fuels are too valuable to burn.

And you have to buy a new Solar DC-AC convertor, when the old one
fails after a few years.
Want to estimate the cost, when your original supplier is out of
bizness? My guessimate comes out at 4 to 8000 dollars/euros.
Not to mention, what replacing one or two failing panels costs.
25 years without maintenance costs is quite impossible....
You need panels with the same properties.........

Well you must have pretty poor "grid tie inverters" (the correct term)
in the USA.
Or is this more republican propaganda?

Some have run for decades in Europe. There are no moving parts and if
they are in a cool dust free environment they run for a long long
time.
What maintenance do you imagine you to something with no moving parts
that is self cleaning when it rains?


I know many people with PV arrays. I don't know one that has failed.
They are deemed to loose 1% max. of output/year.

Prices of the equipment has been in near free fall of late in Europe
so any failures will be much cheaper to replace than I paid initially.
I imagine this is so in the USA too.



jabbut, this stuf is in the netherlands(or Holland maybe).

On Feb 13, 11:20*pm, Sjouke Burry s@b wrote:
"Ralph Mowery" wrote innews:aYOdndVEOPWeQIbMnZ2dnUVZ_vSdnZ2d@earthlink. com:











"Sjouke Burry" s@b wrote in message
. 12.10...
And you have to buy a new Solar DC-AC convertor, when the old one
fails after a few years.
Want to estimate the cost, when your original supplier is out of
bizness? My guessimate comes out at 4 to 8000 dollars/euros.
Not to mention, what replacing one or two failing panels costs.
25 years without maintenance costs is quite impossible....
You need panels with the same properties.........

There are now 'microinverters' that only produce about 300 watts and
are easy to replace. You do have about 24 of them per panel. *With
todays cost it only takes about 5 years for a payback when you factor
in all the tax breaks in the US.

Again look here for a real user.
http://www.kenclifton.com/wordpress/

My neighbour is a real user, about 16 big panels.
The panels are in series, and the convertor
converts high-voltage DC to 240 V ac.
I am an electronic engineer, and I know some high-voltage equipment
to fail on occasion.
Even if a salesman tries to convince me thats not the case.
Besides, the whole installation came from China, in a multi-customer
contract to a chinese firm, including installation and convertor.
It is not a simple convertor, a lot of smart control buildin.
Now where to find such an animal in about 5 years?????
A failng panel is easier, you can take it out of the loop, and keep
on using the rest. That just decreases efficiency.

Any make of panel can be used with any grid tie inverter. And panels
can be mixed so long as of similar specification. So no problems with
replace ments in that respect. Appearance might be an issue with odd
panels.

I too have an electric car. I recharge it on sunny days if at all
possible.
I have a 4Kwp array, the car takes 2.2Kw on charge.
All our domestic electricity is 240 volt here. (UK)

Mark wrote:
We have solar panels all over the place here
in the Peoples Republic of NJ and no smart meters.
Funny, they seem to work just fine.



yeah, I see those small solar panels on the telephone poles all over
NJ.

I figure each panel makes what? $100 worth of electricity per
year??? at best?

how much did it cost the taxpayers to have each one of those installed
on a pole by a crew? and how much will it cost to maintain...

what a scam


My city put them on the "Slow-School Zone" signs. Evidently the panels
charge a battery most of the day and the battery runs the flashing sign
maybe four hours.

On Feb 14, 3:18*am, harry wrote:
On Feb 13, 7:16*pm, wrote:

On Wed, 13 Feb 2013 09:06:23 -0800 (PST), harry

wrote:
Clearly you have never been to Germany.
Solar panels are cost effective *because they need no fuel to run
them. Their projected life is around 25 years. *And they produce no
pollution once manufactured.

It is clear the German government put a lot of money into solar but
they end up paying about 5 times as much for the electricity as I do
from a nat gas plant. About half of that price shows up on the tax
bill, not the electricity bill..

The solar panels will be running when you have run out of natural gas.
So you are proposing to squander yet another asset?
How very banksterish.

Yeah, great idea. We should convert to expensive solar panels
while the rest of the world uses the huge supply of natural gas,
instead of us. Better China and India should use the cheap fossil
fuels so they can have lower costs and put more of the USA out
of business. You're a financial genius harry!

On Feb 14, 2:58*am, harry wrote:
On Feb 13, 6:53*pm, "
wrote:





On Feb 13, 12:08*pm, harry wrote:

On Feb 13, 2:39*pm, "
wrote:

On Feb 13, 2:50*am, Tegger wrote:

harry wrote in news:dbd3954d-ae20-4dfe-b022-
:

An ex-neighbour of mine has a PV system/battery that powers his
electric driveway gates. Cheaper than running a quarter mile of cable.
They are installed where it would be costly to provide an alternative
source of power

Where I live, such solar panels are often installed immediately under
existing power lines. For example, those flashing lights that sit atop
certain traffic signs; until recently, those lights simply had a short drop
of cable from the overhead power, but now have a solar panel. Abominably
stupid and expensive, but in keeping with the current tyrant's Green
dreams.

--
Tegger

Yes, harry is as clueless as ever. *Probably 95%+ of the solar
installed
is at spots that already have power. * Here in NJ, in addition to
seeing
small ones on utility poles, there are bigger arrays on the roofs of a
lot
of homes and businesses. *They don't work without the grid being
alive.
If the grid goes down, you have no power.

Well ****fer that is intentional, it is a safety and cost thing.

Safety thing? *Cost thing? *Clueless as ever.
The essence of the problem is that without the
grid, the power from a solar array would vary all
over the place. *What do you think would happen
to your furnace or TV every time a cloud came by?

But you haven't the wit to understand this.
There are standalone systems but they are much more expensive.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

You haven't the wit to understand that those solar
panels mounted on utility poles by the power company
are obviously connected to the grid. *THAT is what
you were replying to.

Of course domestic PV are connected to the grid ****fer. How else can
power be exported?

And yet you posted that the solar panels someone saw
mounted along the road on utility poles are used where
running grid power is too difficult or impossible. Go figure.
Those panels too are connected to the grid, dumb ass.



One reason they are disconnected on power failure/outage to prevent
them feeding back into the grid and electrocuting whoever is making
the repair.

They are not just "disconnected". More importantly without
the grid, they no longer provide power to the house. You could
disconnect them, just like a standby generator if backfeeding was
the issue.




BTW, the ones on poles are not "obviously connected to the grid"
I can think of several reason why this might nor be so.
All of them to do with money.

Look dumb ass. The poster was talking about solar panels
on utility poles in NJ. You don't live here, so why do you insist
on making an ass of yourself? The ones he's talking about
are installed by the power company and most certainly grid
connected.




Micro-power generation is beneficial because it can be connected to
the grid without needing to enlarge/modify the grid, the power
generated is used locally.

Well, yeah. Gee, maybe that's why they are connected to
the grid, dumb ass.

A couple weeks ago, I got some trojan from Hell. It wiped out my hard drive.
I didn't know what was happening, and had an external drive plugged in. That
stopped working, so I tried my other external drive.

I took the three drives to a friend (graduate of a computer college), who
could not recover anything. Mailed the drives to another friend who found
all three to be dead. Friend two even used the forensic programs that the
cops use.

Something got me. And, it did some kind of damage that two techies could not
recover.

Christopher A. Young
Learn more about Jesus
www.lds.org
..

wrote in message
...
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 05:37:38 -0800 (PST), "
wrote:

PCs have been hacked on a
large scale in some sophisticated attacks in a way that
damaged them so that they had to be replaced.

Huh?

Maybe the software had to be reloaded but the hardware was not
damaged. I understand that for a lot of idiots getting a virus (or
simply a bunch of bloatware) on the machine causes them to just buy a
new one, preloaded but if they had their head a quarter inch out of
their ass they would format and reload the one they have.

On Feb 14, 10:38*am, wrote:
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 05:37:38 -0800 (PST), "

wrote:
*PCs have been hacked on a
large scale in some sophisticated *attacks in a way that
damaged them so that they had to be replaced.

Huh?

Maybe the software had to be reloaded but the hardware was not
damaged. I understand that for a lot of idiots getting a virus (or
simply a bunch of bloatware) on the machine causes them to just buy a
new one, preloaded but if they had their head a quarter inch out of
their ass they would format and *reload the one they have.

It's not farfetched. I assume you've heard of folks that
decided to update their bios and wound up with a MB that
was kaput? The critical boot-up code is typicaly stored
today in flash memory. That makes it possible to do
upgrades, if it becomes essential. But I've never done
one for precisely that reason. If something goes wrong,
it could be bye, bye MB. I guess the other factor was
any such bios upgrade wasn't doing much for me, my
PC was working ok.

Now you would think there would be part of the Flash
that is secure and can't be overwritten by software
when updating the bios.
Not sure if they do that on some PCs, or not. But
the point is that it's a real problem. And I remember
hearing about a specific attack from either hackers or
foreign govt that did render thousands of PCs kaput
so that they had to be scrapped.

On Wednesday, February 13, 2013 11:12:32 PM UTC-5, wrote:
Unfortunately we just trade the old dependence on foreign oil we had
for a dependence on foreign solar collectors right at the time when we
have a fossil energy surplus here. Coincidence? Maybe but I smell rich
people manipulating a market.

Surplus. Uh-huh.

If there's such a surplus then why are prices going up-up-up?

We're supposed to be on the "cheaper" winter blend right now and prices are creeping back to $4 a gallon.

Frankly I'd rather pay the Chinese for solar panels than the greedy old white men manipulating the gas prices.

On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 08:08:32 -0800 (PST), "
wrote:

On Feb 14, 10:38*am, wrote:
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 05:37:38 -0800 (PST), "

wrote:
*PCs have been hacked on a
large scale in some sophisticated *attacks in a way that
damaged them so that they had to be replaced.

Huh?

Maybe the software had to be reloaded but the hardware was not
damaged. I understand that for a lot of idiots getting a virus (or
simply a bunch of bloatware) on the machine causes them to just buy a
new one, preloaded but if they had their head a quarter inch out of
their ass they would format and *reload the one they have.

It's not farfetched. I assume you've heard of folks that
decided to update their bios and wound up with a MB that
was kaput? The critical boot-up code is typicaly stored
today in flash memory. That makes it possible to do
upgrades, if it becomes essential. But I've never done
one for precisely that reason. If something goes wrong,
it could be bye, bye MB. I guess the other factor was
any such bios upgrade wasn't doing much for me, my
PC was working ok.

Now you would think there would be part of the Flash
that is secure and can't be overwritten by software
when updating the bios.
Not sure if they do that on some PCs, or not. But
the point is that it's a real problem. And I remember
hearing about a specific attack from either hackers or
foreign govt that did render thousands of PCs kaput
so that they had to be scrapped.

My MB has a dual BIOS. If flashing fails and corrupts the EPROM it can
be restored at boot. Only one can be written to for flashing
purposes. The backup BIOS cannot.

"...A dual BIOS is a computer motherboard that contains two BIOS
chips, a main BIOS and a backup BIOS. This motherboard setup helps a
motherboard recover from any issues that may happen during a BIOS
update, helps protect the BIOS from any potential virus, and helps
with any other issues that may arise with the BIOS."

On 2/14/2013 10:49 AM, wrote:
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 08:08:32 -0800 (PST), "
wrote:

On Feb 14, 10:38 am, wrote:
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 05:37:38 -0800 (PST), "

wrote:
PCs have been hacked on a
large scale in some sophisticated attacks in a way that
damaged them so that they had to be replaced.

Huh?

Maybe the software had to be reloaded but the hardware was not
damaged. I understand that for a lot of idiots getting a virus (or
simply a bunch of bloatware) on the machine causes them to just buy a
new one, preloaded but if they had their head a quarter inch out of
their ass they would format and reload the one they have.

It's not farfetched. I assume you've heard of folks that
decided to update their bios and wound up with a MB that
was kaput? The critical boot-up code is typicaly stored
today in flash memory. That makes it possible to do
upgrades, if it becomes essential. But I've never done
one for precisely that reason. If something goes wrong,
it could be bye, bye MB. I guess the other factor was
any such bios upgrade wasn't doing much for me, my
PC was working ok.

Now you would think there would be part of the Flash
that is secure and can't be overwritten by software
when updating the bios.
Not sure if they do that on some PCs, or not. But
the point is that it's a real problem. And I remember
hearing about a specific attack from either hackers or
foreign govt that did render thousands of PCs kaput
so that they had to be scrapped.

I suppose it might be possible to have a virus that would overwrite
the BIOS but that would have to be somewhat machine specific.


I remember such a virus back in the 90's. It would screw up the BIOS in
any machine running a Microsoft OS. O_o

TDD

wrote:

On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 10:53:18 -0500, "Stormin Mormon"
wrote:

A couple weeks ago, I got some trojan from Hell. It wiped out my hard drive.
I didn't know what was happening, and had an external drive plugged in. That
stopped working, so I tried my other external drive.

I took the three drives to a friend (graduate of a computer college), who
could not recover anything. Mailed the drives to another friend who found
all three to be dead. Friend two even used the forensic programs that the
cops use.

Something got me. And, it did some kind of damage that two techies could not
recover.

Usually these things just blow up the partition table. That makes the
drive pretty much unusable until you restore it.
To actually wipe the data will take some time, up to hours depending
on the size.

I am not sure what you mean by "forensic programs that the
cops use" but if these are real cops they actually look at the data
blocks and they will be there unless they got overwritten (that
"hours" thing I was talking about)

For all practical purposes wiping out the partition table and the
indexes will make a drive toast and that happens pretty fast. You can
see the raw data but it won't be that usable if it can't be put in
context.

Usually you can inspect a drive on an expendable machine.

If you really want to look at a drive you think is that infected, use
a bootable CD tool. Then it can't spread.
Back in the FAT days, Norton would usually fix most of these problems
without losing the data. I am not sure what works on NTFS drives.

These days I just depend on good backups and I don't hesitate to wipe
the infected drive and starting over when someone brings me a "virus"
machine. Start with a "write all 1s" program (AKA low level format,
even if not true)
Then partition it and format it.
.

I'm thinking that "smart" malware would update the drive firmware
rendering it inoperable until that firmware was replaced. Depending on
how the drive is built, reloading the firmware may be no easy task.

On Feb 14, 11:49*am, wrote:
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 08:08:32 -0800 (PST), "





wrote:
On Feb 14, 10:38*am, wrote:
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 05:37:38 -0800 (PST), "

wrote:
*PCs have been hacked on a
large scale in some sophisticated *attacks in a way that
damaged them so that they had to be replaced.

Huh?

Maybe the software had to be reloaded but the hardware was not
damaged. I understand that for a lot of idiots getting a virus (or
simply a bunch of bloatware) on the machine causes them to just buy a
new one, preloaded but if they had their head a quarter inch out of
their ass they would format and *reload the one they have.

It's not farfetched. *I assume you've heard of folks that
decided to update their bios and wound up with a MB that
was kaput? * The critical boot-up code is typicaly stored
today in flash memory. *That makes it possible to do
upgrades, if it becomes essential. * But I've never done
one for precisely that reason. *If something goes wrong,
it could be bye, bye MB. *I guess the other factor was
any such bios upgrade wasn't doing much for me, my
PC was working ok.

Now you would think there would be part of the Flash
that is secure and can't be overwritten by software
when updating the bios.
Not sure if they do that on some PCs, or not. *But
the point is that it's a real problem. *And I remember
hearing about a specific attack from either hackers or
foreign govt that did render thousands of PCs kaput
so that they had to be scrapped.

I suppose it might be possible to have a virus that would overwrite
the BIOS but that would have to be somewhat machine specific.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

I looked for the actual event and here's what I found. It
was last year at Aramco. Here is one report on it:


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/1...n_1960113.html

"More than 30,000 computers that it infected (at ARAMCO) were
rendered useless, and had to be replaced," he (Leon Panetta) said.


That's the story line that I heard reported at the time on
probably CBS news too.

However if you google for it now, there are a lot of hits on other
subequent reports that seem to say that the virus destroyed data,
hard drive partitions, etc. in the more normal fashion, ie not so
that the eqpt has to be replaced. I think that this looks more like
a case of Panetta mistating the facts:


http://www.zdnet.com/us-iran-is-to-b...ks-7000005672/

A disparity between Panetta's statement that "more than 30,000
computers that it infected were rendered useless and had to be
replaced," which "virtually destroyed 30,000 computers" is Aramco's
official response, which said that "the virus affected about 30,000
workstations. The workstations have since been cleaned and restored to
service."

But is it possible to overwrite the bios and not have enough
boot code there that would allow the PC to be reloaded? Not sure.
Certainly there have been PCs that were bricked doing bios updates.
But then some, as Oren just posted, apparently have more than
one bios. But then could a virus whack both of them? Who knows...
At the end of the day, you would think there would be one section
with the most basic intelligence in the flash chip so that part
can get the machine up again to reload a full bios. And that most
critical part would be in a part of the chip that can only be
programmed by applying a voltage to a pin that the computer
cannot do itself. Flash chips with that feature existed as long ago
as the
90s. But what each and every PC manufacturer does is
obviously up to them....

On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 12:08:17 -0600, "Pete C."
wrote:


wrote:

On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 10:53:18 -0500, "Stormin Mormon"
wrote:

A couple weeks ago, I got some trojan from Hell. It wiped out my hard drive.
I didn't know what was happening, and had an external drive plugged in. That
stopped working, so I tried my other external drive.

I took the three drives to a friend (graduate of a computer college), who
could not recover anything. Mailed the drives to another friend who found
all three to be dead. Friend two even used the forensic programs that the
cops use.

Something got me. And, it did some kind of damage that two techies could not
recover.

Usually these things just blow up the partition table. That makes the
drive pretty much unusable until you restore it.
To actually wipe the data will take some time, up to hours depending
on the size.

I am not sure what you mean by "forensic programs that the
cops use" but if these are real cops they actually look at the data
blocks and they will be there unless they got overwritten (that
"hours" thing I was talking about)

For all practical purposes wiping out the partition table and the
indexes will make a drive toast and that happens pretty fast. You can
see the raw data but it won't be that usable if it can't be put in
context.

Usually you can inspect a drive on an expendable machine.

If you really want to look at a drive you think is that infected, use
a bootable CD tool. Then it can't spread.
Back in the FAT days, Norton would usually fix most of these problems
without losing the data. I am not sure what works on NTFS drives.

These days I just depend on good backups and I don't hesitate to wipe
the infected drive and starting over when someone brings me a "virus"
machine. Start with a "write all 1s" program (AKA low level format,
even if not true)
Then partition it and format it.
.

I'm thinking that "smart" malware would update the drive firmware
rendering it inoperable until that firmware was replaced. Depending on
how the drive is built, reloading the firmware may be no easy task.

From 2005

http://blogs.computerworld.com/node/1099

On Feb 14, 2:31*pm, wrote:
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 08:22:59 -0800 (PST), wrote:
On Wednesday, February 13, 2013 11:12:32 PM UTC-5, wrote:
Unfortunately we just trade the old dependence on foreign oil we had
for a dependence on foreign solar collectors right at the time when we
have a fossil energy surplus here. Coincidence? Maybe but I smell rich
people manipulating a market.

Surplus. Uh-huh.

If there's such a surplus then why are prices going up-up-up?

Natural gas prices at the wholesale levels are going down. If your
supplier is raising the price that is another problem.

We're supposed to be on the "cheaper" winter blend right now and prices are creeping back to $4 a gallon.

That is gasoline, electric plants don't use gasoline.

Frankly I'd rather pay the Chinese for solar panels than the greedy old white men manipulating the gas prices.

So you prefer greedy old chinese people and their US partners *... OK

Not to mention all the govt borrowed and printed money that
went down rat holes like Solyndra. How much nat gas could
you buy with $500mil?

On Feb 14, 2:49*pm, wrote:
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 10:24:05 -0800, Oren wrote:
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 12:08:17 -0600, "Pete C."
wrote:

wrote:

On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 10:53:18 -0500, "Stormin Mormon"
wrote:

A couple weeks ago, I got some trojan from Hell. It wiped out my hard drive.
I didn't know what was happening, and had an external drive plugged in. That
stopped working, so I tried my other external drive.

I took the three drives to a friend (graduate of a computer college), who
could not recover anything. Mailed the drives to another friend who found
all three to be dead. Friend two even used the forensic programs that the
cops use.

Something got me. And, it did some kind of damage that two techies could not
recover.

Usually these things just blow up the partition table. That makes the
drive pretty much unusable until you restore it.
To actually wipe the data will take some time, up to hours depending
on the size.

I am not sure what you mean by "forensic programs that the
cops use" but if these are real cops they actually look at the data
blocks and they will be there unless they got overwritten (that
"hours" thing I was talking about)

For all practical purposes wiping out the partition table and the
indexes will make a drive toast and that happens pretty fast. You can
see the raw data but it won't be that usable if it can't be put in
context.

Usually you can inspect a drive on an expendable machine.

If you really want to look at a drive you think is that infected, use
a bootable CD tool. Then it can't spread.
Back in the FAT days, Norton would usually fix most of these problems
without losing the data. I am not sure what works on NTFS drives.

These days I just depend on good backups and I don't hesitate to wipe
the infected drive and starting over when someone brings me a "virus"
machine. Start with a "write all 1s" program (AKA low level format,
even if not true)
Then partition it and format it.
.

I'm thinking that "smart" malware would update the drive firmware
rendering it inoperable until that firmware was replaced. Depending on
how the drive is built, reloading the firmware may be no easy task.

From 2005

http://blogs.computerworld.com/node/1099

That pretty much says it might theoretically *be possible, not that
anyone has actually done it.
You can still reload the firmware if it did get clobbered.

Maybe. That would depend on what was left of the
drive firmware. If there are no smarts at all, seems unlikely that
your going to reload it's firmware through just the standard
interface used by the PC.




I would suspect that you just had another bad Caviar drive to add to
my magnet collection if I saw it and it failed the data lifeguard
tests. The answer would be in the error code.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Per Stormin Mormon:
Something got me. And, it did some kind of damage that two techies could not
recover.

What kind of anti-virus were you using?

On my daughter's machine, Avast threw a warning once but my macho
son-in-law just *had* to click the button that said "Ignore this
warning" and the system got hosed beyond recovery.

It wasn't a Trojan, but a bad USB controller that moved me to a backup
scheme where at least a couple of my backup drives are not readily
available - i.e. I have to drive to get to them.

That way, when things go really South, and it hasn't dawned on me yet
that something is hosing my backups as I attach them in an effort to
recover... the non-availability will hopefully save me from myself.

I also have a rule - which I will hopefully have the presence of mind to
follow - that once I am down to a single backup, I will never, *ever*
attach it to the problem PC. Instead, I will make copies on another PC
and use the copies.
--
Pete Cresswell

IIRC, it was AVG paid version.

Christopher A. Young
Learn more about Jesus
www.lds.org
..

"(PeteCresswell)" wrote in message
...
Per Stormin Mormon:
Something got me. And, it did some kind of damage that two techies could
not
recover.

What kind of anti-virus were you using?

Pete Cresswell

On Feb 14, 4:16*pm, wrote:
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 12:03:01 -0800 (PST), "

wrote:
You can still reload the firmware if it did get clobbered.

Maybe. *That would depend on what was left of the
drive firmware. * If there are no smarts at all, seems unlikely that
your going to reload it's firmware through just the standard
interface used by the PC.

Why not?

Because the drive has to have enough of the correct
fimware so that it can recognize the necessary commands,
receive the new firmware, and program it into the drive's
flash. If you wipe out all the firmware on the drive,
it's just a brick.

wrote:

On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 12:03:01 -0800 (PST), "
wrote:

You can still reload the firmware if it did get clobbered.

Maybe. That would depend on what was left of the
drive firmware. If there are no smarts at all, seems unlikely that
your going to reload it's firmware through just the standard
interface used by the PC.


Why not?

I suspect most of the drive firmware is initially loaded via an ICP type
hardware port with a specialty programmer, while firmware updates rely
on the existing firmware being functional to enable the PC side
interface to be used to load a new image. If I'm correct, reloading
firmware on a damaged drive would require the proper programmer hardware
module and software to run it.

"(PeteCresswell)" wrote:

Per Stormin Mormon:
Something got me. And, it did some kind of damage that two techies could not
recover.

What kind of anti-virus were you using?

On my daughter's machine, Avast threw a warning once but my macho
son-in-law just *had* to click the button that said "Ignore this
warning" and the system got hosed beyond recovery.

It wasn't a Trojan, but a bad USB controller that moved me to a backup
scheme where at least a couple of my backup drives are not readily
available - i.e. I have to drive to get to them.

That way, when things go really South, and it hasn't dawned on me yet
that something is hosing my backups as I attach them in an effort to
recover... the non-availability will hopefully save me from myself.

I also have a rule - which I will hopefully have the presence of mind to
follow - that once I am down to a single backup, I will never, *ever*
attach it to the problem PC. Instead, I will make copies on another PC
and use the copies.
--
Pete Cresswell

Home data security plan:

1. Primary online data storage - NAS server box with fully mirrored
disks

2. Onsite offline backup - Encrypted USB3 portable disk in fire safe

3. Offsite offline backup - Encrypted USB3 portable disk in safe deposit
box at bank

Put PC backups to NAS automatically at least weekly. Portable disks to
match NAS disk size, do full copy backups monthly, updating the onsite
disk, swap with the offsite disk, update that disk and place back in
fire safe.

Total cost $500 or so, and pretty solid data protection without too much
fuss.

Per :
In that regard it is best to keep your C: drive as small as possible
and keep your data files on another drive. Data is simple to back up
and restore. The C: drive is harder to restore because of the way
Windoze installs software. You really need a cloned drive.

I use drive imaging utilities.

Started out with one of the many DOS utilities, moved to something
called "ShadowProtect" for reasons that probably are not of interest
here.

But, for me, losing the "System" drive isn't all that big a deal -
because I keep my data on a separate drive/partition. It's the data
backups that I am so obsessive about. I can rebuild a system.....
--
Pete Cresswell

On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 16:23:30 -0500, wrote:

On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 15:45:04 -0500, "(PeteCresswell)"
wrote:

Per Stormin Mormon:
Something got me. And, it did some kind of damage that two techies could not
recover.

What kind of anti-virus were you using?

On my daughter's machine, Avast threw a warning once but my macho
son-in-law just *had* to click the button that said "Ignore this
warning" and the system got hosed beyond recovery.

It wasn't a Trojan, but a bad USB controller that moved me to a backup
scheme where at least a couple of my backup drives are not readily
available - i.e. I have to drive to get to them.

That way, when things go really South, and it hasn't dawned on me yet
that something is hosing my backups as I attach them in an effort to
recover... the non-availability will hopefully save me from myself.

I also have a rule - which I will hopefully have the presence of mind to
follow - that once I am down to a single backup, I will never, *ever*
attach it to the problem PC. Instead, I will make copies on another PC
and use the copies.


The easy way to do this is download Disk Wizard from Seagate/Maxtor
and clone your C: drive. Store it somewhere and when you get some
strange crash you have a good starting point. You can just store a
disk image, you don't need a spare drive but that does make an easier
fix. Refresh this clone periodically.

In that regard it is best to keep your C: drive as small as possible
and keep your data files on another drive. Data is simple to back up
and restore. The C: drive is harder to restore because of the way
Windoze installs software. You really need a cloned drive.
This allows you to restore to a new drive quickly - but if the
microcode on a drive goes bad, it is going to be pretty difficult to
get the clone back onto the dead drive. There are likely programs
available similar to the old "low level format" used on MFM and RLL
drives - but they will be VERY specific - kinda like the low level
format was specific to both drive and controller back in the early
days.

On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 16:47:14 -0500, "Stormin Mormon"
wrote:

IIRC, it was AVG paid version.

Christopher A. Young
Learn more about Jesus
www.lds.org
.

"(PeteCresswell)" wrote in message
.. .
Per Stormin Mormon:
Something got me. And, it did some kind of damage that two techies could
not
recover.

What kind of anti-virus were you using?

Pete Cresswell

Quite possible the drive just calved by itself without external
input??

On Feb 14, 3:28*pm, wrote:
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 00:20:06 -0800 (PST), harry

wrote:
I agree that the MBTF is out beyond a few years but we don't know how
well they hold up to lightning. That may not be important everywhere
but we have an ass kicking thunder storm just about every day here in
the summer. (Florida). Then there is that 150 MPH hurricane thing.
I wonder how well a collector holds up to a coconut hitting it at
100mph or so? I know my pool collector didn't hold up too good and it
is just a low tech plastic deal.

Some of us are condemned to life in nasty undesireable places;-)

How is the weather there? By the number of Limeys here, it must not be
that good.

Only the drunks.

On Feb 14, 7:31*pm, wrote:
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 08:22:59 -0800 (PST), wrote:
On Wednesday, February 13, 2013 11:12:32 PM UTC-5, wrote:
Unfortunately we just trade the old dependence on foreign oil we had
for a dependence on foreign solar collectors right at the time when we
have a fossil energy surplus here. Coincidence? Maybe but I smell rich
people manipulating a market.

Surplus. Uh-huh.

If there's such a surplus then why are prices going up-up-up?

Natural gas prices at the wholesale levels are going down. If your
supplier is raising the price that is another problem.

We're supposed to be on the "cheaper" winter blend right now and prices are creeping back to $4 a gallon.

That is gasoline, electric plants don't use gasoline.

Frankly I'd rather pay the Chinese for solar panels than the greedy old white men manipulating the gas prices.

So you prefer greedy old chinese people and their US partners *... OK

The prices of all fuels are linked. If the price of one rises, the
others will follow.

On Feb 14, 7:59*pm, "
wrote:
On Feb 14, 2:31*pm, wrote:









On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 08:22:59 -0800 (PST), wrote:
On Wednesday, February 13, 2013 11:12:32 PM UTC-5, wrote:
Unfortunately we just trade the old dependence on foreign oil we had
for a dependence on foreign solar collectors right at the time when we
have a fossil energy surplus here. Coincidence? Maybe but I smell rich
people manipulating a market.

Surplus. Uh-huh.

If there's such a surplus then why are prices going up-up-up?

Natural gas prices at the wholesale levels are going down. If your
supplier is raising the price that is another problem.

We're supposed to be on the "cheaper" winter blend right now and prices are creeping back to $4 a gallon.

That is gasoline, electric plants don't use gasoline.

Frankly I'd rather pay the Chinese for solar panels than the greedy old white men manipulating the gas prices.

So you prefer greedy old chinese people and their US partners *... OK

Not to mention all the govt borrowed and printed money that
went down rat holes like Solyndra. *How much nat gas could
you buy with $500mil?

A fixed amount. There is no limit on sunshine.

Not likely, as I lost three drives on the same day.

Christopher A. Young
Learn more about Jesus
www.lds.org
..

wrote in message
...
Something got me. And, it did some kind
of damage that two techies could
not
recover.

Quite possible the drive just calved by itself without external
input??

"harry" wrote in message
...
On Feb 14, 7:59 pm, "
wrote:
On Feb 14, 2:31 pm, wrote:









On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 08:22:59 -0800 (PST), wrote:
On Wednesday, February 13, 2013 11:12:32 PM UTC-5,
wrote:
Unfortunately we just trade the old dependence on foreign oil we had
for a dependence on foreign solar collectors right at the time when
we
have a fossil energy surplus here. Coincidence? Maybe but I smell
rich
people manipulating a market.

Surplus. Uh-huh.

If there's such a surplus then why are prices going up-up-up?

Natural gas prices at the wholesale levels are going down. If your
supplier is raising the price that is another problem.

We're supposed to be on the "cheaper" winter blend right now and prices
are creeping back to $4 a gallon.

That is gasoline, electric plants don't use gasoline.

Frankly I'd rather pay the Chinese for solar panels than the greedy old
white men manipulating the gas prices.

So you prefer greedy old chinese people and their US partners ... OK

Not to mention all the govt borrowed and printed money that
went down rat holes like Solyndra. How much nat gas could
you buy with $500mil?
#
# A fixed amount. There is no limit on sunshine.
#

Only true if you ignore the limits on the output of the sun and the amount
of surface area available to capture it,

Per :
Data is a whole lot easier. You just copy it over and
you are done.

If you have it.... that was the point about having multiple copies and
keeping some of them where I cannot get to them in the heat of the
moment.
--
Pete Cresswell

On Feb 15, 6:25*am, "Attila Iskander"
wrote:
"harry" wrote in message

...
On Feb 14, 7:59 pm, "
wrote:



On Feb 14, 2:31 pm, wrote:

On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 08:22:59 -0800 (PST), wrote:
On Wednesday, February 13, 2013 11:12:32 PM UTC-5,
wrote:
Unfortunately we just trade the old dependence on foreign oil we had
for a dependence on foreign solar collectors right at the time when
we
have a fossil energy surplus here. Coincidence? Maybe but I smell
rich
people manipulating a market.

Surplus. Uh-huh.

If there's such a surplus then why are prices going up-up-up?

Natural gas prices at the wholesale levels are going down. If your
supplier is raising the price that is another problem.

We're supposed to be on the "cheaper" winter blend right now and prices
are creeping back to $4 a gallon.

That is gasoline, electric plants don't use gasoline.

Frankly I'd rather pay the Chinese for solar panels than the greedy old
white men manipulating the gas prices.

So you prefer greedy old chinese people and their US partners ... OK

Not to mention all the govt borrowed and printed money that
went down rat holes like Solyndra. How much nat gas could
you buy with $500mil?

#
# A fixed amount. There is no limit on sunshine.
#

Only true if you ignore the limits on the output of the sun and the amount
of surface area available to capture it,- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Or the cost and life of whatever it is that turns the sun into useful
energy.
harry doesn't understand that part of the equation.

Per Pete C.:

3. Offsite offline backup - Encrypted USB3 portable disk in safe deposit
box at bank

I like it.


Instead of the fire safe, I stash one copy in the garden shed and
another in my car.

Gotta wonder how many people lost all copies of their backup to Sandy.
--
Pete Cresswell

On Feb 14, 10:57*pm, wrote:
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 16:23:30 -0500, wrote:
On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 15:45:04 -0500, "(PeteCresswell)"
wrote:

Per Stormin Mormon:
Something got me. And, it did some kind of damage that two techies could not
recover.

What kind of anti-virus were you using?

On my daughter's machine, Avast threw a warning once but my macho
son-in-law just *had* to click the button that said "Ignore this
warning" and the system got hosed beyond recovery.

It wasn't a Trojan, but a bad USB controller that moved me to a backup
scheme where at least a couple of my backup drives are not readily
available - i.e. I have to drive to get to them.

That way, when things go really South, and it hasn't dawned on me yet
that something is hosing my backups as I attach them in an effort to
recover... the non-availability will hopefully save me from myself.

I also have a rule - which I will hopefully have the presence of mind to
follow - that once I am down to a single backup, I will never, *ever*
attach it to the problem PC. * Instead, I will make copies on another PC
and use the copies.

The easy way to do this is download Disk Wizard from Seagate/Maxtor
and clone your C: drive. Store it somewhere and when you get some
strange crash you have a good starting point. You can just store a
disk image, you don't need a spare drive but that does make an easier
fix. Refresh this clone periodically.

In that regard it is best to keep your C: drive as small as possible
and keep your data files on another drive. Data is simple to back up
and restore. The C: drive is harder to restore because of the way
Windoze installs software. You really need a cloned drive.

*This allows you to restore to a new drive quickly - but if the
microcode on a drive goes bad, it is going to be pretty difficult to
get the clone back onto the dead drive. *There are likely programs
available similar to the old "low level format" used on MFM and RLL
drives - but they will be VERY specific - kinda like the low level
format was specific to both drive and controller back in the early
days.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

I wouldn't bet on that. How do you talk to something when there
is no one home? The drive has to have enough valid firmware to
enable it to recognize commands. If you screw with that, I don't
ee how you're going to get new code into it with the drive in a
normal PC. I would think it
would then require connecting to the drive with a special programming
adapter of some kind to put the code into it, if that is even
possible.

You would think that the drives would be built so that the firmware
could not be changed. But apparently according to that previous
post citing a drive manufacturer, it is theoretically possible to
screw with the firmware. Now that he's told the world it's possible,
it's probably raised the level of interest for hackers.....

On Feb 15, 3:03*pm, "
wrote:
On Feb 15, 6:25*am, "Attila Iskander"
wrote:









"harry" wrote in message

....
On Feb 14, 7:59 pm, "
wrote:

On Feb 14, 2:31 pm, wrote:

On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 08:22:59 -0800 (PST), wrote:
On Wednesday, February 13, 2013 11:12:32 PM UTC-5,
wrote:
Unfortunately we just trade the old dependence on foreign oil we had
for a dependence on foreign solar collectors right at the time when
we
have a fossil energy surplus here. Coincidence? Maybe but I smell
rich
people manipulating a market.

Surplus. Uh-huh.

If there's such a surplus then why are prices going up-up-up?

Natural gas prices at the wholesale levels are going down. If your
supplier is raising the price that is another problem.

We're supposed to be on the "cheaper" winter blend right now and prices
are creeping back to $4 a gallon.

That is gasoline, electric plants don't use gasoline.

Frankly I'd rather pay the Chinese for solar panels than the greedy old
white men manipulating the gas prices.

So you prefer greedy old chinese people and their US partners ... OK

Not to mention all the govt borrowed and printed money that
went down rat holes like Solyndra. How much nat gas could
you buy with $500mil?

#
# A fixed amount. There is no limit on sunshine.
#

Only true if you ignore the limits on the output of the sun and the amount
of surface area available to capture it,- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Or the cost and life of whatever it is that turns the sun into useful
energy.
harry doesn't understand that part of the equation.

And you don't understand that fossil fuels are a finite resource.

On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 23:15:58 -0500, wrote:

Has anyone actually seen a drive with a virus clobbered firmware?
I think if I see a corrupted drive I am thinking deer, not unicorn.

All my past drive failures have been mechanical. I have had a virus
hit the Master Boot Record (MBR).

"...Crucially, the code in the MBR is run as your computer starts up
(before Windows) which makes it a great place for a virus or rootkit
to hide.

Even if you reinstall Windows or format your hard drive, a virus
infecting the MBR will not be deleted. So, after you reinstall
Windows, your computer first runs that same MBR virus code which then
reinfects your new installation of Windows with viruses – and you’re
back to square one…"

http://techlogon.com/2012/01/15/how-to-check-for-and-fix-mbr-virus-infection/

Fix the MBR.

"harry" wrote in message
...
On Feb 15, 3:03 pm, "
wrote:
On Feb 15, 6:25 am, "Attila Iskander"
wrote:









"harry" wrote in message

...
On Feb 14, 7:59 pm, "
wrote:

On Feb 14, 2:31 pm, wrote:

On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 08:22:59 -0800 (PST),
wrote:
On Wednesday, February 13, 2013 11:12:32 PM UTC-5,
wrote:
Unfortunately we just trade the old dependence on foreign oil we
had
for a dependence on foreign solar collectors right at the time
when
we
have a fossil energy surplus here. Coincidence? Maybe but I smell
rich
people manipulating a market.

Surplus. Uh-huh.

If there's such a surplus then why are prices going up-up-up?

Natural gas prices at the wholesale levels are going down. If your
supplier is raising the price that is another problem.

We're supposed to be on the "cheaper" winter blend right now and
prices
are creeping back to $4 a gallon.

That is gasoline, electric plants don't use gasoline.

Frankly I'd rather pay the Chinese for solar panels than the greedy
old
white men manipulating the gas prices.

So you prefer greedy old chinese people and their US partners ... OK

Not to mention all the govt borrowed and printed money that
went down rat holes like Solyndra. How much nat gas could
you buy with $500mil?

#
# A fixed amount. There is no limit on sunshine.
#

Only true if you ignore the limits on the output of the sun and the
amount
of surface area available to capture it,- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Or the cost and life of whatever it is that turns the sun into useful
energy.
harry doesn't understand that part of the equation.
#
# And you don't understand that fossil fuels are a finite resource.
#

Are they ?
On what do you base this claim ??