Saturday, January 05, 2008

Episode 65: Support the Techies & Viewer Question Marathon


In this episode, D.Lee Beard announces the independence of Ask the Techies as a private company.

D.Lee also goes on a viewer question marathon answering questions on: creating a web site including domain registration and hosting; how to format a hard drive for Mac System 8; suggestions for video telephoning; is Windows Vista bad; is Mac OS X more secure; viewing magazines online; and he shares viewer comments on previous episodes including leopard and a solution for a wireless USB hub for Mac. This is a long episode, but there were just too many good questions this week. (50min 36sec)

Episode 65: Support the Techies & Viewer Question Marathon

9 comments:

Unknown said...

Hi Techies,

I've seen the show . In that episode you were answering viewer questions and you told one viewer, who asked for a anti-virus-software recommendation, that there are no viruses for Mac. But then I'm asking myself: why is there anti-virus software for the Mac too, if it is not needed?

Thank you for your answers

Greetings Michael

D.Lee Beard said...

Michael:

Why is their anti-virus software for the Macs? Because obviously people will buy it. Make people afraid of something, even if they are not at risk, and they buy into something to make themselves feel safer.

To give the security software for Mac it's due, it does protect against known trojan horses and other security threats that Apple has not updated the code for yet.

-D.Lee

Unknown said...

Hello D.Lee,

OK that's a good point. I didn't think about peoples' fear. You're right with that.

But if I understand you right, you wouldn't say that you need anti-virus software on a Mac. It's only nice to have.

Michael

D.Lee Beard said...

Michael:

Let me put it this way. My mother, over 60 and not very tech savvy, uses a Mac and she never had anti-virus software and never got a virus. I advised her not to use anti-virus software (but she is fairly scam savvy.

Anti-virus software for the Mac, in my personal opinion, is probably going to just slow down your Mac trying to scan everything you download or attach to your computer.

While there are no viruses for the Mac, there are trojan horse applications. The person who easily would fall for a scam should probably have some sort of anti-virus/security software installed as it might protect them from malicious software that they might accidentally install by not reading the Mac OS X warning dialog boxes. Security software might just prevent someone from creating problems for themselves.

But, most of us, if we just execute a little common sense and not trust everything we find on the internet, would be safe without it on Mac OS X.

Unknown said...

Hello D.Lee,

I also think that if you surf the net with a reasonable portion of carefulness, you won't get problems :-)
I have to mention, that I'm only a Mac fan and not an active user so far. So I can't actually say, how the Mac experience really is. I only know it from Macs that my colleagues own or from Podcasts like yours. But I'm saving some money and maybe will be able to afford a Mac sooner or later. Hopefully :-)

Michael

CAZZIE said...
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CAZZIE said...
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CAZZIE said...

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CAZZIE said...
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